112 Comments
Oct 19, 2023·edited Oct 19, 2023Pinned

Thank you. But I have to agree with someone else who wrote a comment. Aren't we supposed to want to give ourselves a chance of less internal chaos in our live's, by working on living our lives without alcohol and that involves moving on from the 'falling apart' stuff', surely ? ..I'm so vulnerable right now that I was a bit confused by the message. But I do understand that I need to embrace the strange. I still like myself ...I'm muddling through. And I'm guilty of letting people know that I'm work in progress' ...fk that..I'm just a human being

Lucie.xxx

I think this stuff is for people who are out the other side of addiction maybe, and onto other things. In 'Quit Like a Woman'...you fell to your knees and prayed for help because things fell apart 'big time' and you then moved slowly through your healing recovery.

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Flo <3 Yes, you are totally right that this isn't going to be the exact message someone in early recovery needs and feels like it's perhaps directed at someone at a different phase of recovery. (I wrote something about that in a comment above, maybe the one you're talking about, and said without wanting to be better I wouldn't have gotten sober).

Helpful to think of it in terms of stages of development and what we need at each stage of development; QLAW was written closer to early recovery and stands as a reflection of that experience, all this stuff here is written from the same person but 6-8 years later so what might have been a perfect framework for someone getting sober or in early sobriety, is not always going to be the same for someone who's a decade along. I don't think that's true for everything I write about, but my relatiionship to self-help and self-improvement has definitely changed over a decade. Thank you so much for this comment.

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Oct 19, 2023·edited Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Thank you SO MUCH for your lovely, comprehensive reply; it means so much. Thanks for taking the time to reply, I really, really appreciated. I love what you do. And this article is incredible: Hello, my name is Holly, and I'm not an alcoholic, it is so brilliant. It should be made compulsive reading for everyone, so many people are still buying the lie. Thank you.

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Thank you Flo

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I love this and really needed to hear it today. My kitchen cabinet doors are partially painted in the front driveway and I may not actually do the ab workout today or ever fully process the traumatic experience of my daughters birth that happened 8 years ago. And its fucking fine. Thanks for sharing Holly.

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Amen.

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Yes!! Live your life, do what you feel like doing each day, forget the schedule and the rules. Please yourself for a change. People in the US are so goal oriented and work oriented-there are so many more valuable things in the world. I think very few haven't had trauma, we survived it, that's good enough. God didn't mean for us to live like this. Work for the almighty dollar to buy more and better stuff and pay payments and pay 2 or 3 credit cards, the more you make the more you spend. Think that's why I love the concept of tiny homes. Every kid doesn't have to have their own bedroom, things were better when they didn't! Sorry, as my husband would say-get out your soapbox. I did ramble a little. :)

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Every time you post a newsletter I wind up buying a new book 😊

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

True story

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LOL. I'm sorry and/or you're welcome

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Books are my favorite way to interact with people 😊

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This made me think about the concept of self-actualisation as introduced by Goldstein, made into a pyramid by Maslow, and a foundation of Rogers approach to psychotherapy.

Mostly people seem to focus on the the implicit need to constantly move forwards, ie to self-actualise, whereas I try to think about it as a race that will never be run because there is always further to go, so why knock yourself out trying?

I’m off to have a long bath and then stroke the dog.

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As in, foundational concepts in psych are to constantly develop in a pyramid or linear fashion?

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Yes, and as in Maslow's "Hierarchy Of Needs" where he says that we are motivated by the desire to fulfil our needs from the basic (food, water, shelter), through the emotional to the eventual goal (at the top of the pyramid) of self-actualisation, and that this desire to be the best version of ourselves is what keeps us striving, except that, as you so eloquently illustrate, it often feels like a fucking chore to keep moving forward and it would be nice if we could just "be" for a while without feeling as if we are somehow failing.

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

My friend and I wonder if we are in purgatory?

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I mean it would definitely explain a lot

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Oct 18, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Everyone I talk to is lonely. (Granted the list of people I talk to is very short but still)

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Same. Well, almost everyone, and those who aren't alone (are in community) I think feel this core aloneness.

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Oct 18, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Ha

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So much for the wonderful friends on FB :(

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Also, the Discover weekly playlist often feels like a fuck up because the algorithm isn’t broadening my horizons by offering me Noah Gundersen simply because I liked him last week. I can already find the stuff I already like.

I long for the days I used to browse the record shops buying albums purely because I liked the look of the cover.

That was worthwhile self-actualisation.

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Me as well

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I’m late to the comments section here but was just able to fully read your post. I love how you can put words to hard to articulate, sometimes existential, feelings. That’s what keeps me subscribed. 💛

Have you ever heard of the Hindu goddess Akhilandeshvari? She is The Always Broken Goddess and being apart is how she derives her power. I think you, Holly, are her modern times conduit. 💫

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Also: My favorite part is how she rides a crocodile, which spins its prey around until its totally confused and disoriented, and symbolically rides the chaos.

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ME TOOOO! We need her teachings now more than ever. 🐊❤️‍🩹

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Emily I was JUST thinking about akhilanda this morning! Years ago me and a collaborator put on workshops called Never Not Broken and I hadn’t thought of her since. I was driving and I was like, ohh, this is never not broken. Thank you for your comment and being here

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Can we have a Always broken Goddess workshop? Not really asking, just sounds delightful!

