SUMMARY KEYWORDS

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SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson 

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

 

Welcome to Your Step-By-Step Guide to Dry January. It is January 1. And I think we’re all ready for a fresh start. 2020 has been a hard one and a long one for a lot of us. And even if we’re lucky enough to stay safe and healthy and secure and sane. It has been a slog. And especially this January 1 is the perfect time to turn the page and start fresh.

 

I’m so excited to bring you today’s episode in it, I’m going to share how to approach dry January in a way that will make you the most successful, I’ll share specific resources that you should grab and access. And I’ll help you get your mind right about what you’re doing. So, you can approach it with genuine excitement. The most important thing I want to share with you is what not to do in dry January, the things we all tend to do, which will actually set us up for failure. All right, so let’s talk about dry January, this is going to be good. If you’re in a place where you know that you need to stop drinking so much. But you’ve been trying and failing over and over again. You probably feel stuck and you feel defeated and you feel tired. And I want to tell you that I’ve been where you are. I know what it feels like to love having a drink at the end of the day. But then wake up at 3am and feel like shit and go to work with hangover. I know what it’s like to have told yourself that you’re going to take a break from drinking. But by 6pm, your resolve has vanished. I know what it’s like to feel really tired of making and breaking promises to yourself to the point where you almost don’t want to try again, because it’s so exhausting. I know what it’s like to feel tired and anxious and irritated all the time to know that your drinking is unsustainable, but to not be able to imagine your life without wine and being really scared about how your life would look like and feel like without drinking.

 

But Dry January is the perfect sort of low stakes time to take a break from drinking and make a change. And what I’m going to talk to you about what to do in this episode is to do Dry January, right in a way that you actually feel so much better after 30 days, that you don’t want to go back to drinking that you want to keep going that you’ve got the tools and the mindset and enjoy January, you haven’t felt like you’ve been white knuckling it the whole way through just waiting for February 1. So, before you start Dry January, or on today, January 1 or second or third or whenever you’re listening to this.

 

First, I want you to envision what could be different in your life when you stop drinking, how much better it would be if you slept through the night and woke up rested with clear eyes and energy. If you started your day feeling healthy and good instead of sick and shaky if you felt less irritated and more able to cope and to enjoy your family more, to feel less stressed to feel less aggravated. If you could remember all the shows you watched and all the conversations, you had. You felt less resentful and defensive, and more open and more trusting. And here’s the thing, what if you were confident and proud of the way you looked, and the way you felt every day? And what if you had more time and more energy to do the things you’d love.

 

So, as we kick off dry January, I know it is hard to imagine your life without happy hours and wine glasses. But I want you to take a deep breath. I’ve got you. I love dry January for a whole bunch of reasons. And I also have some things that I’d like to warn you about, so that you get the most out of your time alcohol free, until you don’t just grit your teeth, and wait till it’s over. Here’s what I love about Dry January, and why I definitely encourage you to take part this year.

 

1. Dry January gives you have a reason and a date to get started. One of the hardest parts of finally getting out of the drinking cycle is that it is so easy to say you’re going to stop and to then move the goalposts. So, you say you’re going to start on Monday, you’re taking an extended break from drinking, but then you decide on Wednesday to drink and just say Never mind. I will start again on Monday. So, if you are a multitasker, please come back to me now because I want you to hear this. Today is the day. It is January 1, or second or third 2021. You are ready. There will never be a better time period. So, no more moving the goalposts. This is your line in the sand, you are doing dry January, like get excited about it. And all you have to do to start is number one, don’t drink tonight. And number two, listen to the rest of this podcast to figure out where to go from there.

