Reflecting on Fifteen Years of Continuous Sobriety

July 2nd, 2025 marked fifteen years of continuous sobriety for me. And since I wrote about it two years ago and then recorded an episode about it last year, it seems like marking my time on this platform has become a tradition. 

But I don’t feel good this week! (I’m kinda sick). So, I sat down and recorded something anyway and captured what’s true for me in this moment. (And I managed to say the wrong year and not notice until I’d already edited the episode! So. Sorry for the weird audio patch at the beginning).

I set out to talk about staying positive without being toxic, and then I ended up having a lot to say about that, as well as:

• feeling our feelings
• the relationship between fear and faith
• step two and believing change is possible
• that we can’t do life alone
• we get to choose our perspective
• and a bunch of other sober shit!

So, if you want to hear me be a bit rambly and reflective and willing to normalize that even those of us on a mission to spark more joy have hard, uncomfortable days… you’re invited to listen! 

And you’re also invited to let me know how you’re doing in this moment and what brings you joy. 

Reach out on Instagram or email me at cate[at]settlingisbullshit.com

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Transcript

Note: this transcript was generated by AI. Please forgive any malapropisms and misspellings. It’s the robot’s fault!

Cate Blouke (00:04.185)

I think there’s a lot of faith in being willing to feel your feelings, in being willing to do that. Like, I don’t think faith is actually just like handing it, like be like, hey, HP take away all of my shit. That’s not really faith. That’s hoping for a Santa Claus, God. I think the faith is in believing that the process will work. my God, I’m so annoyed at myself right now for just saying that. Let me be clear, like, ugh.

like faith in the process. I don’t even want to hear that right now, but I believe it.

[episode intro]

Hello my friend, quick disclaimer before you dive into this episode, this is a very ramble-y episode that I have chosen to leave as it is and not edit. I sat down to the microphone just talking about where I’m at at 15 years sober and it ended up going kinda long and going kinda windy and all over the place. And so if you’re looking for like a good juicy quick hit, this is not the episode for you. And I just wanted to give you a heads up because it’s nice to know what to expect. So if you wanna hear me talk about my life,

Cate Blouke (01:47.903)

and the thoughts that are on my mind in a more stream of conscious way than usual, then please I invite you to dive in. And if you don’t dive in, like that’s okay, but you listened to this much and I would love to hear what is going on in your life. Like I just want to hear from some listeners. It would be a gift. It would be a present to me for my 15 years for you to just like, let me know who you are and what’s going on with you. You can email me at cate at settlingisbullshit.com.

You can hit me up on Instagram. Those are the two ways to get a hold of me. And I would just like love to hear how you’re doing and what is bringing you joy today. So hit me up and if you’re still ready for a ride of Ramble, then welcome to the party. Hope you get something out of it.

Cate Blouke (02:44.495)

Hello my friend. I am recording this on July 2nd, 2010, which means that as of today, I have been continuously sober for 15 years. Or, as my little app tells me, 5,479 days. Which is not a particularly round number, but is a really goddamn long time.

And I wasn’t sure if I was gonna get an episode out this week. To be honest, I am sick and sad. and kinda on the struggle bus this week. That often will happen for me around sobriety anniversaries and just like not feeling well in the state of the world and being in a little bit of an existential moment with myself. But…

The cute thing is that I wrote a post for my 13-year soberversary two years ago, and then I recorded an episode for my 14th soberversary last year, and I just went back and listened to that, and in it I read the 13-year one. So it’s very meta. And now I’m like, well, this is apparently a tradition, and it was actually really helpful to go back and listen to where I was a year ago.

So if you’ve joined me since then, or you didn’t catch that episode, it was episode 14! That was 44 episodes ago, which was also kind of super fucking cool to realize. Anyway, I listened to it and a lot of the stuff that I talk about in that episode really holds true. But I think what’s like really up for me today, in this moment, in this year, is this idea of staying positive without the toxicity.

