Word!
This year I have done about 4 separate months of complete sobriety.
After about 5 weeks or whatever I get to a point where I'm like, "welllllll, I can handle just a couple beers or a bit of wine, I've got this under control..." then I end up back at square one.
So I know that I can do it, it's just a matter of staying really vigilant, and just saying "NO" at all costs, especially once I start to get comfortable.
Comfort can equal complacency, and that's where I've burned myself in the past.
For me, it's not the first few weeks that are hard, it's a month or two months later that's the tempting part.
Another thing that really opened my eyes was while meditating I asked myself, "what's the best memory I have of drinking in the last month?" When I couldn't think of one, I extended it to 2 months, 3, 4...the last half-year...and really, all of my " super feel good, party happy memories" with drinking are from frikken 4 years ago!
So it's not like drinking is even fun for me anymore. Plus, my tolerance and recovery is shit, so, there's really zero reason to put that shit into my body anymore.
One really great ray of hope is that traditionally I've always accomplished big life-goals a year LATER than what I originally decided:
In 2006 I was stuck basically in the background of some other guy's band, doing what he wanted; and I made up my mind to "take charge of my own destiny" and that by the end of '06 I was "GOING TO WRITE AND RECORD MY OWN ALBUM!"
I failed pretty miserably, but by the end of 2007 it was done and I had a new touring band, doing what I wanted to do.
And then 2007 was when I was gonna join Jiu Jitsu: I was all stoked, and looking at Gis online, watching videos...and then, nothing; I just didn't do it.
But, 2008, I manned up, jumped in head first, never missed a single class, and boom, all these years later I'm teaching the class!
So, January of this year was when I first declared that I would get sober...11 months later, the time is now!