Kryptonite

"I'll keep you by my side with
My superhuman might -
Kryptonite"
- 3 Doors Down

***

Sour keys used to be my kryptonite.

I used to bike down to Blackwell Variety store, on my 10-speed bicycle, and eat as many of those damn sour keys as I could, usually before dinner.

I remember once buying an entire round plastic tin, and they barely lasted a day or two.

Giant sour keys.

I wonder how I ever gave them up.

***

Over time, sour keys morphed into Skor bars, Crunchie bars, Dutch Double black licorice, and Rowntree's fruit gums.

I traded it all in for Coke.   (cans, not lines, to be clear...)

At one point, I was drinking four cans of Coke a day.

Then I swapped it out for coffee and cigarettes and about 20 lbs.

Eventually I dropped the smokes and started drinking wine.

Maybe one glass on Monday's, one or two on Tuesday's and Wednesday's, a few more on Thursday, and capped with a couple double IPA's or a second bottle on the weekend.

***

I'm not addicted though.

Like I'm not pulling open the freezer and taking a swig of vodka for breakfast, or anything, and I would very rarely ever drink before 5 o'clock (wine o'clock) unless it was a real special occasion.

It's habitual.

I'm a habitual drinker.

I'm not gonna lie.  

I like it.

I like the warm and fuzzy glass of red wine that seeps through my veins at the end of the day and makes my whole system go ahhhhhhh, thank you.  That's much better.

I like it a lot.

I like it as much as the sour keys, cans of Coke, Skor bars, double double Tim Horton's coffee (side note: thank god I gave up double, double), and all the rest of my habits I've had and changed into something else.

I like these things as a celebration.  

A reward.   

I'm not a "I had a bad day, I want a glass of wine" drinker.  

I'm a "who hoo, let's have a glass of wine and celebrate" drinker.

And in December, there's a whooooole lotta celebrating going on.

***

Okay, I can't even say that it really has anything to do with December.

It has more to do with zero responsibility.

I've had a whole year (um, and some) to catch up with so many people, and every time I set up a date it starts with "when are you free for a drink?"

And before you know it, the one or two on Tuesday becomes a few more, just for today.

***

I gave up booze for January.

Last year, I lasted exactly 8 days on this resolution, when I convincingly made an argument that I might never again be unemployed without any commitments and schedule, and I should just enjoy a glass of wine and stop torturing myself.

And I sure did.

For the entire rest of the year.

***

So, this is round two.  

(Well, three, because I successfully did this a couple years ago).

The deciding factor was a Christmas lunch date in Toronto.  

I was offered to "park in the driveway" at a girl friend's house, and in that moment, I chose taking the train over driving because I wanted to have celebration drinks for the holidays.  That might seem perfectly reasonable to anyone and actually quite responsible, but to me, that meant not drinking was not an option.

At that exact same moment, I knew my habit was starting to dictate my choices and that meant I need to give myself, literally, a sobering reality check.

January needs to be dry.

***

As with all resolutions (and habits we want to change at any time during the year), it is unlikely that it comes easy, since we are going to war with our part of our brain that runs automatic loops.

My automatic loop goes to Yoga class, comes home and has dinner with a glass of wine.

Auto-pilot.

My conversations flow easier with a glass of Australian Shiraz or a Pacific Coast Cab.  I like smelling the wine and figuring out the 'notes' of each glass.

Now I have to re-program myself back to pre-evening drinking days and create a new plan.

***

I post this, not to share my wine habit, but rather to send a note of encouragement to anyone trying to gain control of any unhealthy habit this month.  

Maybe it's food control, maybe alcohol, maybe it's the annual try at quitting smoking.  Maybe it's even as current a challenge as a Social Media fast.

There are two things I repeat to myself to help me make any adjustment to my routine.

1.  I'm not giving anything up.

Giving something up sends a message to our brain that we are in deprivation.   And that, in itself, will create obsessive tendencies to overthink about whatever it is that we are "giving up" and the resolution is likely to crash and burn at rapid speed, while we become progressively more irritable and angry at the world.

I am trying to make an effort to think "This is my choice.   I'm choosing to gain control of my health." or something similar, because that seems to make the path much more bearable.

Even with technology, "This is my choice.   The newsfeed will never end.   I am choosing to regain control of my time."

Believing that we are gaining, not giving up something, might make all the difference.

2.  "Change is difficult in the beginning, messy in the middle and beautiful at the end." 

I read this quote recently and I love it.  When I catch my mind trying to run it's default program, I keep reciting this to myself.  

This is normal.

We are trying to change a habit, and our brains don't want to work that hard.

***

I'm not planning to give up wine forever.

(All my friends are thinking "thank God")

... but I did need to shake things up and get this back in check.

***

We can make changes in our lives easier or more difficult by the mindset by which we approach them.

All humans have addictive tendencies.  Our brains build habit loops and like to do as little work as possible by re-running the same script over and over again.

That's one of many reasons New Year's Resolutions are traditionally broken within the first two weeks of the year.  

Change is always difficult in the beginning, because we are challenging the default.

But it might also have something to do with feeling we "have to", "should", or "need" to change something, instead of "wanting to", that results in a feeling of hardship, instead of achievement, and eventually demise.

It is easier to resent the difficulty and fall back, rather than to keep going to where the beauty lies.

There is nothing we set out to do that is impossible, if we program our belief system in a way that will interrupt the regular scheduled program and rewrite a new script.

"Believe you can and you are halfway there".
- Theodore Roosevelt