And I’ve kind of been wanting to record an episode about it. And today it feels alive because I’m not in a particularly great place in this like moment. I just got out therapy. Woo woo therapy. And I’m just feeling kind of down. And what sobriety has helped me to understand and be able to be with, in addition to therapy,

Cate Blouke (05:07.445)

is that I can be in discomfort, I can be in emotions that I don’t like, but that that doesn’t have to become pervasive. That my overall outlook on life and sense of well-being in the world can be positive even when I’m in a hard place. But that acknowledging when I’m in a hard place is how I get to maintain my sort of like

overall sense of well-being in the world. That’s a huge component of self-compassion practices is acknowledging when things are hard. And I know that in recovery, I have certainly fallen prey to the idea that I can just like step work my way out of discomfort, or I can just like go to a meeting and then I don’t have to feel that anymore. And I think there can be a lot of messaging that can reinforce that.

And so just want to say that like, just because we’re feeling bad or afraid or frustrated or depressed, it doesn’t mean that we’re doing anything wrong. Especially if you’re in recovery and you’re listening to this, I just really want you to hear that. I think that’s one of the big lessons that I have learned in the years that I’ve been sober is that the steps and the program don’t

guarantee that I’m going to feel good all the time and just because I don’t feel good doesn’t mean I’m doing something wrong. It’s actually just a component of being human. And I think that’s probably one of the big lessons that I have learned this year. If I had to name what the theme of Year 15 of Sobriety has been, it would be that just because things aren’t going the way I want them to doesn’t mean I’m doing something wrong. I’m reminded of that.

phrase that in AA you’ll hear is like, is God’s protection. But if you’re not sober and you aren’t really into the God word, like the rejection is the universe’s protection. That one of the hugest gifts for me of sobriety and recovery in AA specifically, just to not be anonymous about it, is cultivating a relationship with a power greater than myself and a sense of trust in the universe. And that

Cate Blouke (07:32.851)

required a lot of active effort on my part. I didn’t come into AA, I didn’t come into my 20s and 30s, because I got sober at 27, with a sense of trust in the universe. I didn’t come in with the woo-woo-ness that I now embrace. I had a very existential phase in college and was just like really struggling to make meaning of the world in my life.

And one of the many things I will be eternally grateful for is that getting sober in AA really offered me a pathway to cultivating a relationship with something greater than myself that I now call God because it’s convenient, but I also really, think, mean source or the universe or flow. You know, I’m really just fundamentally into this idea that the universe

God source, whatever you call it, is ultimately on my side and working for my good. That that’s a belief that I get to choose on a daily basis to show up for. And that usually when I’m feeling pretty terrible, it’s because I have forgotten that I believe that. And what allows me to connect with this sense of positivity, of faith, if you will, of hope, of

trying to be a joy activist in dark times is this notion that even when things aren’t going the way I want them to, my curriculum in life is to feel the feelings around that and to keep showing up anyway. But it’s not to skip over the feeling the feelings. That was actually what I used to drink about, was I didn’t want to feel the feelings. Whereas if I can learn to feel my feelings and

then get centered in my inner knowing, my higher self, my connection with my intuition, my connection with Source. That’s what allows me to keep showing up and to keep trying and to keep taking the next right action. Toxic positivity is what happens when we try to skip over the feeling, the feelings, when we try to delude ourselves into thinking like, okay, well, I just got a mind over matter this shit.

Cate Blouke (10:02.181)

If I just, you know, repeat that affirmation 30 times, like I’m not gonna feel sad today. I’m not having it. I’m not gonna get down. I’m just gonna keep on going, turn that frown upside down and go out into the world and pretend like nothing’s wrong. Like that’s the fucking toxic positivity. And what I have been gifted with in recovery is the opportunity

to really get honest and get real and learn how to be with difficult emotions, difficult times, and still stay grounded in the belief that things will get better. I had a lot of ideas about what I might talk about this week and this is just gonna be a rambly episode and fucking I don’t care. Full permission to stop listening at any point in time, my friends. I am gonna appreciate listening to this next year.

and hopefully some of you will get value out of it, but I think this one’s a little bit more for me than for you today. but I’ve been thinking about essentially step two, coming to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore its insanity or this idea that like change requires belief. That if we want to make changes in our lives, we have to believe that they’re possible. And.

what I’ve learned through recovery and as a coach and as a therapy client and as a friend is that we need other people to believe in shit for us if we’re gonna like sustain it or make it work. And sometimes we need people to believe in it for us before we can even start because we don’t believe in it for ourselves. You know, like that’s what it’s like to get sober.

is most of us end up in the rooms because we just don’t know what the fuck to do anymore and we become aware that we can’t do it by ourselves and so we walk into the rooms and there’s all these fucking happy people who haven’t had a drink in a long time and seem to know what they’re fucking doing with their lives and so we’re like, I’m miserable, you seem happy, I guess maybe I’ll listen to what you have to say. And that was true for me.

