3 Things I’ve Learned from 6 Years of Being Alcohol-Free
Enjoying a “mocktail” with some pad thai 🍹 (Costa Rica - 2021)
On April 25th, 2019, I poured my last glass of wine — what began as a simple 30-day break has turned into a life-changing six-year journey.
Admittedly, I would never have considered myself to be alcoholic by any stretch of the imagination (though depending on what period of life one may have met me, they may disagree).
I did however utilize it on a pretty consistent basis from the time of my first drink in the 8th grade at 14 years old, all the way up until a few months after my 33rd birthday.
Over those 19 years, I experienced incredible highs — often accompanied by just as many lows — with alcohol always playing a role in the background of the latter.
With that being said, here are the top 3 things I’ve personally learned from hitting the pause button on alcohol, just over six years ago.
1. My Sleep Has VASTLY Improved
One of the first illuminating moments I had around my own sleep quality was back in the fall of 2018. My wife and I had just returned back from spending the summer abroad in Finland (her home country) and before that I attended a conference in Austin for the first time, by the name of Paleo FX.
This particular event at that time was known as being one of the very top health and wellness conferences in the country. Attracting thousands of visitors from all around the world, as well as 100s of different companies connected to the space over a three-day weekend.
I was living in Dallas then and decided to make the 3-hour trip south to attend it in-person for the very first time.
While there I came across the Oura ring which I’d be shocked if you hadn’t heard of today.
4th generation Oura Rings
It’s made of titanium and tracks your different sleep levels including both the deep and rem (rapid eye movement) levels. In addition, it keeps track of your heartbeat and a host of other features that I was more than intrigued by at that time.
While still at the conference I placed an order for one, which since this was at the earlier stages of its startup phase at that point, it took just over 6 months for me to actually receive the ring in the mail.
It’s funny but I even emailed the company on a couple of different occasions while I was in Finland for the summer (just a couple months after my order), to see if I could come to its manufacturing facility in the northern part of the country (Oulu) in order to pick it up in person.
They declined, but regardless of that, I did end up receiving the ring a few months later after returning back to the states.
Once in my possession, I immediately began wearing it 24/7 (or as close to that, as I took it off during weight lifting gym sessions, in order to prevent it from scratching).
One of the most shocking observations that occurred for me was the vast difference in my “Sleep Score” on the mornings after having alcoholic drinks the previous night compared to those when I didn’t.
Red wine was my only drink of choice back then (shout out to my cabernet sauvignon lovers), but when I’d have a couple glasses in the evening time, I noticed a drop in both the quality and time of my deep sleep.
This was shocking to me as I didn’t consciously feel any different upon waking up (at least to my own knowledge).
However the ring showed differently.
This was fascinating to me at the time but I didn’t make a choice to do anything outside of experiment with my Sleep Score on nights where I would have one drink, compared to two drinks, compared to no drinks, or when I was really in the mood (3+ glasses of wine).
If interested in more of the deeper back story of what led me to officially hit the pause button on my alcohol consumption, I go into greater details in Why I Stopped Drinking. In addition I also share my biggest insights after the first two years in 5 Observations From 2 Years of Not Drinking.
Any who, when I did remove all alcohol, within a couple of weeks I noticed a vast improvement in both the quality and consistency of my sleep (to which the Sleep Score on my Oura Ring could attest to).
From said increase in my sleep, I noticed I woke up in the morning with even more “natural” energy (meaning without any coffee or other caffeinated stimulants).
This improvement in energy not only directly affected my physical workouts and runs in a positive way, but I also noticed I felt even more clear headed throughout the workday too.
2. Greater Emotional Clarity as to my Triggers
Admittedly, throughout my life at various points I’ve had challenges with vices.
Rather that be porn throughout most of my pre-teens up until my late 20’s, cigarette smoking beginning in college up until my late 20’s, chewing tobacco for a couple years after I quit cigarettes, and overconsumption of both coffee and caffeine for about 7 years throughout my mid 20’s.
I personally know how it is to feel addicted to certain things within my life with no deeper awareness of what's going on underneath said dependency.
This began to take a drastic shift for me once I let alcohol go.
Since I had already given up coffee, porn, and cigarettes, I was left with what felt at the time to be the most difficult one to hit the pause button on. Alcohol.
Over the months after letting it go, I soon became more aware of my own emotional patterns of closing off my communication whenever I felt emotionally hurt, or communicating passive aggressively when I became angry.
I soon was able to realize how challenging it was for me to move forward through said emotions, as previously to that I just would numb out with at least a couple glasses of wine each and every evening.
No matter what I was feeling, I’d soon after feel more relaxed and buzzed, which temporarily took away any issues that I may have been experiencing under that.
Letting go of alcohol was like shining a bright flashlight on what Carl Jung would call my “shadow self.”
Without the nightly glass (or three) of wine, I could suddenly see the areas where I was shrinking, self-sabotaging, or numbing rather than feeling.
It wasn’t always comfortable. But it was incredibly clarifying.
Fortunately during this time I was a part of a mastermind group of ten (10) others who were committed to revealing their fears or areas where they felt stuck, with the intention of powerfully supporting one another in creating greater clarity and breakthroughs around it.
