Are you drinking to cope with stress and anxiety right now? Try this, instead.
Many use alcohol as a tool to handle difficult emotions… but there are much better tools.
I don’t know about you, but nobody ever taught me how to “feel hard feelings.” This is a skill I picked up later in life… fairly recently, actually. 😬
Given the state of the world, politics, and generalized post-election stress & anxiety, I wanted to share a tool to help you feel any big feelings you might be having right now.
➡️ FREE MINDFULNESS TOOL
Breathe through big emotions and find peace in troubling times.
Let me first clarify what I mean here, because “feeling our feelings” is quite different than soothing, comforting, fixing, coping, “moving on” or “moving past.”
Growing up, I was lucky to have people in my life who cared for me deeply — parents, family, teachers, others in community. When I was feeling sad or lonely, angry, frustrated, bored — I had loving adults [and later friends] who would hold me, offer love and compassion, and dry my tears. [Again — very lucky.]
But here’s the thing: Somehow, throughout my whole life, even with all those loving humans who held me in times of need…
I never actually learned how to FEEL my feelings → I only learned how to seek COMFORT.
And something I’ve learned recently — as part of my journey away from alcohol — is the important difference between the two.
In my adult life, I was really good at finding comfort in booze and distraction. Lucky [still] to have great friends to call upon to process or commiserate…
Looking back, I can see that alcohol became my primary tool to cope with uncomfortable feelings:
🍷 After a hard day? Open a bottle of wine.
🍺 Disappointing news? Head to happy hour to commiserate.
🍸 Bored or restless? Grab a book and head to the bar.
And I’m not alone!
Drinking is a socially accepted coping mechanism in our society which makes it veryyyyy common for us to turn to this unhealthy “tool” in times of stress, worry, discomfort, you-name-it.
This is why, during the COVID-19 pandemic, statistics of alcohol use, overuse, death and illness skyrocketed.
The New York Times just published an article detailing how Americans not only started drinking more during the pandemic, but how their excessive drinking has continued in the years after.
A better tool:
With everything we know now about how alcohol impacts our outlook and perspective — how it impacts our physical health, tanks our mood, and actually increases stress in the body — it’s a great time to pick up a few new tools to deal with stress, anxiety, and overwhelm that actually make us feel better, not worse:
➡️ FREE MINDFULNESS TOOL
This two-part mindfulness exercise will help you breathe more deeply and learn to release your big emotions instead of numbing or stuffing them down.
Breaking the cycle:
I drank my way through many hard years, and it only made things worse.
Trying to escape the darkness of the world only made my internal world smaller, and darker. The numbing effects of alcohol give the illusion of relief, but this relief is false and fleeting.
I sincerely know how hard it is to consider setting down your coping mechanism when you’re still smack-dab-in-the-middle of a life you’re desperately trying to cope with…
That’s why my programs don’t start with a break from booze.
My method isn’t abstinence-based. You don’t have to “quit cold-turkey” or “white-knuckle” your way through. All you have to do is show up. Start with some science and self-compassion… and I’ll guide you forward from there.
Learning new coping skills — like this mindfulness tool — can help break the cycle of drinking as “distraction” and the subsequent crash that starts it all over again. You’ll have a new option in your coping toolbox, and that’ll give you a way to manage big feelings with more resilience than ever before.
🎁 Try this free mindfulness tool today for a few moments of peace.
We’ll get through this together.
Because we’re in this together.
xo
If you’re ready to change your relationship with alcohol:
👉 Check out my self-guided course.
If you’d like some personalized support:
👉 Book a free consultation.