Cate Blouke (12:26.715)

Especially because I caught my drinking pretty young and things hadn’t got quote unquote that bad. But I was really sad and miserable inside. And I walked into the rooms of AA and there were all these people who would talk about things that were just so much worse than what I was going through at the time or had done. And they were happy and I was not. And so I was like, I want the Kool-Aid that you’re drinking, y’all.

Sorry, not literally. They don’t have kool-aid at meetings, but now I’m like, that would be cute. It’s usually just really bad coffee that I didn’t want. Yeah, I’m just like so present with the reality that I can’t do life alone. I can’t go after the things that I want for myself alone. I can’t take care of myself alone. And this…

awful, terrible capitalist, patriarchal idea that we are supposed to be like bootstrappy, self-sufficient is just so fucking toxic. It is part of the toxicity that is happening in the world right now in American politics. Specifically, this idea that like, we’re all in it for ourselves and other people should take care of their own shit is just gross.

And I’m really grateful that I have access to communities of care, that that’s what recovery rooms are, are communities of care. They’re a place that I can go and say, here’s what I’m struggling with and get witnessing and support and encouragement. And that’s why it’s like so important to be real and to be raw and to be vulnerable.

And that’s part of what I have tried to bring to this podcast to model and why I was like, you know what, I am going to record an episode today because it’s a big important day for me. And the reality is I’m having a lot of mixed emotions and that’s okay. And like, I’m a year deep into entrepreneurship and it’s been hard. This shit is hard y’all.

Cate Blouke (14:51.754)

I don’t like marketing. don’t like having to say like, hey, book a session with me. Hey, coaching would be great and you should do it. I don’t really like social media that much. And that’s like the honest reality. And it’s the kind of thing that we like don’t talk about that much as entrepreneurs or as coaches, or at least I don’t get to see it, is the realness around it, the raw side of it.

Because we’re all like looking for answers. We’re all, well, let me backtrack that. I mean, my assumption is that we all go to social media and just like want somebody to tell us what to do with our lives and give us answers. And, you know, as a coach, my job is to help you find your answers. And by the way, like I’m really fucking good at my job. I feel very confident and energized and excited when I get to coach people.

But as with any change or any big cool thing that we want for ourselves, there’s all this other shit that we don’t know we don’t know and that isn’t fun. And so the business side of building a business is not my favorite. And so it’s been a hard year. It’s been a really hard year. It’s been an up-leveling year for me. A year ago when I recorded my 14-year…

You know, I was full of pep in my step and vim and vigor and was like, woo party, I’m on this adventure. And now I’m at the phase of the quest where it’s like, we’ve like depleted our resources and we’re all kind of like tired and we keep having to fight monsters. And it’s like, we’re not at the like dark night at the soul moment, but it’s just like the middle slog, I think.

And describing it that way makes it lighter and a little bit funny and helps me reconnect to this notion that life is just like a fucking series of adventures and a lot of them are gonna take us down weird twists and turns that we can’t anticipate and that we get to choose to believe that we’re headed toward and ultimately like

Cate Blouke (17:17.59)

beneficial and valuable destination, even though it is almost never gonna be the one we were actually aiming for. You know, like when I was in four, when I was a kiddo, I really wanted to be a veterinarian and that dream died in fourth grade. And I don’t regret that, cause I don’t, I’m actually very squeamish and don’t like the insides of things or bad smells. You know, but like,

So I think it’s just funny and cute and charming that so many of us get this idea of what our life is supposed to be when we’re teens or 20s or even just like early 30s. like, I’m supposed to be going in this direction. And life is so much more interesting and exciting when we can hold that loosely and let go more easily and more flexibly. And what has helped me do that?

