Embracing God's Grace: A Conversation on Alcohol Addiction Recovery and Spiritual Growth with Rose Ann Forte

What does it mean to overcome alcohol addiction with the help of faith and a positive mindset? Today, we sit down for a heartfelt conversation with Rose Ann Forte, a successful C-suite executive, ministry leader, working mom of four, and an alcohol-free coach. She shares her personal journey of finding freedom from alcohol addiction and how her faith played a significant role in her journey. Discover her international best-selling book, "The Plans He Has For Me," a 12-week daily devotional designed to help people break free from alcohol addiction while strengthening their faith.

Rose Ann also shares her insights on positive intelligence, the scientific practice of using a positive mindset to handle life's difficult situations. We explore the importance of forgiveness in overcoming alcohol addiction, understanding the difference between godly guilt and worldly guilt, and learning how to embrace self-forgiveness and God's grace. Don't miss this inspiring and insightful conversation, and be sure to check out Rose Ann's free resource for navigating social situations without alcohol at www.theplanshehasforme.com. Let her story inspire you to find freedom and a renewed sense of purpose in your own life.

Transcript

Dorsey Ross: 0:15

Hello everyone, thank you again for joining me on the episode of the Dorsey Ross S Today we have a special guest with us. Her name is Rose Ann Forte. She was a successful C-suite executive and ministry leader in the church. She is a working mom of four and a so-called drinker. Over the years, life stresses and the difficult merits creating environment where her alcohol usage increased significantly. After the collapse of her merits, her drinking further escalated and she felt like a shrored with God in the church. Aa was not an option in her mind. She had already submitted to God and didn't want to call herself an alcoholic. When COVID-19 hit, she enrolled in a cocaine program to put alcohol to the side for three months. Right now, rose Ann is an alcohol-free coach, a Pagative, intelligent Coach and International Best-Selling Author of a book called The Plans He Has for Me, which is a 12-week daily devotional for freedom from alcohol. Rose Ann, thank you for coming on the show today.

Rose Ann Forte: 1:45

Oh, thank you, Dorsey, it's so nice to be here. Thank you for having me, absolutely.

Dorsey Ross: 1:50

Well, i'd like to open up with a couple of easy questions, you know. first, and my first question is what's your favorite movie and what does it reveal about you?

Rose Ann Forte: 2:06

Oh, my goodness, That's a hard question, because I hardly ever watched the movie before, i don't know if I'd be able to answer that I literally I don't go to the movies. I will tell you that the last time I went to the movies. I like to live a life that's free of stress And I went to go see Top Gun 2 at the movie theater and I walked down to that movie, completely stressed out. It was a great movie but oh my gosh, after kind of practicing living a low-stress life and experiencing like, oh my gosh, this is going to. Yeah, it was funny. So I'm sorry, that was a hard question for me. You can ask me any question you want, by the way.

Dorsey Ross: 2:54

In your bio. Here you're a bio kind of progative intelligent coax. What exactly is that?

Rose Ann Forte: 3:04

Yeah, thank you for asking that. So it is something I stumbled on that's very consistent with the word of God too. It's the scientific practice of using a positive mindset to handle life's difficult situations versus a negative mindset, and so it's kind of right. It's developing an awareness of sabotaging thoughts that come in And we all know we have them, right, so we can't get rid of them. But positive intelligence helps us redirect them very quickly. You know, for instance, it's sabotaging thoughts of judgment.

Rose Ann Forte: 3:51

We can judge others, we can judge ourselves. We can actually be really good at being bullies to ourselves, right, and we can judge situations. So it's like, wait a minute, i just and this is where it helped me I just told myself a horrible thing like you, idiot, why would you do that? Like whoops, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's a really bad statement. It's not in line with God's word. Let's redirect that, and you know, so I love that. It's just. Yeah, it really helps people switch around the narrative in their head, which again tracks with God's word. Second Corinthians, 10.5, is really talking about capturing our thoughts and making them obedient to Christ. So being bullies with ourselves or judging others not obedient, is it?

Dorsey Ross: 4:48

Right, I do that all the time as well. You know I beat myself up. You know, say you idiot, you're not that smart. Come on And I have to remind, and, like you said, I have to remind myself that, hey, I am not smart. You know, I'm not an idiot, I am who God says that I am.

Rose Ann Forte: 5:11

Yeah, and I was just doing a coaching session right before I came on with you and I was going through day 58 of the devotional. It says a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person's strength. And in order to and it talks a lot about, they say, psychological health assets. I was quoting some scientific journal and a psychological health asset is a positive emotion, life satisfaction, optimism, life purpose, social support. And you can't have those things with when you're being a bully to yourself. You know what I mean And and I know this personally because I went from a place of self-loathing to having purpose and living in joy despite circumstance. So yeah, i know, and the science behind this is they. I wish I had an MRI of my brain before, because it would have been in pretty bad shape. I was diagnosed with something called major depressive disorder, so that's a level beyond depression. So no more, no more.

