Quotes & Sayings About Sobriety

Drunkenness was a communal and personal pleasure at once, a miserable state only to those not drinking. Sobriety to him was a cruel attack of conscience masking itself as awareness. If sober people were so aware, how come they only spoke truth when drunk? Give him the romance of a drunkard over the indignation of a teetotaler any day. — Marlon James

It took a great deal of acceptance to come to terms with being an alcoholic but acceptance was the key to my sobriety ... If I didn't have acceptance at that time in my life I would not be standing here today. — Dennis Eckersley

And you know what the worst thing was?
The worst thing was that nobody ever believed how hard we tried. — Jack McCarthy

The best taxes are such as are levied upon consumptions, especially those of luxury; because such taxes are least felt by the people. They seem, in some measure, voluntary; since a man may choose how far he will use the commodity: They naturally produce sobriety and frugality, if judiciously imposed: And being confounded with the natural price of the commodity, they are scarcely perceived by the consumers. Their only disadvantage is that they are expensive in the levying. — David Hume

In her memoir, Anne Robinson recounts the wake-up call which motivated her to stop drinking. Leaving her eight-year-old daughter alone in their car while she went to buy liquor, she returned to find her daughter with tears running down her cheeks. The guilt and horror Ms. Robinson felt at this sight jolted her into sobriety. — Anne Robinson

Your moment of clarity comes when you face your fears. Sobriety gave me back me - my life. Self-medication kills you slowly. You can never get a handle on that. It's a highly destructive force that has to be dealt with on a spiritual level as much as a physical one. — Chaka Khan

And now I'm right back where I started. Sober and miserable. — Alyson Noel

There are hours for rest, and hours for wakefulness; nights for sobriety and nights for drunkenness - (if only so that possession of the former allows us to discern the latter when we have it; for sad as it is, no human body can be happily drunk all the time). — Roman Payne

Many are the lives of men unwritten, which have nevertheless as powerfully influenced civilization and progress as the more fortunate Great whose names are recorded in biography. Even the humblest person, who sets before his fellows an example of industry, sobriety, and upright honesty of purpose in life, has a present as well as a future influence upon the well-being of his country; for his life and character pass unconsciously into the lives of others, and propagate good example for all time to come. — Samuel Smiles

Picking them up and reading them, I felt sadness do deep that it will never really be gone. It was a sobering moment
sobering not because I was drunk, but because I felt like I was shifting into this new state of naked clarity. It was higher state of sobriety, a painful state of sobriety, because the truth was suddenly unvarnished, making me feel unvarnished. — David Levithan

I once heard a sober alcoholic say that drinking never made him happy, but it made him feel like he was going to be happy in about fifteen minutes. That was exactly it, and I couldn't understand why the happiness never came, couldn't see the flaw in my thinking, couldn't see that alcohol kept me trapped in a world of illusion, procrastination, paralysis. I lived always in the future, never in the present. Next time, next time! Next time I drank it would be different, next time it would make me feel good again. And all my efforts were doomed, because already drinking hadn't made me feel good in years. — Heather King

All the sobriety which' religion needs or requires is that which real earnestness produces. — Henry Ward Beecher

It is most absurdly said, in popular language, of any man, that he is disguised in liquor; for, on the contrary, most men are disguised by sobriety. — Thomas De Quincey

Modesty and humility are the sobriety of the mind, as temperance and chastity are of the body. — Benjamin Whichcote

If we approach nature and the environment without this openness to awe and wonder, if we no longer speak the language of fraternity and beauty in our relationship with the world, our attitude will be that of masters, consumers, ruthless exploiters, unable to set limits on their immediate needs. By contrast, if we feel intimately united with all that exists, then sobriety and care will well up spontaneously. — Pope Francis

Jim Stavridis is the former NATO commander who is sometimes on people's lists, also very plausible, self-possessed, someone with sobriety. — David Brooks

leaving Sobriety City on the Alcohol Express). She — Stephen King

For why in your calamities do you complain of Christianity, unless because you desire to enjoy your luxurious license unrestrained, and to lead an abandoned and profligate life without the interruption of any uneasiness or disaster? For certainly your desire for peace, and prosperity, and plenty is not prompted by any purpose of using these blessings honestly, that is to say, with moderation, sobriety, temperance, and piety; for your purpose rather is to run riot in an endless variety of sottish pleasures, and thus to generate from your prosperity a moral pestilence which will prove a thousandfold more disastrous than the fiercest enemies. — Augustine Of Hippo

