Excellent thread. Thank you for starting this. True insights here.
Long before I finally quit, I would make repeated lists of reasons why it was bad for me to drink. Against the other, very short column of why I wanted to drink. The short column always won out. Week after week, year after year. The obvious imbalance and logic didn't make a difference. The addiction won out.
Until I finally accepted that the short-column reasons were all a lie.
"It relaxes me." -- Actually it made me more anxious and depressed.
"I deserve it." -- Actually, I deserved better than poisoning myself and destroying my health, relationships, energy and self-respect.
"It's how to socialize, it's a party" -- Actually, I stopped drinking in front of other people, and was drinking wine alone out of plastic cups at 1 a.m., throwing up on the floor of my closet while my family slept. Is that a "party"?
"It's what 'everybody' does." -- Actually, everybody doesn't. They don't obsess about alcohol. They can take a few sips and leave it alone. They don't hide bottles in their car, drink so much they can't wake up without feeling sick, make fools of themselves on social media after drinking, wake up four hours after passing out panic stricken and filled with remorse, and shame themselves in front of their children.
Once you apply "logic" to the supposed arguments FOR drinking, instead of why not, I think it becomes easier to flip the switch. And see the lie for what it is.
Instead of fighting, give in. Give in to the acceptance that it's not worth doing anymore. Just take it off the table as an option. Then you don't have to argue with yourself or make lists of reasons why not to drink.
Then it's not a matter of will power, or strength or even determination. It's acceptance. And once you start to heal, without the poisoning of alcohol, it gets easier and easier.