Dorsey Ross: 6:31

Tell us a little bit more about your book and where can people you know contact you and where can people pick up your book?

Rose Ann Forte: 6:40

So it's a daily devotional. It's called The Plans he has for me And it'll help people put alcohol to the side for 12 consecutive weeks to just see what's possible It can. It can be purchased anywhere. Buying books are sold And if you go to my website, wwwtheplanshehasformecom, you will also be able to pick up while you can purchase the book there, but pick up a free resource because one of the hardest things for people to do when they put alcohol to the side is understand what the narrative should be when they're in social situations and everybody's drinking. So I've developed some flashcards for people with 20 different responses that you can use to tell people in a very positive fashion that you're choosing not to drink at this point. So yeah, wwwtheplanshehasformecom, thanks Awesome.

Dorsey Ross: 7:36

Tell us more about your story.

Rose Ann Forte: 7:40

Yeah, my story and I love to share this story because I think it's typical for a lot of people inside and outside of the church. You know, i kind of fell for the lies of this world and I started drinking at 13 years old, just to fit in, you know, and be cool, and my parents weren't around during the day. They both worked. So my friends and I would go to the liquor cabinet and experience alcohol. Then I'd go on to college and it's just to have fun, and I literally I was so sweet and I wasn't a Christian at this point, but I was, so I didn't even know that people didn't drink. I mean, that's the world I lived in. I thought everybody drank in college, everyone. I did not know a single human being that didn't drink. And so I went with the program And then I started working and climbing up the corporate ladder. Same thing, happy hours and business lunches. We even had a liquor cabinet in the boardroom at my company.

Rose Ann Forte: 8:52

I used it again for what people do when they go out on a date, like romanticism, you have a nice glass of wine, so I thought it was necessary for that And then I think, when the trouble starts happening is using it to solve for stress and manage difficult situations, kind of to check out in my life. And I had grown to this place where I was an executive, i had four kids, i had very, very difficult talks of marriage And I just couldn't deal with it all. And the thing is I was a leader in the church. I used to be a Bible study leader. I was very functional And a lot of people are. I know that through my coaching. So it's just, and I used to. I remember I used to drink with people at my church and my Bible study group. It was just something we did. And it's just crazy, as I look back on it, how I picked and choose, you know scriptural references like oh, drunkenness is a sin. Oh God, come on, you know, surely it can't be that bad. That's what everybody does. And I thought I was being a cool Christian. Huh, little did I know. I don't think I shared a lot of light in that realm of my friendships. So, yeah, that's how it happens. It sneaks up on you.

Rose Ann Forte: 10:30

I think What people don't understand is there's a line. You know it's an addictive substance And you can get addicted to it in a year and a decade, but all of a sudden, there's this invisible line that you cross and you don't know when you're going to cross it. But once you do, you can't go backwards. Right, it's like uh-oh, i can't stop. And that's when you know, like a lot of people ask me the question when do you know it's a problem? And most people go to. Well, i'm not drinking in the morning, i'm not beating my wife, i'm not, you know. Well, that's not when the problem starts. The problem starts when alcohol is controlling you versus you controlling it.

Dorsey Ross: 11:17

Yeah, when did you finally decide you know that enough is enough and that you weren't going to stop drinking?

Rose Ann Forte: 11:28

Well, that's an interesting question too, because I probably did that a hundred times right, and that is enough. I'm done, and that's what we all do. The NIH was the National Institutes of Health say you'll try for four and a half years before you get super serious. You know making these promises to yourself. I had stopped for a significant amount of time after I got a DUI. That was some motivation And but then I started again after three months. You know, i was feeling confident and I could handle it and I didn't understand the neurological science behind it. So I eventually went back into my old patterns and it got worse.

Rose Ann Forte: 12:19

But the I finally deciding enough was enough was when I finally decided enough was enough was when COVID hit And I was watching those videos. I think everybody remembers those videos in Italy where they were putting bodies and body bags. Yeah, they couldn't keep up with the DOS And I really got so scared because my drinking was super heavy at that time And I know that drinking suppresses your immune system and it also suppresses your lung function And those are two things that you kind of needed to survive COVID. So I was scared enough to where I decided to quit, and I quit on my own, but I ended up joining a secular coaching program. It was worldwide, it was on Zoom, and I just learned some concepts there that really helped me understand. You know, oh my gosh, life is so much better. And the weird thing is is I felt like they were teaching God's word without God, you know, living a life of gratitude and resisting temptation, that kind of thing, and that's how the devotional kind of was born as well. I ended up working for them and having a lot of people come in to the program that were Christians, because it's like.