 

The second reason I love Dry January is because it makes it super easy to tell other people what you’re doing without labeling yourself or even going anywhere near any discussions of why do you want to stop drinking or do you have a problem? Or come on, just have one. So many people do Dry January, they really do. It’s a thing. So, you’re able to have people know you’re not drinking and why I’m doing Dry January, and easily turned down a drink. Without all that social pressure, without those questions. It’s also the time of year, unlike November and December, when you are not likely to get a lot of social invitations, or family gatherings, or bottles of wine delivered as gifts, or anything else. It’s so much easier to say I’m doing a health kick, no thanks. And that’s it, end of sentence.

 

The third reason I love Dry January is it gives you a reason to just get through the absolute worst part of getting out of the drinking cycle, which is the first two weeks, you do not want to do the hardest part over and over again, by getting to day four and restarting or getting to day seven and restarting. And it’s likely if you haven’t stopped drinking, you’ve been doing this for months and months. And when you do this loop, stopping and starting and stopping again. And when you’re in the loop, you are actually physically withdrawing from alcohol pretty much the entire time you’re not drinking. And it is so easy to say I hate being sober. Being sober sucks. It’s fucking miserable. But that’s not even true. What you actually hate is not life without alcohol, or life when you’re out at the drinking cycle. What you’ve hate is withdrawing from alcohol, recovering from alcohol, calling you right out of the drinking cycle. And that’s what you’ve been doing. If you’ve been doing restarts during your first two weeks. So Dry January, you’re doing the month you weren’t going to get through those first two weeks, and don’t look back.

 

A fourth reason I love dry January is when you commit to it. It lets you begin not drinking without getting tripped up by questions like, Am I really that bad that I have to stop? Maybe I don’t really have a problem. Do I have to quit forever? Or am I really never going to drink again. It is actually those questions that trip up so many women and stops them in their tracks before they ever get started. They start spinning on that stuff and are paralyzed. So, they just stay in the drinking the thinking about drinking the recovering from drinking for months and four years. It is actually those people. Questions that stop so many women in their tracks. But you can forget about even entertaining any of those questions, you are doing dry January, you are taking a break from alcohol. This is a huge health kick, which by the way, that’s exactly what stopping drinking is, it is a huge step that you can take to improve your health. It is way more important for your health than cutting out gluten or cutting down on sugar or meatless Mondays, or anything else you’re doing. So not drinking, it’s a health kick, full stop period, end of sentence.

 

Number five, because you’re doing dry January, you’re comfortable telling people what you’re doing, which is huge. And I’m going to tell you why. If you’ve listened to my podcast series on quitting drinking with Atomic Habit, those were podcast episodes 34, 35 and 36. Telling people that you’re not drinking for a specific period of time is a really important step. In behavioral research terms, what you’re doing is called setting your implementation intention. It’s stating a plan of the behavior, you’re going to change for a specific timeframe, out loud to yourself and to someone else, with a plan of how you’re going to do it to back it up. So, if you take this step, which you’re going to do, when you’re doing Dry January, you were creating that implementation intention. And because of that, studies have shown you are 2 to 3 times more likely to succeed than if you just say, I’m going to take a break from drinking, which I’m betting is what you’ve said many times before.

 

So insane, I’m doing dry January, I am not drinking for the entire month of January, it makes it 2 to 3 times more likely that you will reach your goal. Researchers have seen this in influencing how much people follow through with all behaviors, like your intention to go to the polls and vote, your intention to follow a fitness plan or exercise, your intention to recycle and a million other things. If you state your intention, if you create a plan that’s specific and for a specific amount of time, you are going to succeed. And by taking part in dry January, you are naturally putting forward your implementation intention. So, do it, say it to yourself right now I am doing dry January.

 

The last reason I love dry January is that it gives you a reason and the time to implement the steps behind the Four Laws of behavior change. And it gives you the chance to change your behavior in a way that sets you up for long term success without relying on motivation which ebbs and flows or willpower, which almost always fades or gives out in a few days or a few weeks, especially when you’re confronted by social or physical environments that aren’t designed to support your goals. So, if you do dry January, right, you are going to take the opportunity to change some things in your environment, in your schedule, in your routine and habits. You have the opportunity to actually modify your cue, craving, response, and reward habit loop, so that it’s easier not to drink and more difficult to self-sabotage and drink again.

