So You Did Dry January...Now What?
If you’ve kicked off the new year by taking a break from alcohol (or are just taking a break from drinking in general, really), you might be wondering, “now what?” when it comes to your drinking habits and your overall relationship with alcohol. You might even be counting down the days until you can have a sip of your favorite boozy cocktail or a glass of wine.
Before you start making too many plans, I want to encourage you to take a moment to reflect back on why you took the month off of alcohol in the first place…
Was it to detox/reset your system after the holidays?
Was it to feel better, look better, sleep more deeply, or lose weight?
Was it because you had started to question if you were drinking too much and wanted to “hit pause” so you could evaluate?
Was it because you wish you drank less overall and you hope that taking a short break can start you on the path to moderation?
These are all popular reasons why people embark on a Dry or Sober January. In fact, when I participated in Dry January, it was for a combination of all of the above. I approached a month-long break from alcohol as a magic bullet of sorts that might completely put my life on a new trajectory (long-story-short, it did...just not in the quick-fix way I’d made my fantasy).
What you need to know about taking a break from alcohol is that a 30-day break won’t be enough for you to experience even a portion of the benefits possible from the bullets listed above. Why? Let me offer you a few corresponding reasons:
It actually takes a lot longer than 30 days to detox/reset your system from alcohol. Alcohol is really hard for your body to process
In addition to point 1 above, drinking also causes your body to become severely depleted in many of the vitamins and chemicals it is fully capable of producing on its own. Most of which take well over 90 days to fully replenish once alcohol is absent. So, while you might experience some improvement - you’re not going to really hit your stride until your body is back to processing un-interrupted.
If you’ve questioned your drinking, it’s likely that you’ll feel pretty good about “prooving” to yourself that you can take a 30-day break. Hooray, you’re not powerless over alcohol. Cool. But check yourself...just because you don’t “have a problem” it doesn’t mean you should just go back to what you were doing before...it obviously wasn’t the best relationship if you had to question it.
Let me be blunt, you are a miracle worker if you think you can re-wire your brain to go for moderation in just 30-days off of a substance that you probably have over a decade’s history with. Now, I believe in miracles, but this one’s a little out there.
Ok, so, hopefully, you can understand that transformation doesn’t happen in 30-days...at least not with a substance that is known to cause dependencies amongst its users. Here’s the thing, I’m not telling you it’s impossible to change your relationship with alcohol...I’m just assuring you that you won’t be able to change your behaviors in just 30-days.
What’s more, I want to encourage you that you didn’t get the wild hair to take a break because you “have a problem”. No, it’s quite likely that - like the majority of drinkers - you simply drink too much, but are not addicted (though, if you suspect you are, I certainly recommend you seek appropriate help). No, most drinkers aren’t “problem” drinkers or “moderate/take-it-or-leave-it” drinkers, but rather “normal” drinkers who land somewhere in the middle (but are still drinking rather heavily). I would suggest that your desire to take a break from alcohol is a function of your inner-guide hinting to you that your drinking isn’t doing you any favors and suggesting there might be more to life than happy hours and hangovers.
In my experience, our inner guides don’t make suggestions to us at random...especially when it comes to our health. If you’ve been motivated in any way - even if you can’t quite explain it fully - there’s a reason.
So, if you’ve made it this far - even if it’s been hard and uncomfortable and a test of your will, I want to encourage you to keep going. No, not forever (I’m not big on “forever” commitments), but long enough that you’re able to really see the forest through the trees and take a more objective look at your relationship with alcohol and what got you to wanting/needing to change your relationship in the first place.
We’ve become so accustomed to using alcohol to anesthetize our feelings of pain, anxiety, boredom, stress, and inadequacy, that we struggle to see a world without it...because in that world, you are forced to look at all of the little feelings and beliefs you were subconsciously trying to avoid. And it’s really uncomfortable at first.
The thing is - and I know you know this - but what we avoid doesn’t go away. And I am a firm believer that if we can take a step back from our own self-numbing behavior long enough to allow ourselves to really evaluate the limiting beliefs we’ve trapped in our subconscious, that we can move forward and create the new relationship we were hoping would form after just 30-days.
Your relationship with alcohol is much like any human relationship: you’ve got history. You wouldn’t just take a break from a human you’d had a rocky time with and hope it would all be better after 30-days...would you? I sure hope not. To heal and transform relationships, you’ve got to put in work to rewire and repair. And, unlike with people, alcohol isn’t going to meet you half-way, you’ve got to go it alone and then look back at the relationship and determine how you want to move forward. Translation: you can’t try to moderate and repair at the same time...it just doesn’t work. Here are my specific recommendations for next steps:
Revisit: was your goal just to take a 30-day break, or were you hoping to achieve something else more profound as a result of the break? So often we forget what we really wanted because we get caught up in the excitement of us hitting a milestone. Ask yourself, “Is is likely that I’ve achieved my bigger desire in only 30-days?”
Keep momentum: Use this momentum to stretch a little longer. I find that people who are truly invested in changing their relationship with alcohol see tremendous shifts in the 90-100 day mark.
Get support and do the work: You won’t get far if you continue to just check the “I didn’t drink today” box for another 60-days. The real magic comes when you use that time to simultaneously explore how your relationship with alcohol got to its current state…and put in effort to re-train your mind.
All-in-all, I know an additional 60 days off the sauce can sound intimidating. There will be more social challenges and cravings and uncomfortable feelings to navigate. True. However, I can promise you that I’ve NEVER worked with someone who regretted not drinking for 90-days. Never. I’ve never heard someone who has invested this time in themselves feel regret for not drinking at a wedding or on vacation or at a happy hour once all is said and done. And I know you won’t either.
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If the messages I’ve shared here with you have been helpful and you want to learn more, I invite you to join into my 2021 Dry January follow-up program - Alcohol-Freedom which will focus on shifting your subconscious mindsets & limiting beliefs about drinking so you can find true freedom from alcohol. Learn more about my Alcohol-Freedom, here.