The Rich Roll Podcast - Andy Ramage On Creating The ‘One Year No Beer’ Movement & How Alcohol-Freedom Unlocked His Potential

Episode Date: May 26, 2019

Over the years, I have openly shared my personal journey with alcoholism and that of many guests. A lifeline for the desperate many that struggle in silence, I do this to underscore that there is always hope, no matter how far down you find yourself. But what if you’re not an alcoholic? What if you, like millions of people, occasionally drink just a little too much? Even though it doesn't destroy your life, it leaves you feeling off. You're tired of the hangovers, the lethargy and the low grade depression it provokes. You'd prefer to stop. But because drinking is integral to your social or professional life, opting out seems impossible. What then? This week's guest faced this very predicament, a relatable scenario for a vast number of people. The only difference? Andy Ramage decided to do something about it. A former professional footballer (as they say in the UK), a career-ending injury prompted Andy to hang up the cleats and enter the world of finance. Channeling his work ethic, it didn't take long for him to become successful in the traditional sense, co-creating two multimillion-dollar city brokerages. But doing well in banking ‘required' (or so he thought) drinking. Lots of drinking. Long Mad Men style booze-soaked client lunches. Countless happy hours, pub crawls, and cocktail soirées, followed by clubbing and the occasional after party. It's just what you gotta do to play the game. Andy didn’t necessarily have a drinking ‘problem’. But the lifestyle left him drained. Listless. And looking for a change. Bucking the unwritten rules of his professional environment, he decided to to take a break from alcohol and embarked instead on a quest for peak performance and well-being. It stuck. Not only did Andy feel markedly better, his work performance improved. His relationships became more meaningful. He fell back in love with the simple things that brought him joy as a young lad. Slowly, a new world of life opportunities began to emerge. Transformed, Andy enthusiastically began sharing his experience, challenging friends and colleagues to quit the booze for 28, 90 or even 365-days. What he didn't know was that the friendly contest he concocted among peers would soon explode into a full-blown international movement he ultimately dubbed One Year No Beer. Today, Andy and his friend Ruari Fairbairns have birthed OYNB into a world-leading behavioral change platform offering instruction and support for a variety of alcohol free challenges. Their companion book, The 28-Day Alcohol-Free Challenge* is a UK bestseller (now available in the U.S.*). To date, their endeavors have inspired over 50,000 people to boot the bottle and invest instead in well-being. I first met Andy two years ago when he turned up for our Plantpower Ireland retreat. Fast friends from the outset, I've wanted to share his story ever since. Alcoholism is a self-diagnosed disease. Left untreated, it will progress, ultimately leading you to one of three places: jail, institutions, or death. So if you are a true alcoholic, or a sober member of a certain unnamed 12-step program, Andy's message isn't necessarily aimed at you. This one is for the average drinker, those a bit closer to ‘normal’ (whatever that is) on the alcohol spectrum who find themselves abusing the booze from time to time. It’s for those who started drinking in their teens and never really stopped. And it’s for people who have maintained a slow and steady pace of consumption without any given thought to addiction or the negative side effects of alcohol on a daily basis. In other words, this conversation is directed at the majority of our society.  Because quitting alcohol isn’t just for alcoholics. Enjoy! Rich Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Most people start drinking in their teens, they never really stop. And if you think about it, if you drink once or twice a week, you're always slightly under the cloud of alcohol. You're not maybe displaying the classic signs of nausea and all that sort of stuff, right? That's gone the day after if you've got a bit of a hangover. But it affects your sleep. Go and look at the science, right? Alcohol destroys restorative sleep. And then look at the science about poor sleep.

It's awful for your productivity, for your motivation, for your mental health. So I think people, again, in this middle lane, the moderate drinkers, the average drinkers, don't realize what it's doing to them. It's about what it's doing to you mentally. It's like kryptonite to your dreams in many ways. It's holding you back. It's preventing you from being your best self. That's Andy Ramage, this week on The Rich Roll Podcast.

The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. How are you guys doing? What's happening? My name is Rich Roll. I'm your host. This is my podcast. And today is a very special day because I have a couple guests here that want to say hi. Say hi everybody. Yes! We are coming at you from the hills of the Tuscan countryside on the final day of our Plant Power Italia retreat. It's been an amazing transformative week. And today I'm just carrying on the tradition

that we started a couple of years ago of including the group in the recording of one of the podcasts to offer. So happy to have all of you guys here today to help me get through this. Recording the intros is like the hardest part of this whole thing for me. It's painful, but we're going to get through it together. So excited to have you here today. So the subject matter of today's conversation pivots around alcoholism in general. And alcoholism is a subject that might have come up over the course of this week.

It's certainly a subject that is frequently discussed on the podcast. And I've openly shared my personal experience with this disease. As most of you guys know, I've been sober for many years. But alcoholism is something that is a self-diagnosed condition. Only you can determine if you have it.

And if you do, if you realize or come to the understanding that you are indeed a true alcoholic, I can make you a couple of promises. Unless you get sober and stay sober, it's not going to be a good journey. Your path will eventually lead to one or more of three places that you don't want to go, either jails, institutions, or death. So this is very real. But what if you're not an alcoholic? What if you're just somebody who occasionally drinks? No big deal, like tons and tons of people. Perhaps you drink a little bit too much once in a

while. Maybe your social circles dictate that drinking is part and parcel of your weekly routine. And over the years, you've just bought into this lifestyle, even though you know it's not great. You're getting tired of hangovers and waking up and just generally feeling like crap more often than you would like to. And yet you have this nagging feeling, idea that if you stop, this is going to hinder your social or your professional life more than it's going to help. What do you do if you're one of these people? And I think this is a very relatable scenario. It's a scenario that millions and millions of people can relate to. And it's exactly the predicament that this week's guest faced. Andy Ramage is a former professional footballer, as they say in the UK.

That's soccer for us Americans. Who, after a career-ending injury, ends up going into finance and in pretty short shrift becomes quite successful. Successful in the traditional sense, co-creating two multi-million dollar city brokerages. creating two multimillion dollar city brokerages. And in Andy's business, a big part of the lifestyle of doing well professionally, quote unquote, requires, or so he thought, drinking. Lots of drinking. Long, Mad Men style, booze-soaked lunches with clients,

countless cocktail parties, going to the pub after work, going to the club after that, the whole deal. Essentially, it's just what you got to do to play his game. And he didn't necessarily have a drinking problem, but the whole thing, the whole lifestyle just left him drained, it left him tired, and ultimately a little bit broken. And he realized that he just couldn't keep going down this path. He needed to change. So he ends up going on this quest for peak performance and wellbeing. And as part of this process, he takes a break from alcohol and this break ends up sticking. Not only does he feel better, his work performance improves, shocking. Can you believe that? His work went up when he stopped drinking.

His relationships become more meaningful and he falls back in love with all of these things that brought him joy as a young lad. And this whole new world of opportunities for his life begins to emerge. And it was so transformational in fact, that Andy starts to share his experience and he ends up recruiting and challenging his friends and his colleagues with something he and his friend end up calling one year no beer, one year no beer. among friends would explode, leading him to not only write a best-selling book

about the whole thing called the 28-Day Alcohol-Free Challenge, but also co-found a movement called, what do you think the movement's called? One Year No Beer. Let me hear it louder. One Year No Beer. One Year No Beer, oneyearnobeer.com, as a matter of fact.

And it's grown into this world-leading behavioral change platform that offers instruction and support for a variety of alcohol-free challenges. And along the way, Andy and Rory, his co-founder in this, have inspired over 50,000 people to date. And it's so successful, in fact, that Andy ultimately walked away from his lucrative finance career to foster it full-time. It's a great story. It's all coming up in a couple few, but first. We're brought to you today by recovery.com.

I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because, unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs.

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And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem, Thank you. to support and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, gambling addictions, and more. Navigating their site is simple. Search by insurance coverage, location, treatment type,

you name it. Plus, you can read reviews from former patients to help you decide. Whether you're a busy exec, a parent of a struggling teen, or battling addiction yourself, I feel you. I empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. really do, and they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. Okay, Andy.

So like I said, I first met Andy about two years ago on the Plant Power Ireland retreat. We became fast friends, like I do with everybody who attends our retreats. And I always knew that I wanted to share his powerful story with all of you guys here today. And I think it's an impactful one. It's not necessarily for those of you who are in 12-step or all you people who know deep down

that perhaps you need 12-step. I think it's more for those who are a bit closer to normal on the alcohol spectrum. Those who consider themselves average drinkers, people in the middle who find themselves abusing alcohol from time to time, those who most likely started drinking in their teens and never really stopped,

people who kind of maintained a slow and steady pace of alcohol consumption without any real given thought to addiction or the negative side effects of alcohol on a daily basis, which basically means a majority of our society, right? This is the way that most people relate to alcohol in our culture. So I think this one is really great.

And despite Andy proclaiming himself an introvert, he is quite the storyteller. Final thing, Andy, as a thank you to all of you out there for listening, wanted to give you guys a special deal. You can get 25% off their 28-day, 90-day, and 365-day alcohol-free challenges when you use the promo code RICHROLL at oneyearnobeer.com. And in full disclosure, I don't have any financial entanglement here. I'm not an affiliate. I'm not getting paid for that code or otherwise. And neither Andy nor One Year No Beer

is sponsoring this podcast. It's just a great program. I encourage all of you guys to check it out. So you guys, say hello to Andy. Give him a greeting from Italy from our retreat. Andy, we miss you. We love you. And we're so excited to share your message

with everybody here today because your name has come up several times over the course of the week. So much love, my friend and everybody out there. Please enjoy my conversation with Andy Ramage. Good to see you, my friend. Thanks for coming over to do this. I'm excited, man. I'm excited.

Last time I saw you was a beautiful day in Shoreditch. Yeah, hanging out. Super trendy neighborhood in London, and we had a catch up. And we talked about when you were going to come to LA to do the podcast, and that day has arrived. That day has certainly arrived. I'm excited. And what a lovely day that was in Shoreditch. And I came all the way to LA, and it's lashing with rain. What's the story with that? I blame you. The rain was insane. It's already rained more in the last week than it did all

last winter. Which we need. It's good. Yeah, it's good. But just not when I'm here. Come on, I see the adverts from home and Rob Lowe and all those handsome people in the sunshine and I arrive over and it's lashing. That's not supposed to happen. I like how you zeroed in on Rob Lowe. Yeah, I've got him in my mind for some reason. Well, your mistake number one was January. Picking January as the month to come here. There's this idea, this endless summer beach boys concept that it's always 85 and sunny here. And we do have a winter, it's mild, know it's in the 40s and it rains

in the winter so sorry to burst that bubble a little bit but we have some sun for you today good yes it's back we're back on track um well you've been on a crazy journey that we're gonna uh unpack as i like to say here um but before we even do that just congratulations up front you've made the leap from full-time career into this kind of social entrepreneurship, community building, activism. I don't know what you would describe it as. Occupation, which is no small thing, man. It's huge. Yeah, and it's been a real adventure, probably a 10-year adventure to get here.

It's not like I came up with this idea and ditched the work and decided to run straight headfirst into this adventure. It's just been a slow, gradual process, but here I am, you know, and it's so super exciting. I had a couple of days ago, Brad Stolberg and Steve Magnus, who wrote a book called The Passion Paradox. And it looks at this tension that exists between the pressure to kind of leap and follow your passion, no matter what the consequences, versus the new hot take, which is maybe don't follow your passion. That's not so smart for most people. Do the wise thing. And where they kind of come down on it is what you have executed on beautifully, which is following your passion,

but doing it incrementally and responsibly. Because I think when we met in Shoreditch, you were still working part-time and perhaps with an aim of ultimately at some point getting out, but not in a hurry to do so. Oh, absolutely. And there's this whole sort of thesis around Cal Newport, I don't know if you're familiar.

Yeah, he's coming on the podcast pretty soon. He just sent me a galley of his new book. Oh, right. I'm excited by that because I think he's great. Deep work and so good they can't ignore you. And the whole thesis behind that is that actually you grow your passion over time. You grow meaning over time. That certainly happened for me.

