Sober Weddings and Birthdays? The Cheat Code to Awesome AF Celebrations

"Is it even a celebration if there’s no alcohol?" 🥂

In this episode of The Alcohol Myth Podcast, hosts Jonathan and Ellen tackle one of the most deep-seated beliefs in our culture: that alcohol is a requirement for joy, weddings, birthdays, and milestones.

We explore the "subconscious programming" that makes us feel like we’re ruining the party if we aren't drinking—and why that belief is actually absurd when you shine a light on it. From "bad luck" wedding toasts to the pressure of a St. Patrick’s Day birthday, we discuss how to navigate social expectations while staying true to yourself.

What we cover in this episode:

The "Bad Luck" Myth: Why we feel like we’re "spreading negative energy" if we don't toast with champagne.

Rewiring Your Beliefs: Practical steps to challenge the "need" for alcohol using curiosity and awareness.

The Cheat Code for Life: Discover the magic of having a "good night" AND a "good morning."

The Job of Alcohol: Learning to identify what you're really looking for (connection, relaxation, celebration) and getting those needs met for real.

Connect with us:
📧 Email: thealcoholmyth@gmail.com
✨ Hosted by Coaches trained in This Naked Mind & Affective Liminal Psychology.
Jonathan: https://livecreativeaf.com/
Ellen: https://ellenbiggscoaching.com/

Subscribe for more episodes on pulling back the curtain on the alcohol myth.

#Sobriety #AlcoholFree #TheAlcoholMyth #SoberCurious #PersonalGrowth #ThisNakedMind #CelebrateSober

Chapter Timestamps
00:00 The "Bad Luck" Myth of not toasting
01:08 Introduction to The Alcohol Myth Podcast
02:17 Today’s Myth: "It’s not a celebration without alcohol"
03:50 Does removing alcohol remove the joy?
05:44 Why the celebration myth is so deeply ingrained
07:15 The insanity of the "Wedding Toast" pressure
08:45 Taking responsibility for your own beliefs
10:03 Where do our drinking beliefs come from?
11:36 The fear of changing your social role
13:45 Prioritizing your clarity over others' comfort
15:47 The reality of "boozy" birthdays (sickness vs. fun)
19:02 The "Cake Incident": Celebratory beliefs beyond alcohol
23:20 Step 1 to rewiring: Asking "Is it true?"
25:06 Practical Tip: Pausing to identify triggers
26:17 The "30-Day Break" hurdle (Waiting for the "right" time)
28:18 You are not alone in this struggle
31:14 Can you still have "antics" and fun while sober?
33:43 The Cheat Code: A great night AND a great morning
35:21 Practical Exercise: Putting on the "Non-Drinker" hat
37:40 Alcohol as a "leveler" vs. finding true joy
40:16 Getting back in touch with your true self
42:04 What "job" are you giving alcohol?
44:38 Conclusion & How to get in touch

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

When I was drinking more than I wanted to, it would have felt like bad luck or like I was inviting ruin upon my friends if I didn't participate in, you know, cheers and toasts and things like that. Like, think about going to a wedding and, you know, like not toasting the new couple with alcohol. Like if I'm not sipping champagne and wishing them well and toasting with everybody, am I like, I don't know, like spreading some negative energy in onto their marriage or something like that? And like that's it's so absurd when you say it out loud, I think. Like it's but it's it's one of those things where the the insidiousness of the alcohol myth is that it it goes unspoken, right? It's like this this subconscious programming that we've just absorbed. And that's one of the reasons that we do this podcast so that we can say the ridiculous thing out loud, shine a light on it, and be like, you don't actually make sense or have that much power over me if I see it, acknowledge it, and talk about it. Why does the world act like alcohol is the answer, even while it is creating problems of its own?

SPEAKER_00 1:08

On the alcohol myth podcast, we pull back the curtain so you can see what's really going on with alcohol and what life could be like without it.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

We are coaches trained in this naked mind and effective liminal psychology who fell for the alcohol myth for decades. Now we help people take back control of their lives by changing their relationship with alcohol from the inside out.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

You don't need to wait for a rock bottom. You don't need more willpower, you just need a new way to understand what you are feeling and why you are reaching for that next drink.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

So let's dig in. Welcome to the Alcohol Myth Podcast. I'm your host, Jonathan, and I'm joined by your other host, Ellen. Hey, Ellen.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Hey Jonathan, good to see you.

