Daley Quinn is a former magazine beauty editor turned full-time freelance journalist, blogger, and content strategist. This is The Daley Dose, a place to get your fix of everything from working in the NYC media industry, Daley’s favorite beauty and fashion finds, life updates about sobriety, and so much more.
Sometimes, staying sober can be really fucking hard—it’s really all about taking it one day at a time. It’s helpful to lean on others who have been through the same journey. I have found that reading inspirational sobriety quotes from others who have been through it has been immensely helpful.
Inspirational sobriety quotes are important because they can give you a sense of hope. They give you a sense of comfort knowing that others have been in the same shoes as you. Some of them even make me laugh. I think that if you do consider yourself “in recovery,” leaning on inspirational quotes will definitely be helpful for you. And even if you decide not to be sober at some point, I bet some of these quotes will stay with you for the rest of your life. Below, I’ve rounded up some of the best inspirational sobriety quotes that have helped me stay strong through sobriety and live my life to the fullest.
When I was in the early stages of sobriety, I was attending The Luckiest Club group meetings most nights of the week. During one meeting, one woman was talking about how she felt empowered in sobriety. She said that she didn’t have to be sober, she chose to live alcohol-free. She knows that she is completely free to have a drink, but that one drink will come with a whole package for her. It will come with many more drinks after that. It will come with really bad decisions that night. And it will come with a massive, can’t-move-from-my-bed hangover the next day.
I love this quote because it reminds me that yes, I can have alcohol whenever I want to, but I know that it will come with a whole package that I’m not interested in opening.
If I’m being totally honest, I hate how much sobriety has allowed me to succeed beyond my wildest dreams. I hate that one substance has the power to keep me behind and stunt my growth. I’m bewildered by the significant shift I’ve felt in my mind, body, and spirit since going alcohol-free nine months ago. I love this inspirational sobriety quote from Mary Karr because I know that it absolutely describes me.
I think this quote from Anne Lamott is kinda funny. I feel like people believe that drinking brings so much happiness and fun to their lives, when in my experience, it’s been the opposite. Going sober has brought me many moments of joy—a feeling I didn’t feel very much while binge drinking every weekend for ten years.
Everything about this quote is 100% accurate. I feel like I have a new lease on life in sobriety. I’ve never felt so much gratitude for random things in my life. I am discovering my intuition for the first time and choices are much easier to make.
I watched an interview recently with Jamie Lee Curtis and Colin Farrell, where she was talking about how staying sober will be her greatest legacy. I think she is such a badass and I, too, feel like sobriety has been the great accomplishment of my life, and I’m only nine months in.
Sometimes, relapsing is a part of the sobriety process. There have definitely been moments where I’ve thought about drinking over the last nine months. I think that if you relapse, it’s important to not get too down on yourself. Just get back up on the horse and keep riding.
Ugh. This one hits hard for me. My first five years of drinking alcohol were incredibly fun, and the last five years were rough. I know for a fact that I was using alcohol to numb all the shitty parts of my life because I’m currently in the process of working through all that shit I was suppressing.
Getting drunk is so damn easy. In fact, society and advertisements tell us it’s weird if you aren’t getting drunk. It’s weird if you aren’t having a cocktail at happy hour after work. It’s weird if you aren’t enjoying a glass of wine with your pasta at home.
Alcohol is everywhere, and it’s become so normalized that you’re weird if you’re not downing it. I know that the shift is happening, because I see non-alcoholic drinks everywhere I go in NYC these days, but it’s going to take time to shift such an ingrained mindset that we all have around alcohol.
If you haven’t read about my rock-bottom story, you can find it here. You don’t have to hit rock bottom to quit alcohol, but unfortunately, that’s a big part of my journey. I definitely feel like my life is unfolding in new ways and that I’m building a new foundation to stand, and thrive, on.
I was just watching Parks and Recreation with my fiance, and Rob Lowe’s cutie little face made an appearance on the episode. I really don’t know how long I will be sober for, but I do know that, when I look back on my life and reflect on this time, I’ll realize that going alcohol-free truly was the best gift I’ve ever given to myself.
It’s like the gift that keeps on giving. Like Mary Poppins’ magic bag—you get a giant gift of joy in sobriety, but you also get a ton of other incredible gifts that have been stashed inside sobriety, too. Peace, happiness, clarity, gratitude, confidence, hope, and so many other treasures.
Staying sober can definitely be hard, and I have certainly had my moments. But the life that sobriety has given to me feels like a much better, richer life than the one I had before I stopped drinking.
The beginning stages of going sober are really, really hard. I look back on my first few months and cringe thinking about the number of tears I cried and the sadness I sat in. Now that I am nine months in, I do feel like being sober is much, much easier. Most days it feels like a natural part of myself, while other days it is a choice I have to make that day.
One huge thing I’ve noticed about sobriety is that I am able to show up more for my friends and family. I am way more present, I am more engaging, and I’m able to follow through with things that I wasn’t able to when I was drinking.
This is another one of those inspirational sobriety quotes that hits me so, so hard. Everyone drinks alcohol for different reasons, but I’m now aware enough to know that I drank to numb all the shitty feelings I had about myself. There is no doubt about it—your confidence will go up once you stop drinking alcohol.
I don’t really consider myself “in recovery,” but I definitely relate to this quote. I was in hell the last few years I was drinking. The beginning of the pandemic was the worst of it. I was drinking whole bottles by myself, which is concerning considering I’m a 5’2” petite gal. While I don’t think sobriety is all roses and rainbows all the time, there have been plenty of moments where it has felt like heaven.
I have experienced quite the opposite. I’ve seen the amazing depths of the world because I’ve quit drinking. I appreciate the little things in life so much more.
Okay, I don’t really think that drinking alcohol is “selfish,” but I do know that it numbs all of the feelings, including the amazing ones. You can’t numb the bad feelings and not the good feelings while drinking. You numb everything, and lose a lot in the process.
Tell me this is not exactly how you’ve felt waking up from a hangover before! This is exactly how it felt when I woke up with my hangover after the last night I drank. I ended up going to the hospital that night, and missed one of my best friend’s 30th birthday parties. The hangovers I was experiencing were not worth the minimal amount of fun I was having when going out.
I agree with Kate! Addiction has so much to do with childhood trauma and your experiences as a kid. I think it’s important to work on those things and then, once you feel like you’ve reached a good point on your healing journey, you can decide if drinking alcohol is right for you. Remember: sobriety is all about small efforts repeated everyday.
This is one of those inspirational sobriety quotes that just makes me laugh. I’ve never broken out in handcuffs, but I’ve certainly gotten in trouble from alcohol more times than I care to admit.
Okay, so this one might not be specifically about sobriety, but it can definitely apply to recovering addicts from both drugs and alcohol. I’ve learned the hard way I am the only person that can change my life. For a few years before I finally quit, I knew, intuitively, that alcohol was holding me back from becoming my full self.
This is one of those addiction recovery quotes that I know will hit home for a lot of folks who hit rock bottom in their journey. It’s okay to make mistakes, and how we overcome those hardships is what makes us stronger and opens up our body, mind, and soul for an extraordinary destiny.
Daley Quinn is a former magazine beauty editor turned full-time freelance journalist, blogger, and content strategist. This is The Daley Dose, a place to get your fix of everything from working in the NYC media industry, Daley’s favorite beauty and fashion finds, life updates about sobriety, and so much more.