As a Brit who was socialised to binge-drink at least once a week throughout my young adult life, with a default sober state being characterised by a reserved, inhibited nature, I have grappled with this recently.
This year, as per some previous years, I partook in “Dry January” — although this year I extended it to “Dry Q1″ and then slightly longer. I enjoyed some of the sober benefits (no hangover, challenging myself to do self-work to function well in hectic social situations), but missed the joy inherent in feeling the altered state of disinhibition and mental & physical relaxation from the buzz of alcohol.
Indeed, I attended a networking event in May and felt I was lacking the edge to bond well with people I viewed as prospective employers/colleagues. I made the conscious decision to have a vodka redbull and the effect was immediate — my social anxiety dissolved away, and I was cracking jokes, driving conversation, and getting widespread approval.
It validated my theory that the self-work to reach that state of mind in a sober state was too hard, if not impossible, and I should embrace using alcohol in various social situations. I drank on a handful more occasions and had a good time.
However — and I’m going to write about this more in a full post — I had a breakthrough later on in the year. I think partly as a result of my experimentation with sobriety, plus very intentional breaking of the sobriety, I’ve built a mental model that allows me to access the same confidence, comedic expression, and disinhibition I cherished as a result of alcohol, purely through mental instantiation.
Having made this breakthrough I feel like I may never go back to drinking, since both my baseline and upper-bound mental states have raised. I don’t this is a unique phenomenon — I have seen alcoholics that went sober describing a similar thing where after an initial dip — in their “sober adjusting period” — after a while “everything raises”.
All this is to say that your defence of alcohol in my view is the defence of some local maxima, but I strongly believe there is a much greater stable state on the other side of sobriety that is broadly accessible.
I have had a very similar experience. A short break went longer and longer. At this point I had maybe 3 beers and a few sips of wine in 2.5 years. In the first year I had a few non-alcoholic beers and felt that “social anxiety dissolving away” as if it were real alcohol. I realized much of the benefit was psychological, if anything being drunk works against it. Also, overall I feel sharper. This can come with additional, not necessarily pleasant but useful self-reflection. I don’t think I’ll ever drink again, although I’m not totally against some other future psychoactive alternative.
As a Brit who was socialised to binge-drink at least once a week throughout my young adult life, with a default sober state being characterised by a reserved, inhibited nature, I have grappled with this recently.
This year, as per some previous years, I partook in “Dry January” — although this year I extended it to “Dry Q1″ and then slightly longer. I enjoyed some of the sober benefits (no hangover, challenging myself to do self-work to function well in hectic social situations), but missed the joy inherent in feeling the altered state of disinhibition and mental & physical relaxation from the buzz of alcohol.
Indeed, I attended a networking event in May and felt I was lacking the edge to bond well with people I viewed as prospective employers/colleagues. I made the conscious decision to have a vodka redbull and the effect was immediate — my social anxiety dissolved away, and I was cracking jokes, driving conversation, and getting widespread approval.
It validated my theory that the self-work to reach that state of mind in a sober state was too hard, if not impossible, and I should embrace using alcohol in various social situations. I drank on a handful more occasions and had a good time.
However — and I’m going to write about this more in a full post — I had a breakthrough later on in the year. I think partly as a result of my experimentation with sobriety, plus very intentional breaking of the sobriety, I’ve built a mental model that allows me to access the same confidence, comedic expression, and disinhibition I cherished as a result of alcohol, purely through mental instantiation.
Having made this breakthrough I feel like I may never go back to drinking, since both my baseline and upper-bound mental states have raised. I don’t this is a unique phenomenon — I have seen alcoholics that went sober describing a similar thing where after an initial dip — in their “sober adjusting period” — after a while “everything raises”.
All this is to say that your defence of alcohol in my view is the defence of some local maxima, but I strongly believe there is a much greater stable state on the other side of sobriety that is broadly accessible.
I’m aware that I claimed having sober comedic expression available to me but then made a comment that was very unfunny.
It is very hard to be intentionally funny in this context.
Maybe the best I can do here is to just say scooble-dee dooble-dee weeble-dee
I have had a very similar experience. A short break went longer and longer. At this point I had maybe 3 beers and a few sips of wine in 2.5 years.
In the first year I had a few non-alcoholic beers and felt that “social anxiety dissolving away” as if it were real alcohol. I realized much of the benefit was psychological, if anything being drunk works against it. Also, overall I feel sharper. This can come with additional, not necessarily pleasant but useful self-reflection.
I don’t think I’ll ever drink again, although I’m not totally against some other future psychoactive alternative.