SPEAKER_02 1:53

Good to see you. We are trained in effective liminal psychology, and we're coaches that help people um navigate and find freedom from alcohol. And to do that, we get together and talk about the myths that alcohol has been feeding us our whole lives. And today's myth is a doozy. Um, today's myth has me hung up for a long time. Uh, and it is the myth that it's not a celebration if you don't have alcohol. Whew. We just uh at the time of this recording, I just navigated my second AF birthday. Um, and my birthday, thank you, thank you. I'm older and wiser now than I've ever been. Um, but my my birthday happens to fall the day after St. Patrick's Day, and I got a little Irish in my ancestry. Um, and so I always took St. Patrick's Day as a wonderful excuse to celebrate, and that meant drinking way, way, way to excess. And then yippee, I've got my birthday the following day, which was another reason to drink way, way, way to excess. But uh, and so I fell for that myth for the vast majority of my life that it's not a celebration unless you're drinking. Um, but this year, uh, once again, I navigated St. Patrick's Day and then my birthday without alcohol. And I gotta tell you, it was better than all of my boozy, blurry, barely remembered experiences of celebrations and birthdays in the past. But Ellen, let me throw it over to you. When um you hear that you it's not a celebration unless you have alcohol, what comes up for you?

SPEAKER_00 3:49

Oh uh yes, yes, yes, and yes. Like I like me too, kept me stuck for a really long time. It was like, how I could not fathom uh celebrating, having joyful occasions, which are very important to me. I'm all about the joy. And like I it was almost like if I removed alcohol, I would be removing the joy. I mean, that I believed that. So it was like, well, I I'm about the joy. I can't remove the alcohol, then there's no joy. So and celebrations for sure, right? Birthdays, anniversaries. I mean, somebody gets good news, a promotion. You know, I mean, does you name it, all the holidays, of course, Friday? I mean, there's so many things to celebrate, especially if you're someone that centers their life around joy, right? So um, yeah, and I just I'm so curious to hear some of like a contrasting story from you, because St. Patrick's Day, of course, being like one of the booziest year days of the year, I think, coupled by your birthday, which is typically a really boozy day for a lot of people too. I mean, and and and the beliefs that I imagine you had around how amazing it is that you get to double drink for your birthday, right? Like, I mean, we we think that we're getting away with something. Um, and then to contrast that with like how you might spend it differently now. But yeah, I think this this myth that we can't celebrate without alcohol is a deeply held one. And it's reinforced by society and messaging. And I mean, geez, it's in the Bible, I think, right? Like it just like you gotta have wine with all the things. I mean, you know, justify it so much, right? Yeah, I know. So then it's like, well, how can it be bad? How can it be harmful if we've been doing it for centuries and centuries? And it's very easy to talk ourselves into how it's impossible to celebrate without alcohol.

SPEAKER_02 5:55

I'm even thinking about how like when I was drinking more than I wanted to, it would have felt like bad luck or like I was inviting ruin upon my friends if I didn't participate in you know, cheers and toasts and things like that. Like, think about going to a wedding and you know, like not toasting the new couple with alcohol. Like if I'm not sipping champagne and wishing them well and toasting with everybody, am I like, I don't know, like spreading some negative energy and onto their marriage or something like that? And like that's it's so absurd when you say it out loud, I think. Like it's but it's it's one of those things where the the insidiousness of the alcohol myth is that it it goes unspoken, right? It's like this this subconscious programming that we've just absorbed. And that's one of the reasons that we do this podcast so that we can say the ridiculous thing out loud, shine a light on it, and be like, you don't actually make sense or have that much power over me if I see it, acknowledge it, and talk about it.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

And it's so universal too. Like when you shared that story about the wedding, I had this flashback to my dad remarried um when I was in my 20s and went to the wedding, and my dad, I don't know what he would call himself, but he drank and then he stopped drinking. He never went to AA, but he and he did that a couple times, but now he's not been drinking for a very long time. And um at the time of their wedding, he was not drinking and had not been drinking, and his the woman he was marrying did not want him drinking. That was part of the reason why he quit for the second time. And at the wedding toast, what you're describing, her parents provided a beautiful bottle of champagne for everyone to have a toast, and they insisted. My dad was like, No, I don't, I don't drink all I don't, and they were like, it became this thing. They were like, Can you at least just put it to your lips? Like they were so worried that it would be bad luck. They wanted an alcoholic to put champagne to his lips so that their wedding would not be ruined. And I just like when you think about the insanity, right? But that's how deeply ingrained it is. This messaging, it's not, it's no joke, it's not like it it's it's like we believe this stuff. We really believed this stuff. I mean, I didn't believe that one. I thought that was a step too far. But I I believe that if you didn't have, if you weren't an alcoholic, you should darn well be drinking on your, you know, the toast.