During this time is when I first started speaking about being a highly sensitive man (which I had become aware of over 5 years prior but was too afraid to openly share about more publicly). You can refer to my very first YouTube video back in 2019 where I shared “If You Really Knew Me” or “My Story of Being a Highly Sensitive Man.”
The more I shared myself within the mastermind group of others who were extremely supportive and doing the same type of inner work themselves, the more comfortable I became in openly sharing myself outwardly through my different writings and videos.
I’d be doing a disservice if I said alcohol was the main culprit in not being able or willing to share certain aspects of myself, however I will say letting it go has proven to be a benefit to me in going deeper within myself to see what truly is going on emotionally beneath the surface, at times when I may feel emotionally off balance.
3. Increased Intuition & Enhanced Sensitivity Towards Others
As I mentioned a bit earlier, I now fully own, honor, and embrace that I’m a highly sensitive man. If you’re not too familiar with the term, its meaning may not be what you actually think it is.
Dr. Elaine Aron, who’s a psychologist and best-selling author of the book The Highly Sensitive Person, coined the term from research she did in the 90’s for her college thesis at the University of Cal Berkeley.
Through her findings she was able to see that a small percentage of the general human population (about 15-20%), were genetically predisposed with a more sensitive nervous system.
She created an acronym, DOES, to help better describe the different traits and qualities of highly sensitive individuals:
D – stands for Depth of Processing and are those who think deeply about things, are very reflective,
O – Stands for Over Arousability and are those who have a propensity of becoming overwhelmed easily - rather that be in large crowds, from loud noises or bright lights, or just in general when they are in highly stimulating environments
E – stands for Emotional Responsivity and are those who have strong emotional responses and hare highly attuned at picking up on the undertones of others feelings and overall “vibes” outside of the five senses
S – stands for Sensitivity to Subtle Stimuli which means having more awareness of subtle details in one’s environment, such as sounds, sights, smells, and tactile sensations
Without going too much more in depth or detail around this for now (though you can read 5 Signs You May Be A Highly Sensitive Person if you’d like to explore even further), I recognize that I fit the qualities of such to a tee.
When I first became aware of being highly sensitive, I fought it like hell.
My original perceptions of the term “sensitive” was that of being weak, less than, or “not man enough” in comparison to others.
However what I came to learn was that I was doing myself and my nervous system a disservice, if I continued to try to live my life without embracing what was genuinely true in my lived experience (beneath the surface).
I’ve had some pretty unexplainable experiences that some would refer to as hellaciously “woo woo,” that in all honesty, for periods of my life, I utilized alcohol in order to block out or quiet my highly sensitive and intuitive nature.
Once I fully let go of alcohol, it was like my antenna or radar became even more heightened (or another way of looking at it is that I came back to my center of already having super heightened senses).
I felt and still feel as if I’m able to pick up on aspects much more quickly than I previously had in the past.
One example would be when I attended a bachelor party in Miami with a group of friends.
Upon entering the entertainment district we were in, something immediately felt off within my nervous system.
As we all walked to stand in line to enter a club to just dance, have a good time, and take in some adult beverages (for them), I noticed I didn’t feel safe.
I then told the other guys that I’m not telling them what they should or shouldn’t do, but that something feels off to me and I’m not going to go inside of the club that we were all in line for.
A couple of the guys pleaded with me that there was nothing going on, however I stood firm in what I was “picking up” on and told them they could by all means do whatever they wanted, but I would be going elsewhere.
I then began heading down the street away from the club, to which all the others ended up choosing to follow me.
After going into another spot where we all danced, conversed, and just had an overall good time, upon leaving that area and returning to where we had just been half an hour prior (in front of the previous club), there were a handful of police cars, 3 ambulances, and 2 stretchers that were hurriedly being taken inside of the club.
Without bragging, I told them “I knew something didn’t feel right about this spot.” To which they replied and said “thank you for trusting what you shared with us earlier.”
Who knows what could’ve happened if I had I ignored my bodily senses and tried to “push through” just to blend in with everyone else (who not to a fault to their own, but were just not as in tune as I was with the undercurrents of what was present with where we were at).
To wrap things up, I want to be clear that what I’ve shared above is solely based on my own experience. This isn’t about bashing alcohol in any way, as even though I don’t drink it, I’ve on occasion bought bottles of wine as gifts for others whom I know partake in it.
This is more about my own life and what I’ve noticed within myself since letting it go.
I admittedly sometimes actually miss the flavor and texture of a full-bodied red (shout out again to my cabernet connoisseurs), however not enough to at this point in my life take part in it again.
While this may not be everybody’s cup of tea, I myself am fully committed to living a life of self-mastery.
To me this means mastering my mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being, so that what I call The Divine or GOD can use me and this temple that I’m housing to the absolute highest degree of what’s possible, while I am still alive and breathing.
From this place I do my best to listen and follow where it is that I’m being guided, and if there’s anything in the way of potentially impeding or slowing down that process, my highest intention is to see it and lovingly let it go.
Alcohol for me has been one of those things where the cons far outweighed the pros within my own life (upon deep reflection), to which I know I wouldn’t be where I’m at and feel how I feel today, if I continued down the same path of consuming it as I had in the past.
I hope my personal reflection around it has on some level been useful for you and your own life’s journey, equally the same.
With Love,
Brandon
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