The capacity for emotional sobriety belongs to everybody in the human family and leads to a fully human response to the adventure and goodness of the gift of human life. — Thomas Keating

Getting sober was one of the three pivotal events in my life, along with becoming an actor and having a child. Of the three, finding my sobriety was the hardest thing. — Gary Oldman

Honesty.
Sobriety.
My virginity.
No way to regain
the first two, I almost
gave away the last. — Ellen Hopkins

Gwynn, she was always talking about wanting to be drunk and honestly I did want to encourage that, I wanted to go to a bar with her and let all the stuff sobriety pushed down be released so I could catch it in my palms and finally kiss her. She was just so sad. Melancholy was a fleshy wave permanently cresting on her face, she had to speak through it when she talked. — Michelle Tea

Cultivate these, then, for they are wholly within your power: sincerity and dignity; industriousness; and sobriety. Avoid grumbling, be frugal, considerate, and frank; be temperate in manner and speech; carry yourself with authority. — Marcus Aurelius

I think you're under no obligation whatsoever to forgive anything, to forget anything. You're not required to push away the years of abuse because the abuser now chooses to be sober and in his sobriety regrets his actions. And white may be small and unforgiving of me, I think people who do so at the snap of a dam finger are either liars or are in need of serious therapy. I assume you heard him out, so in my personal opinion, any debt you might owe for your existence is now paid in full. It may be fashionable to hold that terrible actions are indeed terrible, but that hte person inflicting them isn't responbile due to alcohol, drugs, DNA, or GD PMS. He damn well was responsible, and if you decided to loathe him for the rest of your life, I wouldn't blame you for it. How's that? (Cybil to Gage - she ROCKS) — Nora Roberts

Education gives sobriety to the young, comfort to the old, riches to the poor and is an ornament to the rich. — Diogenes

Gately can't even imagine what it would be like to be a sober and drug-free biker. It's like what would be the point. He imagines these people polishing the hell out of their leather and like playing a lot of really precise pool. — David Foster Wallace

Get Up is basically the book I wanted to have my first year of sobriety. I wish someone had given me this book a year before I even went to a meeting because I was already miserable. I didn't enjoy drinking anymore, I just couldn't stand the idea of not doing it. I was afraid if I got sober I wouldn't be able to write anymore. That was a really big fear of mine, which turned out not to be true. — Bucky Sinister

Better to sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunk Christian. — Herman Melville

She has no regrets; she knows now he could never have made her happy, even though he has, apparently, joined AA, is doing better. But sobriety is his journey, not hers; he needs to do it for himself, alone. Still, she misses him hugely, doesn't feel ready for another relationship yet. But as time passes, she hopes that she might be, eventually, with someone new, easier, kinder. — Sarah Rayner

[T]he more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer ... [taking] away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence of somewhat else than a careful accumulation during youth and health for support in age and sickness. — Benjamin Franklin

Ya think that the whiskey tastes good? Try a big cup of sobriety - now that is the good stuff! — Steven Tyler

Relationship. R-E-L-A-T-I-O-N-S-H-I-P means this: Really exciting love affair turns into overwhelming nightmare. Sobriety hangs in peril. — Gary Busey

(The new boyfriend) knows I write every day for hours but has no idea that all I'm writing about is me. It seems wiser to let him think I'm an aspiring novelist instead of just an alcoholic with a year of sobriety who spends eight hours a day writing about the other 16. — Augusten Burroughs

Above all things endeavor to breed them up the love of virtue, and that holy plain way of it which we have lived in, that the world in no part of it get into my family. I had rather they we're homely than finely bred as to outward behavior; yet I love sweetness mixed with gravity, and cheerfulness tempered with sobriety. — William Penn

To conclude, therefore, let no man upon a weak conceit of sobriety or an ill-applied moderation think or maintain that a man can search too far, or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or the book of God's works, divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavor an endless progress or proficience in both; only let men beware that they apply both to charity, and not to swelling; to use, and not to ostentation; and again, that they do not unwisely mingle or confound these learnings together. — Francis Bacon