SPEAKER_02 8:38

Yeah, I mean, and the I think the one of the most exciting things about doing this work and having these conversations is that we then get to at least step toward, if not step into, responsibility for our own beliefs, right? Like once you experience this uh kind of expressing this weird belief out loud, then you have to examine it, you have to deal with it, and you have to be like, am I okay with that? That that's something that I deeply think. And then you get to kind of figure out and unwind that belief and choose something better for yourself, which is so exciting because like our beliefs really are the programming of our lives. You know, if we believe something to be true about the world or about ourselves, then we then kind of automatically take actions that prove that thing to be, you know, correct or you know, in alignment or whatever. And it's very uncomfortable when we don't. When you act against your beliefs, that's a very uncomfortable experience. I think a lot of things, a lot of people don't realize that you can actually you can actually be the author of your beliefs and design your life in a way that is actually going to serve you and move you towards your goals. And that's a lot of the work that um you and I do online with our clients.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

That's so true. And uh it's making me think about like when we have these beliefs, sometimes we don't even know where they came from, right? I mean, this this you know, a belief that you need to have alcohol to celebrate. I mean, that came from somewhere. I wasn't born with that belief, right? Like it came from messaging, it came from experience, it came from, and also I had confirmation bias. I was looking for when I was happily drinking, uh, you know, it it I there was lots of perceived joy there in the opening of the special bottle of champagne and the, you know, like before it was causing me problems, there was no cognitive dissonance around that. It was just like, yes, this is joyful, this is wonderful. And then time moved on and I was no longer fully embracing the joy of it. It was very challenging for me, but I still was holding so tightly. It's like that's what's so um painful, I think, about that part of the journey before we are really questioning, before we're changing our relationship with alcohol. It's like it's so painful because we know that it's not joyful on one level. We know that it's not bringing making things better, but but but we believe that it does. So it's like it doesn't, it doesn't compute, and that is really uncomfortable. And to challenge the belief that when everybody around me is also giving me that message, it feels very threatening and confronting and um scary and unknown and unknowable.

SPEAKER_02 11:36

Yeah, I think that something that was just coming up for me when you were talking about that is the experience of celebrating something where alcohol is involved and like the factor of the other people around you. So, like if I'm if I for me, if I go out somewhere for my birthday, you know, we're we're either on St. Patrick's Day or it's my actual birthday or whatever, and I'm with friends, then in the past that that would have involved like, you know, people are putting drinks in my hand, and it's just like uh that's the that's the expectation is that I'm going to take them. And you know, like in the past, that would have been me, right? Like I I really played this role in my friend group where I'm the one that can go the hardest, drink the most, I set the pace, I'm the life of the party. I'm you know, like I have that role to play. And then when I stopped drinking, I had to kind of renegotiate my role within my social circles. And I was really, really worried about that and really, really scared. But I guess my fear of changing my role in the social group was less than my fear of losing all of the wonderful things I was discovering with my alcohol-free life. And I wish I could say that it was like a this is coming from a like a I'm moving towards something kind of thing, but it was actually I was more afraid of losing one thing than the other because it had become so important to me, right? Like the the clarity that I was experiencing, the increased capacity to feel joy and show up in my authenticity, like all that stuff. I was I was not about to lose that so that I could just go play some role in a social group um during a celebration that was supposed to be about me anyway.

SPEAKER_00 13:30

So yeah, I that is really powerful because I think it speaks to what happens when we stop drinking, we start to care more about ourselves, right? Like we're starting to prioritize ourselves and to for you to say, I care more about how good I'm feeling and protecting that than I care about showing up in a way that's going to make my friends comfortable. Like, how new was that? Because I I know for me, uh, you know, until I got that distance from alcohol, it was the opposite story. I was like, I cared more about showing up in ways that would make my friends feel comfortable and I would feel this belonging with them than I did with honoring what I really wanted or what I what I might be building towards. I mean, I can remember. Oh, I just so I mean when you were talking about the that you you would be the one getting the drinks. I mean, what do you do when it's somebody's birthday? You want to buy them a drink. So the poor birthday person, although I, you know, or you think the lucky birthday person, right? I get to have all these free drinks, but sometimes it's way more than feels good. But of course, we don't ever want to say, no, no, no, you know, if it's like an insult if I don't take your drink, or if I don't, you know, back in the days of shots, like do the shot with you, or whatever, right?

