7 Psychological Benefits Of Stopping Drinking Alcohol (forever)
Alcohol is, currently, the most consumed legal drug worldwide. It is the social drug par excellence, and it is difficult to find people who have not drunk alcohol in their life.
But that is changing. For years we have had scientific evidence that advises against alcohol consumption, due to its clear relationship with various types of cancer and many other diseases. The World Health Organization and the vast majority of health institutions warn that there is no safe consumption of alcohol and that the safest dose is 0.
7 psychological benefits of stopping drinking alcohol
Those hoaxes about how a glass of wine a day was good for the heart are long gone. False myths financed by alcohol companies to continue selling their poison.
But I’m a psychologist, so I’m going to talk to you about the psychological benefits of stopping drinking alcohol (forever). Because there are (and there are many).
1. Greater mental clarity
Alcohol kills neurons, destroys connections, damages the cerebral cortex, hinders blood flow to the brain. These physical effects They have direct consequences on our intelligence, our memory, our ability to concentrate
And of course there are many extremely intelligent people who have drunk alcohol their entire lives. But we should not fall into the fallacy that they are immune to the neurological damage of alcohol. Simply put, they have achieved all their successes despite alcohol consumption.
If a successful or famous person comes to mind who drank a lot of alcohol, think that alcohol has only been a glass ceiling in his life You have limited your potential, you have limited your abilities. Alcohol does not add, it does not provide advantages of any kind, it only subtracts.
Why do we drink alcohol? Largely, due to its obvious disinhibition effects. Alcohol temporarily “turns off” part of the prefrontal cortex, the part largely responsible for our self-control abilities.
Most people use alcohol to temporarily ignore feelings of shame and thus dance in public, talk to the person we like or allow ourselves to do the first stupid thing that comes to mind.
Alcohol doesn’t give any magical power, it just makes it easier for us to do certain things without feeling bad about it (until the hangover hits). What is the relationship between alcohol consumption and self-esteem? Well, what we commonly call self-esteem depends largely on our sense of self-efficacy. Getting things done and being aware that we had something to do with it.
What alcohol does is give us a false sense of self-esteem, as if Asterix took a few sips of his magic potion to fight the Romans. But since Asterix has the power of the magic potion, he doesn’t exercise or train. So if the Romans arrive at a time when he doesn’t have a potion, he won’t have much to do against them.
When we abuse alcohol to keep our low self-esteem afloat, we rob ourselves of the opportunity to learn to face social situations that scare us. Self-confidence is not something we suddenly gain one day. It’s something we build from many interactions. So, a direct consequence of giving up drinking is improving our self-esteem and our social skills without needing to get high.
3. You will overcome dependency
Alcohol is addictive, and many people suffer from psychological dependence on alcohol, even if they do not know it yet Many dynamics of abusive consumption are normalized in our society, so some cases of addiction easily go unnoticed.
When we are bad, we grab the closest lifeline. Therefore, many people who had recreational alcohol consumption on weekends for years end up escalating their consumption and developing alcoholism after some emotionally intense event, some crisis Like the death of a loved one, a divorce, a bad time…
Getting away from alcohol as soon as possible will reduce your chances of developing an addictive behavior problem in the future.
4. You will regain your motivation
Alcohol, like other addictive drugs, hijacks the brain’s reward mechanisms. One of the reasons why alcohol and other drugs are so addictive is that they promote the release of dopamine and other neurotransmitters associated with feelings of reward and reinforcement.
When we abuse these mechanisms for a long time, the brain develops tolerance to the effects of these neurotransmitters, so it becomes increasingly difficult for us to experience the feeling of motivation without consuming alcohol (and in greater quantities each time).
A person who uses alcohol every weekend or even daily, You are likely to experience this lack of motivation in the rest of the activities of your life Giving up alcohol restores brain reward mechanisms, making it easier for us to feel motivation and other pleasant emotions on a daily basis and frequently.
5. You will feel less anxiety
Another reason why so many people consume alcohol is as a way to self-medicate worries, anxiety or sadness If our usual relaxation rituals revolve around alcohol, we will be taking away the opportunity to deal with stressful situations on our own, naturally.
Alcohol temporarily disconnects us from unpleasant emotions, it makes us stop feeling anxious in the short term, but at the price of making us feel more anxious in the long term. Because every time we feel anxiety, instead of accepting it and managing it in a healthy way, we will turn to alcohol, the emotional lifesaver that is closest to us (just out of habit).
Many people distance themselves from us over the years. Our interests change, they evolve, they mature, we prioritize other things. It is something that also happens a lot with “friendships” that are only sustained by alcohol consumption.
They often tell me in therapy how after giving up alcohol, they realized that they were having fairly superficial friendships, even somewhat toxic. People with whom almost 100% of their plans had to revolve around alcohol. And if there weren’t drinks in between, they didn’t really know what to talk about or how to enjoy time together.
Stopping social dependence on alcohol also helps us to better “filter” our relationships, and focus only on those that really contribute to us, that we enjoy the time we share. If you think about it, the fact that you need to get high to endure a conversation with someone is a bad sign of the connection you have.
7. You will sleep much better
Alcohol disrupts the brain’s circadian rhythms, including complex sleep mechanisms Most people who stop drinking alcohol improve their quality of sleep over time, with all the advantages that this entails for the rest of life.
You may be interested: “Insomnia: how it impacts our health”
Do you need help to quit alcohol?
Giving up alcohol and becoming teetotal is a very brave decision, because it means facing a large part of society that will pressure us to continue drinking. Furthermore, almost everyone has been subjected to years and years of marketing and normalizing alcohol consumption to celebrate and feel good. It is not easy to free ourselves from psychological dependence on alcohol.
Am Luis Miguel Real, addiction psychologist, and if you think you need help quitting alcohol, it will be a pleasure to help you. Contact me and we will get to work as soon as possible.