Rose Ann Forte: 13:54

I went to my pastor after I'm like, why couldn't I solve this in the church? Why did I have to go outside the church to solve this? And then I'm hearing God's word and my pastor said you know, the world is teaching the kingdom without the king, and I thought that was just brilliant. Yeah, so yeah, that's that's pretty much was. The pivoting point is I was scared, i quit. I had no intention of quitting forever. I just wanted to know what quitting for three months could lead to, and it led to such a transformed life And I guess I'll share. My weight was down, my blood pressure was down, my resting heart weight was down, my peace was there, my joy, my self confidence, my ability to make decisions, you know, just believing in myself again. So it was quite the transformation.

Dorsey Ross: 14:58

And that's how the daily devotional came about.

Rose Ann Forte: 15:02

Yeah, i was. I was an enrollment and client journey coach with people, so I talked to a lot of people that were Christian, so I knew who the Christians were inside the coaching program And I started just in a paper and pencil format looking at scripture that matched with my no-transcript, my walk and their teachings and I text it to people in the morning. I text a scripture and a prayer and they'd be like, oh my gosh, thank you so much, roseanne. This really helps. You need to keep doing this, and so they encouraged me to keep going with it. Yeah.

Dorsey Ross: 15:39

Yeah, why 12 weeks? What is is there coming special about 12 weeks, or how does that, how did that come about?

Rose Ann Forte: 15:48

Yeah, i think. Well, it certainly matches with my experience, which was about three months. But because so many people can't imagine forever, i think like, oh, you have to do this forever. At least if people are willing to do 12 weeks they can have the success rate goes up. Right, it's well, it's only 12 weeks. So I think the success rate that I've seen is about 80% because it's like it's only 12 weeks, i can do this. But then what you want to have happen in the 12 weeks is go, oh, my gosh, this is so much better, right? So that's the reason.

Rose Ann Forte: 16:29

The other reason is it takes, at least scientifically, at least 66 days to change a neurological habit, and once your body gets back into homeostasis, it is a substance, so you have to let your body readjust. Now you're you're dealing with triggers and neurological habits and patterns that you've done in the past. So you're learning like oh, when I'm stressed, i don't take a drink, i clean the dishes or I listen to music or I call a friend, and so you're just developing new neurological patterns so that you don't always stay in that victim state like, oh, i want it, you know. Oh, i can't have a drink. Oh, no, i'm gonna do something else with this feeling of stress or this feeling of wanting to have fun and connection. Yeah, that's why.

Dorsey Ross: 17:26

Okay, i know, i'm sure that a lot of you know a lot of people that deal with alcohol. you know they, they feel, you know, shame and guilt. How do we process that? Or how do you process that?

Rose Ann Forte: 17:42

Yeah, my pastor did an incredible sermon on shame and guilt and I'm just going to steal from him right now, but he was in second Corinthians And I believe Paul was talking about godly guilt and worldly guilt. And godly guilt is something where we just were walking and step with God And we acknowledge that we've done something wrong and we repent, and so we turn around right And we it doesn't mean we won't ever do it again, but we just acknowledge that we've done something wrong and we ask for forgiveness. Worldly guilt is shame And instead of saying I did something wrong, you say there's something wrong with me And And as a result, you hide, meaning you keep secrets and you blame meaning you blame something else other than yourself. And he is the garden right As the perfect example of that right. When they send, they hid from God and they blamed, they blamed the serpent, adam blamed Eve, and I think that when people are feeling the shame, i want them to take away the shame and understand the facts and the truth.

Rose Ann Forte: 19:15

Right, the facts and the truth are that we experienced stress, we wanted to relieve the stress and we reached for alcohol. But when we can reflect back on that, we can look at the truth. We reached for it, but it didn't really solve for stress. It probably created more, and that we may have said something We didn't want to say, did something we didn't want to do, felt terrible. The next morning was less productive, right. And we wake up in the morning we think we chose the alcohol because we wanted to relieve stress And what we did is we didn't deal with it and we created more. So what we're trying to do in the coaching is kind of understand the facts and the truth without assigning blame, because we're in autopilot mode And we talked about this at the beginning.

Rose Ann Forte: 20:16

Right Of shaming ourselves of believing something's wrong with us, nothing's wrong with us. We're operating exactly the way God created us. When we practice something, it becomes second nature. That's how he designed our brain And that's why he has these guidelines, because he loves us and he doesn't want the sinful behaviors to be trapped in the operating system. But you know what They do, it's okay. That's why he provides new mercies and forgiveness every morning. And yeah, and so it's just being a little bit more at peace with science, awareness of what you've done in the past and following him. Does that make sense to you?