SPEAKER_02 14:53

I'm thinking about the many birthdays that like when I was in my 20s, I had like the I had a great downtown apartment. It was, you know, central to like our whole little area. And so my my apartment would be where we would start and end every night. And so if somebody had a birthday in my friend group, we would start and end the night at my place usually. And I thought that was great because you know, I got to pre-game before everybody showed up, and then I got to just crash out and go to bed whenever everybody was done. Um, but I mean, I was never the first one done, and I was never, I was always the last one, right? Like I was always the one that was like watching the sun come up, sitting on the roof and you know, just like wondering why I wasn't having more fun. But I can't tell you how many times that we'd take out one of my friends who didn't drink as much as I did, and because it was their birthday, they were having that experience that you were talking about where everybody's putting drinks in their hands and they haven't built up this tolerance that I had, and they would have a terrible end to the night. I mean, oftentimes, you know, sick in my bathroom and you know, needing to sleep it off on the couch, and that was their birthday, right? Like, that's how they spent their birthday. What are we doing? Like, that's not fun. Like, we should be doing things that are actually like life affirming if we're gonna celebrate a birthday.

SPEAKER_00 16:27

Come on, you know, and that's so normalized, right? Like, you think about especially for young people, I think, but even as you get older, I mean, there there becomes a certain age, I think, where it's no longer funny to end up vomiting all night long. Like, I certainly reached the age where when that happened, I I didn't think it was funny anymore. Whereas when I was young, I was just it was like a badge of honor. It was like I used to, I mean, I'm embarrassed to say this, but I used to play quarters in high school, which is a drinking game. And you would do like, I mean, I did it with I didn't, it was like uh Bertles and James wine coolers. Um, but I would get I have so much that I would end up vomiting, and then I would come back and keep playing. I mean, and this was this was normal. This is I wasn't the only one doing that. It's like, and then of course, the hangovers the next day, you celebrate them kind of with your friends, like, oh my God. And if you can't remember, if you couldn't remember your birthday, like people might think that was the most hilarious thing ever. And it's like what what as a society, what are we celebrating here? Like, really, what what is it that we're honoring and celebrating? And when you get when you're in it, you can't, there's no other way to see it. But when you get outside of it, it's like I mean, if Annie talks about this in her new book, but it's like if you were an alien that came down to earth and witnessed this, it would be like, wait a minute, they're they're paying to drink something that makes them sick and have no memories. Okay, like it makes no sense.

SPEAKER_02 18:07

You can't even remember the good time that you were supposed to have been having, right?

SPEAKER_00 18:11

Like, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:14

I think so much of that, like we kind of keep circling back on the um factor of playing a role and making ourselves do something because that's what's expected, and that's what society says that we need to do during a celebration. And that's something that is possible on the other side of figuring this stuff out, is having more regard for yourself uh than you have for needing to fit into somebody else's container. But it's not necessarily a straight line. Like once you have this figured out, it's not something that's like, oh, well, I never struggle with that anymore because I've got it figured out, right? Like, didn't you recently have a cake incident?