 

 If you’re listening to this episode and have been trying to take a break from drinking, but keep starting and stopping, and starting again, I want to invite you to take a look at my new on demand coaching course The Sobriety Starter Kit.

 

The Sobriety Starter Kit is an online self-study sober coaching course that will help you quit drinking and build a life you love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hitting the process. The course includes the exact step by step coaching framework I work through with my private coaching clients, but at a much more affordable price than one on one coaching. And the sobriety starter kit is ready, waiting and available to support you anytime you need it. And when it fits into your schedule. You don’t need to work your life around group meetings or classes at a specific day or time. This course is not a 30-day challenge, or a one day at a time approach. Instead, it’s a step by step formula for changing your relationship with alcohol. The course will help you turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst-case scenario. To the best decision of your life, you will sleep better and have more energy, you’ll look better and feel better, you’ll have more patience and less anxiety. And with my approach, you won’t feel deprived or isolated in the process. So, if you’re interested in learning more about all the details, please go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. You can start at any time, and I would love to see you in the course.

 

So, I went through the four steps to habit change, to change your cue, craving, response and reward cycle in Podcast Episode 35. So Dry January is the perfect time to actually take action on this. If you want to review exactly how to do it step by step to support you in changing your habit of quitting drinking, I really encourage you to go back to the episode, or check out the show notes of that episode, you can go to hellosomedaycoaching.com/35. The approach is really effective, but also super practical. When you listen to it, you’re going to be like, that just makes sense. Some of the principles are around. Instead of making drinking easy, you make it more difficult, you up level your physical environment and you add more friction or difficulty between you and the ease of drinking. You make not drinking rewarding by getting yourself sober treats, and that kind of immediate gratification that is not drinking alcohol. So, you’re rewiring your treat and reward structure.

 

You track your continuous days not drinking, which you do naturally enjoy January, because seeing that progress buildup is in and of itself rewarding and gratifying. But there are a few reasons that I think a lot of women, “do Dry January”, or maybe they try to do Dry January. And the way they do it actually undermines their goals and their future health and happiness, rather than setting them up for success. And I want to go through those. So, you can do dry January in a way that it sets you up to keep going.

 

The first thing I see is a lot of women decide to do Dry January and maybe hold on for the whole 30 days, or for two weeks or three weeks of the 30 days, and then slip back into drinking and the same crappy habits. When they were doing Dry January, it was more like they were holding on desperately for a few weeks after the holidays to not drink. And if you do that, in the long run, it doesn’t make much of a blip on the radar, and changing the relationship with alcohol or getting out of the Groundhog Day cycle they’re in. Or Most importantly, it doesn’t give them the opportunity to see what life can be like and what you can feel like when you get away from drinking when you’re not white knuckling it.

 

So, if you say, I tried not drinking, it was just okay, or it wasn’t that good, or I didn’t notice that much of a difference. And you shrug and settle back into your kind of crappy daily drinking and recovering experience, you really didn’t get the most out of what you could have in this month.

 

So, here are 4 things I want you to avoid as you start your Dry January

1. I want you to use Dry January as a springboard to change your relationship with alcohol, not a reset. I want to say that again, use dry January as a springboard not reset.

    

2. I don’t want you to think about forever or never again, and somehow convinced yourself that after a 31-day break, you’re going to be able to drink in a more moderate way. And I don’t want you to say I’m not going to drink for 30 days. And then I’ll know that I don’t really have a problem with drinking. I can stop again for 30 days at any time, because I just did it. So, I’ll just drink in February. Again. What you’re doing there is you are already before you start sabotaging any chance that you might have to really change your mind set about not drinking and create long lasting positive behavior change. You’re not resetting your treat and reward system because from the outset, you’ve already set up your mental reward for not drinking in January as being able to drink again in February and you’re going about thinking about dry January already. Long as something to get through, not an opportunity to see how much better you can feel, and how much your life can change. When you stop drinking. Your goal should be I’m going to do dry January, and by the end of the month, I am going to be so proud of myself. And I want to see how good I can feel. So that I can decide then, to keep going.