You know, I never would have thought down the line that here i am this sort of entrepreneur and helping people you know change their relationship with alcohol when five years ago i was knee deep in the stuff yeah you know and here i am and i think it's very much that take in life that actually you can build this momentum towards you know your passion and your meaning and it's not about rushing headfirst into it you can do this stuff on the side you know you can create these side hustles and these movements in and around the day job to the point that you realize this is something that I'm impassioned by. I'm going all in, but in a gradual process that's not going to put your family and things together. Right. It's not a binary mathematical equation. It's more like

advanced calculus because you essentially are walking away from a very lucrative career with a pretty predictable trajectory where you know you're going to be making X for the next number of years to step into not necessarily the most easy to comprehend for-profit venture. It's not like, oh, I'm going to do this startup now and we're going to scale this thing and sell it. You're creating essentially a movement. And so you go, well, how am I going to make a living starting a movement that I kind of want to be free for everybody, much like November Project or something? Yeah. And ultimately that's when we first set one beer up four or five years ago, the idea that it was going to be completely free. And we were two well-paid brokers, Ruri Fairbains and I, the co-founder. And we were like, just give

this stuff away. We were so impassioned about our own story. Let's help as many people as we can. And then we realized quite quickly that actually free costs a lot of money when you're self-funding this thing. And we were like, hold on, this is literally hundreds of thousands of pounds we'd put into this thing. Not free for you. No, not for me and Ruri. And we got to pay for it. And we were like, hold on, this is literally hundreds of thousands of pounds we'd put into this thing. Not free for you. No, not for me and Ruri. And we got to this point about two years ago, funny enough. And we were like, I don't think we can continue.

We can't fund this thing anymore. We were broken. Again, we were broken in our body and our minds because we were doing this around our very busy jobs and our families and whatnot, that we're going to close the doors. And it was one of those moments. We got together to predict the next six months. And within that we both looked at each other and went i don't i don't think we can do this man i think i think we've got to go and uh we said look let's just take two weeks off we're going to turn the lights off and by fluke i'd created this really basic um course

let's call it to show people how to take a break from alcohol and give them all these tips and tricks about behavioral change and it was really easy for for me to put a paid for component on that. So when we closed the doors, I said, look, let's just leave this. I'm going to flick the switch and see if we can sell some of this stuff. We disappeared for two weeks, came back and it was like this little miracle. It was like, we sold five of these courses, right? It wasn't a lot, but it was enough for us to go, ah, maybe there's another way to do this. Maybe actually people would pay to come and learn from us and learn all these tips and tricks and whatnot to try and better themselves. And we can create a real

business then that actually is robust enough to help lots and lots of people. Just enough sort of positive vibes in your direction to keep that pilot light lit. Yeah, yeah. And that was it. And then literally, I think two weeks after, Pam McMillan came to us and said, would you write a book? The 28-Day Alcohol-Free Challenge. And it literally has taken off from there.

We just haven't looked back to the point now we've got investment coming in the front door, which we can get into a bit later. Joe DeSena has just invested in Spartan Races. That's great. Yeah, I know Joe. That's fantastic. Yeah, so now it's becoming this real business to do good in the world which is super exciting to the point that i've stepped away from broken as you mentioned there i was still doing two days a week but it was never really two days a week you know it's like

your mind's always in it um to the point that now this is a full-time vocation this is not a job this that's crazy this is just how does it feel to be completely free of the oil business? It is wonderful. Because my text and WhatsApps and whatnot, it's always going on, right? That is a real fast paced, full on type of business. It's very hard to just dip your toe into that business because when you're in there, it's game on. And there's always problems associated with that. So for me to have had the last six weeks just writing my next book, thinking about wanting a beer, trying to do a bit of the social stuff and all these was uh and it's an ambitious it's a it's ambitious to be able to execute on that and you're doing it man it's unbelievable it's super cool to see yeah and exactly and i think if you remember back at the plant-based uh way retreat i stood up

and said you know what i think i know what i'm going to do i think i'm going to leave my job and try and take this to the clarity that that got the clarity that that was going to be your mission. It took me a year and a half to get there. Well, it's scary. You have kids and a wife and mortgage and all of these things. Every responsible person and everybody in that more conservative world

is going to pull you back to stay. Oh, exactly. And then there is that pressure. Exactly. You've got a family and you've got these people dependent on you and you've got this dream and you've got this passion, but eventually it always wins out. And you said to me all the time, look, when you get out and you really get the chance to focus on this, great things are going to happen. And here I am. Yeah. You have to open that door to allow that energy to come in. Yeah, exactly. And there's something about setting aside

the responsible aspect of kind of bridging both worlds or having one foot in each world, which I think is important. And I did that and you've done that. At some point, you've got to leap all the way. And until you do so, you're not really putting the message out to the universe that you're all in. So why

should anybody else reward you for being all in? Exactly. That's so true. I think you've got to show up at some point. You've got to literally stand up and be counted and say, right, I'm going to do this. I don't care what the consequences are. And ultimately, as you said yourself, I think once you go all in, people notice that, people respect that, and you start to gain the extra momentum that you couldn't probably quite get before. Yeah. Well, let's back it up. I want to hear the origin story, the superhero origin story, which begins with an athletic kid with a dream of becoming a professional footballer. Yeah. I mean, so I signed with a professional club when I was 10 years old.

Oh, I didn't know it went back that far. Yeah, yeah. So I've signed with a club. Where in England did you grow up? So I grew up in East London, a place called Dagenham or Dagingham, if you want to be posh. It's not very posh. It's very blue color, working class, I guess, humble beginnings. But I loved it there.

You know, I had two things, a BMX bike and football. That's all I needed. And I was very lucky, parents together, full-time mom to look after me and my two brothers, just all I needed you know I was very lucky parents together full-time mum to look after me and my two brothers just all about football and I just loved it it was my passion and I think it was very much it gave me a focal point it gave me meaning I felt comfortable in that environment and outside of that environment I was less comfortable in many ways but I had this like burning passion to to win yeah know, from a very young age. But it wasn't almost to win in terms of victory.

I just didn't want to lose. You know, it was that kind of mindset. I was very driven to not lose. And even when I think back, you know, it's like funny when I've spent- What did losing represent for you? It meant that, you know, let's look at the work of Carol Dweck, right? It was that fixed mindset. I could not lose at anything because it meant that I wasn't good enough, right? It was that fixed mindset. I could not lose anything because it meant that I

wasn't good enough, right? I believed. And if you look at the Carol Dweck's work, fixed mindset versus growth mindset and fixed mindset being that everything's innate, it's inbuilt. Growth mindset being that you can learn and be better. I was totally at the one end of the scale. Fixed mindset, I was this athletic God sent down to be the best at everything. So I couldn't afford to lose because it was it was the death now it just meant i wasn't good enough you know so and even when i reflect on like carol beck's work for example it's really interesting because obviously the big movement is towards the growth mindset but that fixed mindset was like fire in my belly you know it got me so far really

quickly and i think a lot of athletes in some ways end up with a fixed mindset to a point but the great athletes then learn to have a growth. Yeah, I mean, I'm asking because I relate to this very much as somebody who grew up with a strong desire to try to control my environment, whose self-esteem was very much wed to how fast I was swimming in the pool. And it's like a life or death thing. Like it feels so real and the stakes are very high, even though looking back on it now, it's like, who cares? Right. Yeah. But, but I look at it like, this is what I can control. I can control how hard I work, how much yardage I'm putting in,

how many workouts I'm doing a week. And somehow that made me feel safe amidst you know some chaos that was beyond my ability to manage oh absolutely and for me when it got really interesting was a few years later at 16 I mean I left school at 16 to go and be a professional footballer and I reflect on that my daughter's 13 I couldn't imagine in three years she'd go out into the big wide world and I loved loved it, right? That wasn't work. It's Phil's- You're living the dream, especially in the UK. Yeah. Like rockstar. It's a great stuff. I remember when you talk about rockstar, I remember like driving, this was when you're 17, you can drive. And I was driving along the A12. It's a bit like a

dual carriageway in my beaten up Ford Fiesta that costs like 200 pounds, right? This thing had no central heating. you could start it with a house key that's the sort of car that it was right I remember driving along in this thing and bearing in mind I'm driving in ski gloves because it's so freezing I've got to undo all the windows because there's no heating to de-mist I've got right said Fred a real like cheesy blaring out on my stolen car stereo this This is something up. And I remember thinking to myself, Andy, you've made it, man. You've made it. And there I was, you know, at 17.

And in my eyes, I had. It was the greatest gift ever to be a professional footballer. But what happened when I got there, I quickly realized I wasn't good enough. Technically, I was miles behind the other boys. And something happened then that was to serve me for the rest of my life. I started to read a lot, which seems like a strange thing to do, right? You're a professional footballer and you start reading, but I started to read about all the other great players.

What were they doing? And this shifted that fixed mindset to a growth mindset because I figured it out. Hold on, all the greatest players in the land, they're the last people to leave the training pitch. They're the ones that actually are training harder and working harder than any other of the professionals. This is not an inbuilt thing.

This is something they've nurtured and they've worked hard on. And I picked up on that. And that was fantastic for my career, right? Because quite quickly, it escalated me up the ranks to the point at 18, I thought I was going to become a professional. And you talk about this is hard. This is brutal. We literally queued outside the manager's office at 18. You find out you're going to be a professional professional or you're out. You're not good enough. And it's that brutal. One by one, you go in to the manager's office. And I walked in like a hero and walked out devastated. You're not good enough, son. Out you go. And when I reflect on it now, I spoke to my brother about it. And he said at the time, what I said to them was, look, I respect your decision, but I'm going to prove you wrong. And I did. I found a professional club and I scored in the professional league and done all

those things I dreamt of all of my life. And then actually at 21, I got injured and my career was over. Right. What I love about that story is that you weren't content to just accept this talent deficit that you were being told, like, look, you're only going to go so far. But through dedication to learning and mastery over craft, you're able to bridge that talent deficit gap and still make your way. Oh, absolutely. And it's the greatest gift, I think, is reading and podcasts. I will say that I think podcasts and reading, you know, it's a close second now. But for me, books have transformed my life throughout my life, and they continue to do so. What were the books at'd see that they were training harder than anyone else you know these were the guys putting in the effort whereas to the naked eye you just thought they were naturally gifted they just turned up and bent it like beckham but

actually the truth was they were working harder than anyone else so i picked up on that and thought right i need to add that to my game and that got me to a place that most boys never get to right because most boys drop out because it's it's really tough but I think what football taught me which served me so well in my broking career down the line was about failure and athletes will tell you that you learn about failure on a daily basis you know are you in the team every pass every missed time tackle you get dropped from the side you're in the side that's brutally hard and then you get told you're not good enough a couple of years later, you know, and you've got to pick yourself up and come back stronger from that. And those lessons have served me all of my life, that ability to be able to keep

coming back. So you make your way, what was the team you were playing on in your twenties? Gillingham. So these are like second, third division. These are not like premiership clubs, but they're professional clubs. Right. And then you get injured. I get it. How old are you? I'm 21.

21, okay. 21. It's pretty devastating. And I ended up in Ireland actually at this stage where I met my now wife, Tyra. And I had a great old time. You know, I absolutely loved it over there, you know, and I got into IT and the crack, as they say, and I love Ireland. It's such a special place. And I spent about three or four years there working. Then I went traveling around Australia again with Tara and I arrived back 26 years old. Just to stop in London for a little

while, my brother said, look, I think you'd be quite good at this broken thing, right? My brother's a trader for BP. So he was like the big, one of the biggest traders in the market. And he said, look, basically, I think I'll line you up an interview see how it goes and i turn up for my interview we have two bottles of wine and that was a sign of things to come you know it's like this is what this this life's all two bottles of wine at the interview in the office or at like a restaurant no no at a restaurant okay no not in the office luckily that comes later but you know and at 25 this was just wonderful to me i was like hold hold on, there's this industry I can go and be in and you get to entertain, you get to take people out. And it was

like sport for me. Broken was like sport. If you've seen it, it's fast paced. You've got to be on your toes all the time. There's slide tackles, there's sending offs. It's just like, you know, professional sport to me. And, you know, it was something that I really excelled in quickly, very quickly over the years, grew quite a big business at quite a young age and loved it. It was just part of who I was. There's an aggressiveness to it, a competitiveness to it that is different from other industries because it's so like dynamic and visceral. Yeah. The trading environment.

And it's so work hard, play hard. Oh, absolutely. And not many people can handle it. It's one of those things that it's, and you can't work out who's going to be good at it. What I love about the broken industry, you can have the PhD going up against the barrow boy without an exam to his name. And the barrow boy can run rings around the PhD, you know, because it's a different type of mindset, but it is all about that fast pace learning to handle failure because it's a different type of mindset, but it is all about that fast pace, learning to handle failure because it's an emotional rollercoaster on a daily basis. And a lot of people just haven't got the stomach for it as it were, but it was something that I excelled in very quickly. But then I sort of reached that place at 35, having 10 years in

that industry of, you know, having a good time and working super hard and playing super hard and all those things. And I had one of those slow epiphanies, I'm going to call it at 35, where I'd sort of made it in that sort of stereotypical sense. I'd spent the last 10 years trying to get to this point, but I was overweight, unfit, unhealthy. My relationships were strained. You know, I was very unhealthy mentally and physically in many ways. Yet here I was, I'd reached that sort of conventional nirvana as it were of a successful career in the house and a family and the kids and all that sort of stuff and I was like oh I feel a bit meh I was like a five out of ten this wasn't supposed to

happen you know in my mind it was supposed to be angels singing and I was meant to moonwalk out the office at this stage of the game so I started to reflect on everything that had gone on in the past and I looked around the office and looked around the city of London and saw a lot of people stuck in that same loop all trying to reach this conventional place of success to discover that's actually really what life's not really all about and from there I started to really reflect on everything in my life and think you know I'm going to try and do this differently I'm going going to stay in. I'm not going to run away. I'm not going to join a monastery and sort of rebel against the city. I want to stay in the city. I want to be successful and I want to do it on my terms. And that means I want to get super fit. I want to get super healthy. I want to be energized. I want to be motivated. And I want to nurture my relationships at home. That was the

most important thing to me. And as part of that process- Radical. I know. It's like, who does that? For a trader, for a broker. Yeah. No one does that. Right? And part of that process, and what changed my life actually, funnily enough, was a book, Awaken the Giant Within by Anthony Robbins, a classic self-help book. That book comes up all the time on this podcast.

It's a game changer. And for me, it sat on my bedside table and I couldn't even tell you where it came from. And normally I know the lineage of every book that I ever read and it sat there for months. And it was only after that sort of epiphany, as it were, I thought, self-development, I'll give it a go. Pick that book up. My life changed. I read the one quote in there. It's not events that shape your life, but beliefs about them. Game changer for me. I suddenly realised, actually, I've got control. And again, I traced the lineage of that saying back to Epictetus and Seneca and all these wonderful stoic philosophers and got really into stoicism and realized I've got control over my life. And as part of that process, I started to look at meditation and exercise and diet,

but nothing would really stick, right? Because I was always a bit anxious to meditate because I'd been out entertaining clients and felt a bit like hung over and a bit jaded. I couldn't get any sort of decent run going in terms of my exercise because I'd be out on a Tuesday night, for example, with clients and they wouldn't fancy it until the weekend. The same with diet, right? You'd wake up wanting to eat a salad and yet you'd end up having a McMuffin to get over the night before. So I just couldn't get this momentum. So constantly my mind was saying, what about the alcohol thing? Imagine if you just gave that up.

But it was the last thing that I ever questioned in my life. You know, I was looking at meditation. I was looking at diet. I was looking at everything. This elephant in the room, this thing that makes you feel like shit constantly, you know, that's draining your energy and, you know, occupying so much of your time and you have a blind eye to it. And so does so many people, they just don't see it. And I almost

couldn't see it. And I was fearful of taking a break from alcohol because in my mind, it's how I create my business. It's how I celebrated, commiserated. I fell in love with my wife, Tara, because she drank pints when I first met her. You know, it was this, that was the sort of world that I lived in. And here I was starting to think maybe if I took that thing away. So it reached the crescendo where I said, you know what, I'm going to give it a go. So walk me through your relationship with alcohol. I mean, you don't qualify as an alcoholic. You don't think of yourself as an alcoholic. I mean, alcoholism is a self-diagnosed disease and everybody defines it differently, I suppose. But what was your relationship with booze? And this is a brilliant question and a great time to talk about the way I view it. I'd sort of view it almost as a gradient, if you know what I mean. At the moment, conventional thinking wants two

boxes. There's the alcoholic box and you put problem drinker in there, addict in there, and everyone's in that box, and everyone else is in the other box. There is no gradient to this alcohol thing. And this is something that I really want to get into because, in my opinion, it is just one long gradient. Everyone's on there. Anyone that drinks is on that gradient. It's not this box situation. I'll do you one better on that one. I actually think that addiction in general, which can manifest in one's relationship with alcohol or any substance or behavior or relationships or literally anything that takes you out of whatever emotional state that is making you uncomfortable, addiction, quote unquote, in its broadest sense is a condition that I think all humans experience

on a spectrum. So on the very far end, you have the guy lying in a gutter who can't pull the needle out of his arm. But way on the other end of the spectrum, you have somebody who is in a series of unfruitful relationships where they repeat the same behavior pattern that culminates in that relationship being unsuccessful like it's the same thing right and our relationship to ourselves determines the extent to which it's going to manifest in a substance or a behavior any kind of errant um you know uh outgrowth of our personality. Oh, absolutely. And this is where it gets interesting.

And having this conversation with you is fantastic because normally if I do an interview, if it's on the telly or whatever, you've got two minutes. And for the first minute, the interviewer is trying to put me in a box. And the reason they're trying to do that is to protect themselves.

They want to get you in there so they can go, I don't have to listen to his message. He's one of those. He must be an alcoholic or he's a so-and-so. So I have to be like an alcohol-free ninja and almost duck those questions. But I lose half of the interview trying to avoid being put in this box because I want them to listen because my message is not aimed at those people because I wasn't there. If we look at that gradient in many ways, you know, I'm talking to the moderate drinker, the average drinker who's sometime a heavy drinker, because if you look at that gradient in many ways, you know, I'm talking to the moderate drinker, the average drinker, who's sometime a heavy drinker, because if you look at that gradient,

it's not a linear process. You don't come in at one end and end up at the other. Most people never slide all the way. They get stuck in this sort of mid lane malaise, I'm going to call it, where they just drink to celebrate, to commiserate. And sometimes they drink moderately. Sometimes they drink heavily, maybe a wedding, and then they go back to averagely. But these are the people I'm most worried about. Nobody's going to look at them and say, hey, man, you need to knock it off. Because they're just kind of doing what we socially approve of. But when you break it down, they're going out two or three nights a week, and they have a mild to severe hangover, maybe two mornings a week or something like that.

What is the net impact of that on one's life? Well, I mean, there's research is there now. And this is a route that I don't often go down because I don't like to take almost the fire and brimstone route, but the research is there. Any alcohol is awful for your health. It's linked to in over 50 studies directly to cancer and specifically breast cancer to over 60 different diseases. Very soon there'll be a time when there's no safe limit around alcohol. So you've got all this midline, mid-lane people, let's say, that are moderate drinkers or average drinkers. They're just grinding the gears year after year, year after year.

Because there's almost an argument to say for someone that slips all the way down, right? They reach some point of an awakening. Something big enough happens that slaps them around the chops and they go, shit, I've got to do something about this. Yeah. And that's why you hear the term grateful alcoholic, because people have a spiritual awakening that changes the trajectory of their life. But the problem drinker, or perhaps even the alcoholic who can just kind of keep it under a lid and maintain, they'll go to their grave with that behavior pattern that slowly kills them.

Yeah, exactly. So you've got those two gradients there almost. You've got the people that almost are reborn and have this transcendent experience are the ones that grind all the way down. And you and you see that story played out richard roar i really like he's a franciscan monk he's got a lovely book called yeah falling upwards it's a bit churchy but the message behind it is really interesting this ubiquitous story that there's the fall before the rise the night before the day and i really resonate with that and what i'm saying is the

people in the middle don't have that experience, right? So they just keep grinding it out and grinding it out. And they're not always going to slip to that point that there's some awakening. So really my message is all at these people in the middle and very much what we do at One In A Beer, and we'll come back to that, is basically trying to give them that synthetic experience of what life is like without the booze again, right? Because most people don't discover it. And to go back to my own personal, where I was with alcohol, I was in the middle, right? I was drinking no more than my peers. Was I drinking too much? Absolutely. But so's the rest of the planet. That's the point. Had I reached the point where there was a rock bottom moment? Absolutely not. Had it affected my career? career not really was i in trouble at home

not really but i was still drinking too much and that's the message i'm trying to get across because then people have to listen they have to stand up and listen because actually i'm talking to them i'm not talking now to the people that have got maybe dependency issues and all those type of things i'm aiming it right in the middle this mid-lane malaise of people saying look going alcohol free will be the best thing that you've ever done. Taking a break from the booze, take it from me, will just transform your life in so many ways. And people almost can't get their head around this. But my point is this, if you want to be an even better athlete, take a break from alcohol, guaranteed. If you want to be an even better parent, take a break from alcohol, guaranteed. An even better

entrepreneur. And even's the key word. I'm not saying you're not a great athlete or a great parent, but you will be even better when you take a break from alcohol. Fact. If you extract out of this equation, the dependency aspect or the ism or the addiction element, dependency aspect or the ism or the addiction element, just push that aside. Like you said, that's a different category of people. Those are my people. Yeah, that's me. The big hurdle that you have to address, confront, and deal with is just the social pressure, like the environment that is contributing to this kind of behavior perpetually. And I know that's a big part of your story as somebody who doesn't feel that they had a dependency issue, just being immersed in a professional culture in which drinking was part and parcel of how you made a living. I mean, you've told me this story about like your mentor

or your boss telling you like, if you're not going to drink like forget it you're never you're you're you're not going to make it in this business you're finished yeah and you know i was told on no uncertain terms by various people um that if you don't drink in this business you're like you're done for what what can you offer basically if you actually think about that that's such an insane thing it is and and genuinely i've said directly that by by a couple of people just said well what do brokers do if you don't take us out and sort of you know entertain us i don't really understand it i'm like well we actually do a lot more than that and but what's interesting about this story but that was six years ago when this was going on and i was first

thinking about doing it and i heard a few of those stories i ended up leaving um that firm not but for that reason i left that firm um just to set up my own business, right? To test myself again, to test myself in the arena that was this, you know, I guess, very social world that I was in and could I do it without drinking, right? And it was unheard of. This is like, no one does this. No one doesn't drink in this industry for a proactive reason, to be a little bit better and a little bit faster. And to fast forward a bit, you know, the business that I ended up setting up was seven times bigger than the previous one. And the reason that was, it's because I stopped drinking. people, as mentioned, that I was going to stop for 28 days. They all laughed, right? My one really annoying colleague bet me any money I wouldn't last 28 days. And he was totally right. I didn't. I lasted about two weeks and my rubber arm would be twisted because I was in this social pressured environment

of being the broker and I was the larger than life sort of character and I'd entertain and that meant going out and whatnot. So if people saw you two weeks ago and you were swinging off the chandeliers and then fast forward two weeks, you're like, I don't fancy drinking tonight. That's just not acceptable. You know, people are like not willing to hold on. It's like, why are you doing it on my turn? You know, if I'm out with you tonight, I want you to perform as it were. So I found it really difficult going up against that social pressure. And I made every mistake in the alcohol-free book. For example, I can't tell you how many times I would literally get to the bar and I wasn't drinking tonight. Like I'd made the conscious decision, I'm not drinking. I'm having a sparkling water. I'd get

to the edge of the bar and there'd be a bit of a scrum and you'd sort of smell the art, you know, the crisps and feel the ambience and the clutter of the glasses. And then through the sort of smell the art you know the crisps and feel the ambience and the clutter of the glasses and then through the sort of beer soaked air comes that immortal question what do you want and i'd say like with full confidence pint of lager please not like how does that happen i just to me when i hear that though because i've done that a million times like that sounds like alcoholism yeah no see i yeah so i know i view it differently in the sense that I just think it's conditioning. In so many ways, it certainly was for me. There was definitely no dependency there, but you put yourself back in that environment

and you just do these things like, hold on. And, you know, and I've learned so much about, you know, psychology and behavioral change since then, that for me, most definitely, it was just about actually finding ways to prepare yourself in advance for those sort of moments. Because as soon as I got a decent run going, life just changed beyond belief. I got to 28 days. I eventually got there after various false starts. And did you do that? I don't want to interrupt you, but did you do that on your own? Or did you have like a program? Were you accountable to anybody? Like

what? How did that work for you? No, so no, I had nothing. And that actually is a really good question because it was the genesis, I think, of what we've done at One Year No Beer because six, seven, eight years ago, when I first really started looking at this, I couldn't find anything for someone like me, for where I was on my stage of the journey. I didn't believe there was anything for me. I couldn't find any role models. It's either AA, which is shrouded in mystery, you know, and conjuring up ideas of, you know, old men in trench coats in church basements, or that's it. There's no other... There was nothing. Literally nothing. It was like tumbleweed.