Sobriety isn't for cowards, Chief Inspector. Whatever you might think of an alcoholic, to get sober, really sober demands great honesty, and that demands great courage. Stopping drinking's the easy part. Then we have to face ourselves. Our demons. How many people are willing to do that? — Louise Penny

The Elders would go forth, and each must stand for himself ... to go in all meekness, in sobriety, and preach Jesus Christ and Him crucified; not to contend with others on account of their faith, or systems of religion, but pursue a steady course. This I delivered by way of commandment; and all who observe it not, will pull down persecution upon their heads, while those who do, shall always be filled with the Holy Ghost; this I pronounced as a prophecy, and sealed with hosanna and amen. — Joseph Smith Jr.

To conclude, therefore, let no man out of a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied moderation, think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works; divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress or proficience in both." - Bacon: "Advancement of Learning". — Charles Darwin

I keep telling people: Don't make me the poster boy for AA because I don't know a lot about sobriety, but I do know a lot about drinking. — Billy Joel

Aping the lower class will only lead to fatherless children, unusable muscles, and the fear of tomorrow's sobriety. — Bauvard

Your best days are ahead of you. The movie starts when the guy gets sober and puts his life back together; it doesn't end there. — Bucky Sinister

What are reason and sobriety without the knowledge of intoxication? — Hermann Hesse

There is a road to freedom. Its milestones are obedience, endeavour, honesty, order, cleanliness, sobriety, truthfulness, sacrifice, and love of the fatherland. — Adolf Hitler

I personally believe this: We have only today; yesterday's gone and tomorrow is uncertain. That's why they call it the present. And sobriety really is a gift ... for those who are willing to receive it. — Ace Frehley

Sobriety is concern for one's health - or limited capacity. — Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Be your OWN celebrity! — Jamie McCall

Let us avoid debt as we would avoid a plague ... Let every head of every household see to it that he has on hand enough food and clothing, and, where possible, fuel also, for at least a year ahead ... Let every head of household aim to own his own home, free from mortgage. Let us again clothe ourselves with these proved and sterling virtues-honesty, truthfulness, chastity, sobriety, temperance, industry, and thrift; let us discard all covetousness and greed. — J. Reuben Clark

It's a great advantage not to drink among hard drinking people. — F Scott Fitzgerald

India is known for its sobriety and wisdom, balanced and sensible thinking. We need strong institutions and we need good governance in the country. — Pratibha Patil

She [Beatrice] alone was still real for him, still implied meaning in the world, and beauty. Her nature became his landmark - what Melville would call, with more sobriety than we can now muster, his Greenwich Standard ... — Dan Simmons

Lead's erasing then vanishing
Banished from whatever it is they're drinking and it's cleaned
Running from the pitcher as if it's her fantasy — Criss Jami

A state of temperance, sobriety and justice without devotion is a cold, lifeless, insipid condition of virtue, and is rather to be styled philosophy than religion. — Joseph Addison

Achieving true sobriety goes beyond abstinence. it's also about healing your soul, apologizing for damage you did to other, and seeking forgiveness. — Lou Gramm

Oppression makes wise men mad; but the distemper is still the madness of the wise, which is better than the sobriety of fools. — Edmund Burke

I was angry at myself for my inclination to vice. I longed for the day when a state of frenzy would lead my mind to sober pasture, just as it had for Saint Augustine. I longed for the day when the love of one woman would be sacred enough to forget all the rest. — Roman Payne

I think it's important for me to show the world that sobriety hasn't made me soft. I'm on a mission to prove I'm still a nutcase. — Steve-O

Beware the deadly fumes of that insane elation Which rises from the cup of mad impiety, And go, get drunk with that divine intoxication Which is more sober far than all sobriety. — William Rounseville Alger

What sobriety conceals, drunkenness reveals. — Anonymous

My main focus in sobriety has been to replace fear with faith or love. — Steve-O

It is no longer necessary to preach sonorously of the sinful and deleterious effect of liquor on the human mind and body; the essential evil is recognised scientifically, and only the sophistry of conscious immorality remains to be combated. Brewers and distillers still strive clumsily to delude the public by the transparent misstatements of their advertisements, and periodicals of easy conscience still permit these advertisements to disgrace their pages; but the end of such pernicious pretension is not remote. The drinker of yesterday flaunted his voice before all without shame; the average drinker of today must needs resort to excuses. — H.P. Lovecraft

