Stephen Beach

“I wanted a drink. There were a hundred reasons why a man will want a drink, but I wanted one now for the most elementary reason of all. I didn't want to feel what I was feeling, and a voice within was telling me that I needed a drink, that I couldn't bear it without it.

But that voice is a liar. You can always bear the pain. It'll hurt, it'll burn like acid in an open wound, but you can stand it. And, as long as you can make yourself go on choosing the pain over the relief, you can keep going.”
― Lawrence Block, Out on the Cutting Edge

“He gave me so many anti-anxiety techniques. Reciting the alphabet backwards if I'm walking to a boozy party and feel my heart start to jackhammer. Tapping along to a song, which does something fancy in the brain. Or holding somebody's hand. I still use these tools to this day.”
― Catherine Gray, The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober

“We want ecstasy as a way of life, not a liver-poisoning alcoholiday from it.”
― Crimethinc, Anarchy and Alcohol

“...do you think if you died drunk you’d sober up before you met Jesus?”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger