Day 8: The Demons Have Names
We have been moving around the edge of something.
I have said the word demons a few times in this book already.
I used it in the title of this chapter because it is the word that best fits what I am trying to describe. “Demon” is not a clinical term or a diagnosis; it’s something that lives in the dark rooms of your mind, it has weight, takes shape, and has a voice that has been influencing your decisions from the shadows for years without you ever giving it a name.
Unnamed things have more power than named things.
Think about the fears you have carried that you have never said out loud; they grow in the dark, expanding to fill whatever space you give them. But the moment you put a word on something, the moment you look at it directly and say, “This is what you are, and this is where you came from,” something changes.
It does not disappear, but it loses the power that comes from being unknown. When you can name the thing, you can put boundaries and limits on that thing; when it remains unnamed, it remains limitless and infinite in what it can do and where it can go in your mind.
Today, we name them.
Mine had several names, and learning what those were allowed me to pierce the veil of darkness that covered my mind and drove my addiction, so I could see the light and save my life.
The first one was abandonment.
My mother committed suicide two weeks after I turned 6.
To a six-year-old, the shape loss leaves becomes an imprint on the soul, one that’s “filled in” with a variety of things throughout life. I carried guilt in that shape; I also filled it with anger, rage, addiction, and more. That imprint on my soul was then carried into every relationship I ever had, even the one with myself. I left before people could leave me, I tried to be who they’d like, and I pushed before I could be pushed…
I wasn’t aware that I had this issue; I thought my life was like everyone else’s life, and the only difference was that I didn’t have a mom. The reality was far worse. I didn’t have a mom, I didn’t have an outlet, I didn’t have an adult to help guide me towards processing the feelings, I had trauma planted in me, and it grew.
The second one was worthlessness.
Not the word I would have used at thirteen…
But that is what it was; I was the kid who wasn’t able to protect myself, my brother, or my sister, in a moment when I needed to; I was the kid who stayed back in school, I was the one who got in trouble, I’m “that guy” who was sent to Scared Straight…
I was told in a hundred different ways by a hundred different systems that I was full of potential and just wasting it, like I had a clue how to do anything else with the issues inside me.
I didn’t think I was worth anything, and it led to self-harm, self-loathing, and I believe it broke my mind as I distinctly remember thinking I didn’t know who the fuck I was, or was supposed to be; I just knew I was wasting whatever was inside of me, and I couldn’t stop it, so I accepted it, I was a waste of a human life.
The third one was grief.
Twenty years of unprocessed grief sat in the back of my mind, never addressed, never mourned, just covered up and walked over.
My childhood drove more of my drinking than I ever admitted, and I could not address the drinking until I understood it wasn’t the problem; it was a symptom of these issues, and I’d never get sober until I gave them names.
Suicide, Assault, Neglect, Abuse, Worthlessness, Betrayal, Isolation…
Your demons are different, but they exist.
Maybe it is a parent who was never there, or was there in ways that hurt you. Maybe it is something that was done to you that you have never told anyone. Maybe it is a version of yourself you are ashamed of, where you are the one who did wrong; maybe it was something you didn’t do that you should have, and you’ve been running from the shame ever since...
Maybe it is a loss you never allowed yourself to fully feel, getting cheated on by someone you love, wasting an opportunity given to you, or ruining the chances for someone else…
Whatever it is, it has a name.
You do not have to share it with anyone, and you do not have to go to therapy tomorrow to purge it from your system. My ask is only that you look at it; be mad, be embarrassed, be sad…
But you have to look at it.
Because the thing about drinking to numb your demons is that it is the least effective strategy you could have chosen.
Alcohol does not touch the demon; it just turns off the lights, so you don’t see it as well. When you sober up, the lights come back on, and it is still there, patient as ever, right where you left it, a little bit bigger and stronger.
The only thing that works for clearing these demons from your mind is looking right at them, calling them by their names, and deciding they no longer get to run your life.
That process takes longer than 31 days, and it starts with a name.
Your Day 8 Sober-Challenge
Write down your three biggest demons, and don’t use vague descriptions; give them specific names.
Not “I have anger issues.” But rather, “I am afraid that anyone who gets close will hurt me and leave me, so I scare them off before that can happen.”
Not “I have a bad past.” But rather, “I have never processed what happened to me when I was young.”
Three specific events need to be named.
You do not have to do anything with them today beyond writing them down, but now they are on paper, in the light, where you can see them.
That is where the work starts.
- Zac
PS: You just did one of the hardest things a person can do, you looked at the thing you've been running from and gave it a name; that's not a small act.
If you're a man who's ready to keep that momentum going and build something solid on the other side of this work, 31 Days to Masculinity is the next step. Thirty days. One decision a day. A framework for the man who is done letting the unnamed things win.
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