And even to try and, and this actually reminds me, to try and find role models and heroes. Your story is one of the first I came along. And as you know, in your story, it goes all the way through to those classic, I guess, rock bottom moments. So to find someone who was an entrepreneur or a business person or an athlete that stopped drinking alcohol for proactive reasons, because they want it to be fitter and faster. There were none, literally no role models. And on that note, if anyone's listening, I want to know what these people are. I still don't really know that. I want to know the athletes are, the entrepreneurs are, the people that have stopped drinking for a proactive reason and they've 10x their business or their athletic careers better than ever because there's so few of these people out there. So here I was in that situation. There was nothing for me.

I was learning on my own. I was making every mistake on my own, but rather than give up, I got really intrigued by the whole thing. So I went back to university to study the degrees and the master's degrees and all these things part-time because I was fascinated. Why was this happening? I knew I didn't have this dependency, but I was still making these mistakes. I was still crumbling to social pressure all the time. And eventually I got to this 28 day moment, which was such a big thing for me. And I remember waking up, it was Saturday morning, sun was shining, the kids were on top form, Tara was in love with me. I was in love with her. And I went, this is pretty cool. I think this is how you're supposed to feel. Like my eyes were bright again.

I was like, oh, I haven't felt like this in years. And what's interesting, in my mid thirties, I felt tired all the time. I was lethargic all the time. And I genuinely believed that's the sort of what happens when you get to middle age. And. Right. And here I am at 44, you know, and I'm running rings around. 22-year-olds, I'm full of energy, full of vitality. So how sad was it that I actually believed that's sort of how you're meant to feel? And it's not. And it wasn't until I got a bit of space from alcohol that I actually realized what it was doing to me in terms of that mental cloud, I think, that just hangs around. And this is what people don't realize. Most people start drinking in their teens, they never really stop.

And if you think about it, if you drink once or twice a week, you're always slightly under the cloud of alcohol. You're not maybe displaying the classic signs of nausea and all that sort of stuff, right? That's gone the day after if you've got a bit of a hangover, but it affects your sleep. Go and look at the science, right? Alcohol destroys restorative sleep. And then look at the science about poor sleep. It's awful for your productivity, for your motivation, for your mental health. So I think people, again, in this middle lane, the moderate drinkers, the average drinkers don't realize what it's doing to them. I'm not talking about all the amazing health benefits, and there's going to be so much more of this coming through, by the way way that suggests alcohol is the number one carcinogenic right it's like

smoking in many ways but it's not about that it's about what it's doing to you mentally it's like kryptonite to your dreams in many ways it's holding you back it's preventing you from being your best self this is what gets me excited about it all yeah i mean i remember you know when it was starting to get dark for me. You have this idea that, okay, I'm entering into this bargain. Like, I'm going to go out tonight, I'm going to have fun, and tomorrow it's going to suck, but I'll shake it off. And when you're kind of 21, you can do that. You can shake it off pretty quickly.

But as you progress into your 30s, you're not shaking it off in a couple hours. And if you tied one on pretty good, I mean, it's days before you feel normal again. So let's say you hit it hard Saturday night, so Sunday's a wash. Monday, and then you don't really sleep well that night, so Monday you're kind of out of it. Tuesday, the fog's starting to lift a little bit, but you're not 100%. And it's really not until like Wednesday or Thursday that you actually feel like, okay, like now I feel like how I'm supposed to feel. And then it's Friday. And you go out again.

Yeah, I mean, you know what I mean? So you're literally working to your capacity one day a week. Yeah. And that's just going out once. Yeah, that's just like one hard night out. This is the point that people are missing constantly, right? So then you go back into the city and then you realize that people are just underperforming all the time, but they don't realize. I describe it a bit like a cuckoo in the nest. It sort of gets its way into your life and

you don't really notice it. Its effects are so subtle, but you're not quite as motivated anymore. You're not quite as energized. You know, you haven't got that sort of mojo or that brightness in your eyes, but it's so subtle, you don't really notice. A bit like I was saying a minute ago, I just thought that's how you're supposed to feel. But then you get people to remove it

or take a challenge, for example, and they have these sort of eureka moments, as I sort of mentioned, almost a similar moment to when you hit the sort of rock bottom that you just go, oh, that's how I'm'm supposed to feel and that's why we see these massive transformations and that's what happened to me so i got to 28 days the social how long did it take you to get to 28 days i i reckon i i must have taken about 30 attempts right so you're

talking over the space of like years yeah okay, okay. Right? So I'm being very honest. And somewhere along that spectrum is when you left and started your own business? Yeah, yeah. Like in the middle of that experiment? Okay. Yeah. And then I came back to that new business with this mindset of I'm going to do things differently, right? I'm going to actually set up a broken business and not drink. This is unheard of, I know.

And in many ways, because once I arrived there, I realized the business would fail unless I was on my A-game constantly. We'd gone up against all the big competitors. This was a little-known firm in the UK at the time, OTC Global Holdings. And what we did was massive, you know, very quickly. And the reason it was massive, because I was on my A-game all the time. You know, it makes such a difference. On a Friday morning, when the whole of the city is decimated, right, the presenteeism is through the roof, you know, I'm banging the drum. You're on it all day. There when the whole of the city is decimated, right? The presenteeism is through the roof.

You know, I'm banging the drum. You're on it all day. There's the window of opportunity. Yeah. And lunch times were a massive window of opportunity for me, right? Because I knew a lot of the other brokers were out wine and a dime. And I was like, let's hit it hard over lunch. Let's hit it hard on a Friday.

And we muscled our way into that business just by being sharp and on the ball because of all the great things that came back from going alcohol free. So I get to this 28 day mark as mentioned, and I think this is cool. I'm going to keep going. And bearing in mind, the social pressure is building up now. People are like, okay, the joke's over. Come on, let's get back to drinking. We've got clients to entertain. And I'm like, I don't think so. I'm going to keep going. I'm just going to push this boat out a little bit longer and see how I go. I'm feeding really good. I'm just going to keep going. I'm just going to push this boat out a little bit longer and see how I go. You know, I'm feeding really good. I'm just going to keep going. And what happened, I got to 90 days and that's when things really started to take off. For example, I lost a lot of weight. I

lost three stone in weight, 42 pounds in weight, right? So now you're looking really good. And this is something I want to talk about. What happens when you go alcohol free? You get all these hidden advantages that you've got no idea are there for example time right we're all time poor it's a modern day disease right stop drinking you will get a ton of time back like for the last 10 years prior to that it was a constant wrestle with the alarm clock every morning alarm clock wrestle there was no time it was work stress family repeat and all of a sudden i was waking up just a little bit before the alarm clock. And I was like, cool. I got into how Elrod, the morning miracle, Jeff Sanders, five air miracle. I thought, you know what? I'm going to start pushing the old alarm clock back a bit and see what happens.

And I pushed it all the way back to five o'clock. That gave me two hours, right? Two hours a day to do what I wanted. Me time. I got super fit. I got super healthy. I did my study, did degrees, did the master's degree, started the movement all before work. And this is when it gets really interesting. That was two hours. But then I was getting so confident because of the alcohol-free superpowers that was building up in my ability in the office. I was like, well, actually, I think I'm going to get in an hour later now. Because I was confident that when I was in the office, I was knocking it out the park. Right, your productivity is so off the charts compared to what it used to be comparatively that you can afford to come in an hour later

and still kill it. So then that two hours in the morning turns into three hours. Yeah, and this is the subtle changes that I'm talking about that people haven't picked up on because you've got that confidence, that self-efficacy that in your ability because you're consistent. This is the key word, your ability because you're consistent this is the key word consistency

when you're drinking you're never consistent even if it's once a week this is why i'm talking to the moderate drinkers as well because your diet's never consistent your exercise never consistent your productivity is never consistent but when you remove the alcohol you're on the ball every day you're confident you're going to turn up so now i've got three hours to play with right you can change the world in three hours a day pretty much and that's when the snowball started i started to look at my diet and here's a great story for you so well it starts off not particularly well but my dad ends up having a treble bypass right um was a walking heart attack didn't realize quite a fit guy has a treble bypass me and the three brothers all get checked out of course i'm

the only one who shows up i've got heart disease 35 years old i've got heart disease calcium score i should have been a zero i was like an eight right very minimal but i showed up i've got heart disease i'm not surprised i was overweight unfit stressed to the hill and unhappy to a degree um anyway fast forward i get on this alcohol free adventure adventure and now I'm flying, I'm starting to lose weight, I'm consistent, I'm exercising all the time because I know I'm actually going to turn up and not have to phone a trainer with one of those mystery bugs that, you know, you've picked up because it's a hangover really. And I'm losing weight and I'm getting

super fit. I go back to the cardiologist, the same cardiologist who just a year prior had basically looked at all my stats and said, you've got heart disease. And you know, it's a good sign when your heart, when your cardiologist says the word astounding about four times in a row, because I'd also changed my diet to plant based because I'd researched it and figured out that was the best diet for me, which is again, just shows you what can be done right because prior to that i was the classic meat eating salad dodger do you know i mean i'd have anything that was meat nothing that was green you know and here i am making this massive transformation and this this is what

i'm getting into yeah because i think once you get on a roll with this stuff and you bust the conventional wisdom right the conventional wisdom that i'd always believed was one you needed to get the career and you'll be successful that wasn wasn't, you know, and you'll be happy. That wasn't true. Then I bust the next conventional wisdom that you need alcohol to be cool, fun, sexy, and successful. It's total bullshit. So then you start to look at everything. I looked at my diet and said, hold on, do I need to eat meat to be a man? Do I need to eat meat to be fit? Actually, is that the best diet for me? No, it's not. So you get get onto this role this is where you can sort of hear there's a transformation coming because of you know the catalyst that was giving up alcohol so i transform my diet right now bearing in mind i'm a broker in the city i am

don't drink vegan sober broker and a ginger right i was going for the like smallest minority broker that's ever lived in the history of brokers right so? So here I am, I'm gaining this momentum. I go back to the cardiologist. He says, astounding. He says, astounding again. And he looks at my stats and says, your resting heart rate's gone from 68 down to 48. You're athlete fit again. Your body fat's gone from 35% down to below 10%.

You are lean. You're super fit. You're super healthy. And he says, with regard to your heart you've you've pulled this heart disease right it should have gone up it hasn't gone anywhere this is like astounding and he says hold on i just want to speak to the guy that actually did the test because he understands the the stats better than me you can see what's going on he disappears for five minutes he comes back in and says this is this is amazing he says it looks like you've reversed the heart disease yeah i mean how

cool is that and again that's a plant-based diet but and going alcohol-free because it was alcohol-free that was the catalyst to get there well when you're boozing it up it's pretty hard to control your diet we can't you're just like you wake up you feel lousy and you're just you're gonna put your face on a you know an egg mcmuffin for sure you know like you just can't control that craving for greasy food. And when you're hammered and you're out late, all bets are off on what's going to go down your pie hole that night. Exactly, right? So back to that consistency. So this one thing, this going alcohol-free, is the catalyst to all this good stuff, because that's why we see it in our groups now. People have these massive transformations in all areas of their life from this one transformation, which is taking a break from the booze. And again, this is the

moderate drinker, the average drinker to the sometimes heavy drinker that are getting these huge realizations. And that's certainly what happened to me to the point that I was firing on all cylinders and thought, this is brilliant. I've got to share this thing. I didn't really know how I was going to share it or what I was going to do with it. Well, you're filling a need. I mean, what's so powerful about your message and your experience in your journey is that you really weren't a problem drinker.

