If you have been doing Dry January, I see you. Especially if it hasn’t been easy, I see you. I am on a sober journey myself, and have come so far over the last eight months. I wanted to share openly about my process, and may do so in a couple posts. In particular, one dimension of brain healing in sobriety resulted in a creative breakthrough that I have struggled with for decades.
Though my relationship to alcohol has never been disastrous, I have come to see the many ways it holds me back from living my best life. I have always identified as someone who can take or leave alcohol, so when I leaned into drinking while I was laid off during covid, I didn’t see it as a problem.
In fall 2021, I went through a separation followed by divorce, which, combined with housing instability, was completely stressful. I gradually leaned more and more into alcohol and weed. I was high achieving, working at building my own business, and really enjoyed getting a buzz in my free time. There is a saying, “the opposite of addiction is connection.” It took a few years for me to see clearly that I was prioritizing my relationship with a substance over the learning edge of making new friends and learning how to date in a new world.
I do see alcohol and marijuana each as a medicine that has a spirit and alters consciousness. There are ways they helped me through this challenging time of transition and instability. There were also many times these substances did not deliver the relief, fun or pleasure I was hoping for. I read in a journal entry from this time, “the medicine doesn’t work anymore.” More and more often, my substance use was underwhelming or left me with depressive symptoms.
Over the last four years, I would do two sober months a year like Dry January or Sober October, to show myself I didn’t have a problem. Some evenings were extremely hard, especially after the end of my work week. At the completion of the month, I would very enthusiastically return to my use.
Talking with a good friend who was doing a year of sobriety, I became more sober curious. How would a longer period of sobriety benefit me? I also dated someone who was a recovering alcoholic and felt clear in myself that I would rather have a relationship with this special person than with an addictive substance.
To support my sober journey, I enjoy listening to podcasts with personal stories of recovery and scientific studies of the effects of alcohol and sobriety. There are marked phases of brain healing that occur after weeks and months of sobriety, in particular as dopamine levels normalize between 3-6 months. I was really looking forward to these landmarks of healing.
Over my 25 years of playing guitar, I have always considered myself a rhythm guitarist, in contrast to a soloist. The skill to improvise and play melodies by ear always felt out of reach for me. I had written it off as something I was incapable of, and it would often frustrate me intensely to try and fumble at this skill that seemed so natural for some people.
A few months into my sober journeys, as I was playing guitar with my coffee on a Sunday morning, I found myself playing melodies without much thought or effort. It was a quiet and profound culmination of this skill that always felt beyond me. I basked in the beauty of the music that flowed through me and the magic of healing.
I believe this massive skill upgrade came as from my sober journey supporting the trauma healing I have been doing over the years. I continue to be curious and inspired: what levels of clarity, capacity, and beauty await as I continue to heal and grow?
