10 Ways To Enjoy A Festival Sober

Matt from our crew doing a flip on our trampoline at Zion Noiz Odyssey Music Festival just last week

1. Just fu¢king do it.
   That’s literally all you need to do. I almost stopped after those initial 4 words but I figured I would share a little bit more about how I learned to enjoy festival life over the last (nearly) 3 years clean compared to the 13 years of complete DISASTERTOWN festival life I lived before.
2. If you feel the need to drink or do drugs, just try enjoying life instead. Chances are you are in a beautiful place filled with beautiful people with beautiful personalities and costumes. Try to enjoy it. If you don’t know how to enjoy life, try putting on a unicorn onesie and hand out candy to everybody at the festival. You can enjoy life most by helping other people enjoy life. (pro-tip: bring candy & other things to share: stickers, snacks, glow sticks, etc.)
3. Try to learn to hula-hoop. You can do this by trying it. Front and back or left and right. NOT ALL AROUND! At least not yet. Try it on your arm. BAM! Instant pro.
4. Observe people. Watch the person who is REALLY good at hula hooping and try their tricks. Observe peoples talents and let them know. Hug EVERYBODY!
5. Dance! Dancing is key! If you cant dance, just try. Literally not a single person gives a fuck. And 99 percent of people are fuckin terrible. But if you try, you will have a good time. Sober or not, once you get over that terrified phase, YOU WILL HAVE FUN!
6. Eat food!! Embrace the food! You might have this pre-existing perception that festival food is terrible. Maybe your jaw was just so fucked up you couldn’t chew and your face was so fucking mangles up it couldn’t produce enough saliva to even think about swallowing a bite. If you eat the food sober, I promise it will be fucking MAGICAL! Like THOSE CREPES DAMMMMMNNNNNNNNNNNN
7. Meet people! ESPECIALLY your neighbors! Do this early though! Ideally on Thursday or Friday or whatever the first couple of days you are at the festival. Festival people (especially when hung over / cracked out) dont like to interact with people they dont know. So get to know them when they are still fresh with wide eyes of rainbows, unicorns, sunshine and PLUR vibes!! Quick before the jadedness comes out!!!!
8. Stay up ALL night and DANCE until the sun ALMOST comes up! Super-Pro tip: There is usually a 30 minute span where you can get THE MOST comfortable festival sleep. It occurs right when the sun is starting to come up (no longer SUPER FREEZING COLD, but before it’s fully up (not yet SUPER FUCKING HOT) My ideal time is usually 4:47AM but with daylight savings time, sometimes it changes.
9. Go to the workshops! Literally each and every one of them could be re-named “how to better enjoy this music festival sober.” Some common ones you see are things like hula-hooping, devil sticks, breakdancing, fire spinning, poi, drum circles, yoga, meditation and SOO MANY different forms or art and music. I never even seen this things happening until I got sober. I always heard about them but thought that they were a myth, like that epic performance of Daft Punk playing at the trash fence of Burning Man.
10. Keep your crew together. Your festival experience is made up of the sum of what you do with your festival crew. It is based on experiences and experiences are amplified when shared. If you do lose someone, try your best to find them but don’t panic. Sometimes people do need some alone time, but be sure they know where and how to find you. (camp site, front left of the main stage, etc.) Pro Tip: Come up with a meeting point BEFORE someone gets lost ;)

-Stanley Arthur
❤ Festival Addict ❤

I hope you enjoyed that little article, if so you might want to check out my book or other platforms. If you want to check them out, you can here:

Amazon (Canada): https://www.amazon.ca/How-Quit-Drugs-Survived-Festival-ebook/dp/B071QX9VHG/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid&sr

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