I want to share with you what one of my coaching clients told me, after 30 days of not drinking, she wrote, it’s hard to believe how much has changed in just a few weeks. In my first week, I was anxious about not drinking, about how to get through the weekend and about my job. I felt sick and exhausted just by getting up going to work and not drinking. But the days actually feel easy now. I feel good. I’m happy and productive. I had a great hike with my dog last night. And I got a lot of work done during the day, I am killing it at work. What began is boring days not drinking are beginning to evolve into just simpler days, which is actually a really pleasant balance to the madness I’ve been used to. And I am amazed at the difference I already see in my body. After just a month. My stomach is bloated, and I stopped taking my ulcer medication. I thought the reason I felt like garbage meant that I needed to take amino acids and supplements. But the truth is I was just drinking way too much. I used to have a pill container full of vitamins. And now I’m down to just a few. She wrote, not drinking is the very best thing in the whole world. And she wrote me a whole bunch more. But this didn’t happen, because she was just waiting for her 30 days to be over to prove she didn’t have a problem with alcohol. She was taking advantage and was excited about what she could do. Since she wasn’t drinking. Her goal was not to get through 30 days and drink again. Her goal was to get out of the drinking cycle. And she did it and she felt so good. She kept on going. She was enjoying mornings with coffee and a clear head. She was going for hikes in the evenings because she wasn’t drinking. She was sleeping when she was tired and taking breaks. And when she was overwhelmed. She was listening to her needs and getting herself so retreats. She wasn’t biding her time until February 1 to drink again. And right now, she’s past 30 days and 60 days and 90 days. She’s on 120 days plus and looking to what’s next.

 

3. I don’t want you to cheat yourself out of the opportunity to try some of the social support options that are really awesome and out there to inspire you during Dry January. So, I get it joining one of those private free I’m not drinking Facebook groups or other groups. It feels like a big deal. It feels scary to raise your hand and say hi guys, almost no one in my life noses because I’m desperately trying to keep this a secret. But I think I need to stop drinking. And I’ve tried to stop or moderate and or moderate before and I can’t do it. So, trust me, I was fucking utterly terrified. The first time I posted in a Facebook group, it was the BFB or the Booze Free Brigade. And if you’re interested, I’ll tell you how to get in there later.

 

But Dry January is the perfect time to do it seriously, now is the time. First of all, everyone’s doing it. You will not be alone in restarting on January 1. Second, getting the group social support. And joining people with like-minded goals is just habit change 101. It’s literally the first thing anyone will tell you to do. If you’re trying to change an ingrained behavior. It’s the reason people join workout groups and clubs and study groups. And it won’t be as scary or as hard or as awkward when you do it now, everyone is deciding to do Dry January. So just jump in. I mean, why not? It’s cool. You’ll be with a group of women all doing week one and week two and cheering each other on. That is a huge motivator. And in these groups, it is not all doom and gloom. Seriously, it’s not. It’s more you’re badass and high fives all around. So, I literally don’t care what group you join, but join one. I’m going to attach to the show notes of this episode. My free guide to two of my favorite private nondrinking groups, the BFB, or the Booze Free Brigade on Facebook, and She Recovers Together. Both of those are free. But there are also other great free Facebook groups, like the unexpected joy of being sober, as well as paid memberships, like the luckiest club group from where MacLellan and Tempest, and a whole bunch of others. So, take the opportunity now to dive in. Don’t miss out on all that group social support, you deserve your high fives.