SPEAKER_00 19:01

Yeah. So I it I mean, I celebrations. I mean, we talk a lot about alcohol here, but just to give the, you know, expand this out. We have so many beliefs around celebrations, right? One of them being that alcohol is required. But so it I my latest birthday, uh I was two-ish years alcohol free. I had been growing in my health journey, right? I was realizing the things that made me feel good and the things that don't make me feel good. And one of the things that I realized does not make me feel good is when I have like pastries or cookies or cake in the morning because it just sets off this sugar spike for me. And then all day long I'm going up and down. So not that I never enjoy those things. I do because I really like those things, but I reserve them as often as I can for after dinner, like after a full meal. So it's not like hitting my bloodstream and it's not, and then you know, I can go to bed if I'm starting to get those sugar spikes and drops. Um, it does disrupt my sleep though. So it's not a perfect solution, but as long as I want to keep sugar in my life to some degree, that's the best I can come up with. But I know for a fact that they do not do well with sugar in the morning. So it was my birthday. My sister was um in town, and so she was offering to take, you know, make a special birthday breakfast for me. And so, and she's been on a health journey too. And so, you know, we were talking about that and how I what I really wanted was like a really good omelette and some really nice, fresh local fruit. That was what I wanted for my birthday breakfast. And and she asked me a couple of times, like, because we've always, I mean, we grew up with a special coffee cake that my mom used to make for us for breakfast. So it's like it's the true, it's what I make for my girls on their birthday. It's like this very ritualistic celebration breakfast meal. So she kept coming back to me, are you sure you want me to make that? Because will it feel like birthday if you don't have it? And I'm like, no, I really don't want it. I I I want the omelet. I want she makes a great omelet. I was super excited about my omelet. Um and so she was like, okay, okay, okay. And then the morning of my birthday, she couldn't help herself. She's like, she didn't make the coffee cake, but she went and got cinnamon rolls because she was like, I just I don't think a birthday is a birthday without a sweet treat of breakfast. So it's like it just goes to show how deeply ingrained it is. And here it was my birthday, told her what I wanted, and I'm not blaming her. I'm it's just kind of funny, right? But then my reaction to that was okay, this is really important to her. She obviously we talked about, and it's important, you know, that's something about a birthday morning. And of course, now they're there. What am I gonna do? Not eat them. She went through the effort to get them. So, of course, I have the cinnamon roll on my birthday, and I didn't want it. And was it delicious? Yes, of course. Cinnamon rolls are delicious, but I that's not what I wanted. And so it just, you know, you can remove alcohol or put in anything. for these these things these beliefs that we have that are these they come from somewhere it might be your family it might be society and we just so often just acquiesce to make people around us happy and so I would like to say that now I prioritized myself and now so I didn't have the the you know but I did but I I learned something from it I think next Chris next birthday I'll be one step closer to being like you know what even if you bring the cinnamon rolls I'm not eating them I'm gonna put mine away I'm gonna have it for dessert like at dinner time so but it's a bit it's a it's hard I mean this stuff if it was easy it would you know we would not be here talking about this right like it's hard to go against society family expectations what your brain is telling you is required I mean it takes a lot of rewiring and patience and practice Ellen I'm curious and I well I mean I know the answer but I'm gonna set you up for it if somebody was listening to this and they were like dang you know like they keep talking about taking responsibility for your beliefs and like rewiring that how would you walk through the process of rewiring or at least confronting the belief that you have to have alcohol in order for it to be a celebration? Well the first question I would ask is is that true? And the answer might be your answer might be yes hell yes it's true but like let's just start to get some clarity okay that's true for you where did that belief come from let's talk about that where is that where did you first when did you first start believing that because at five you didn't believe that so let's see where when did you first start believing that where has what evidence do you have that it's true? Is there any evidence out there that possibly it's not true? Like have you ever had a birthday celebration with that alcohol that was great or or been to someone else's or you know just really getting that would be my first step is to really understand where this belief comes from so that we then have the agency to decide whether or not we want to just on autopilot agree with whatever has been programmed into us or if we want to take the steps towards like examining it and and reimagining it. That would be the first thing I would say what what are you thinking?

SPEAKER_02 24:33

100% I just the value of becoming aware in the first place of these beliefs that are driving you crazy and like putting you in situations that you don't want it's not working for me anymore awareness is the very first step. It's opening the door to everything else and you can't really do much about your beliefs until you make yourself aware of them. And so I think that a practical way that people can start to become more aware of those beliefs is to pause when you find yourself doing something you didn't want to do or you know once again having some kind of negative result like examining what led you there and what what beliefs kind of put you into that spot. So like if you're waking up with a hangover and you're like I'm so sick and tired of drinking more than I want to what is going on with that ask yourself what is the belief that you have that is undergirding the result that you no longer want and if you can identify and like specify that belief you are well on the way to understanding it and then eventually learning how to to rewire it.