You were a moderate drinker who sometimes drank heavily, who by your own account didn't have a physical dependency issue. And that is super empowering because who else is advocating for this kind of lifestyle who stands in those shoes? It's either the hardcore alcoholic or nobody. So I would imagine as you start to kind of put a voice to this, that on the one hand, you're this positive lighthouse beacon where people like yourself can go, hey, man, now it's cool to do that.

I'm going to go check this out. But also very threatening to the other moderate drinkers out there who are probably thinking, bugger off, because you're holding a mirror up to their behavior that they've convinced themselves there's nothing wrong with and saying, hey, maybe you should take a second look at this. And I would imagine that's not always so welcome. No. And you've hit the nail on the head. People don't want to hear that message. And right back to what I was saying at the start about the interviewers, they're always trying, they've got to get you in that box because they don't want to actually listen to the story. And you mentioned something about social pressure. We run a survey in conjunction with Sterling University of over a thousand people, right? This is massive percentages. 98% of those people said the reason

that they didn't take a break from alcohol more often was because of social pressure. 85% of them said they'd been bullied into drinking. 78% said they'd heard those classic lines of, go and have a drink with me you will you will you will you will you will right so we've got this massive problem with social pressure no one's talking about this stuff right no one's going after this this is absolutely huge and what it says to me that we've got this massive group of people that have been completely underserved for for so so long that are in this middle this midline um this malaise type of place of average moderate drinkers um that are actually

desperate to take a break maybe they're starting to hear the message get out there maybe they're sick and tired of the hangovers maybe they believe they're going to be fitter and faster but they're scared stiff to do it because the social pressure all around them keeps convincing them not to and i think if we go back to evolutionary psychology and i mean you had um your vow on it was fantastic wasn't it yeah it's a wonderful guy and robert wright's got some wonderful books that the moral animal that i love which is a similar idea and when you look at that stuff it talks about like you know status being one of these really powerful uh evolutionary drives to stay in with the group staying with the

crowd so it's no wonder that we feel this pressure to align and conform, as it were. Yeah. And so much of it is imagined or illusionary anyway, because as I'm sure you've come to realize, we put all this emphasis and energy around not being judged. So, okay, you end up drinking because of all of this social pressure, because you don't want people to think of you in a certain way. But ultimately, what you come to realize after you walk this path for a while is that everybody's self-obsessed and they don't really care because they're thinking about themselves. And if they've had a couple of drinks in them already, like they can't even remember what's going on. So, a lot of this is like we're projecting something that actually isn't even really real.

Yeah. And there is an element of that. Absolutely. I remember the first time I would go out with my friends and I'd just sort of disappear on that note. And they wouldn't even notice. It was really disappointing at first. Because you were like, yeah, I showed up to press the flush or whatever. Because I'm not drinking, I'm going home.

And they don't even know. It doesn't even register, right? It's the same thing with being vegan at a dinner party or a restaurant. You think everyone's going to get all crazy about what you order. And then after you've done it for a while, you're like, they don't really care that much. No, and this is another point. So there's two elements to this. It's one, trying to get the message out to other people to give people a break, basically. It's cool if you want to drink, but if someone decides

that they don't want to, just be okay with it. It's all you got to be, but just try to remove that beer pressure of, go on, don't be such a wuss, don't be such a lightweight. And women are just as bad as men. There is this culture of trying to encourage people to drink. Is it really? Is there studies on that? That's interesting. Yeah. I don't know if there's studies on it, but that's more a subjective view. But from what we see within our groups and many of our members, you'll see the women

as much as men saying they're facing this same sort of social tribal pressure, as it were. So it's just trying to actually get people off their back. We're going to have a hashtag, break the beer pressure, is what we're calling it. We're going to just try and get that going. It's a big campaign we're investing in just to try and get this message out to people. Look, just leave people alone if they want to take a break. It should be cool and acceptable for someone to turn up to the pub or a function and say, I'm not drinking tonight. Just be accepted.

Well, meanwhile, it's not in a lot of social circumstances. So the question always is, well, what is the answer to that? You hear this a lot in the rooms in AA. It's like, well, some people who really own their disease and are cool with it will just be, I'm an alcoholic. I don't drink anymore, dude. You trust me. You don't want to see it. It's not, it's not a good look. You know, it's cool. Like I'll say something like that, but other people will say, I'm not drinking tonight. Like they try to be low key or casual. And what I like about what you've created and what you've done is you've kind of created this exit door. You just say, hey, I'm doing the 28 day no beer challenge. Like no one's going to say, oh, come on.

Like that's something people will say, oh, good for you. That's cool. Like it's almost you get a pass. Yeah. And that's that's our dream for it. Our dream for it is that anyone at any time could say I'm doing a one year no beer 28 day challenge or a 90 day challenge or whatever it is and that's the reason we set it up and for me I needed that I needed that excuse in the early days because as I said just turning up and saying I'm not drinking tonight

just wasn't enough I needed something to cling to so I decided to do one year no beer that was the original call that's why we called the company one you know beer in the end because i needed something big enough to buy me the space as it were and it worked you know it was just enough to get me past and here's the secret to all of this if you can get past the first 28 days and you get on a roll with this thing and you feel great and you get your energy back and your mojo back and all those wonderful things then you're unstoppable because then you know what it's like to really you know have your vitality back and your vibrance back that you don't want to stop. And you keep going. Like in our group,

if someone gets to 90 days, 85% of them continue and they continue because they're loving it, right? They feel great. They're probably losing weight. Their eyes are bright. Why wouldn't they continue? You know,

so the key is just to give people enough space to get started. And I think the social pressure is something that we really need to go after because I think it's holding so many back. Because as I say, I think there's a lot more people interested in than this than you realize. They're just not quite, don't have the courage, let's say, to make it happen. Yeah. So make it cool, make it comfortable, make it exciting, make it collective, create accountability, and kind of create a celebratory environment around it is enticing to people. And it gives them that excuse or that permission to give it a go. And I think in terms of habit and behavior change, you're spot on.

28 days is enough time to connect with what it feels like to live in a different state. But in my own personal experience, I'm not convinced that 28 days is enough for full habit change. Like I think you need at least 90 days for something to really begin to lock in. Oh, absolutely. So the 28 days really is that little taster because it feels so much more achievable. It's like, look, just 20 days. It's a month. Cool. And then go back to doing whatever you were doing before. What have you got to lose? I've worked it out. The average drinking career. So it's 50 years. It's like 0.4%. So at least 0.2% or something. It's like, like, what have you got to lose? You know, if everything that I'm saying is true,

there's nothing to lose and everything to gain. And if somebody says, well, I just can't imagine going to the pub and showing up and not having a drink. Like that just, just to live in that reality feels so uncomfortable. Well, maybe that's something you need to look at. Well, yeah. Right. And now we're getting to the crux of it. Right. The reason we set up One You Know Beer wasn't really to help people stop drinking alcohol.

That's just behavioral change. When you're aimed at that middle group, it's just behavioural change. It's not dependency. It's about so much more than that. It's actually about giving people the opportunity to rediscover their best self in many ways. There is this malaise of unhappiness that's like sweeping the nation, isn't it?

And I think, why are people drinking more and more? Why are people drinking every celebration and commiseration and to unwind and all these things? Because actually think culturally they're a bit unhappy they're a bit stressed in their jobs and I think what happens when you go alcohol free it gives you a chance because you get this natural vitality back to really look at all those things again in your life and try and replace some of them with vibrancy that's why our groups are all about health and fitness and connection people People are missing so much connection. And the reason we created One You Know Bit was to give people all of these tools to actually lead this healthy, vibrant, vital life.

It's not just about giving something up. It's about replacing it with something that is healthy and invigorating. Exactly. Now we're getting to the crux of it. This is what excites me. healthy and invigorating. Exactly. Now we're getting to the crux of it. This is what excites me. This is what I do the research about and the study about, because actually what we're trying to do is give people that root into that. You know, the alcohol thing is just an excuse for us to get together, to come together as a community, as a group, and actually learn all these different

things about habit change, figure out how it works, apply it to alcohol. And it's a behemoth for many people. And the confidence and the momentum they get from taking down the alcohol challenge is huge right so then they land it on their diet exactly the same way that i did land it on maybe exercise suddenly the domino effect of how it impacts what you're going to do in other areas of your life absolutely and now all of a sudden they're making connection as well with like-minded people who are inspiring maybe they start listening to your podcast all of these sort of things they just open themselves up to this new world because i think so many people get stuck as i said like grinding the gears in the middle they're never shaken from their tree to like have these new eyes this fresh approach to life and they come to us

for example or anyone for that matter to do a challenge doesn't have to be us but it's that experience very often that is enough to spark all of these other you know vital ingredients to a life well lived this is huge i think what you said about unhappiness is massively true and i think you've actually understated it i think there's gigantic swaths of the population who are very unfulfilled in their daily lives. And I know what that feels like. I know what it feels like to be upwardly mobile and completely disconnected from myself and tremendously unhappy. And when I was in that state, the only thing that kept me going was the idea that I could go out and party that night.

The idea that I would just go home at the end of a miserable day and go to bed so I could wake up and do it again was unpalatable, unimaginable. It was almost like alcohol allowed me to continue in this life that wasn't right for me, but it also prevented me from confronting it and making changes. And I think we live in a culture in which there's so much energy behind distracting us, whether it's video games or movies or Netflix or alcohol or whatever, pick your drug or gambling, whatever it is, we're never bored. We have a supercomputer in our pocket that can keep our mind occupied at all times. And you actually have to muster almost an innate superpower to get still and honest with yourself, to live and sit with your feelings. You have to go out of your way to do that. But in truth, that's the only way in which the truth of your circumstances is going to become evident to you.

Absolutely. And you've hit the nail on the head, right? And this is essentially what we're trying to do for people in many ways, because you only discover that, I think, when you remove the alcohol. And Gabor Mate, I know, is a good friend of yours, and I've been lucky enough to train with him, has that that saying not why the problem why the pain and i think this is we're really getting into the crux of this now why are people working to such a point they're so stressed that they're coming home and turning to the drug that is alcohol why are they feeling lonely in a massive city and turning to the drug that is alcohol because i think we're missing these foundational psychological elements that if we

look for them we can discover them and we can try and actually do healthy things to fulfill those needs but what happens is when we're drinking we just turn to alcohol all the time right because it's just so bloody easy it's so easy to come out and crack open a bottle of wine and here's the thing it doesn't mean that you're going to end up to being an addict or dependent it could be these moderate drinkers that are going through exactly the same stuff. They're unhappy. That's why they're drinking twice a week because they're unfulfilled in their jobs. You know, the stats are, you know, one in two people and more really dislike the job that they're in. You know, this is so sad. The connection is just breaking down all over the place. And very much what we're trying to do within One You Know Beer is give

people this opportunity to remove the alcohol and then reflect on all these points in their life and then put the work in to add fulfilled, healthy alternatives to relax, to relieve boredom. Come on, Andy. I love my job. I love my kids. But you know, I like to watch the game on Saturday and maybe drink four to all right let's be honest 10 beers and then maybe do it again the next night and like no harm no foul yeah I don't cheat on my wife I show up at work on time I get my kids off to school like what's the big deal yeah and that's my point right for all of those people at the moment you might be a good dad and you might have fun and you might be reasonably successful, but I think if you remove the alcohol, you'll be even better. You'll be even more vibrant. You know, you will get that opportunity, I think, in many ways to experience

like all the best things about life without taking alcohol. And here's another thing. Now, when you say that, it's like, ooh, you want to take my best friend away from me. I know. Yes. This is the other option, right? But if you like the taste, alcohol-free alternatives are brilliant, right? There's a lot of placebo in that. You're not going to get the drunk effect, but that's the bit that's holding you back. I don't understand that at all. No. I know.

Why would I do that, right? But they are a brilliant alternative, I think, for people for that placebo early on to fit in, to reduce the social pressure. I think lots of people like to turn to the alcohol free alternatives, but I get it. And this is not going to appeal to everyone. But my point is this, I think if you want to be a great entrepreneur or a great athlete or any of these things, and so people are out there, they want to be the better or the best version of themselves. There is no place for alcohol or just take a break, just reassess, try being an entrepreneur

without it, try being an athlete without it. And if you're even better, continue. What have you got to lose? Nothing and everything to gain. So how long into this journey before you start getting your master's in positive psychology? This is when you're still working full-time? You decided to go to night school? Yeah, so I finished a degree because I left school at 16 to be a footballer. So I had no formal education outside of the baseline at 16.

