Lisa Kelly

Transcript

15 years ago i sat across from a friend in a starbucks nursing yet another brutal hangover i had questions about her new life after quitting drinking so are you happy now are you still having any fun how did you quit she filled me in for a bit and then right there in the middle of the cafe she hauls out the big book of alcoholics anonymous and passes it to me oh my god i am freaking out mortified i want to crawl under the table right then and there i don't even really think i'm all that bad i mean yes i like to drink but i

haven't lost everything um i still have my child a a i didn't know much about it but i knew i was not going there our coffee ends and as she hugs me goodbye she tells me to hang on to the book how did i end up here working professional single mom of a two-year-old all as well or so i believed yet just a few days earlier something new had taken place after i'd put my son to bed i wanted to pour myself a glass of red wine as i often did but right as i was heading to the kitchen i was confronted by a voice

it said to me lisa how do you see yourself continuing to drink the way you like as your son grows up i thought about my younger self i hated watching my mom drink growing up how many times had i begged her to quit i thought about my son how many times had i rushed through his bath time in bed just so i could get to my bottle more quickly this intrusive voice had woken me up and disrupted my denial of my addiction i don't know where i crossed the line but i was tired of the pain tired of the secrecy tired of perpetuating my cycle

of shame about a week later i asked my friend to take me to my first aaa meeting i walked in filled with terror but something happened there and i left with a tiny shot of hope so i went again later that week and i kept going eventually i realized that giving up was no longer an option that inner whisper knows listening allowed for a new script rewrite of my life story at first i was paralyzed with fear thinking that if i quit drinking my world would get smaller but instead it expanded exponentially that voice was the catalyst to the very best plot twist we can't

let our ego and fear keep us from hearing our inner truth denying our greatness doing so blocks our infinite potential about six months into my sobriety i took some of the money that i used to spend on wine and i opened an resp for my son a humble amount has been getting deducted every month from my bank account for the last 15 years this month the last payment came out my son goes to university in the fall i was amazed to discover that i have accumulated in that modest pot of savings enough to cover his four years in residence had i continued to muffle that

voice i wouldn't be here sharing this story and who knows what sort of person my 17 year old would be today was any of this easy no not even close but when we pay attention to those little voices and take what seems like impossible steps we manifest rewards beyond anything we could ever imagine you

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.