I'm pretty confident about my sobriety, but I don't want to get too confident because that's when I'll crash. — Mary Docter

One has to recognize that science is not metaphysics, and certainly not mysticism; it can never bring us the illumination and the satisfaction experienced by one enraptured in ecstasy. Science is sobriety and clarity of conception, not intoxicated vision. — Ludwig Von Mises

To sober up seems to many like making life "so serious," as if seriousness precluded joy, warmth, spontaneity and fun. But there can be a delusional, blind quality to non-sober festivities. To have our eyes open soberly with all our senses and memory intact allows some of the most rewarding, soul-nourishing, and long-lasting pleasures possible. — Alexandra Katehakis

Sobriety diminishes, discriminates, and says no; drunkenness expands, unites, and says yes. Not through mere perversity do men run after it. — William James

I couldn't keep living this lie for a minute more. I've been sober for two hundred and eighty-three days. My sobriety requires me to apologize to you, but my heart can't take another day without you knowing how much I still love you, and how deeply sorry I am for the pain I've caused you. — Kindle Alexander

The well-ordered mind knows the value, no less than the charm, of reticence. The fruit of the tree of knowledge ... falls ripe from its stem; but those who have eaten with sobriety find no need to discuss the processes of digestion. — Agnes Repplier

I had no idea what time I'd left, how I'd gotten home, who'd been up here, and how long he, she, or they had stayed. Another night, added to the hundreds that had gone before, shrouded in mystery. Really, when you thought about it, it was creepy. My own life was a secret to me. — Heather King

Procrastination has been a boon to my sobriety. I keep thinking I'd like to go out and get really trashed some night--but not tonight. It's really a variant of "One Step at a Time. — Rob Dinsmoor

That whole bit was something John had come up with, the man having a terrible habit of carrying out his drunken 3:00 A.M. ideas even after daylight and sobriety came. It was always 3:00 A.M. for John. — David Wong

Is sobriety all that we are to expect of a spiritual awakening? No, sobriety is only a bare beginning; it is only the first gift of the first awakening. If more gifts are to be received, our awakening has to go on. As it does go on, we find that bit by bit we can discard the old life - the one that did not work - for a new life that can and does work under any conditions whatever. — Bill W.

Many already leaving Sobriety City on the Alcohol Express — Stephen King

When I hit Hollywood, it was full-blown. I was a party boy. It amazes me that I made it ... to be able to have led this amazing career when I was out every night. Every once in a while I'll see old reruns of myself and I see I'm giving it my comedy best, but with dead eyes - no sparkle. I was in the middle of all that abuse. But now I'm a recovering alcoholic with many years of sobriety. — Leslie Jordan

So the opposite of addiction is not sobriety. It is human connection. — Johann Hari

It will all be over in 2 weeks — Ken Novak

Which is recorded of Socrates, that he was able both to abstain from, and to enjoy, those things which many are too weak to abstain from, and cannot enjoy without excess. But to be strong enough both to bear the one and to be sober in the other is the mark of a man who has a perfect and invincible soul. — Marcus Aurelius

Unlike some men, I had never drunk for boldness or charm or wit; I had used alcohol for precisely what it was, a depressant to check the mental exhilaration produced by extended sobriety. — Frederick Exley

You stick a bunch of drunken murderers together, ain't long before some turn to thieving, then to lying, then to bad language, and pretty soon to sobriety, raising families and making an honest living. — Joe Abercrombie

Sobriety is okay enough," Denny says, "but someday, I'd like to live a life based on doing good stuff instead of just not doing bad stuff. You know? — Chuck Palahniuk

if you are always drinking, you should probably never drive — Dmitry Dyatlov

Old Sobriety's son? How is the old devil?"
"Dunno, sir, what with him being dead."
"Oh dear. How long ago?"
"These past thirty years," said Shawn.
"But you don't look any older than twen-" Ponder began. Ridcully elbowed him sharply in the ribcage.
"This is the countryside," he hissed. "People do things differently here. And more often. — Terry Pratchett