I went back to finish the degree. I did all this part-time in those mornings when my life was changing. And the master's now finishes this summer in June. And my second book also finishes in June. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's exciting. I'm busy, busy, busy, but alcohol-free superpowers. This stuff cannot happen.

You have a lot of energy. I'm not going to dispute that, but alcohol-free superpowers. This stuff cannot happen. You have a lot of energy. I'm not going to dispute that. Yeah, this is the difference. But how long, so you're having this experience, you're kind of having this epiphany. I'm sure you're beginning to share it with your colleagues and your friends, et cetera. But when does it dawn upon you that you want to create like a movement?

I mean, that's a leap, right? From, hey man, like I'm killing it at work and I feel good, to I'm going to like basically put this message out in the world and kind of crowdsource this idea. Yeah, by fluke in many ways. I met a guy, Rory Fairbanks, another broker. And just to close the story, I mentioned the book, the red book, Anthony Robbins, Awaken the Giant Within. I normally know the lineage of all those books. It was Ruri that gave it to me 10 years prior. And And what's funny about it, we decided to get together, bearing in mind I'd left that company. He worked for the old firm and he was really worried about meeting me because he was like, oh, I'm not drinking. I'm meeting Andy. This is going to be some big, you know, drinking session. Did he know you from another con? Like, had he been out partying with you in the past? Oh yeah. So we knew each other. We were thick

as thieves. We worked together in the old firm and I left to set up a new one and we got together and he's thinking, oh no, this is going to be a big boozy session. I'm seeing Andy and I'm thinking, Oh, I'm going to have to explain, go through the whole process with Ruri and tell him why I'm not drinking. We get together. We're both not drinking.

It was brilliant. So we sat there for like waxing lyrical about how great we were feeling about not drinking. Yeah. Two brokers not drinking and crushing it in many ways. And we just sort of said, I think this is really cool. I think we should share it.

He was way more tech savvy than me. I went on hold. He wrote a little ebook, set up a website and just said, let's just put this ebook up on the website, see what happens. And one of those 10,000 downloads later, loads of people are picking up on this book. We start getting emails. It's gone all over the world, 72 odd countries.

You're like, we just thought we were going to be sharing it with a couple of guys like us in the city um and it hasn't really stopped since because suddenly it started to gain arms and legs and we were like this is really cool we're helping lots of people we get all these wonderful messages about it's transforming people's life it's just giving them the confidence and the courage actually it's about taking a proactive break it's not about problems and boxes and all this sort of stuff. It's just like, come and take a challenge, just see how you feel. So it really starts to gain momentum. And we haven't really stopped since. Did it begin, like just on a tactical level, did it begin with a Facebook page or a website when you guys got together and said, hey, let's do this ebook? Like, how do you even introduce that to the public?

Yeah, it was via a website and then another website and then another website as we spent more and more money trying to get this thing wrong, right? It's like building a house and never actually going to see what was going on. Like, we were getting, I'm sure we made every mistake in the book that you can possibly think of. And then it was Facebook, very much. We set up a community and we were like, will a community thing work? And it's the most powerful thing we have now that the one you know be a community is just stunning how many how many people do you have on that page now so we have about on facebook about 50 000 which is really cool um but then we have the closed communities in and around there

and what's wonderful i think it's really like the best part of social platforms right because all the fluff is stripped away. No one's in our group going, hey, I'm on holiday and I'm amazing. You know, isn't my life wonderful? It's like, do you know what? I'm having a really tough day today. What would you recommend? Would you show me some support? Or it's like, do you know what? I'm at day 90. I'm a hero. I'm loving, you know, I've lost five stone in weight. I feel better. I'm more energized. So I think you just see this wonderful community coming together, right? over the world we have tons of american members you have different ones for different cities no it's all at the moment but i think we will as we're definitely

going to segregate out especially into the us i think is the big sort of growth i guess area in many ways but it's just a wonderful platform to see people coming together from all over the world from all different races or different sexes all different ages going this is really cool why didn't i do this years ago i feel great you know i've got a text this morning from a guy that's triathlete um uh iron man he's been trying to convince him to do it for ages he's been thinking about doing it he's 16 days in because he also started you know start of jan sends a message. I'm crushing it at work. It's the best I've felt in years. Why didn't I do this like 10 years ago?

This is sort of what I'm talking about. Yeah, it's good. It's good. And the connectivity, like that's a situation in which social networks can really be of benefit to people, to help them be accountable to other people, to get that encouragement, to have a lifeline. Especially if they feel alone or like they can't talk about it in their professional environment or in their personal environment. I mean, the fact is, outside of that one you know beer community, most people are going to be drinking, right? So it's a solo mission.

They don't want to hear about it. No, they don't want to hear about all the good stuff. You go, no, I'm feeling brilliant because I'm not drinking. They're like, bore off. They're all drinking. They don't want to hear about it. No, they don't want to hear about all the good stuff. You go, no, I'm feeling brilliant because I'm not drinking. They're like, bore off. They're all drinking. They don't want to hear it. And also, they probably won't support you so much. So tribes are so important in this space, whether it's us, whether it's Club Soda, Annie Grace.

But there's not enough. I could go around the world on literally like one hand, hello, Sunday morning. There's only about six or seven of these type of communities out there aimed at this middle ground you know i mean trying to inspire them but it's so super important i think that people come together like that and inspire each other because in the big bad world you're going to be out there on your own but this stuff is so culturally ingrained i'll just tell you a quick story about my book right bearing in mind my first ever book and i'm so proud of this, always wanted to write a book, and it's called The 28 Day Alcohol-Free Challenge, right? There's a giveaway. There's clue number one. I haven't had a drink at this stage.

It's pretty straightforward. Right, yeah. I haven't had a drink at this stage, right, for four years. I've co-founded a movement called One Year No Beer, right? So I invite all my loved ones, my best friends over to celebrate this book, right? The doorbell goes. My mom and dad at the door, congratulations, champagne. And I'm like, oh, how's this going? Of course. My brothers turn up. Congratulations, wine, friends, whiskey, beer. So strange. Human beings are bizarre.

And they all love me and they get it. But it's just so ingrained in our culture that you go to someone's house, you bring alcohol. So I've got this photo of all my books. I'm really proud of them all fanned out on the kitchen table that I wanted to give everyone. They're completely surrounded in booze. You can't even see these things. And I think it just shows you what it's like at the moment. Society is so ingrained in everything that we do that it will become a solo mission. And that's why tribes are so super important because you need that connection. Yeah. Well, two things. First of all, the alcoholic is the only person who will think that it's a good idea to celebrate a year of sobriety by getting drunk. That's alcoholism in a nutshell, which is kind of related to the story that you

just told. But second to that, what I appreciate and just want to highlight about your message that I think is super important is dispelling this notion that it goes back to this binary thing. Like, oh, you're an alcoholic, so you have a problem. You have to quit. Or you're not an alcoholic,

so you should be able to decline a drink at any moment and it shouldn't be no big deal. And if it is a big deal, then you're not an alcoholic, so you should be able to decline a drink at any moment and it shouldn't be no big deal. And if it is a big deal, then you're probably an alcoholic. To say, actually, there is this middle ground where, yeah, you're not physically dependent, but to walk away from it is a little bit harder than we've previously acknowledged. And to just shine a light on that and say, yeah, it is hard. Maybe you're not an alcoholic, but it still means that it's difficult to say no to a drink when mom and dad show up with champagne to celebrate your book about sobriety. Exactly. And I think this is where people find themselves in that loop. We look to our peers and our loved ones, don't we, for that social guidance. And it's very difficult. You know, hold on, everyone else I know is drinking.

So why am I going to be the only one that doesn't and this keeps everyone stuck in this negative loop and that's exactly what i'm trying to do is just to snap people out of that that malaise almost this middle lane and just go just try something different right just imagine if i'm right because there's nothing to give up and everything to gain because if you have this almost this window to a transformation by taking a break from booze, it's so simple, right? It just sounds ridiculously simple, but it's so true. I have to say, just for the record, that I'm an alcoholic through and through. And I need the tools and the resources of Alcoholics Anonymous to keep me on my path. 12-step is what saved my life. It continues to save my life. It's my number one priority. My job is to stay

sober and help another alcoholic achieve sobriety. And the minute that I start to lose sight of that or I deprioritize it or I take it for granted is when I began to slip back towards a drink. And that's just me, right? So my question is, have you had people who have come in who perhaps were not ready to admit to themselves that they were an alcoholic but found a soft landing with the 28-day challenge who then realized like, hey, this is harder for me than I thought, who then ended up seeking help in kind of a more robust or professional environment. Absolutely. I almost think it's like an early warning signal, you know, come and do a challenge. And if you really wrestle with it and you really struggle with it, and it might just be the thing that I can do it, I can do this is easy. And then I can't even string together like six days.

Yeah, exactly. And because it's not stigmatized, it's just a fun challenge, right? Who's not for a fun challenge? It gives people a little opportunity, I think, to test the system. And it might be- In a low stakes environment. Exactly. And it doesn't work out. You go, hold on, this is way tougher than I thought it was. But in saying that, we have a lot of people that will come back and try and try again and try again and then crack it. And some people will try again and try again and then crack it. And some people will try again, try again, and actually go, do you know what?

And we signpost people towards, you know, the wonderful work of the AA or 12-step or smart recovery or whatever it is. Treatment centers or anything like that. Yeah, exactly. And that's really important. And also, I think many of our members will do a 90-day challenge, for example, and then they'll go back to drinking. Because this is not about not drinking forever or being absent forever. It's like Lent or something, right? It is, but it's readdressing. Because the secret behind all of this is that I know if they take a 90-day break from alcohol, they'll see. And they do it with the right mindset. This is really important. Do it with the mindset that we're trying to get across that there's nothing to

give up and everything to gain. They learn to socialize again. They learn to relax again. All those things that actually have been missing from their life. They get connection again. They get community again. They're more likely not going to stop drinking anyway. They're just going to keep going as it were. They're not necessarily going to go back. But I think a lot of people that do go back because they've seen the other side of the alcohol matrix, as it were, at least they can look themselves in the mirror now and know what it's like to be alcohol free, know what it's like to drink. And very often they'll go back and old habits start to reappear. Suddenly, they're drinking once or twice a week. They feel tired all the time, lethargic all the time. They come back and do another challenge.

