Harness your discomfort
“You don’t drink anymore, right? So what do you do?”
An old friend from high school asked me these questions at a recent reunion. As shocked as I was to be asked, the answer that came out of my mouth was even more shocking - “I practice being uncomfortable.”
I’m sorry, what?!? Before spiraling into self-ridicule for my abnormal response, I remembered I wasn’t embarrassed at all. I let out a soft giggle and carried on with the conversation.
Fear of discomfort is what led me to an overzealous drinking habit. My feeble attempt at feeling comfortable usually involved a bottle of Marc West and some Real Housewives.
Quitting drinking forced me to get to the other side of discomfort. As my sober day count grew I noticed a pattern - feeling extreme discomfort as I struggled through cravings in the evening and then extreme gratitude, pride, and peace when I woke up to another day alcohol-free.
After reading Dopamine Nation by Dr. Anna Lembke it became clear that this pattern isn’t unique to me. It’s the result of creating a dopamine deficit in the brain which is then rewarded with a release of pleasure chemicals. Purposely tipping the brain-chemical scale to the side of pain results in a bigger dip to the pleasure side before the scale levels out (where it should stay most of the time).
I hacked the system. If I couldn’t find comfort in a bottle of wine I’d find it through purposefully making myself uncomfortable (in healthy ways).
For me, this looks like:
cold plunging
going for that 3-mile walk
eating my damn vegetables when I want a cookie
picking up a book when I want to binge a show
slapping my hand away when I want to reach for the phone to scroll
According to Dr. Lembke, “Pressing on the pain side resets our balance to the side of pleasure” and “Abstinence resets the brain’s reward pathway and with it our capacity to take joy in simpler pleasures”.
The next time you start to feel uncomfortable and start looking for a way to escape, play with this concept instead. What’s an activity that’s good for you, makes you uncomfortable, and you don’t want to last forever? Try it and notice how you feel after.
Sobriety is uncomfortable (before it becomes comfortable). Heck, life is uncomfortable. There’s no way around it, so why not get good at it?
Practice harnessing the rewards of discomfort enough and you might find yourself talking about it at your next reunion (and not feeling uncomfortable 😉).
