Whiskey, i love whiskey, the fine craftsmanship, the amazing flavor, like no other the aroma just just sniffing a good whiskey, makes me feel things made, i'm never drinking again. No, if, if someone offers me a glass i'll drink it, but me alone in a bottle, i realize that's just not that's not a good combination. I used to drink whiskey every single day and i realized i was getting addicted when i was trying to cut down on it and and just how difficult that was. This was back in late 2017 early 2018.

I thought you know i i like. I enjoy drinking. Nothing wrong with that, but uh. It was also a time where i was starting to care more about my health.

I had started working out for the first time in my life, and i thought you know if i want to live a healthy life, i should probably cut down a little bit and for any same person, that's very easy to do for someone that was really getting Into it that was very difficult to do uh and that's when i realized oh sh. Maybe i have a problem and uh. That's why i quit drinking for a few months, because i thought you know i need to show that i'm the one in control. I had just read a book on buddhism as well, which talks all about self-control, so i wanted to prove that i could quit drinking.

Even though i was clearly getting really into it and that felt really good to me, i felt really empowered, because i'd shown that i could do that in retrospect, you know what was the point, but what happened was i i think a lot of you can probably Relate to this, when you want to do something that you know isn't good for you, you sort of reason with yourself in your head. You know it's like uh. I can eat all this crap now, let's work out later, it's that kind of logic, and i what my what my brain said to me was, like you know, felix pat yourself in the back you quit drinking before you've shown that you're in control. You know, obviously, everyone drinks.

This is not a problem for you, you can just drink whiskey again, so i do, and i think this time was the when it was the worst for me, because in retrospect i realized i was dealing with a lot of anxiety at the time. Well, i did know it, you know drinking to sort of escape. Emotions is a recipe for disaster. This was during the time of all my controversies.

I was dealing with a lot of stress, probably the most i've ever been through. I knew how to deal with that, but there was also so much going on even behind the scenes that no one even knows about, and during all of it i had trained my brain into thinking. Something's bad is coming. You know it seemed inevitable.

I mean i'm at this space where everything is fine right now, but everything can go just really fast and i had seen that happen, so it wasn't completely irrational, even though my emotion probably felt it. I felt irrational about it. I was like. Why do i have so much anxiety like i remember, asking friends about it and i was like dude, i feel so like uh, anxious about these things.

I know it's completely irrational, but uh uh. I just can't shake it, you know and they they said like you know it's actually not that irrational at all, and i was like yeah you're, probably right. If i really wanted to further analyze how i felt at the time, i think i was still not just addicted to escaping these emotions by drinking, but also, i think i was addicted to youtube and i was so scared of losing youtube through all these controversies that I uh, i was fueling one addiction because out of my fear of losing another one, so yeah a lot of controversial, a lot of stress and at this time imagining a life without drinking just seemed really bleak to me. I thought you know everyone does it.

It's never gotten bad or out of control. Usually, when you talk about you know drinking and an addiction, it's usually you know someone losing their job or losing their loved ones or their whole life getting ruined by it. But i i was nowhere even near that, so i i don't want it to seem like i'm trying to co-opt all that pain, that people have you know, but i i do also recognize it for what it was, and you know also it's almost that romanticizes idea Of a guy um with a heavy heavy head or heavy heart over looking over at a bar with the with the glass, you know it's almost seen as a as a cool thing. So all these things are sort of playing to your mind and you justify to yourself why it's okay, but at the time i to me it had gone to a point where you just felt pathetic.

I i wanted to stop because i hated being in this anxiety of of in between and when i stopped drinking this time it was. It was really rough, especially because i was having withdrawals from it. It took me a long time to be able to sleep properly again, but i did manage it and i was i was done and i haven't touched it since which i'm really proud about. But i never really talked about how i quit and you know that whole process, like i've, only really spoken about these things, because people asked me uh, but in reality i never talked about it, because i i was really embarrassed about it and even now just saying It i'm kind of like, and the main reason i was embarrassed, was because i hadn't quit drinking, but i hadn't quit my addiction.

