Thread by @Meta_Trav

Meta Thread: Alcohol and Addiction

I despise drinking. I think less of anyone who drinks.

Pathetic behaviour. Literally intentionally acting to lose.

Here's how you beat it (like I did):

I was a bartender at 19. Did that 3 years. Picked up a nasty drinking habit. Became a stockbroker around 24. Habit went through the roof.

Became a daily drinker in my 30s. Perfect nutrition, but drank everyday.

Bizarre dissonance.

I have "alcohol use disorder." One drink turns into 20+ real quick. I cannot moderate it.

There's a test you can do. Search up AUD.

I've never thought of myself as an "alcoholic." I see it now as an undignifying label to modify one's identity. AUD is good. You just can't handle alcohol.

It's a maladaption problem. Just like some can't handle certain foods without breaking out, gut issues, etc.

I had an epiphany one day reading about the Great Donald Trump. The guy has NEVER had a drink. Not even one time. He had an older brother (Frank) who died from alcoholism.

Reminded me of when I read Richard Branson doesn't drink either.

So many successful people don't drink. Pay attention to it.

I thought more about Trump, "literally, not even one?" Every time he was in the club, the bar (because he's very social) he was stone cold sober.

I took a quick canvas of all my outings, how many had been failures.

I took a quick canvas of my 100s if those 1000s of outings, how many had been failures. A step back in life. 90%? 95%?

Then there's Trump. 100% dominated every one of those nights. Stone cold sober when everyone else is self-immolating. Dignity totally intact.

I could only imagine how much undignifying behaviour he witnessed and never took part in. Sitting there, laughing in his head, "what a loser." Every time he sees someone embarrassing themselves on drink, his view of himself increases.

When I think of all my "cringe memories." It's all drunk. All my undignifying behaviour? Always drunk. You know when you're just sitting there and you get a flash of some really embarrassing shit you did 10 years ago? Slices right through your mind. Completely fucks you up.

Up until this Trump epiphany, I had technically "hated" drinking. Like I actually hated it. You have to get there first. Felt like it had a control over me that I hated, but I currently lacked the ability to break it.

The hate was there, but I needed the disgust.

I then read this Tweet by Musk about action frequency and error rate. He said great entrepreneurs have a high action rate and are actively reducing their error rate.

Made me think of the math of drinking: was doing it a lot, massive error rate.

Thought of a chart of compounding over time of a high error rate vs low error rate. Two curves. Booze increased my error rate by order of magnitude. How would this affect my successful action compounding over 10 years?

Booze is an absolute disaster for compounding daily wins.

Ex. I had brutal anxiety with employees. It's one thing they don't tell you. Guts just in knots over simple emotional problems. I've never had anxiety in my life.

Suddenly I feel it over each little thing.

The guys over at /stopdrinking on reddit mention they all had anxiety

So here I am, engaging in this rethtarded activity nearly daily. Massive error rate. Huge steps back. Crushed dignity, anxiety.

I could finally see it. I wanted to be like Trump, laughing at the losers.

So I quit. Took up vaping as a backstop, figured I'd need somewhere to direct the addictive energy. Worked well. Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't do vaping, I'd do organic hand-rolled cigs.

A note on addictive energy. Here's what the problem is: humans are designed to face "problems," we generate cortisol, adrenaline, etc then seek a couteracting motivation hormone (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin) to "overcome" the problem. It pushes us to a solution.

I like to think of this cascade of negative hormonal states that proceed a perceived "problem" as "rage energy." You generate "rage" in response to a problem (depending how big of course).

Then this "rage" needs to be channeled (counteracted) by one of the motivation hormones.

When we live ancestrally, we generate rage, we solve our problems. We take a direct path to "fix" what's actually a problem (direct action). No food and winter is coming? Generate rage, you and the boys go on a massive hunting endeavour. Pushing hard the whole time.

Problem is now, we have warped problems that tap into the rage generation system. So our boss puts a deadline on us, we generate rage.

And this isn't like angry face rage, it's more like you body being "primed." I like to think of it as the body "reverberating." Vibrating.

So you are reverberating. You can feel it, you're a bit pissed off. Your colleague doesn't feel the same, he just says "nope not doing the deadline, adios" but you feel you have to. Childhood BS about letting dad down or something. This makes you not see proper options.

So you rage, nothing can solve it. You feel "conditioned helplessness." You do the deadline, feel like shit. But then you fantasize about hitting the liquor store on the way home. BAM, rage flows into dopamine, problem solved. You feel in control again, you made a decision.

When you re-direct this rage energy into a secondary, non-related activity, this is called a "displaced action."

Maladapted problem. No solution. Rage generated. No outlet. Make plan to take action that releases motivation hormone. Displace rage. Rage resolved, in control.

Addiction is just the constant experiencing of conditioned helplessness and displacing the subsequent rage energy into bullshit.

So, long explanation of why I vaped. I figure I hadn't fixed whatever my triggers were that made me displace into booze. So I displaced into nicotine

It worked well. Instantly.

But looking back, I think I had a greater epiphany that was fixing whatever conditioned helplessness I was feeling: I was starting to protect my dignity.

Trump's story taught me about dignity.

I went from putting a substance in my body and giving my dignity FREELY away to whoever the fuck was around.

To never ever giving my dignity to anyone. EVER.

After 2 months being sober, anxiety finally went away. Haven't felt since.

Eventually tossed the vape into a forest about 5 months in. Had a weird cough and it affected my sleep.

So was completely sober 5 months in.

I've been sober nearly 3.5 years now. Zero desire for booze

But the disgust I have for booze is permanent. I LOVE going out socially and being around everyone drinking. I get such a kick out of it. I just troll endlessly and enjoy myself.

It's such a stupid ritual. I just laugh at it. Its hilariously dumb when it hits you.

It's the world's greatest larp: have fun by CRUSHING YOUR DIGNITY FOR AN EVENING.

Yeah, sure some can handle it. But fuck 95% can't.

It's really funny to watch it all go down. You're just stone cold sober. Having a blast. Endless entertainment. Cringing as people toss their dignity to the curb like it's a greasy McDonald's bag full of half eaten food.

Walk out of there. Have a smoke. Laugh some more. Go home and have a great sleep.

Like, it's the greatest thing in the world. I get Trump now. Just always mocking everyone. You're all losers because you drink. It's hilarious.

So then there's the relationship. You never drink. Frame intact 24/7. Eyes sharp. Always ready and able to copycat with precision.

Shit starts getting really good rapidly. You are not someone who is fucked with easily. Frame getting stronger each day. Dignity through the roof.

I used to have a big power point presentation on how to stop drinking.

But honestly. If you value dignity. Stop.

If you don't, keep drinking.

Loser.