Exegesis

So I'm working on my own sobriety and basically atleast once a day I will convince myself that I'm being brainwashed by buying into the notion that I'm a person that just can't drink.

I've been trying for the last ten years to drink in moderation and it never works and my life always improves dramatically when I'm sober but I still sometimes worry that I've joined the Religious Cult of Sobriety.

How do you secular folks maintain your identity as free thinkers while also identifying with a group of people who all share sobriety in common.

I don't even have a problem with spirituality. I just hate the idea I might be a member of groupthink.

SoberHoopsFan

Personally, I don't identify with anyone. I just don't drink. When you aren't addicted to alcohol, life is a lot simpler and a lot more normal.

silentrun

I don't have a program. I have been hanging around here and taking what I identify with from whomever regardless of methods. As far as thinking that someone convinced me that I can never again control my drinking. That one is all me. That's why I quit because I broke through the delusion that somehow I had control.

trachemys

I had to quit drinking because I was dying from it.

No groupthink.

freshstart57

I don't identify with any group, especially any religious/spiritual fellowship recovery thingy. I refused to accept that paradigm, and still do.

I can drink very easily, I can buy a bottle, open it, put the neck in my mouth and tip er back. It will mess me up sooner rather than later, I think. I can also not drink, and that's the route I've chosen. I have also chosen sobriety unconditionally, which means, even if <anything you might imagine>, I still would not and will never drink.

The idea that I or anyone else 'should' be a person who drinks, or that it is a natural or normal occurrence, is part of the lie of alcoholism. Drinking alcohol is neither natural nor normal.

I am done with alcohol forever, and I'm free.

MesaMan

^ Yep

I had something written up, but that is much more eloquent.

If I know other Sober Folks, it's a Statistical Cluster, and coincidence. Just as is knowing other Folks into really hot Food, as I am.

I'm lazy. Simply not Drinking is easy. None of the Moderation or 'ongoing struggles' malarkey.

No Free Thinkers were harmed in the making of this Sober Statistical Cluster.

Hawks

Group think extends to many areas of life.

Driving on the correct side of the road is a good example... What happens if you don't?

A ticket
A crash
An injury or death

And yet, there is not a single thing to actually stop anyone from doing it.

(barriers on freeways etc aside)

Except the consequences of not doing it.

So, perhaps you can frame it that way.

Consequences of not drinking? Sobriety

Consequences of drinking? Pretty open ended, I'll let you fill in the blanks.

Best of luck with your decisions

anattaboy

I would say this is the least "groupthink" community around. The diversity of methods leans more to the individual and non-traditional--even in the newcomer forums. I like it here. It's my primary support.

freshstart57

Hawks, Exegesis was not comparing the choice of drinking with not drinking. He was asking something completely different.

Do you have an opinion on this?

Soberpotamus

I try to keep in mind I can no longer drink. The option to drink has been taken away.

Everything beyond that is fine for me to question/interpret.

Hawks

I'll see what Exegesis makes of my post, if anything, before deciding if further input is needed.

Exegesis

Hawks and Freshstart, both of your answers were helpful as well as everyone else's. I never really thought of the necessary and helpful instances of groupthink. I guess it's kind of silly to be worried about groupthink when the group that thinks drinking is normal is way larger.

I'm also very happy to hear that it's possible to choose sobriety without accepting any paradigm. To just not drink because it makes you happier.

I guess the biggest thing I have trouble accepting is that I am a person who cannot drink. I don't have any problem with accepting that I have a problem or calling myself an alcoholic or the stigma or anything. It's more so that alcoholism is a set of behavioural characteristics and the typical literature on alcoholism (AA) tries to frame alcoholism as a physical illness, or even worse as a metaphysical spiritual illness.

Maybe if the science were more complete on genetic predispositions to certain behaviours it would be easier for me to accept. I can't prove it, but I am convinced that what happens in my brain after consuming alcohol is not the same thing that happens in the brain of someone with no problems with alcoholism.