I was still addicted just to something else. I was addicted to nicotine patches now. Instead, i had replaced my drinking habit with nicotine pouches. So stupid a lot of people notice it in videos like i had this patch here.

A lot of people use it to quit smoking. It's basically yeah strong nicotine. Whenever you have that feeling of craving or addiction, it sort of gnaws on you, and it really helps to have something to replace it with the problem was yes, i replaced it with something else. That is way less bad for you, obviously, but it still didn't feel like i had beaten addiction like i had just replaced it and which i i felt really embarrassed about, and that's why i always try to hide it, and i also didn't want to be a Bad influence - and there are other reasons but i'll get into that, and i went through the same thing with nicotine, where i i quit it twice quitting.

It was really hard because i had to come in terms with that. I would have nothing when you get that itch of wanting to consume something or your addiction. I knew the only way for me to deal with it and to finally be rid of, it was to just have nothing so when you get those addiction, dips and you're feeling bad you consume whatever it is. You want and oh i feel good again.

I realized. I would have known of that and that kind of felt, like uh, almost losing a friend, i'm not even exaggerating it's like uh, something that you used to rely on will no longer be there, but i have decided you know i was. I was beyond fed up and uh. I just had to deal with it, and i knew that if i could literally just deal with it for a couple days, i would be over it, and that was the case uh.

That was really tough withdrawals, but it was fine. It was not a big deal as someone who's been studying. Philosophy on my own stoicism in particular allows for vices like drinking it's described as letting your spirit loose kind of, and i use that as my voice of reason like. Yes, it's fine for stoics to drink, but they obviously draw a distinction between using it and being controlled by it and that's a fine line to walk for for some people.

Myself, especially, i was drinking because i was stressed out, and it wasn't until i dealt with those emotions that i was able to not rely on these things anymore. The problem is when you develop these habits. To cope with your problems. Is that when you no longer have these issues, you still have to deal with the addiction like that? Just doesn't just go away, uh on its own, and i think i think buddhism had it right all along it's just i didn't do it correctly, where it's.

They say that craving something is suffering and you will always suffer unless you uproot your cravings and i i needed to finally uproot those cravings and i did and that worked. I don't feel anything about alcohol or nicotine at this point, because they're completely caught out of my life, which is very liberating it's very freeing. I think i could have gone through my whole life with the keep consuming alcohol and nicotine and a lot of people do. I think that i could have done that just fine, but i've been obsessed with this idea of freedom, the stoic idea of freedom of not being bound to anything and let my actions be my own and that's what really motivated me to wanting to free myself.

You can, you know, be bound to your passions, the things that you enjoy and i think it's hard to recognize when you are. You know because i realize, in retrospect, yeah i've been addicted to youtube for for uh almost 10 years and that's led me to put way more value into it and than what it really is. And it feels like liberating to me to even acknowledge that. And let go of that and i didn't plan to make this video and i didn't really want to talk about it, not just because i was a bit embarrassed, i'm not anymore, but it feels weird talking about it, but also because i wanted to overcome these things.

On my own, i wanted the the virtue of overcoming to exist purely just for me, but i'm hoping that talking about these things might lead people to open their eyes about their own actions and what they're all they're. Also doing. It's a tough thing to admit going through this experience. I am so humbled to people that deal with other forms of addiction because i didn't see it that way before people that maybe deal with the being overweight or i don't know whatever drug addictions or whatever it could be.

You know, obviously it's not the same, but i understand the mentality which i didn't have an empathy for it uh the same way because i never questioned myself doing it because it's never been a problem on the outside uh there's a marcus aurelius quote. That goes. I think of yourself as dead. You have lived, your life now take what's left and live it properly, and i see this as a guide of live life as you've already made all your mistakes.

It's the same as nietzsche's life-affirming principle and i can finally say i would kiss the demon on his cheeks before i wanted to escape my mind. But now i feel like i want to sharpen it and that feels incredibly liberating. So you know what and that's it.