But this time, they do a year. Or maybe they keep going like myself. I mean, I never put an end date on this thing. I just keep going because I love it. Why wouldn't I? So it's been four years. Almost five. It'd be five and... Almost five, yeah. Fair, but why would I ever drink why would i you know seneca said it best you know it's not that we don't have a lot of time that we just waste so much of it why would i ever waste a day on a hangover i'm just i'm just never doing that right and therefore it

becomes easy for me because i've built this vibrant healthy lifestyle that's alcohol free so why would i put that in danger by having a drink that just doesn't compute in my brain anymore therefore no willpower is required it It's not thinking about this every day. It's just gone. It's just off my radar. So you've explained the intellectual aspect of the benefits to be had by putting alcohol in the rearview mirror, and you've cultivated and created this amazing community, support community for this endeavor. But what are the actual practical steps that you advocate, like in the book, on the Facebook page, in the work that you do, in the speeches that you give, et cetera, to help people figure out how to actually

execute on this? Yeah. And this is really important. So again, within the box, we've got all the practical tips, right? Those like take out the ringleader, for example, you know, you've always got that one guy in the pack or girl in the pack. That's, you know, if you try and tell them in a social environment that you're not drinking, they're going to destroy you. Right. And they're going to take the mic out of you and everyone follows. take them take out the biggest guy first that's an in-person moment this is not a text moment this is like get in front of this guy or this movie thing yeah and tell them all the reasons why you're doing this challenge right and be open and honest with them because you get that person on side watch the rest follow you know in social environment i mean that's the real sort of light and experiential stuff to the real deeper meaningful stuff which is you know it's about autonomy it's about mastery of this subject and this is where it gets really interesting and there was a great study by um

walter miskell the marshmallow study i'm sure you're familiar with this the marshmallow study where they brought the kids into the room the the four-year-olds into the room and they offered him one marshmallow right but just before the researcher left the room he said i'm gonna offer you a deal if you don't eat that marshmallow, when I come back, you can have two marshmallows. So he leaves the room and then they timed how long it took for these kids to eat the marshmallows by fluke because he wasn't actually testing for that at the time. He came back to the study years and years later because his daughter went to the same school as the other kids. And he started to notice that some of the kids were always in trouble. Some of the kids were doing really well and actually looked at his data and realized the distance or the time that

they took or they resisted the marshmallows actually was a real indicator of future success and happiness and wellbeing. And the science was all over this, right? The medical field were all over it. Who's going to defer gratification? Yeah. And it was like, this is, it's very rare to see something in childhood play out into adulthood so then they latched onto this whole willpower thing and said right if we can show people how to learn how to delay they're going to be more successful more happy and whatnot and i think it's misled a generation right because everyone's been fixated on not eating the marshmallows as it were when actually our approach is eat the marshmallows

right come to this thing and rather than white knuckling an alcohol-free challenge and holding on for dear life for 28 days remind yourself of all the great things that are happening right now about being alcohol-free have you woken up and you feel more energized are your eyes brighter as someone just said wow you look great have you got more energy you know are you crushing it at work constantly connect to the winds that you're getting in the moment rather than holding on for dear life to the end of 28 days or the end of 90 days. So this is more of the sort of underlying philosophical type of psychology that's going on that we're constantly hammering that sort of stuff home, along with the ownership, ownership of your challenge right when you make behavioral change

um ryan and decky self-determination theory talks to us a lot about autonomy like owning the process when we make an intrinsic change right it's completely different to feeling forced or a change is prescribed like i should do this i should give up alcohol to i want to give up alcohol and when you do you own the process we talk about this right and what that gives you is a bit of space to bake failure into the pie because you're going to fail if you look at the science uh the trans theoretical model or stages of change model it normally takes people three or four times around that loop to make any sort of behavioral change so too many people have this perfectionist mindset it's like if i'm going to take a break from alcohol,

unless I get to day 30 perfectly, then I'm a failure. Yet they might get to day 14 and have a slip up or a blip. And there's two ways you can approach that. You can say, that's it, I've failed. When in reality, you might've been drinking every single day leading up to that point. That's a massive win, right? But accepting failure as part of your learning process is a huge, huge different type of mindset because then it gives you that space to have a couple of blips along the way, but you're continually making that momentum.

Yeah, taking ownership of it is absolutely the most crucial aspect of it. If you're doing it for somebody else or to get somebody off your back, it's not sustainable. Like really doing it for the right reasons because this is what you want for yourself, I think is key. And that's something that you can't will upon another human being. They have to, it's intrinsic. Like you said, they have to come to it themselves.

And those missteps, quote unquote failures, I hate that word. There should be a different word for it. Those slips or whatever you want to call them are your greatest teachers because you can then deconstruct that event and learn a lot about what led you to a certain behavior. What was the cascading series of emotions or events or circumstances that culminated in you drinking a beer or going off your diet or failing to wake up on time whatever it is and from that

you can extract the information required to create a long-term plan that's going to serve you well far into the future oh absolutely once you've hit the nail on the head that's it and when you give yourself that space and we call them slip-ups there's just all the learning and all the growth is in the slip-ups now that's but when you're and all the growth is in the slip-ups. Now that's- But when you're like, just speaking as an alcoholic, like it's, they're shrouded in so much shame. Yeah. You know, they're horrible.

Yeah. There's pain. There's pain in there. And at the time it's going to hurt, right? But if you embrace it and if you're prepared for it in many ways, so it's not something that we actively encourage, but we sort of slip it in there subtly prepared for it in many ways so it's not something that we actively encourage but we sort of slip it in there subtly because we lose too many people that will come along do a challenge brilliantly well to day 20 slip up and disappear and go i failed that's it and i think when you're aimed in that middle ground so we're not aimed at the dependent you know you can say to those people look don't use that as an excuse to give up so you must slip it in we slip it into some of the

work that we do for the videos or the emails. So it's in the back of their mind that actually they might slip up. And if they do, there's great learning in there and it's going to hurt. And you're going to feel like you've failed and you've messed up, but there's so much growth in there. Because as you said, you can find out ways to not slip up in the future. And suddenly then you do 30 days or 40 days or 90 days and the whole world looks a lot different. And it's a lot easier to get from 80 days to 90 days than it is to get from zero days to 10 days. Yeah. Right?

Yeah. The hardest move in yoga is onto the mat, right? So you just got to get onto the mat. Zero to one. Yeah. You got to, that first couple of weeks is where all the graft is for lots of people. And you touched on it right at the start. Lots of people will get to day 21. I used to do this all the time. Feel amazing. What do you do?

You celebrate. You have a drink. Let's go party. I feel great again. Let's go out and do it. I see this all the time. Why do we do that? It's so funny. It is. And this is the stuff that fascinates me. This is the stuff that I'm trying to learn about. Well, yeah. I mean, this is psychology. So drilling down on the psychological and philosophical underpinnings, the foundation that resides beneath this, it's about identity, right? And I think, you know, we're two white males. You're coming from a very alpha industry. So, it conjures up this idea of masculinity. And what does that mean to be a man? Does it mean that you have to, you know,

pound your chest and be the guy at the bar who's ordering a round of drinks for everybody who can entertain through lunch and be the most charismatic guy while he downs a couple of martinis and then goes back to work and crushes it throughout the afternoon. And is that what it means to be a man? And is there a better definition? Can we reclaim

this and change it? Yeah. And I think this is a really important question, right? Because I think so much identity is baked into alcohol, for example, and a sense of manliness. But actually, even just winding out that a second, women are drinking as much as men for the first time ever. So I think, you know, women's identities are being wrapped up in alcohol very much now. But back to the manly question, I think it takes a lot of courage to step away and not drink. It really does, as a man. I think it's one of the most manly things that you can possibly do is like make a stand when every, you know, Mark Twain said it best, when you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect. And I think that's so true around alcohol, to have the ability to step away from the crowd

takes an immense amount of courage. And I think there's something really empowering for me to be a father to my two girls and not drink. I love that. That makes me feel strong as a person. That makes me feel manly that I can deal with all life's thrown at me, whether that's a funeral or whether that's a stress or whether that's stereotypical, you know, major trauma in your life with a clear head and deal with it, you know, effectively and vibrantly rather than bury myself in alcohol. I think there's something extremely empowering by that. When you understand that alcohol masks your emotional state and that more often than not, it's used to escape from whatever you're feeling in the moment. And that can be, like, if we're being totally honest,

like, that can be characterized as cowardly. And I think it takes a lot of courage to say, as uncomfortable as I am in this current situation that I find myself, I'm going to sit with it and experience it because that's the only way I can learn from it and make changes or move forward. But to deny it or make changes or move forward. But to deny it or escape it or numb myself from whatever it's trying to tell me is taking an easy route

out and an escape hatch that ultimately might feel good in the moment, but isn't serving me. Yeah, exactly. And I think there's real empowerment in that. And I think that's one of the biggest benefits of going alcohol-free. It's actually facing everything life's got to throw at you with that clear head and knowing that you can deal with it and knowing that you don't have to run away and and and ultimately understanding that the fear of facing it is more severe than the pain of actually facing it yeah you know i mean it's like the anticipation that builds, that creates all that anxiety around facing that thing you don't want to face. When you finally just face it, 99 times out of 100, you're like, why? It wasn't that bad.

Exactly. And then you build that confidence, that self-efficacy that actually, do you know what? I can deal with all of these things. I can deal with the stress or the job loss or the funeral or the death without alcohol. But I think for so many people, it's become so ubiquitous in our lives that for every occasion, there's an excuse to have a drink if it's socially or commiserate. So you hit not even one drink you haven't had in almost five years? No. And why would I? It makes no sense to me. Why would I ever do that? That's how my mindset is with this thing. It's just like, look, I've gained so much from this alcohol-free adventure that I'm on. Why would I ever go back?

It just doesn't register. So what's the second book? The second book's on motivation, which I'm super excited about. So it's channeling all my learning in many ways. It's like you put yourself under pressure again and you agree to write a book. And then you go, oh, now I've got to go and write this thing and it's been fantastic because i think it's very much dialed into what i've been doing at one you know beer and behavioral change on a mass scale in many ways i mean you know the mission over the next few

years is try and reach a million people so i'm constantly trying to figure out better ways to motivate people um better ways to help people make behavioral change. So I'm just dipping my toe into the water. I'm just warming up. There's so much to learn. I don't have all the answers far from it, but I'm really starting to make headway because I think a lot of what the second book's about is about a process, a motivational process that underlying it all really is just an excuse to create a life well lived. It's a motivational process that you can use to overcome alcohol, but you can also transform your diet with it. And you can also change your career with the same type of process, if you know what I mean. And ultimately what you're doing, you're building momentum towards this life well lived to fill these psychological needs that I think are missing in so much of modern day life.

And what's that book going to be called? I can't, I don't know. Well, actually, I don't, I genuinely don't know. You're just in the writing part of it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we've got another four or five months yet. Yeah. Well, you guys have had crazy growth and you've gotten tons of media attention. So you've definitely tapped a nerve and a cord and you're filling a need. Like there's, the response to One Year No Beer has been massive. Oh, absolutely. Like the world over, because I think people dialed into the fact that, hold on,

wow, this is really cool for one. And I can take a break and it's not all about, again, dependency. And it's, it's in that middle ground that no one's really been in there before. And I think people are excited about it. And there's more and more momentum. As we know, millennials are drinking less and less. And I think, again, about it. And there's more and more momentum. As we know, millennials are drinking less and less. And I think, again, it's that middle band, that sort of 30 to 50-year-olds are like, hold on, is this right? Are we meant to be doing this, right? It is the 30 to 50 to the 60-year-olds.

The millennials don't drink that much. I'm around a lot of millennials. And they don't have the same relationship with alcohol that our generation did. Maybe because pot is so ubiquitous. I don't know what it is, but it's definitely qualitatively different. And there's more interest in wellness and wellbeing than there was when we were that age. And also being authentic. You know, we see this all the time, you know, on the social platforms, and ultimately we're not authentic when we drink and we turn into someone that we're not. And I

think the younger generation are thriving on authenticity in many ways i think that's astute yeah and and i think we hide behind it and and i've said this all along even if you're drinking twice a week you're never really you we almost joke about this all the time you actually only start to discover yourself which is the greatest discovery you'll ever make by the way your authentic self when you take a break from alcohol because you're normally under its cloud, whether that's just the subtle effects of not having slept very well, or the obvious effects of actually the hangovers, or actually being under the influence of alcohol. You rarely get to experience life as yourself. And even my story, I assumed I was this extrovert all of my life. I thought I was an extrovert. And then I stopped drinking and went,

I'm a classic introvert. And you might not think that, but I genuinely am. I read a book. It was like, I don't want to go to that party. No, like, it's not fun anymore, you know? And it was such, it was so liberating to figure that out. But imagine for like almost 40 years, I'd convinced myself I was someone that I actually wasn't.

I could play the part brilliantly, but I was like Superman. I had to go into the phone box and down a couple of pints and then I come out as this like flamboyant guy whereas um you know I love being me now but that's really hard and actually it's a good point I think a lot of people struggle to let go of that identity that person that they've created or that persona that they've created around alcohol and for me that was one of the hardest challenges was just going, I'm not going to be that guy anymore. But you know, I don't want to be that guy anymore. I want to hang out around the vol-au-vents and just sort of have a nice deep conversation with someone. Do you know what I mean? I don't want to be hanging

off the chandeliers anymore. And for me, that's been the greatest discovery of all is actually being myself and loving it and enjoying it. What did you learn from your time with Gabor? loving it and enjoying it what did you learn from your time with Gabor I'm Gabor's great and so the big the big learning for me was back to this this core theme which was why not not why the problem why the pain exploring the the prospect of childhood trauma yeah exactly I mean and some of that is really interesting and Gabor went out on a limb and he did some pretty crazy stuff. And I was like, oh, I'm not sure. Like on you, like one-on-one with you personally or just in general in terms of his ideas? Within the group.