 

And 4. Consider getting yourself a gift for the new year. And that’s to give yourself the support and the guidance of a step by step framework to follow as you stop drinking, one that will hold your hand through this process every step of the way. Look, drinking is a really hard habit to break. Even when you forget about the fact that you want that buzz, the physical effects of drinking, it also brings up all this shit, fears and insecurities and ingrained beliefs that you have about the value of drinking and helping us bond and fitting in and being included ideas about the value of alcohol in society. And then drinking is an earned privilege of adulthood. And that you’ll be giving up something precious, if you decide to literally consume a different liquid than the one you’ve been consuming. Drinking is a hard habit to break because it is a lot of mindset work, habit work, yes, but also mindset work. And that’s the work we do in Coaching. So, I created an online self-study version of the private one on one Coaching work I’ve been doing for years with my clients. It’s called the sobriety starter kit, and it’s available now, it is significantly more affordable than private coaching, if you want to check it out. Or if you’re just curious about what’s included, you can go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. Or you can go to my website hellosomedaycoaching.com. And the link to The Sobriety Starter Kit is at the top of each page. The course is all about how to get out of the drinking cycle and build better ways to relax and enjoy life and cope and de stress, how to manage anxiety and tension and frustration and boredom without drinking. The Sobriety Starter Kit is a self-study course. Which means you can do it on your own time. You don’t have to set a time in your calendar to go to an online meeting or an online lecture or go to an in-person meeting. The course will help you stop drinking and create a life you’d love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hating the process. So, as you’re starting a new year, as you’re doing dry January, you owe it to yourself to get some support to make this change. You deserve to feel better and look better and honestly make your life easier than it is right now. And I wouldn’t be telling you about this course or launching in if I didn’t think it was good. I promise you that. It’s just not my style. So, if you want to find out about The Sobriety Starter Kit, go check it out. I’ll put a link as well in the show notes of this episode. And you can just see if it might be a good fit for you. So that’s it.

 

In this podcast episode, I’ve shared the six things I absolutely love about dry January. And four things I want you to avoid or think about as you’re jumping into this month of being alcohol free. I want you to be excited. It is a new year it is a new start. It’s time to make the changes in your life that you deserve. You deserve to be healthier and happier. You deserve to be more fulfilled and confidence. You deserve to no longer settle for less than that. You deserve to be happy and love your life. And I know that not drinking is the foundation of building the life you want the life you love. Because right now you know what your life feels like when you’re drinking and recovering from drinking. And if you’re listening to this, you owe it to yourself to just get started and to see what life without alcohol how good that can be. There’s never been a better time. Don’t let another month go by stuck in the drinking cycle.

 

So, I’ve got a bunch of other podcasts that will help you start the New Year right as well. Last week, I did one on How to manifest the shit out of your life and how to create vision boards and affirmations and why they work. Even if you think it’s cheesy, trust me go listen to that episode. Before that, I did three episodes on how to break your habit of drinking, using the research into what works in behavioral and habit change. So, listen to all three of those. They’re super helpful. And if you’re interested in working with me one on one for private coaching, I’d love to talk to you about it. You can find out all the details of the one on one private coaching work I do at my website hellosomedaycoaching.com, and you can go under contact me and just set up a free 30-minute call to see if it’s a good fit for you. And if you’re interested in the sobriety starter kit online course, as part of the private coaching, you get the full sobriety starter kit online course included in that work plus you get the one on one in depth, personalized life and sobriety coaching sessions. They’re tailored to you your life, your relationship, what motivates you, your family, your work, and they include daily text and email support from me when you need it, as well as Core Energy Coaching, which you can find out about on my website. But trust me, it’s pretty awesome. Give yourself some support as you start this new year. And that can be the free private Facebook groups. It can be my podcasts; it can be the great Quit Lit books. It can be the online Sobriety Starter Kit course, or one on one coaching with me your life, your schedule, your budget and what sounds really awesome to you. So, enjoy Dry January, I am super excited to support you in this process. I’m excited for you to do this. And I’d love to hear from you about how it’s going.