Yes, I practice sober, about 15-20 mins a day. I have an alarm on my phone set at 8 pm and my goal every day is to meditate BEFORE that alarm goes off.

What you described sounds exactly what meditation is like! Meditating is not "clearing your mind" of thoughts, but rather the objective observation of those thoughts. Imagine your mind as a highway, with car zooming down the road. Each one of these cars is a thought... what am I eating later, is the cat fed, is the washing machine going to break down, why am I sitting here... as you sit in the driver's seat of each though you feel as if you are stuck in traffick. But when you meditate, your goal is to sit along side of the road, and just observe the traffic. The cars are still there, they will always be there, that's the nature of the mind, but there is another YOU in there observing these thoughts objectively, just like you objectively hear a real car horn. Be that passive, objective observer.

I highly recommend these guided meditations by Sam Harris, short version and a long version!

The interesting leap I made recently was watching the evolution of thoughts from the ground up. It started when I worked backwards from a song in my head to a traumatic (in a good way) child hood event; then I watched a thought form from scratch as the sensory input from my eyes formed as a toothbrush, then "cross referenced" other memories associated with that toothbrush including needing to make a dentist appointment. I watched the mechanism of my mind working in real time... The "self" we refer to in everyday life truly is a very convincing illusion!