is like be more flexible and courageous and curious and excited about the twists and turns in life is this kind of core sense that there is something out there that is helping me become an even brighter, healthier version of myself. And I started going to

the recovery gym here in Portland a few months ago. And it’s a gym for sober people or for folks in recovery by folks in recovery. And it’s a CrossFit gym, which like never in a million years would I have thought that life would take me down that path. And what that experience continues to teach me every time I go is that growth is hard. That

Getting what I want requires determination and effort and patience and can be like frustrating and exhausting. cumulatively things add up. And I think that’s actually a really nice summation of what it has been like to be sober for 15 years is that like it has required a lot of effort of me.

Cate Blouke (19:42.104)

and lot of willingness to be uncomfortable and a lot of willingness to learn to be flexible and to grow and to stretch. And that even though I haven’t gotten the kind of cash in prizes that I was hoping for in early sobriety, even though I am very much not where I thought I would be at 15 years deep, I’m in a real cool place. Even on a week where I’m sad and having

kind of a hard time. I have access to this sense that like I’m in a really cool place. Like life’s actually kind of cool. The fucking fascists are coming and the world is burning and shit’s crazy. And also I can be joyful and I can show up to a goddamn CrossFit gym in a tank top with sequins on it to celebrate.

being sober for 15 years with a bunch of people who are also committed to their own kind of sobriety and growth. And it was really cool and really meaningful to me. And that’s kind of what the core concept of positivity is all about. It’s a core concept in positive psychology. That’s one of the training programs I’ve been through and really what I bring to my coaching and to my life.

is this sense that we get to choose our perspective and we get to unlearn, we get to like untrain our brains from focusing on the negative. One of my favorite pieces of AA literature is a story in the big book called Acceptance is the Answer and

The part of the story that usually gets read is all about how acceptance is a solution to all of my problems today. And I have a whole episode about the difference between settling and acceptance, and that’s great, and we love acceptance. Huzzah. But my actual favorite part of that story is a little bit later, it’s like a page or two later, it’s talking about how when I focus on the problem, the problem increases, and when I focus on the solution, the solution increases. And I think that is really so core.

Cate Blouke (22:00.618)

to living a joyful, vibrant, thriving life is being able to recognize, being able to catch myself when I’m focusing on the negative. And I think the important component that doesn’t get talked about in the story is I don’t get to just flip my pair of glasses from

the sort of like negative, like here’s everything that’s wrong glasses to the like, yay, everything’s sunshiney and woohoo glasses. There’s a step in between where I take off the negative glasses and I get centered and I feel whatever feelings need to be felt around the negative or around the frustration and the sadness. I really have to like go through that.

first in order to be able to then consciously pick up the like, okay, here’s the rose-cuddly glasses, here’s the choice that I am making, the conscious choice that I am making to look at things from a more vibrant and gratitude-filled perspective. But part of what I hope I have been able to do in this episode is normalize the fact that that is hard. Even for me, even for someone who is generally pretty like upbeat peppy,

et cetera. I didn’t come into sobriety looking like this, y’all. And it’s always like an ongoing conscious practice. And that I think it’s really important to normalize and acknowledge that no matter how long I’ve been sober, no matter how much work I have done on myself, I don’t get to get out of the like hard feelings of being human. I don’t get to

excuse myself from disappointment or frustration or grief. And that that’s not the point. You know, the point of like truly joyful living, which is what I am trying to preach on this podcast and trying to put out in the world, is wholehearted living. It’s the capacity to be with all of our feelings and to honor what’s true for us and then to make conscious choices.

