Two Years of Sobriety Taught Me These Essential Lessons About Life

George Kalantzis
7 min readJul 7, 2021

At the height of my sobriety is my ability to express my truth authentically

Photo by Andrew Coop on Unsplash

Another empty bottle, a night I regret.
The smell of vodka pours from my sweat.
Trapped between the past and future, I
am walking on thin ice. One wrong
step, my life, the price. — GK

After a heavy night of drinking, these words above poured out on the empty pages of my journal. The cold fingers of addiction suffocated my truth and held me down for almost twenty years. Most of the time, I never thought twice about it because I was good at disguising my suffering. Looking back, I know this is far from the truth.

My relationship with alcohol was like a stubborn ex-partner you keep going back to when you know they will treat you like shit. It wasn’t how often I drank but why and when that led to the destruction of my life.

Today, I am two years sober.

Since choosing to have my last drink, I’ve cried more times than I can remember. I came face to face with this fiery demon who called me to get lost in a sea of false beliefs and worries any chance he got. I thought about running…a lot. I thought about losing myself in a bottle. But I didn’t.

There are plenty of people who will read this story and find parts they do not like and deny…

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George Kalantzis

George is a professional storyteller, a dad to a sassy and adventurous eight year-old girl, and the author Of Nowhere To Go