Peter Hedges Quotes

When I finally got sober, I moved towards what I might have been if I hadn't been destroying myself when I was young.

The '90s were a time of building for me. Building a life that was sober, drained of harmful, wasteful excess and manufacturing in its place a family of my own.

My character had been in the chair for seven years. He had gone through his anger, depression, drug and alcohol abuse. He had gone through everything, now he was up, he was happy, he was filled with his dream.

I'm sober now and very happy.

I think I've improved in a lot of ways because of being able to stay clean and sober.

I used and abused drugs and alcohol. When I stopped doing that it became a lot clearer that life goes from inside to giving as opposed to taking and destroying.

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

It is 10 years since I used drugs or drank alcohol and my life has improved immeasurably. I have a job, a house, a cat, good friendships and generally a bright outlook.

Getting sober was the single bravest thing I've ever done and will ever do in my life.

I learned that I had character defects, that I was allergic to alcohol and drugs, and that I had an obsession with all the bad stuff. But thank God that I woke and that I had good people around me to support me. There's not much more I can say about it. You have to want to be a better person.

But my activities have been pretty much focused in the last almost 30 years on the recovery, of my own recovery, the understanding for my family of my recovery.

Even when you've made mistakes in life, you can still contribute and pick up the stuff and move on.

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

Getting sober just exploded my life. Now I have a much clearer sense of myself and what I can and can't do. I am more successful than I have ever been. I feel very positive where I never did before, and I think that's all a direct result of getting sober.

If I were to try to identify a turning point I'd say that was it - getting clean.

I got sober. I stopped killing myself with alcohol. I began to think: 'Wait a minute - if I can stop doing this, what are the possibilities?' And slowly it dawned on me that it was maybe worth the risk.

If I have a problem, stuff's going through my head, I feel like using, I usually go and talk to my dad... I decided to get sober a lot younger than he did. He first tried to get sober when he was like 32, I believe.

Since I've quit drinking, I'm not sure I've found the good life, but I've certainly uncovered a better one.

My main focus in sobriety has been to replace fear with faith or love.

Anybody that's not supportive of me staying sober obviously has to go. But on the other hand, there are not really a lot of people who don't want me to stay sober. I was a nightmare.

With any recovery from morbidity there must go a certain healthy humiliation.

I was a savage for so many years of my life. There was some seed of determination in me that I was not conscious of. I was mostly consciously getting into trouble and drunk.

Going to rehab was the best decision I ever made.

I don't drink. I choose to be sober now. I have drunk over the last six years, but I just don't want to be that person anymore.

The first thought that I had about really trying to get sober was, 'Man, I could do a lot of good in the world. I can lead by example and just be this heroic recovery guy.' And that's just a bad reason to get sober. You can't get sober for anybody's benefit, let alone the world at large. You really got to do it for yourself.