For the better part of ten years this is the exact question that I would ask myself every morning in the shower. I would stand there with the water washing over me and wonder if I drank too much. In hindsight, now that I don't drink any more, I realize that if I was asking myself the question, "Do I drink too much" everyday, I quite obviously drank too much. But this begs the question, how much is too much?



The answer to this question would probably vary for each individual, but I know the bottom line was that I came to the conclusion that I drank too much. My average had to be a twelve pack of beer a day. Not a twelve pack every single day, some days on the four or five. But then I would have a "good run" a couple of times a week where I would polish off an 18-pack, or even give a case of beer a run for it's money. So my average had to be around 12 beers a day.

Then one day something happened…….my daughter incarnated into this world and all of the sudden drinking simply didn't make as much sense to me. I simply couldn't see myself being a bad example to her. How could I tell her not to drink, when I myself drank? I couldn't reconcile this, so I stopped. That's right, I walked away from drinking. Now I don't drink. Not even a beer with dinner, because what would be the point of that? Because of the taste? That's what I told myself for years, that I drank beer because I liked the taste. It's a funny thing though, when you walk away from something after being so deeply entrenched for so long, you come to some realizations.

For me, one of those realizations was that I didn't drink beer for the taste. I drank beer because of the way it made me "feel". I refused to admit this when I drank, but after stepping away, I realized that it was true. Why do we as humans spend so much time trying to avoid the truth? Because that's exactly what I did for a little over fifteen years, I avoided that which was true through drinking. I think Marcus Aurelius said it quite poignantly when he said," Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth." My perspectives had all become clouded.

So did I go to meetings to come to these realizations? Or did I find religion? No, none of those things. The only thing I can point to is my daughter incarnating into this world to, in my new found perspective, save me. I have a very strong knowing that my daughter was literally sent here to save me. Or was it that she was summoned from somewhere deep within myself?