The chief effect of alcohol is to deaden you to everything you are going through, and indeed to impair your critical faculties. That is why alcohol seriously compromises your ability to enjoy genuine pleasures. Right then, right there, it all made sense. That was my "Eureka!" moment. I was free. No longer a slave to alcohol and my life revolving around it. At that moment I realized I no longer had to make up another excuse or text him the next day saying how I "fell asleep" when in reality would rather get in a drunken coma then hang out with my best friend and work on cars. So many times I had left car shows/events early or blew off working on a car because I wanted to get drunk. At that moment I knew I would never have to make that decision again and it felt incredible. The ‘magic’ of this book made the craving go away and 8weeks later I still don’t have it. And would you believe that making dinner and dealing with the kids has gotten EASIER without alcohol!! Being less enjoyable, especially when you’re out with your friends, you think you’ll have a hard time adjusting to life without alcohol without something that seemed to be part of you for so long. This unabridged audiobook is direct, easy-to-follow and engaging way of digesting the method, which will help you control your drinking habit for good without willpower of sacrifice.

You can continue to enjoy your trips to the pub, go out, deal with stress and boredom, and even feel more relaxed without suffering from unpleasant withdrawal symptoms or gaining weight without longing for alcohol or envying other drinkers. I've drunk to the detriment of my life for the last 20 years. I've often wanted to cut down and didn't understand how stopping altogether could be possible. This is the enigma of all drug addiction: because we know that we could enjoy social occasions and cope with stress before we got hooked, we sense that alcohol does nothing for us. But because we also know that we cannot enjoy certain occasions without it, we tend to close our minds to the fact. Familiarize yourself with all the options such as Allen Carr’s Easyway to stop drinking and local treatment centres.Cutting down doesn’t help, it just makes the booze seem more precious. The more you cut down, the hungrier you actually get and deprived you feel. After all, only 10% don’t fall into the trap, but once you understand how ingenious it is, you will wonder how anyone managed to avoid it. The fly was never in control! The moment it got a waft of the nectar, it was being controlled by the plant. That is the nature of the beast and it had no choice to follow the instincts. You were never in control! We defined an alcoholic as a drinker who has lost control, let’s adjust it to “A drinker who realizes that he is not in control”

Christmas can be a wonderful high, but do we get into a terrible panic because there is no Christmas for the rest of the year? The heroin addict has to go through that terrible ritual to try to end the awful lows that the first dose created and the following doses perpetuated. Persevere for more than a few days, and you’re probably afraid of all the withdrawal symptoms of the void that might form without alcohol. I listened to the book in the car, washing dishes, etc. I didn't quit drinking when I started it, but I followed the instructions and I never listened while I was drinking. I had a lot of fear at first, but I decided to go to the bar with my wife and I knew my friends were going to have some questions about this, because I quit. Nowadays, I go to the bar to play golden tee golf, and darts, but I haven't had a drink in about three months, and I don't see any reason I'd ever drink again. I have to admit I was nervous to go to a bar and try to avoid drinking, but it's really easy.Global, regional, and national age–sex specific all-cause and cause-specific mortality for 240 causes of death, 1990–2013: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013 (2015) – The Lancet VOLUME 385, ISSUE 9963, P117-171, JANUARY 10, 2015 https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(14)61682-2/fulltext

It's hard to believe that this book was written by a person who has been an actual alcoholic. The way he talks about alcohol sometimes reminded me of Steve Carell's character in The 40-Year-Old Virgin describing breasts to feel like bags of sand. Smokers following Allen Carr’s Easyway were about 6 times more likely to be abstinent, assessed after 13 months, compared to similar smokers in the general population. There is only one real culprit. No it’s not alcohol, but the ignorance that surrounds it. It is this misconception that we drink because we choose to. Allen Carr’s Easyway has more than 40 years of experience and 150 centres in over 50 countries across the globe. Can you picture the fly alighting on the plant as the teenager sampling their first shandy? Can you visualize the lager lout just about to throw up as the bloated fly before it tries to take off? And when the alcoholic can no longer close his eyes to the fact that his life is being dominated and ruined by drink, doesn’t he try to cut down and control his intake, rather like someone who is grossly overweight attempts to cut down on food. But does dieting make food appear less precious? Quite the contrary. The more you cut down, the more hungry you get, the hungrier you get the more deprived you feel, the more deprived you feel the more precious each morsel becomes. Exactly the same happens when you try to cut down on your drinking. At the times when you won’t allow yourself to drink, you feel miserable because you can’t drink, and when you do allow yourself to drink, you still feel miserable because you can’t drink enough. Aren’t the struggles of the fly similar to the abortive struggles of the alcoholic who is trying to control his intake? Drinking hasn’t become less precious to him. On the contrary, it now dominates his whole life. The more both the fly and the alcoholic struggle to escape, the more imprisoned they become. Are the semi-digested insects not comparable to the down-and-out meths drinkers of skid row, whose entire existence is now confined to begging or stealing the next fix, and trying to find somewhere warm to sleep off the effects? Does the fact that the fly can see the partially digested bodies prevent it from joining them? Who knows?”

Success stories

At about 51% of the way through the book the aha moment as the author calls it towards the end had already hit me, I didn't feel I needed to finish it, something in my mindset had changed about alcohol and the desire to drink it was gone. Even the alcohol free beers I had been trying to substitute with were no longer appealing because I genuinely feel I am not missing out on anything. I went to a BBQ that would normally trigger cravings and FOMO but I happily didn't drink and didn't care. I finished the book regardless and have mixed feelings about it. John: What made you decide to get in touch with Allen Carr’s Easyway to apply for training as an alcohol therapist? For example, I can agree that pure alcohol tastes bad - but to argue with a straight face that therefore everything with alcohol tastes worse than without, is like saying that everything with salt tastes bad because salt by itself doesn't taste good. Everything Carr said fell into place and not only was I going to be sober, I was going to stay sober and it was going to be easy. I am proud to say I am currently six weeks sober, I have not felt this good since I was about 20 and I have zero desire to drink. This includes going to the bar for lunch with my co-workers, bowling in a league once a week, celebrating New Years Eve, my birthday and attending a wedding. It is a feeling I cannot describe to say I have beaten alcohol.

Moshammer, H., & Neuberger, M. (2007). Long term success of short smoking cessation seminars supported by occupational health care. Addictive Behaviors, 32(7), 1486-1493 John: The recruitment process is pretty arduous and the training is really tough. Was it worth it? Tell us a little about how it feels to free people from their alcohol addiction?Another thing that really changed my mind about getting shitfaced was when he said, since you love alcohol and it reduces your senses sometimes to the point of unconsiousness, then you must think going a few rounds with McGregor in the Octagon is positively charming. Well, apart from not wanting to keep re-reading the same book, I soon realised it didn’t quite work like that and as such decided to book myself on one of the ‘Easyway to Stop Drinking’ seminars in Birmingham.