How To Stop Drinking

We will start off with the basic premise that EVERYBODY who are addicted to alcohol would rather not be. Who wants to be enslaved to anything, least of all to the contents of a bottle that enslaves and destroys one's life, one's family and ultimately one's self.

For the average person drinking is a pleasure. A glass of wine with dinner enhances the meal, a beer after work or while enjoying a barbeque or watching a ball game is a rare pleasure. Many of these pleasures are fine, and so we have a bit more or that glass becomes a bottle, that beer becomes a six-pack and We haven't even started thinking about distilled spirits yet.

The next step down this slippery road is when one starts having a drink in the morning to help one recover from the headache. Then this becomes a habit.

We won't go on but suffice it to say that the demon drink has been responsible for many a destroyed life. Not everyone but for those in danger the best thing to do is stop. If you are lucky you may realize your tendency before addiction sets in and quit then, or at least got it under control, or are at that stage now when drink is getting the better of you. This program is then for you as well as for those who are already an alcoholic.

It does not claim to take the place of AA or one of the other admirable programs out there. What it sets out to achieve is to tackle the mental side of alcoholic addiction. This is often a side that gets neglected when trying to quit anything addictive. Most folk who try to quit smoking by using the patches or chewing the gum fail because they are not really mentally prepared to quit. So how to stop drinking 101 tackles that problem.

It starts out taking the premise that the person with a drinking problem wishes to stop. But stopping is hard. There is the physical craving which we cannot tackle but there is also the mental attitude which needs encouragement.

So it takes a 7 step approach:
• Self belief Self Belief is important in setting yourself goals and convincing yourself that you can achieve them. Start small and build.
• Become a detective Investigate and write a report about yourself, who you are, what you do and how you behave, especially when you are drinking
• List the benefits Ensure you are clear in your own mind how your life will change for the better once you are free of the addiction to booze.
• Positive reminders These are mantras you can say and convince yourself about while off the booze.
• Negative reminders These are the punishments you will administer to yourself each time you fail.
• Change companions This is often the hardest thing to do but you must not hang out with your drinking buddies anymore… they are part of your problem, a big part.
• New routines. Remember the drink after work, the Sunday Barbeque. The poker game. Well what you need to do is find other things to replace these habits: A gym membership. Take up cycling… anything to change the places you used to go where having a drink was a natural extension of your day.
Do these things and you will find that you will be mentally prepared to overcome the very real problem of weaning yourself from the addiction to alcohol.