Soberish October: 5 Ways to Make It Count
Hey everybody. Welcome back to another one of these ten minute Mondays. I want to talk about Sober October today because we're just a few days into October, which started over the weekend and you might already have an opinion about how it's going. Maybe you started on the first and you're feeling really good about it. And if you are, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:Or maybe you haven't even thought about doing sober October, but you enjoyed that dinner, including the wine, but you still want to drink less for the rest of the month. So whether you're taking the month off, whether you're cutting back or you haven't even started yet, so I want to walk through five things that can help you to get something out of October that lasts beyond October. The first one is for anyone who feels like they missed the start. Because here's the news, you haven't. Let's just say that you've been thinking about taking a break, but October 1 came and then it went.
Speaker 1:And then you had plans over the weekend and now here we are on Monday. Here's the thing. You could start tonight. If you want that thirty days, your thirty days will run into November and that's totally fine. Or you could start now and just go through the end of October and then see how you feel then.
Speaker 1:We all like these clean starting dates. And I totally get that. But think about what happens when missing that date means that you put off something that you've been wanting to do for a whole another month. By the time November comes around, you could already know what a few weeks of drinking less feels like for you. Just remember that there's a lot of days left in October and that could be a lot of progress.
Speaker 1:The second thing is to decide what you're actually trying to change. And this is where Soberish October can make sense. You might want a full break. And if that's what you've chosen, I think that's amazing. But you also might want to keep having a couple drinks now and then while changing how often it happens and how much you have.
Speaker 1:Let's say you enjoy going out for dinner on a Saturday night and having some wine. You're comfortable with that, but you are less happy about maybe having wine most of the other nights of the week when you really haven't given it that much thought. Well, that's something that you can work on this month. Or you could decide that this week you're going to keep the weeknights alcohol free. And then for Saturday, you decide how much you want to have before you get there.
Speaker 1:Now you know what you're doing when Tuesday evening comes around. You're not opening the fridge and trying to figure out, I'm just trying to drink less in October and what that means tonight. Now of course, we want to keep the amount in check as well. If you drink less often, but then you end up having all of those drinks that you're trying to cut back on over the weekend, then you really haven't reduced that total. And then you want to look ahead at the part that you'd expect to be difficult.
Speaker 1:If you usually pour wine while you're making dinner, what would you like to have instead? It sounds like this small thing, but having something that you really enjoy already in the fridge is a different experience from standing there and wishing that you had thought of it earlier. Number three is give yourself a chance to find out whether some of your expectations are actually true. For example, you might think that going out without drinking is going to be awkward. And maybe at the beginning of that night, that's going to be true.
Speaker 1:You sit down, everyone orders, you order something different, and you're a little bit more aware of yourself than you'd like to be. But what happens after that? You might get into the conversation and stop thinking about it. Somebody tells you a story and you laugh. Dinner arrives and you're having a pretty normal night.
Speaker 1:So later it's worth remembering the entire evening. You felt awkward at the beginning, but you also spent most of the dinner enjoying yourself. That gives you a different expectation to bring to the next time. Now you might also go out and genuinely miss having a drink. That happens.
Speaker 1:And that's allowed to be the experience. We're not trying to convince ourselves that everything feels exactly the same without alcohol. What I'd like you to pay attention to is when you did miss it, how much of the evening was really affected? Was it just the first few minutes or were you uncomfortable the entire time? That can help you figure out what to do differently next time.
Speaker 1:Now that's an example of going out, but you can also do the same thing at home. If you think you need wine to settle down at night, see what the evening is like when you give yourself some actual downtime without it. Put away the work, sit down, maybe put something on TV and watch something. Then you have an experience that you can compare with what you expected. Now, it's important to actually take note of this.
Speaker 1:Like you can take a mental note, but you could also take a quick note in your phone if that helps you to remember. Just a, you know what? Thought this would be harder, but I was fine after dinner. Or I still found this to be difficult. I need to think about what I can do to keep myself occupied or as an alternative.
Speaker 1:Number four is what do you do when you drink when you said you weren't going to drink? You know, that's the million dollar question. Now there's a study on dry January that they did that I think is worth mentioning here. Researchers followed eight fifty seven adults and checked in on their drinking six months later after dry January. And what they found were that people were drinking less and felt more confident turning down drinks.
Speaker 1:And that included people who hadn't made it through the full month. Now people who completed it were more likely to improve. And because in this study they chose to follow people that were trying to do a dry month, So it doesn't prove that the challenge caused every change or that every approach works the same. But even with that in mind, it's encouraging that missing the full goal wasn't the end of the story for those people. So think about that if you had a night where it didn't go as planned.
Speaker 1:Let's say you took Monday through Thursday off and then maybe you went out for dinner Friday intending not to drink, but then you ended up having some wine. Of course, you're going to be disappointed. And that's okay. You had a plan. You didn't follow through on it.
Speaker 1:But what would help you now? You can look at what happened. Maybe sometimes getting friends on board makes it easier and you hadn't told anybody about it and you found it harder to turn it down when that offer came up than you expected. Maybe next time you can mention it before you go out. Or maybe you got there and you decided that you wanted to have some wine and then it's worth being honest about that decision and whether you're happy with it afterwards.
Speaker 1:Either way, can still choose what you're going to do on that Saturday after the Friday. It doesn't require you to abandon the rest of the month. And you also have to remember you still had four evenings where you did what you planned. If something helped on those nights, maybe you can use it again. If you're repeatedly finding that you can't stick to those limits that you set, don't keep trying to do the same strategies.
Speaker 1:This is time for you to reflect and look, okay, moving forward, what can I change what I'm doing that will possibly lead to a different outcome? And then the fifth thing is to think about what you're going to do when October ends. Let's say you get through the month and you've noticed that your Saturday mornings, they're more. You are up earlier. You feel better.
Speaker 1:You're doing things that you normally wouldn't get around to doing. That's actually something that you may want to keep. So what would your Friday nights look like for that to keep happening after October? Or maybe you were pleasantly surprised to realize that you barely missed drinking on weeknights. You were expecting that to be the hard part and it really wasn't.
Speaker 1:So you might decide that you're happy to keep that going. You could also finish the month and decide, you know what? You do want to drink again, but you've gotten a better idea of the occasions where you enjoy it and the times that you could take it or leave it. That's the kind of thing that I want you to come away with, with opportunities like Sober October, Soberish October, and January. A few things that you've learned about yourself that can actually help you to decide how you want to drink.
Speaker 1:And if you haven't noticed a big change in how you feel, I don't want you to feel like you have to invent one. Look at what you did notice, include what was difficult, and then decide whether you want more time or maybe you want to work on that part a little bit more. So as you go into this week, think about what you're asking yourself to do. Are you going to take a break? Are you cutting out a couple of nights during the week?
Speaker 1:Is it the amount that you want to change? What's important is that you can start now. There is no clear date that it has passed you by. It's most important for you to get clear on that, on your goals. And give yourself a chance to see how it goes.
Speaker 1:You can learn from a good evening. You can also learn from one that didn't go as planned. So if you haven't started yet, you can still join. There's tons of October left. Okay, thanks for hanging out with me this week.
Speaker 1:If you got something out of this, please rate and review. And until next time, cheers to your mindful drinking journey.
Creators and Guests
