How About a Cost/Benefit Analysis?
A normal Cost/Benefit Analysis of your drinking would be four lists: Costs of Drinking, Benefits of Drinking, Costs of Quitting, Benefits of Quitting.
We suggest that for all practical purposes you can skip the Costs of Drinking and the Benefits of Quitting parts – not much mystery there for the most part.
Instead focus on the Benefits of Drinking since these are the things you’re going to have to replace with new activities and/or coping skills.
These will also be reflected in the Costs of Quitting, the benefits mirror image.
For an even more eye-opening bit of processing, figure out what Benefits your spouse or significant other is getting from your drinking – and they are benefiting or they’d have left by now. That will also lead to their Costs of Your Quitting which is where the sabotage comes from.
Remember, all of your relationships are dances which have included alcohol as one of the partners – omit alcohol and the dance changes. Then everyone around — not just you — has to adapt to the new dance, and most people find that annoying, at best.
As always, some good humor, good will and patience go a long way in getting you to that “new normal” that constitutes life after alcohol.
Court Ordered to AA?
Some time back we wrote about it no longer being legal for courts to require AA attendance (see “No Judge, No AA”).
But if you’ve fallen into that trap and are trying to figure out how to comply without actually joining the cult, or wasting your time in mindless meetings, we suggest that you research just what constitutes an AA Meeting.”
According to AA, a meeting is two people, a coffee pot, a resentment (for example, being illegally ordered to attend cult meetings?), and a Big Book.
Really. That’s all it takes for it to be an “AA meeting.”
AA itself will help you start a new group and you and a friend can take it from there.
Yes, sometimes it’s easier to creatively comply with an illegal mandate than to fight it. If this is one of those times, we suggest you just might want to keep your head down, move forward, and smile a lot.
Need More Information?
Alcohol Abuse, Alcoholism, and 12 Step Programs That Can’t Tell the Difference
“How Can You Possibly Cure My Years of Alcohol Abuse in Just 5 Days?”
Our Expanded Program Description
Ending Alcohol Abuse: What Works
Ten Things I Wish I’d Known Before I Sent My Brother Off To Rehab
The Bucket of Crabs, or Why AA and Alanon are Bad For Your Health,
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