Cate Blouke (24:21.836)

to be grateful, to stay positive, to focus on what I can bring to a situation or what I can contribute rather than just what I’m getting out of it or what I’m not getting out of it especially. That that’s the place of empowerment and choice and agency. And unfortunately, I don’t get to just go there by doing enough step work or going to enough meetings or calling my sponsor enough or whatever. I don’t get to live there all the time. That’s what

being addicted and being in my alcoholism looked like was I just wanted to feel good all the time, and that’s not actually a realistic expectation in life. And so I tried to create that situation with drugs and alcohol, and then that just usually made shit worse. And so on this kind of like weird Wednesday in July, which is in many ways just another day and in

other ways is like a really big day for me. I’m both really grateful and really sad. I’m both filled with awe and appreciation and also anxiety and disappointment and frustration. And all of that can be true. We get to have conflicting feelings. I had a lovely conversation with a friend yesterday.

about how I don’t believe in this idea that fear is the opposite of faith. I may have talked about this on the podcast, I don’t know, but if I haven’t, here you go. I find that idea actually pretty toxic. The idea that if I am in fear, then I am not in faith shames me away from feeling my feelings. I fundamentally believe that like I can—

absolutely know in my soul that the universe has got my back, which I do when I can access that part of myself. And I can also get freaked out sometimes. And it doesn’t mean that like, I’m doing something wrong, I’m not believing hard enough, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like that’s a version of toxic positivity. That’s a version of, I don’t know, toxic spirituality. I think that what there is to do is that like when I’m freaked out,

Cate Blouke (26:49.618)

It’s just like an opportunity to be present with that. Like I don’t get to just like be freaked out and then be like, God, fix my freak out. It’s, it’s that I have to say like, okay, like what am I freaked the fuck out about right now? Like, let me actually get that out of my system. Let me write it down. Let me say it out loud. Let me talk to someone about it so that it gets out of my system. I have to like.

acknowledge it and feel it to get to the other side. And then I can look at like what’s reality and what’s true and what needs to be addressed. And it’s in that process that I think like my higher power gets to come in and be helpful. But I think there’s a lot of faith in being willing to feel your feelings and being willing to do that. Like I don’t think faith is actually just like handing it like be like, hey, HP take away all of my shit.

That’s not really faith, that’s hoping for a Santa Claus God. I think the faith is in believing that the process will work. my God, I’m so annoyed at myself right now for just saying that. Let me be clear, like, ugh. Like faith in the process? I don’t even want to hear that right now, but I believe it. You know, that that’s I think kind of the point of all of this shit I’ve been rambling about is that

having a sense of connection to source is having faith that the process is what it’s supposed to be and is going to get me where I’m supposed to go and is going to be kind of like bumpy and rocky and uncomfortable sometimes. And my job is to like acknowledge the discomfort instead of running away from it or trying to ignore it or pretend it doesn’t exist. So here I am.

Being imperfect, being messy, being a human, having a human experience, being kind of sick, being kind of frustrated, being kind of disappointed, being kind of sad, and sharing that with you in the hopes that like this helps you feel less alone in whatever you’re going through right now. That even those of us who

Cate Blouke (29:19.554)

talk about this stuff, who have cultivated skills and tools and awareness and perspective that we want to share. Like, we’re not immune. Like, it doesn’t mean that we don’t have hard days too. Like, we’re all just humans on this human ride. And sometimes it’s, you know, not an especially comfortable ride. So if you made it to the end of this episode, you are a darling, dear human.

And I would just really fucking love to know what’s going on with you. Like honestly, it would mean so much to me for you to reach out on social media. You can message me on Instagram. You can also email me at kate at settlingisbullshit.com. Like I would just like love to hear from y’all because so much of this is just like talking into the void. And I know you’re listening.

But I would love for it to be a little bit more of a conversation. And I would just really love to hear what you got out of this, what you want out of this podcast. You know, I am open to listener feedback, suggestion, conversation, because this really is about you. Like, I want you to know that I think you’re fucking awesome. And if you want to send me an email, I will tell you that you are fucking awesome directly.

and not just into the general population. Anyone can hear it. Oh, all right, my friends, I’m gonna stop there. I hope that whatever’s going on for you today, you can find some comfort and some capacity for self-care.

Cate Blouke (31:07.052)

Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please help me grow the podcast by subscribing, leaving a review, and sharing it with anyone you think would benefit from hearing it too. Your support means the world to me. If you’d like to get updates about new episodes, posts, and offerings, please visit settlingisbullshit.com to subscribe to my newsletter. You can also find information there about working with me one-on-one to build your most amazing life. Until next time, remember that I believe in you and that you are fucking awesome.