There's an unspoken history of alcoholism in my family. My dad is a high-functioning alcoholic. My grandfather apparently used to be an abusive drunk but no one talks about it. My brother and sister black out occasionally, two or three times a year, but I am by far the worst. Blackout nearly everytime I drink.

I'm sure this is just my AV or whatever but there is still something inside me that despite the ten years of evidence I have to the contrary that maybe next time will be different. Maybe next time I'll drink in moderation like a regular drinker. I still want to believe it's a matter of discipline or will power rather than accepting I can't drink normally. When I think about it rationally I know that even if I do drink a regular amount I won't really enjoy it because I'll just be constantly monitoring my intake and wishing I could just enter oblivion and I am never really satisfied until I am blacked out.

So yeah, I guess my hang up comes down to: how do I accept that my problem which is a set of behaviours has root causes of a physical nature.



(Side topic)
I'm in my danger zone for relapsing. It's always at two weeks where I figure (well, didn't drink for 2 weeks, must not have a problem.) then within 48 hours I'll black out and wake up hating myself.

Halloween is coming up and I think if I go out I'll either drink or won't have any fun because I'll be wishing I was drinking the whole time.

How long did you guys have sober before you were able to hang out at parties where everyone was drinking and actually enjoy yourselves?

Nonsensical

The group of people who think they can one day moderate their drinking despite numerous personal experiences to the contrary is much larger than the group who has come to realize that sober living is their best option.

Your AV tricked you into being part of a group and groupthink and you never even knew it.

The choice to give up alcohol could not have been more personal for me.

jazzfish

I just stick to the facts. In 30+ years of drinking, I was never able to moderate my drinking to the point that I avoided the problems it caused. At some point, I had to decide I had collected enough evidence.

That said, having grown up in the 80s when insurance was paying for rehab, Hollywood was pumping out recovery movies, and every kid seemed to go at some point, I did have to do some work shedding certain beliefs about alcoholism that held me back.

Nonsensical

There's a large group of people who think that way. You don't have to be one of them.

freshstart57

Exegisis, you just laid out a perfect rationale for quitting drinking. You make a series of correct statements linked deductively. The final action, making a plan about continuing to use alcohol, remains somehow out of reach.

How do you accept that a set of maladaptive behaviours have a physical cause? I dunno. It seemed clear to me that my urge and crave to drink were a result of the buzz and deep pleasure I received from drinking, and drinking a lot. Is it different for you? Does the cause of your behaviour matter if you have reasoned you need to stop doing it?

Instead of worrying whether you can drink or not, why not just decide you won't? There is nothing keeping you from having a better way of living your life. And there is nothing to risk, nothing to lose, and everything to gain by deciding to quit.

You can choose to quit drinking, you see, and then you can do it. Are you ready to decide about continuing to use alcohol?

aasharon90

This is your spiritual journey incorporating
tools and knowledge of a recovery program
into ur everyday affairs.

doggonecarl

Sobriety isn't necessarily contingent on you accepting the cause of your problem. You only have to accept that you have quit drinking. For good.

hopeful4

I think you just have to dumb it down a lot. Instead of thinking so deeply into it, just look at the past behavior, it hasn't worked, so something has to change. Make it as simple as that.

I overeat under stress. I have taken recently to telling myself that certain things are like an allergy to me, I cannot have them because the following X things will happen and I will feel terrible. It is quite simple, but it's working.

I also fully realize that during my own triggered times, I need to have alternative things to keep me occupied.

fini

as Carl says, about not needing to know the exact 'why' in order to accept.

and Exegesis, this: but there is still something inside me that despite the ten years of evidence I have to the contrary that maybe next time will be different., well, yes, i spent years there. until i knew it would never be different. it was a horrible spot, having my repeated evidence and then having my 'mind' screw me over into thinking that all these years of evidence didn't really mean anything as far as "next time".

the truth is in your own history.