Drinking alcohol is often a social thing, which makes giving it up harder.
Recently, the drinking alcohol was banished from all daily activities. For seven days, I did not drink anything. Not because I do not like to have fun, but because it became a habit. And any habits, but definitely the toxic ones, tend to be disruptive for my life, my productivity and my creativity.
So the decision to lower the amount of alcohol intake was made. Last Monday morning, I wrote a new goal for my weekly goals: a minimal of six days sober.
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This Monday morning, I had been sober for seven days. The first few days were kind of annoying, because the hangover of the last weekend needed to get out of my body. I drank a lot of water and I had to battle the boredom in the night. Usually, when the work is done, a bottle of beer or wine is opened. After a lot of creative work, my brain keeps running, and starting to drink is the main trigger to relax and not think of anything else.
Of course, this is not the way it should be, and this is the reason I decided to throw it out, even is it just for seven days. I needed to know it was possible and what I would stumble upon. Here is an important lesson I learned.
You build your social connections with people of similar interests.
For example, if you sport in one gym everyday, you most likely connect with people who have that same routine. Yet, most likely, these people are different from yourself and you can also learn something from them. The same goes with drinking; if you like to drink to party and forget the daily struggles, you will connect with people along the way that share these values. Most likely people that interests you because you can learn something from them, but the interests are aligned.
So what happens when you change your mind-state, interests, routine or way of life? You might have a hard time enjoying your time with your social connections, because you are focused on something else. They might not like the change and try to get you back to your former self, because they are used to you being that way. If you let them, you will never evolve and always stay the same. Not because you want it, but because they need you. This helps you not and it lowers your self-respect and self-esteem in the long run.
You have to be tough if you want to change your interests, in this case, stopping or lowering your alcohol intake. It does not only mean battling yourself to keep your own promises, it also means managing your social connections to make sure the change sticks. It might mean changing the relationships with your friends and possibly cutting people out of your life, because they are not able to make the change themselves.
Changing a (toxic) habit might have far reaching consequences. It is a good decision in the long run, but in the short term you will have to battle the circumstances you have created doing the habit. This is even tougher then enduring the feeling of the detox.
If you are ready to let a (bad) habit go, make sure you are ready to change your social world with it.