SPEAKER_00 26:00

Yeah and I'll tell you what like the best way to approach it is to start to experiment because I mean how many times have you worked with people or just even talked to people that will say you know oh I want to take a 30 day break but not this month because I've got this celebration to go to or it's my birthday or there's a fourth of July thing happening. So I can't do it I'll do it after July 4th. You know there's always and it so often it's either holidays or celebrations, right? That are the things that people hang on to like I can't do it until that particular event is over because we just have that deeply deeply ingrained belief that it's can't be done. So just picking one picking one that's coming up in the next 30 days and being like and you don't even have to like take a whole 30 day break but like just like start to do that awareness work of when did I start believing that in July 4th potluck barbecue had to have alcohol because I know when I was five and I would go to the family barbecues, I wasn't drinking alcohol. So but maybe I started watching all of the adults drinking at that time and maybe that's when it first started you know or maybe it's the advertisements that I see with all the people cheersing with the barbecue on the beach and happy and you know there's all this messaging that that we get and just kind of pulling back the curtain a little bit and being like oh with compassion too right because instead of being like well I don't yeah how stupid is that like obviously it doesn't need to be you know that's not helpful because we believe these things for a reason and we're not alone it's like everybody and their brother believes this stuff you know we're not crazy for believing these things that's one of those things that stands out to me about this conversation is that when you say the thing out loud that like is the belief that everybody's struggling with you're going to find so many other people are like right how crazy is this right like um because again like you just said Ellen you're not alone in this struggle and that's one of those things that you don't really like I had no idea when I was drinking more than I wanted to I had no idea that other people were also feeling exactly the same way.

SPEAKER_02 28:26

I really thought that it was like there are just people that are normal and they just drink and it's not really a problem for them. And then there are people who are like alcoholics and you know taking every day one day at a time and just white knuckling life and you know like miserable all the time because they have a disease that's really what I thought because I didn't hear other people talking about this like um like like we are and that's one of the reasons I know that you and I are really excited to be doing this podcast in the first place like just to let people know you're not alone in this and the the quieter that we are about our experiences and the more closed off and self-protective we are the more there's room for shame to kind of fester in those kind of dark unexamined corners.

SPEAKER_00 29:28

And the second you like I was saying say the quiet thing out loud and you recognize that there are so many other people that are experiencing the things you're experiencing there's no words for how um connected and freeing that experience is oh a hundred percent like I think about like we're talking about celebration so you know a a birthday where you would celebrate with friends end up over drinking which was pretty much every birthday for me and then seeing those friends the next day or the next time you see them and then everyone being like oh my gosh that was so much fun we had such a good time we were dancing till 3 a.m oh my gosh how fun and nobody mentioning anything about how crappy they felt the next day waking up at three in the morning being filled with regret writing in my journal I can't believe I did it again. Nobody's talking about that everyone's just glorifying the kind of the fun crazy antics that we all got up to and so in my mind I was thinking this was just super fun for like nobody else is having trouble remembering the end of the night nobody else is waking up in a cold hot cold hot sweats you know feeling regret and shame and sick to their stomach and maybe needing to go vomit and having a terrible headache and crawling out of bed the next day pretending that I was okay because I was embarrassed that I overdrank so much. So let me just pretend that I actually didn't drink as much as I did. You know it just the pretending is the most heartbreaking part of it when I think back on it just how much I pretended because I felt like I was the only one.

SPEAKER_02 31:11

I felt so alone that's um you were talking about the like glorifying the antics part and I was really worried when I went alcohol free that I'd never have crazy stories or these super fun late night experiences or these antics um false like you can still go out and shake your butt until three in the morning and have a great laugh with your friends and not be schmammered and actually have more fun than you would have had if you were ingesting a poison that slows down your experience of reality and makes you feel sick. Like um I think that people really often are under the misconception that you're throwing out the baby with the bathwater. I'm just right now I'm hearing that phrase and I'm like oh my God what a terrible phrase but like you know don't throw the baby out with the bathwater right like you get to have the fun and you don't get to have the burden of the hangover and the regret and things like that too. It's totally possible and it might not sound possible right now but that's just because you haven't done it yet.

