Since my last post, I’ve been enjoying a steady deluge of ethanol soaking my insides and throwing my metabolic health into a tailspin. There have been a couple of breaks, but the return to steady weekend binge drinking felt inevitable. However, things feel different now. My most recent a 27-day break was going well until, after a long ride on the bike, I had a beer and several glasses of wine. I can’t say the initial effect of the alcohol was all that enjoyable. To borrow a heroin expression, it felt as though I was chasing the dragon – but I never caught the beast. I was drinking on autopilot in an unhappy state of mind, but I was also watching myself from outside (my meditation habit may have helped on that front). Who was this unhappy fellow quaffing drinks as though under orders from some mysterious overlord? Sleep was demolished that night and the mood was heavy and low the next day. So what’s the solution? I think I can never fully write off alcohol from my life – I do like an occasional beer – but that’s it. The solution is not to tell myself that I can NEVER have something – that’s depresssing and just asking my evil inner egoic child to rebel against such admonition. The solution is to let myself be sober curious – to not drink a majority of the time, but to have the occasional beer every now and then – without guilt, but with presence, and to let it go after one.
Daily ruminations on the challenges and triumphs of quitting booze