Benefits of Living Your Life Alcohol Free
Alcohol is the best bad friend I ever had, until it wasn’t. It has always there for me, more reliable than people in this way. When life hurts me, it soothes the pain away. It makes choices easier.
Until one day it became the pain, my choices got worst and every activity became an excuse to drink. At times prioritised it over the people I loved. Life began to unravel.
This my own personal experience, it may different for you and doesn’t represent the views of the podcast that inspired this post, which is:
Rich Roll Podcast, episode released on May 6, 2024, featuring Andy Ramage. All credit for the original conversation and ideas goes to Rich Roll and his guest. Full episode link: Watch here
Who is Andy Ramage?
Andy Ramage, a former footballer whose life changed after career ending injury. He turned his life around to become a very successful oil broker and owner of his brokerage, this of course wasn’t without challenges. The greatest of which was to quit drinking and go going alcohol free.
“What alcohol promises, it takes away. What alcohol-free gives you, it gives you a thousand times more.”
— Andy Ramage, Rich Roll Podcast
Andy’s choice proved to be yet another critical turning point in his life. This shift coincided with a global movement in the alcohol industry and a greater profitable trend towards non-alcoholic beverages.
Rich Roll Podcast, episode released on May 6, 2024, featuring Andy Ramage. All credit for the original conversation and ideas goes to Rich Roll and his guest. Full episode link: Watch here
Alcohol-free lifestyle
Andy speaks not to the rock bottom alcoholics for which there is so much conversation about, especially online. His advocacy speaks directly to those ‘middle of the lane’ drinkers, which describes most people.
So who is in this ‘middle of the lane?’ This describes the average folk, the once a week or just on the weekends kind of drinker, the typical social drinkers if you like.
“They’re completely unaware that their relationship with alcohol is negatively impacting their life.”
— Andy Ramage, Rich Roll Podcast
“
Alcohol for many of us is not a problem, or is it? If you find yourself in the ‘middle of the lane,’ the affects are less visible when compared to a heavy drinker. Andy describes some of these as:
- Lack of motivation
- Inconsistent engery
- No being your best self
- Mood swings
My experience
At the worst times I have a much more unhealthy relationship with it, including at times binge drinking. Recently I have moved much more in the direction of a social drinker (just a few drinks a week). However like you might be I’m fully aware and have experienced the following pitfall’s of alcohol:
- It becomes a crutch – I lean to heavily on it to get things done.
- It slows me down – It hinders everything from photography to writing
- False confidence – It gives me a fake confidence in social situations
- Nights of drinking – even social drinking can impact the next day
- Financial expenditure – the cost adds up
- Fitness levels – it really gets in the way of fitness goals
It’s true we can’t blame alcohol for everything, I had ADHD long before alcohol found me. It does however seem to exaggerate both the best and the worst in me.
Emptiness and success
Does alcohol bring us any real success, happiness, health or contentment? There is social component to alcohol that is said to be beneficial to health, but how many drinks does it take to negate that?
If we are blunted by the experience of alcohol just as Andy Ramage has suggested above, then what are the implications on our lives? Does alcohol hold us back? Stunt our growth?
“I woke up in my mid-30s… I had what looked like success — but I wasn’t happy. I was overweight, anxious, unfit, and unfulfilled.”
— Andy Ramage, Rich Roll Podcast
Even though Andy had made a financial success in his second career he still felt he was unfulfilled in a number of ways:
- Mediation
- Exercise
- Nutrition
He found of all these aspects of his life inconsistent. Alcohol was the real problem.
My Experience
As a middle aged man, I’m overweight and just like you might be, I’ve cut back on my drinking, tried mediation, tried lifting weights, I’ve even changed my diet, walked a lot more and currently trying callisthenics. That said I’m aware that drinking alcohol even, socially has or does derail most activities like these given half the chance. I have experienced:
- Headaches even from a few drinks
- Exhausted after taking socialising a step too far
- I have uttered the words “I will never drink again” (many times)
- Spent too much money
- A lose of motivation to work
- Come back at all late hours
- I have promised myself to start that diet tomorrow!
- I have promised myself to go to the gym later
And yet quitting alcohol is the last thing on my list to try to stop or truly change.
What happens when you quit
Andy committed himself to a 28 day break from his ‘middle of the road’ drinking.
“Alcohol is the only drug in the world where if you stop taking it, people give you shit.”
— Andy Ramage, Rich Roll Podcast
After that period, he experienced so many positives he decided to stick to make it a permanent part of his life. It wasn’t easy though, he met resistance. His business mentor warned it would have very negative impacts on his career.
The potential fallout on his career was huge, and yet he stuck to it. He experienced a wide range of positive mental, physiological benefits:
- Sleep returned.
- Anxiety dropped.
- He lost 3 stone (42 pounds).
- His business grew 7x faster.
- He showed up as a 9 or 10 out of 10 every day.
My experience
I am an expat living overseas, and alcohol plays a huge role in the lifestyle. I can sympathise with how difficult it must have been for him to quit.
There is no way of knowing the numbers, but from my time overseas, I’m very sure that alcohol consumption still remains high in expat communities. It’s such an essential part of the business and social culture. Alcohol consumption may well be falling across the UK and the USA, but there is not much sign of that in my community.
If you’re a non-drinker it is going to be harder to network, or even date for example as a foreigner overseas. Everyone simply meets around bars, restaurants and drinks around business.
I have now gone from someone with a drink problem, to a social drinker, with just a few a week. That need to social drink is always a temptation. I feel better now than I have for a long time, but when I do drink I feel the affect of the following:
Let’s choose writing as an example. I spend a lot of time doing that these days. I know from experience that just even one drink has certain negative impacts on the writing and editing process. If I have any alcohol:
- My mind is clearer
- I’m more focused
- My symptoms of ADHD are less intense
- I’m far more likely to stick to a workout schedule
- Far more likely to stick to a healthy diet
- I also plan head better, and act on it
That old adage, write drunk, edit sober, just doesn’t work.
Faking It to Making It
I’m not Andy Ramage, I’m stil trying to build my career, but what he discovered about himself, and others was very quite eye opening to say the least.
1“That became my USP (not drinking) — my unique selling point. I built deeper relationships because I was really good at my job and still fun.”
— Andy Ramage, Rich Roll Podcast
He is not saying that you will become an instant success if you don’t drink. What he is saying is, an alcohol free life has the real potential of reshaping your life, and reinventing who you are.
Final Thoughts
What do we have to lose? If quitting alcohol is transformational then we have everything to gain.
“You’ll never know unless you try — so why not just take a break?”
— Andy Ramage
You may not even have an unhealthy relationship with alcohol like I definitely have had, in th past. I’m also aware that is still in me.
The odd thing with alcohol is that we keep going back to it. Just like when I kept repeating the same mistakes with it again and again.
It has damaged many relationships around me. The worst of all might be the amount of time I have wasted on and around it. The answer to life is most certainly not at the bottom of a glass.
For this portion of my personal, business and career, I want to take back more control, more health and have healthier habits and relationships.
Honestly I’m not sure I will ever be an alcohol free person, but I know I am definitely better without it. I will for sure take longer and longer breaks from it overtime.
Good luck with your journey and I hope you have found something useful in both Andy Ramage’s inspirational work, and thanks again to Rich Roll for shining light on this very important subject.
