This week on Sober Stories, we had the opportunity to interview Alex McRoberts. (S01/E007) Alex is a 500 Hour Registered Yoga Teacher, Certified Life Coach, entrepreneur, podcaster, and Ontario Certified Teacher. She has taught yoga internationally, in Canada, where she is from, Kuwait, where she called home for five years. She now resides in Bali, Indonesia. When Alex became sober in 2019, yoga played a key role in her sober journey. In 2020, Alex founded the Mindful Life Practice Community and Sober Curious Yoga, an online yoga community with participants from all over the world who are changing their relationship with alcohol using mindfulness techniques such as yoga, meditation, community and journaling. She also hosts the Sober Yoga Girl Podcast.

In our conversation with Alex, we talked all about mindfulness, yoga, and sobriety, how Alex found purpose and her jet-setting lifestyle after quitting drinking, and how yogic philosophy aligns with living alcohol-free.

For our full conversation, head to the Sober Stories Podcast (Apple, Spotify) or view the episode on our Youtube Channel. 

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Alex, on how yogic philosophy aligns with sobriety

I was raised without a religious background, so I didn’t really have any toolkit for interpreting and processing everything that I was going through, and making sense of it, until I came across the yoga sutras. Ahimsa, or non-violence towards the self, non-violence towards others — once you see it in that sense, and you’re like, ‘wait, everything I’m doing with alcohol, like my binge drinking, my partying, is all very violent towards myself. I’m literally making myself sick, making myself hungover and making myself anxious. Putting this stuff in my body that’s so bad for me. Once you see it from that lens, I completely agree with you. And I think it took me a while to get to it.

Alex, on the harm caused by “vinyasa and vino” + alcohol in yoga spaces

When I see how many sober people come to yoga as their refuge… yoga is part of so much rehab, in so many programs for people in recovery, and on every YTT I’ve been on, there’s been at least one person who’s openly identified as, “I’m in recovery, I’m a recovered alcoholic.”

I think it’s really common for sober people to come to yoga for their healing. And then for them to be pushed by these studios, or hear alcohol jokes in yoga — I’m sensitive to that. People are just so vulnerable there and for us to be talking about alcohol and joking about it, it just doesn’t feel appropriate. I do have some empathy for people because I was once in their shoes and they don’t see the harm that it’s causing.

Alex, on the courage to be different and find new connections

I’m just very different from my family, and that’s been hard. However, I’m just going to embrace who I am — I’m different. And I’m going to find my people. And I’ve moved to an island in the middle of nowhere. I think that’s a hard thing a lot of people experience — you might not get into the whole spirituality thing, but you might just find like, ‘look, I’m not like my friends who want to drink so much anymore and that’s okay.’ You really have to make an active effort to find your people and surround yourself with your people or else I think it’s really easy to get back into your drinking ways.

Connect with Alex

On Instagram – @alexmcrobs, @soberyogagirlpodcast, @themindfullifepractice

Online – The Mindful Life Practice

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Catch the whole conversation:

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