SPEAKER_00 32:26

Yeah I mean I can remember the first time I had the realization that it was like wait a minute I get to have a really fun night and a good morning like that felt like I I that was always my trade off you know oh it's my birthday okay the next morning I'm just writing off I can't I know I can't do anything I'm not gonna schedule anything I'm gonna plan to sleep in I'm gonna plan to just have a slow day right and to know that I can like have a great birthday celebration and then wake up the next morning and like want to go on a walk or want to, you know, like what whatever I could I had this real I had a dinner party that I hosted which I always would have been you know many bottles in and I had a work call the next morning at like 7 a.m and I could do of them both.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

Like I was like wait what I it was always the trade-off for me of thinking okay if I have the 7 a.m thing I just I can't schedule anything because I don't trust myself to not over drink so I just won't make a plan or I'm gonna have to cancel whatever's in the morning so I can have my fun night and to to not have to make that trade off and to you feel like you won the lottery like wait I I can have the good in the night and the good in the morning what nobody talks about that it feels like a cheat code for life like when you when you get there and you're like oh my gosh I'm happier and more relaxed than I've ever been in my life and I'm clear minded and productive and I get to have all this fun are you like wait that's all that's that's wild and I don't know like and and you and I can talk about it and I know that if I'm just putting myself back in you know a few years ago when I was drinking more than I wanted to listening to this I'd have been like you know like they're just high on their own supply or whatever like they they just like yeah I wouldn't have believed it yeah I guess I would just say to that person like experience it like you just gotta you gotta go there to know there I guess um but yeah and I don't want to give the the belief too that it's all sunshine and roses like you're never gonna have a bad day too but I mean we're talking specifically about celebrations and the ability to celebrate and have crazy fun times and yes you can that doesn't mean that every moment of your life is going to feel like that when you go alcohol free because that's just not reality.

SPEAKER_00 34:51

I mean no life ever feels like that no matter what you do. So because we're not meant to like be in joy all the time as much as I wanted that I've come to recognize that that's just not the way life works.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

Yeah 100% Ellen I'm gonna ask you the question if somebody's made it to this point in the podcast and they're thinking about how can I take some practical steps towards not feeling like I have to have alcohol in order to do a celebration what would you advise them?

SPEAKER_00 35:21

The first thing that came to mind and there's so many different ways you could approach this but I'm just gonna go with the first one that came to mind which is like imagine like put on a hat that is I'm a non-drinker I am a non-drinker just put that on for a second it might not fit whatever but just imagine that you're a non-drinker what would a non-drinker do to celebrate I had no idea I had no idea so it's a question like you have to get really curious like if if alcohol was not on the table if there was not no alcohol was no part of a celebration what would be celebratory to me what would call to me what sounds fun what how do I want to spend my day is do I do I care about going out in the evening or would I rather do something fun during the day would I the sky's the limit right like take try to really like start from scratch with like a beginner's mind a cure a total curiosity of like if this day is really about me celebrating feeling good joyful what does that mean to me and it's going to be different for every you I'll ask that to a hundred people it's gonna be a hundred different answers.

SPEAKER_02 36:33

So like really get curious about what it is for you and then you know investigate that a little bit and maybe try try it you know and you can practice not on your birthday if you want you know you can be like okay my birthday's in July I'm gonna pick a day in June and practice this to see if I could really do it on my birthday you know but like trying to let's break the myth right that alcohol is the only way to celebrate because there's lots of other ways you go what would you do what would you say I was just thinking you you said that if you asked that question to a hundred different people you'd get a hundred different answers which is absolutely true but when I was drinking my answer for everything would have been to drink and so I think the how wonderful it is to have something else that you can do to celebrate right like then then tying one on and drinking to excess like the alcohol is this incredible leveler right where it can take a mundane um Thursday night and make it have the same lived experience as a New Year's Eve or as a birthday right like you're you're consuming the same substance if you're drinking frequently and more than you want to like I was like you're consuming the same substance uh at its core and you're getting the same outcome right which is like feeling a little tiny burst of like a buzz and then chasing that for the rest of the night as you spiral into a terrible hangover and not feeling good in the morning right like we've done this before. But the idea of approaching the question of a celebration with that beginner's mind that you were talking about what would actually make me happy what would I do if my default wasn't just to drink alcohol there's so many different possibilities you could go to you could go look at animals in a zoo you could go roller skate you could uh stare at clouds I don't know there's literally thousands of things you could do that wouldn't be the same as what you're doing all the time anyway right and what's more celebratory than doing something novel and fun um and so I just I just was strike it was just struck me how much I love that answer.