Dorsey Ross: 21:03

Yeah, it does. We talked about thinking about forgiveness from God. How is forgiveness an important part of this journey?

Rose Ann Forte: 21:14

Yeah, wow, thank you for that question, because that's a huge one.

Rose Ann Forte: 21:19

Forgiveness of self, i think, is important because many times we're good at forgiving others but not ourselves, and we are told that God wipes the slate clean And the reason he does that is so we don't look in the past and keep beating ourselves up.

Rose Ann Forte: 21:37

Right, we can only look forward if we accept the gift that's been offered forgiveness. And then the other thing that's really important about this a lot of people drink because they've been legitimate victims of somebody else's sin against them and they're trying to process that pain, right. And so I want to acknowledge to people that they have been wronged and that when somebody sins against them, they're owed a debt. Right, but when we process, when we forgive that person, it doesn't mean that we've given them a hall pass, right. It just means that we've transferred the collection of that debt to God so that we don't have to continue to experience it again, that we're free to move forward. Now, that doesn't mean we don't have boundaries around ourselves to protect ourselves in the future or have learned something from that, but processing that forgiveness, which is just the release of that debt to God, is super critical for those that are using a substance to really deal with the pain caused by somebody else.

Dorsey Ross: 23:03

Yeah, how do we, how do I help someone I know who has this problem?

Rose Ann Forte: 23:13

Yeah, i think the important thing is a combination of compassion and boundaries. I think getting mad at the person or shaming them is never going to help, because they're already having a narrative of like I'm a loser, i can't control this right. So having some compassion is a really important part to gain their listening. Also for letting them know, especially if it's a loved one or a friend what's possible in the relationship if we put this to the side. But the other thing is boundaries too, because that doesn't mean that you should let them do or say anything that they want when they're in a drunken state, and so it's just being having boundaries, but showing this love like I love you so much, let's say, as a spouse, i love you so much. What's possible for us if we do this? Because when you behave like that, it's and it's just bringing some recognition and awareness of the cost of their drinking as opposed to you know what's wrong with you.

Rose Ann Forte: 24:29

Why can't you stop? Well, trust me, unless you've been addicted to something, it's. It's really hard And actually I'm going to take that back. Everybody knows how hard it is to change a habit that they have. Everybody knows like I don't care if that's losing weight or sugar or checking your cell phone. It's hard to change a habit. So this is the change of a habit that's so deeply ingrained, combined with an addictive substance, so it's not something that people can just go oh okay, i'm going to not drink today. Well, if that was the case, then we wouldn't have alcohol problems because we could just choose not to drink. But it is a retraining of the neurological pathways of the mind.

Dorsey Ross: 25:18

Yeah, And those that may be listening to this later. As we get rid of the clones, what do you say to people who secretly suffer with this?

Rose Ann Forte: 25:30

Yeah, i would just. I just want to scream to the world that you're not alone. According to the NIH, this is a problem for 11.3% of the population in the US, and I think that's numbers really low, because those are only the people that admit it's a problem, and we just need to be more honest with ourselves about what the substance is costing us and know that, as I sit here today on the other side, know that there is a better life and it's worth taking the actions and the steps to change these behaviors that have just become routine in our lives, and just look to God to walk that journey with Him.

Dorsey Ross: 26:25

How are you doing now and what are you doing today? and what are you doing today?

Rose Ann Forte: 26:32

I am having fun with purpose. I used to believe I was just a washed up person that had nothing to offer the world, and now I feel like I have a voice and purpose. I'm actually in the midst of taking a break during the summer of coaching after this last cohort, and I'm developing a program for churches, because I think it's really important that people be connected with others, and so I'm excited about delivering a program that will be helpful for churches as well in this journey.

Dorsey Ross: 27:12

What encouragement would you give to our listeners today?

Rose Ann Forte: 27:18

Just knowing that it is possible to renew your mind, that God's Word is true. I always used to make exceptions like this part's true, that part's not. I'm not going to pay attention to this one. I believe in that one, but all of it is true. You can use all of your pain and suffering for His glory, as you so well know, and if we follow His path, we bring light to others and we develop a purpose, and I think that purpose just fills us up with the Holy Spirit. I think you very well know.

Dorsey Ross: 28:00

Yes, eamon. Well, thank you so much for coming on to the show today. We greatly appreciate having you.

Rose Ann Forte: 28:09

Yeah, it's been so nice. It's so nice to share and I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity. You were spreading a lot of light yourself, and so I really admire what you do.

Dorsey Ross: 28:21

Thank you. Well, guys go. thank you so much for coming on to the show today and for listening. Please like, share and hope you enjoyed this episode. God bless, bye, bye.