You know, he almost joked. He said, look, if you think you had a really good childhood, but you've now got one of these terrible diseases. I got news for you. Come up here and I'll tell you. Yeah. And in five seconds, he'll identify. Yeah. And I'll say, well, they didn't have a great childhood and actually all these other things.

So some of that is quite difficult to stomach as it were. And he's great, you know, so confident with it and he's charismatic with it. And he's so learned on those subjects. It's fascinating to be around. But the big point for me constantly, which really got me thinking about this big cultural question, you know, why are people turning to alcohol and similar substances on a mass scale that might not end up as dependent? What's the pain points?

And I think the pain points are these classic things that we're missing, like connection and autonomy and control. These are the much bigger questions that we should be asking rather than getting too focused on, like, alcohol is the devil. We have to remove the alcohol. It's not that. It's way bigger than that. Have you read Johan Hari's harry's books yeah yeah so he was just in here recently i just put his episode up the other day but that's his whole thing you know lost connections that this lack of

intimacy this disconnection that humans have from each other is driving not just you know the the addiction epidemic but our epidemic of of declining mental health and depression and suicide and the like oh exactly right and then this goes back to that box argument so the box people we can understand that maybe they're all addicted but everyone else on that plane on that gradient are probably drinking a little bit because they're a bit unhappy you know i mean not everyone but you get the point i think because of this cultural malaise that because they're a bit unhappy you know i mean not everyone but you get the point i think because of this cultural malaise that maybe they're lacking autonomy or they're stressed all the time so they're just looking for things and what's happening is they're not discovering ways to

achieve those ends without alcohol because it's so easy and it's so ubiquitous and it's so encouraged whereas it takes a lot more effort to find ways to create new connection. It takes a lot more effort to find ways to relax without alcohol. And again, this is all baked into what we're trying to do at One Year Beer. That's why it's so big. Well, the natural progression of what you're doing, and I'm sure you've thought about this, and I'm interested in where you're at specifically with it, is to take this model and create these communities, not just virtual communities, but in-person communities, city by city. Right. So in the way that like, turn around, see the November project book underneath crushing it, like pull that out. And then your book is behind there to pull that out.

So November project, you see that on the bottom. And then your book is underneath David Goggins over there. I'll 28 day alcohol free. See, there you go. I should have pulled that out before. And then your book is underneath David Goggins over there, 28-Day Alcohol-Free. There you go. I should have pulled that out before. In the way that November Project has these city-by-city chapters, and it's free, and you show up in the morning, and you work out, and it's high energy, and it's exciting, and it's very communal and encouraging. I can see a tweak on that, like a version of that around the idea that you're putting out into the world. Oh, absolutely. It would be really cool. Yeah. And it's starting to happen. We have lots of sort of meetups as we call it, where the members are just saying,

look, I'm in Chicago, I'm in New York, or I'm in London. I'm going to get together. Who wants to join me? And seeing the online transfer offline is stunning. And I touched on this because the group and the community come together in such a honest way it's really nice when you meet in person because you've got rid of all that fluff again no one's pretending to be something they're not it's very real it's very visceral so when you meet these people in person there's that instant connection that instant bond and then it's not about alcohol right no one's talking about alcohol they're talking about getting fit they're talking about getting healthy they're talking about crushing it in their jobs so i think a lot of this will transfer into these physical style meetups all over the world that's the plan we've just got

over a million pounds in investment which is you know huge for us that's great farm that's and that's from joe no joe's one of the investors and we've got about 10 a million pounds that's that's amazing yeah you know we've only've only really been operating for a couple of years in terms of our business. But the mission is to try and grow a business that does good in the world, that actually can get out there. How dare you? No, but this is the thing. What's interesting about this, for the last 100 years, there's only ever been one message

marketed about alcohol, that it's cool, sexy, fun. And we're flooded with all this marketing. And my vision, I think for One You Know Beer, if it grows big enough, is that maybe we're advertising on the billboards. Like the real truth, which is going alcohol free is cool, sexy, fun, and you'll be way more successful or at halftime on the Superbowl. You know, someone actually coming the other way, telling the other side of the story, because for the last hundred years, there's only ever been, you know, almost one message, if you know what I mean. And if you're not partaking, then you're some kind of freak or you're damaged.

Yeah. Whereas this is the opposite. It's like, hold on, we're all crushing it over here, by the way. You know, we're having these wonderful time. We're all like losing weight, getting fit, crushing it at work, and we're not drinking, you know? And that's why I want more role models to come out the woodwork and say, I don't drink. We seem to know everyone that does drink or the sports stars that fall out the nightclub at 2am, but we don't really know about the guys that don't drink who are like, who are at home, you know? Yeah, exactly. Well, I love the book. What's cool about it is it's not like, um, some kind of, you know, typical self-help primer where it's like, here are the steps to do this. And it's not heavy in that regard. It's very colorful. It's very graphics heavy. It's very easy to read.

You could pick it up and open it to any page and get some wisdom about how to navigate your day in a healthier way. It's just friendly, you know, it's like, you could leave it out anywhere. There's no like stigma. Like if you bought a book, like, do you have a problem with drinking? You know, you can't like have that out in your coffee table, you know what I'm saying? This is so true. But this is like, oh, this is cool. Like, I want to look through this. It's full of beautiful photographs and it's just, you know, it's uplifting, I guess is the word I'm looking for. Yeah, and it's so true.

And when we said to the publisher, Pam McMillan, we were like, look, this needs to pass the tube test. We need to make it look that someone can pick it up. Is somebody okay reading this on the subway? Yeah, exactly. Or are they going to be like pretending to read something else? War and Peace. And then they've got to like jam it in the middle of it. So, you know, it's bright and it's in your face. And it's, you know, that's what it's about. It's all about uplifting and vibran war and peace. And then they've got to like jam it in the middle of it. So, you know, it's bright and it's in your face and it's, you know, that's what it's about. It's all

about uplifting and vibrancy and health and being your best self. I think that's what life's all about. You know, that's why I'm on this mission. That's why I'm, you know, chasing this path towards meaning in many ways. How's the book doing? It's doing well, right? Fantastic. Yeah. And then it gets another lift. So it was out this time last year, but then it goes again because we have the big thing in the UK called Dry Jan. So lots of people right now. Oh, that's happening right now. Yeah. That's happening right now. Yeah.

So what else are you doing in LA? We are SoulCycle. This is the difference. Yeah, SoulCycle. This is different. You come to LA, it's going to be like party time. We're up in the 6am spin class, my wife and I. Tara, loving it, right? And it's a different world because you just see a different part of life, you know? And I think you see, you make that real connection that doesn't have to involve alcohol all the time yet, but we have a brilliant time together.

Right. Well, thank you for coming out here. It's a pleasure to connect with you. It's been great. One year, no beer is the way to go. It's super cool what you're doing. It's serving a huge need for people. And I applaud you and I'm at your service, my friend.

Anything I can do to help you, please reach out to me. Everybody should, whether you have a problem with alcohol or not, you should check out the book, the 28 Day Alcohol-Free Challenge, just because it's an awesome book. And look, let's be honest. The truth is, chances are,

if you're not struggling with alcohol in one way or another, I'm sure you know somebody who is, or maybe somebody who could just do with a little break, right? That's really who we're going for. Yeah, exactly. The people in the middle, the moderate to average drinkers, just come and take a break. And if you feel amazing at the end of it, keep going. Right. That's it it find one year no beer on facebook and one year no beer.com or it's onyb.com why don't you know beer.com okay cool yeah it's all happening just come and do a challenge and just see how you feel you feel great keep going and what are the what's your deal with the public speaking oh this is the big thing you're doing a lot of that yeah i really

want to get into the second half of this year i want to to speak as much as I can, get this message out there. I'm really enjoying it. And again, it's like writing in many ways. I think you have to give it a bit of time and respect that is public speaking. And that's something that I want to add to my armory, as it were, just to get out there and meet more people and test myself, get myself out of the comfort zone as an introvert, standing up on stage and talking in front of a lot of people.

You're so introverted, Andy. Oh, my God. I keep saying it and everyone's going, no, you know, standing up on stage and talking in front of a lot of people. You're so introverted, Andy. Oh my God. I keep saying it and everyone's going, no you're not. I mean, you're sitting across from me struggling with what to say. It's just, I got to pull it out of you. Yeah, yeah. I know, I know, I know. I am though, you believe me. But that's a big thing for me speaking. So yeah, I really want to get on stage and get this message out to more and more people. Cool. Well, as those things get scheduled, I trust that they will be up on the website

if people want to come and hear you and shake your hand and meet you. And if someone's listening to this and they're like, hey, I'm going on a business trip. I don't really feel like drinking. I'm going to be with a couple of guys. I know they're going to go out partying

and I'm going to be sitting in my hotel room bored. Where should they go? Should they go to your Facebook page and try to find somebody else like-minded in their city? Or like, where do you point those people? Yeah, go to one, you know, beer if you can. And on the website there, you can sign up to a challenge if you want to sign up to a

challenge or go to the Facebook page or on Instagram. I'm doing Facebook lives and Insta lives and all this sort of stuff trying to inspire people. There's loads of stuff going on. It's a big community. Cool. All right, my friend, come back and talk to me some more. Will do.

I love it. Thanks so much, Richard. It's a pleasure. Yeah, thank you. Peace. All right, my friend. Come back and talk to me some more. Will do. I love it. Thanks so much, Richard. It's a pleasure. Yeah, thank you. Peace. Plants. No beer. Sobriety.

And we're out. All right. Thanks, you guys. I hope that you've been inspired by Andy's message and the tools that he's putting out into the world. I really enjoyed that. I hope you guys did I hope that you've been inspired by Andy's message and the tools that he's putting out into the world. I really enjoyed that. I hope you guys did as well. So do me a favor, let Andy know what you thought of today's conversation. You can hit him up on Twitter at O-Y-N-B-U-K, as in One Year No Beer UK. And don't forget to check out his book,

and don't forget to check out his book the 28 day alcohol free challenge and you can visit oneyearnobeer.com where you can get 25% off their alcohol free kind of tutorials and programs when you use the promo code richroll

that's oneyearnobeer.com once again I'm not an affiliate I have no financial entanglement with that whatsoever that was just a gift that Andy wanted to give all of you guys today. If you're struggling with your diet, if you really want to master nutrition, create some staying power around healthy eating, I implore you to check out our Plant Power Meal Planner. Really proud of this program that was really crafted and created to answer one very basic question or solve one very basic problem, which is how do you make nutritious eating convenient and delicious?

Well, we came up with the answer and it involves thousands of plant-based recipes that are customized based on your personal preferences. It integrates with grocery delivery in most metropolitan areas. You can create grocery lists out of it. And we have a team of amazing nutrition coaches at the ready to answer all your questions about how to eat, when to eat, how much to eat, all that kind of stuff. No matter how silly your questions are,

that's what they're there for. And you get all of this for just $1.90 a week when you sign up for a year. It really is an extraordinary program. We get emails every single day from people that are using it. They're loving it. It's changing lives. I'm really proud of it. So to learn more and to sign up, go to meals.richroll.com or click on Meal Planner on the top menu on my website, richroll.com. If you would like to support our mission here on the podcast,

just tell your friends about the show or your favorite episode, share it on social media, take a screen grab, post it on Instagram or wherever, hit that subscribe button on YouTube, on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, on Google, leave a review on Apple Podcasts, leave a comment on the YouTube versions, the videos that we put up on this, and you can support us on Patreon at richroll.com forward slash donate. I want to thank everybody

who helped put on the show today. Jason Camiolo for audio engineering, production, show notes, interstitial music, Blake Curtis and Margo Lubin

for videoing and editing the show for YouTube, plus all the short clips that you see on social media. Jessica Miranda for all her graphics, Wizardry, DK, David Kahn for advertiser relationships, and Allie Rogers for portraits and theme music, as always, by Annalima. Appreciate you guys. Thanks for the

love. Thank you for the attention. It means so much to me that you guys tune in every week and have listened all the way past the end of this interview, all the way to this point. I will see you back here next week with another amazing conversation. This one will be with Ara Katz and Raja Deer. They're with a company called seed.com and it's all about the microbiome.

It's amazing. So until then, more love, less booze, no more beer. All right, peace, plants, sobriety. Namaste. Thank you.