The Clear Horizon

From oblivion of alcoholism into the light of sobriety

life

  • Am I Re-Nerd-Ing? – Why Reading, Gaming and Podcasts become relevant

    When have I returned to reading, listening to podcasts and gaming? It wasn’t in the same moment I stopped drinking. It started when I realized that replacing my drinking habits with hanging out on social media too much. I realized that falling for filter bubbles and fake news aggravated passive aggressiveness and depression. How did Read more

  • Alcohol or activity – What defines your Masculintiy?

    James Clear writes that you should build habits to define your identity to keep up the habitual routine. The argument goes: If you identify with your habits, the habits become you or at least help shaping your identity. If working is a big part of your identity (which is normal if you are belonging to Read more

  • Why I hate the winter time – and how to deal with it

    Sometimes it just strikes you down from behind like a thug with a log. From one day to the next, all the decisions you made, all the new habits accumulated, all the good things that have happened to me seem like dust in the wind. Then something like a depression pushes you down, aggravated by Read more

  • Proactive vs reactive. How a prefix determines your fate

    An interesting aspect of addiction and depression or anxiety disorders has (at least from my point of view) a lot to do with your own initiative. What do I mean with that? In various blogposts, coaching contributions and podcasts, as well as as in my own work and my own addiction, there is one common Read more

  • Midlife Crisis or Catharsis?

    Do I sound melodramatic? Maybe. But that is how most of the time you’ll feel when in a remorseful state you can’t escape if you want to quit drinking but can’t muster the strength to escape the loop of triggers, cravings, giving in to cravings and then swearing to never drink again just to find Read more

  • Rethinking

    At first, I didn’t even want to become completely sober. I just wanted to drink commonsensical, meaning I wanted to drink like anybody else. Thing is, I found out that on occasions of commonsensical drinking, it was an illusion all along. I drank way too much on these occasions, so all set boundaries ended up Read more

  • And then it all went over the top

    After a couple of years, I felt it was time to get rid of the feeling of having no proper qualification (in teacher education, you were only deemed as “qualified” once you had both degrees of teacher education, at least if you want to work in a public school, and I wanted to get out Read more

  • No Drugs – But why has all the Fun gone?

    After nearly choking off my life motivation and sinking headlong into a deep depression, I finally made it to get rid of smoking cigarettes and abolishing dope, I mustered the strength to get my life as straight as possible: I declined a possible apprenticeship as a programmer and inscribed as a student again. I moved. Read more

  • Procrastinating through college – or: Who needs a Future anyways?

    After I finished my Abitur (Giving you the permission to study at a university) I did my substitute service instead of military service (which, no doubt, included as much drinking as having been a soldier would have). This is a fuzzy era, I only know that I hated this time and took every opportunity to Read more