Laughter is day, and sobriety is night; a smile is the twilight that hovers gently between both, more bewitching than either. — Henry Ward Beecher

What marriage is to morality, a properly conducted licensed liquor traffic is to sobriety. — Mark Twain

We're all looking at the people around us, the people who have gone before us who have succeeded in recovery and have long-term sobriety and they are an illustration for us of how good it can be. — Scott Stevens

The Democrats have to be stopped and that's going to be what ultimately brings us everybody back to sobriety here. — Rush Limbaugh

The conviction: I will not tolerate this age. The freedom: the freedom to act on my conviction. And I will act. No one else has both the conviction and the freedom. Many agree with me, have the conviction, but will not act. Some act, assassinate, bomb, burn, etc., but they are the crazies. Crazy acts by crazy people. But what if one, sober, reasonable, and honorable man should act, and act with perfect sobriety, reason, and honor? Then you have the beginning of a new age. We shall start a new order of things. — Walker Percy

I will that women adorn themselves in modest apparel," he says, "with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; "But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works. "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection." Here he looks us over. "All," he repeats. "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. "For Adam was first formed, then Eve. "And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. "Notwithstanding she shall be saved by childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety." Saved — Margaret Atwood

Employment gives health, sobriety, and morals. — Daniel Webster

Sex parties, alcohol and drugs lost their appeal to Sven after a while. Music never did, in his continual search for that sober connection
intimacy with one person over a long period of time, as opposed to periods of intimacy with a bunch of random faces. — Jess C. Scott

In my life, I find that in sobriety, I feel much more. And I have much more depth. — Jeffrey Tambor

Sobriety and health is the greatest thing. — Jeff Bridges

The social prestige of wine at table and at the club must be destroyed through lofty example and polite ridicule; forces which are not always available, and for whose successful operation much time will be required. But the outstanding fact remains, that the world has come to regard liquor in a new and clearer light. Our next generation of poets will contain but few Anacreons, for the thinking element of mankind has robbed the flowing bowl of its fancied virtues and fictitious beauties. The grape, so long permitted to masquerade as the inspirer of wit and art, is now revealed as the mother of ruin and death. The wolf at last stands divested of its sheep's clothing. — H.P. Lovecraft

I stopped loving my father at some point while I was a drunk. I began hating him after I became sober. — Phil Volatile

It goes without saying that moderation and sobriety are of the very essence of vow-taking. — Mahatma Gandhi

Not being a man of means, I knew that if I did not stay sober enough to earn money, I would run out of liquor. — Alcoholics Anonymous

Upon occasion we should go as far as intoxication ... Drink washes cares away, stirs the mind from its lowest depths ... But in liberty moderation is wholesome, and so it is in wine ... We ought not indulge too often, for fear the mind contract a bad habit, yet it is right to draw it toward elation and release and to banish dull sobriety for a little. — Seneca The Younger

Critical sobriety is out of the question so long as this master of terror-in-the-commonplace exerts his spell. — Anthony Boucher

Berg, while the go-to guy for decisions for past campaigns, engaged in frequent and successful battles against sobriety. — Sally Courtnix

And let no one suppose that I claim that just living can be taught for, in a word, I hold that there does not exist an art of the kind which can implant sobriety and justice into depraved natures. Nevertheless, I do think that the study of political discourse can help more than any other thing to stimulate and form such qualities of character — Isocrates

I have other obligations now - the show, my family, my life ... though I know that without my sobriety I wouldn't have any of those things. — Rob Lowe

The Necrotelicomnicon was written by a Klatchian necromancer known to the world as Achmed the Mad, although he preferred to be called Achmed the I Just Get These Headaches. It is said that the book was written in one day after Achmed drank too much of the strange thick Klatchian coffee which doesn't just sober you up, but takes you through sobriety and out the other side, so that you glimpse the real universe beyond the clouds of warm self-delusion that sapient life usually generates around itself to stop it turning into a nutcake. Little is known about his life prior to this event, because the page headed 'About The Author' spontaneously combusted shortly after his death. However, a section headed 'Other Books By the Same Author' indicates that his previous published work was Achmed the I Just Get These Headaches's Book of Humorous Cat Stories, which might explain a lot. — Terry Pratchett