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

I love this, and thank you for sharing the Akomolafe post too. When I was preparing (my mind) for pregnancy and childbirth, someone told me to trust that nature is *always* organizing in our favor. What they meant was that every setback is, in fact, a step forward. While it's extremely tempting to believe this, I found myself preparing more so by imagining being alone in total chaos. Something completely disorganized that stays that way, and I must sit with, and in, it. This is the Buddhist concept of the Bardo. A complete shit show that is only just that, but also something we must traverse. Nothing is guaranteed on the other side, except is influenced by how we sit with the chaos of now.

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oof. this hit.

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Loved this one, Holly. Thank you. Also, on being close, I like this take:

“Human beings do not find their essence through fulfillment or eventual arrival but by staying close to the way they like to travel, to the way they hold the conversation between the ground on which they stand and the horizon to which they go.”

~ David Whyte: https://www.kolhai.org/close_david_whyte

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Ohhh I do love this. I also have yet to read David Whyte but he keeps coming up.

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

I adore David Whyte - recommend his Sunday Sessions. He hosts calls 3 sundays in a row (I think the next one starts in Sept), reads poetry and philosophizes. It’s a nice spiritual service to start the week and hearing him give the context behind his poems makes them come alive.

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Alex ♥️

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Oct 18, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Love this line ..."To consciously become close is a courageous form of unilateral disarmament."

And. "we might be equal to the inevitable loss that the vulnerability of being close will bring."

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

I needed this tonight, muff. the only life worth living is the one that i have right now, and i’m thankful it’s a life with you in it.

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Aww muff. Same same same.

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Holly! Let me start with: I love you so much. I was so weirded out by AA, and your book Quit Like A Woman was life saving and affirming to me, but here I am still struggling with what I suppose is full blown addiction to alcohol. What you are sharing here is deep, obviously. And I’m motivated to respond before seeing your latter information about whatever else you posted below the main message because it is so urgent to me. I am left with a feeling of well, what then? Aren’t we *supposed to* strive for better, more aligned with the universe/ GOODNESS (ugh)? And to put a fine point on it: isn’t my tonight, that includes vodka worse than yesterday, when I abstained? This is the part of sobriety that’s the hardest for me: the feeling that when I fail (drink), I’m gutting my universal support. It’s 1:11: your ancestors and spirit guides are watching your failure to be able to navigate this shit show without substances, and what the fuck are you doing about it? Well, life didn’t stop, I say. I still am caught in hungry, lonely, angry, tired. I want to be numb. I want to be the party girl you expect me to be. I want to go back to being gifted/buying towels that say things like “it’s wine-o’clock!” and ask coworkers to get happy hour because it’s what we do: Us normal people who need community and laughter, and numbness. But I also want to bust through that shit like the Kool-aid man and be different. I first read Allen Carr in like 2001 (for cigarettes), and I was free of nicotine for 5 years before I questioned the decision. I’m over this specific struggle with substances so fucking much. If I’m honest it’s been going on since I was about 15 and I’m 47 now. Anyways, THANK YOU because per usual you challenge me in all the best ways, and if I figure it out, it’s surely thanks to your input. Love your face, honesty, and writing style. ❤️❤️❤️

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I love you so much and thank you for this severely honest note. One thing you said about "what then? Aren't we supposed to strive for better?" I don't know what then, I mean I have my own ideas (and I think that when you're in active addiction, it's helpful to use the self-improvement framework, because I think it's in close proximity to where someone is; like wanting to be better was my entire reason for recovery). Anyway, what came to mind was this quote: “Each of you is perfect the way you are ... and you can use a little improvement.”

― Shunryu Suzuki

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“I want to be the party girl you expect me to be”. This is such a powerful and resonant line. I’ve worked a lot with addiction and one of the most debilitating aspects that keeps people in the madness is feeling the need to be someone they are not or no longer want to be. Addiction makes you forget who you once were and therefore it’s harder to reconnect with her, so addiction then becomes a place of uncomfortable comfort, of safety. I hope you do break through like Kool-aid man and I also know that the desire to do so will be a big part of what makes it happen.

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I so love this piece, thank you for writing it. Lately I have been become hopeless in my ability to recover from my fatigue/apathy/burnout/menopause/awakening -- whatever-this-is. Many spiritual teachers talk about how we need to surrender everything, even death to let go of the constant need to improve, succeed, and even survive and allow "what is". I recently noticed after years of this and *thinking* that I have surrendered, that I am still in "fix-it" mode and assume I will get over this, and I will be better on the other side. But that isn't surrender....and I wonder if I am not feeling better because I am still assuming, trying, and pushing to get over this and get back to achieving. What if letting go of all functionality, achievement, fixing, and allow where I am right now - as useless and as hopeless as it feels - Is exactly where I need to be right now.

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I could have easily written this. It’s so close to home. Thanks for sharing.

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Andrea Gibson is a national treasure. Their poetry is breathtaking.

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TRUTH.

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Oct 19, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker

Yes! I only discovered Andrea in the past couple of years and they and Holly are the only newsletters I get!

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Was just thinking of you today 💫 always good to see your name pop up in the inbox. Bookmarked to read later. Much love ❤️

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Much love! We're (emily and I) are taking MBs training program...I think you did that too? Been thinking about you.

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Oh fantastic. I absolutely loved it and made great friends from class. Hope it's going well for you both!

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So far so good :)

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Is it ironic to say "more of this please?"

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ha no! Hi!!!

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