Around the time I hit 30, alcohol just kind of stopped working for me. It makes me feel a little calm and tired, but the euphoria is gone. Previously I was close to having a problem with drinking and went out a few too many night a week for a few too many drinks. I still drink a little, but in the kind of way someone might drink milkshakes. I sort of miss it, but sort of don’t.
Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
61–70 of 295 posts
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#62> Some those who have never once taken the trouble to consider whether they do well or ill to drink wine may add that wine is good for the health and adds to one’s strength; that is to say, will make a statement long since proved baseless.
Wait how did Tolstoy know this? The studies proving it baseless only came out like a year ago!
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#63Call me crazy, but as a highly analytical person that has spent 70% of my waking hours in the last five years working on something technical, my social skills are best when I'm hungover. The logical analytical side of me is diminished and I am much more "normal". I have a much higher rate of success on dates with women when I have a really bad hang over and then a few drinks. It does feel like a lobotomy, and that's…
But... this way you end up dating somebody that only likes you when you're hung over. That doesn't sound like a winning strategy to me.
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#64"When a man is sober he is ashamed of what seems all right when he is drunk. In these words we have the essential underlying cause prompting men to resort to stupefiers. People resort to them either to escape feeling ashamed after having done something contrary to their consciences, or to bring themselves beforehand into a state in which they can commit actions contrary to conscience, but to which their animal nature…
This is the core of the issue. The thing is that in modern western societies shame is placed upon many activities that are normal and necessary for a human to enjoy a good life. It is shameful in many places for a person to sing, dance, and to express their true emotions. So we intoxicate ourselves, in order to escape from the overly rigid social conditioning we have all internalised.
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Eh, I don’t think it’s that deep. I take drugs because it feels good and I have a good time, so the risks are worth it. I have zero interest maximising my lifespan at the expense of enjoyment. I’ll never understand why the general population is so hell-bent on preventing people from enjoying their own life.
Alcohol and other drugs feel good and allow you to have a good time by allowing you to escape negative emotional experiences and just enjoy the moment: fear, social anxiety, trauma. Without those negative feelings, you would already feel good, and the alcohol would lose it's appeal.
No, it’s not so simple. Alcohol changes the brain in ways that affect dopamine and endorphins. You literally feel pleasure and happiness… unless and until you’ve had too much of course
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
What’s your current state of soberness?
If you mean at the current moment in time, I'm sober. And it's easier when I'm typing and can edit my sentences as I go. But in day-to-day, trying to explain things or convey my thoughts coherently, I'm pretty bad. I think it's gotten worse in the past few years with how isolated I've been starting with the pandemic.
> If you mean at the current moment in time, I'm sober. And it's easier when I'm typing and can edit my sentences as I go. But in day-to-day, trying to explain things or convey my thoughts coherently, I'm pretty bad. I think it's gotten worse in the past few years with how isolated I've been starting with the pandemic.
Talking is a skill like any other.
So, a comparison.
You know how you can picture a car in your head but you can't make draw a car unless you've spent time practicing as an artist? That is because connecting our mental representation of "a car" and making our hand draw a car is a skill that requires a lot of training. This is why artists practice drawing still lives, looking at an orange and copying it down to paper with a pencil trains your brain on how to translate the thing that is visually inside your head to what your hand needs to do to re-create it.
Well, the same for mental dialogue. Going from "idea in head" to "words coming out of mouth" is a skill that takes practice.
There are ways to practice this! Toastmasters is a famous group whose goal is improving this skill, but there are many other routes. I had good luck with table top RPGs, I spent years playing a character who is supposed to be charismatic, and accordingly I had lots of chances to practices being outgoing!
We are good at the things we practice doing!
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#67If you're a habitual drinker - try not drinking for a month to see if the habit just stops. I stopped to do an experiment on my sleep and biomarkers and haven't found the urge to continue (still drink socially but I used to have a whiskey after dinner pretty reliably). For me it was pretty clearly just to destress and have something to sip on in front of TV. I switched to a non-caffeinated tea+honey+lemon which might event help with sleep rather than disturb it.
Kinda basic psychology but it's helpful to just put the bottles away in an a cabinet - if I don't see them I don't even think, "oh - I could go for a drink". The difference is expending the willpower to not drink vs not to even think to drink.
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#68Drinking slows down my brain and reduces the number of threads running in parallel. Sometimes very useful to enable normal-passing interaction in social environments. Or just to be able to focus. Lots of people with ADHD drink to achieve a more single threaded experience. Edit to add: I don't meant to encourage drinking as a tool for managing ADHD. It works but it's a blunt and dangerous tool. If you're at that point…
Untreated or late diagnosed ADHD people are ridiculously overrepresented in drug & alcohol recovery programs. It's honestly chilling and it prevents me from taking this in the probably more lighthearted spirit that was intended.
Fun fact! Over 50 percent of people with untreated ADHD will have problems with substance abuse at some point in their life!
Oh wait, that isn't fun at all.
ADHD is real and untreated it can (and often does) destroy lives.
(Also: People with untreated ADHD have 3x the gen-pop rate of car accidents!)
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#69Call me crazy, but as a highly analytical person that has spent 70% of my waking hours in the last five years working on something technical, my social skills are best when I'm hungover. The logical analytical side of me is diminished and I am much more "normal". I have a much higher rate of success on dates with women when I have a really bad hang over and then a few drinks. It does feel like a lobotomy, and that's…
Are you sure it's the raw intellect turning women away and not, you know, unpleasant levels of arrogance?
Re: Leo Tolstoy on why people drink (2014)
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Eh, I don’t think it’s that deep. I take drugs because it feels good and I have a good time, so the risks are worth it. I have zero interest maximising my lifespan at the expense of enjoyment. I’ll never understand why the general population is so hell-bent on preventing people from enjoying their own life.
Alcohol and other drugs feel good and allow you to have a good time by allowing you to escape negative emotional experiences and just enjoy the moment: fear, social anxiety, trauma. Without those negative feelings, you would already feel good, and the alcohol would lose it's appeal.
No, you're overthinking it. I'm perfectly happy when I'm sober - I have a nice house, a great relationship, a happy family and tons of hobbies. I am in no way crippled by fear, social anxiety or trauma.
Drinking with my friends makes me happy in different ways. Alcohol doesn't lose its appeal just because I'm happy while I'm sober.