SPEAKER_00 39:05

Yeah as you said that I had this image and I might have shared this before but I I remember vividly this one time and it was Mother's Day and I got myself a bottle of champagne to celebrate Mother's Day because that's how I celebrated everything. And I can remember it was approaching five o'clock thinking oh I'm gonna open that bottle and just feeling this level of disappointment that it didn't even feel special because I opened a bottle of bubbly I mean not the expensive bubbly but I opened a bottle of bubbly on the regular like a couple times a week if not depending on what phase I was in if I was in like the bubbly phase it might have been every day of the week. If I was in my white wine phase it might have been more rare but um it just it didn't like I wanted so much for it to feel special that I got to open this bottle of bubbly on Mother's Day to make Mother's Day special. And it was just like such a like you said it was I mean it was just what I did every day. So it it ceased to be special.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:05

And and how would like trying something totally new and different that might might feel really special be you know as an alternative yeah I think building on that like being honest with yourself about what you would actually want and you know it for me when I was drinking more than I wanted to I was so I didn't even know how out of touch with myself I was but I was so out of touch with myself. I was a total stranger to me because I've been silencing me with alcohol for years and years and years. And it can feel a little bit weird to be like I could just you know put myself back in that spot it would have felt weird for me to be like what do I really want? And to not just default to the top answer which is to drink right like okay what's the other thing right what's something what's something that's not that and it would have taken me a few minutes I'd have had to sit there uh to get in touch with what I actually wanted but just because it was wasn't like top of mind doesn't mean a that it wasn't there or that b that it wasn't valuable or c that it wasn't attainable that's still there for you you have had experiences of celebration I can almost guarantee that didn't involve alcohol right like there was a time before alcohol was running the entire show and I hope for you that you know as a child there were joyous experiences that you had that felt celebratory that didn't involve alcohol. You've done it before it could be a very long time ago but you've done it before and you can do it again.

SPEAKER_00 41:51

Yeah and to your point of like not knowing I think I me too and I think something that can help with that is like when you think okay what what what do I want on my birthday I want to drink the next question would be what what is it what is it that the drink is giving me that I really want like what what what is drink what do I really want and I'm thinking that drinking is is it like I want to feel special I want to feel connected I want to feel loved I want to feel appreciated like what is it that the opening of the bottle is going to make us feel and and then see if you can come up with something alternative that will maybe actually give you that feeling or get at least I'm not gonna say that I I don't want to you know be too confronting about the alcohol piece, but like you might have a better chance of getting what you want when you actually get what you want and not what alcohol you know like not using alcohol as a substitute for what you want.

SPEAKER_02 43:00

Yeah it strikes me that when you're drinking more than you want to it's like alcohol is the Swiss Army knife solution to everything. But it doesn't actually do anything particularly well except for the cycle of getting you slightly buzzed and then making you super hungover and feel bad, right? Like it does that really well but oftentimes in our minds we attach so much other stuff to it that maybe in the past it's like gestured at but accept no substitutes. Go for the real thing. And I love that question like what job am I giving alcohol in this instance and how can I get that need met so much better by something that can actually do that thing. You're worth not having the substitute you're worth not having the uh facsimile of having your needs met you're worth actually getting your needs met yeah 100%

SPEAKER_00 44:00

Would have that question would have floored me in the past, I think. I would have been like, What? And I wouldn't, but then it's like, yeah, what what do I really want? I mean, it's a good question.

SPEAKER_02 44:10

Yeah. And something to revisit. It'll change, it'll evolve. You'll get better and better.

SPEAKER_00 44:18

And we have to remember too. Like I, you know, I'm alcohol-free two and a half years now. It's still nice to be reminded that I can ask myself that question when I'm reaching for cake. You know, what is it that I really want? I, you know, because we we we do use substitutes. So alcohol is just a particularly poor one.

SPEAKER_02 44:38

Yeah, for sure. Ellen, what a great conversation. Thank you for joining us on the Alcohol Myth Podcast as we've been teasing apart the idea that you need alcohol to celebrate. I think we've shown that that's not really true. And I think if you examine your experience, you'll see many times when you've been able to celebrate without alcohol. So let's consider this myth busted. And I hope that you'll join us next time as we take on another one of the insidious alcohol myths. Thanks for listening to the Alcohol Myth Podcast.

SPEAKER_00 45:11

If this episode sparks something for you, we'd love to hear about it.

SPEAKER_02 45:14

Send your questions, stories, or ideas for future episodes to thealcoholmyth at gmail.com.

SPEAKER_00 45:20

We read every message. We really do.

SPEAKER_02 45:23

Take good care of yourself. We'll see you next time.