What Is Balance With Alcohol?

What’s balance with alcohol? Ask 10 people and you'll probably get 10 different answers…..

For one person balance is having 1 night out every week.

For someone else it's a glass of wine every evening because they can moderate.

For another it's drinking all holiday because that's what holidays are for.

When I went from drinking every weekend to every few weeks people told me I didn't have balance.

Then when I cut back to every few months people told me I still didn't have balance.

Then when I stopped drinking completely I was told I was taking it too far and didn’t have balance.

The point isn't that people criticised me for not drinking… but that the definition of balance kept changing.

No matter how often I drank there was always someone who thought I should be drinking more.

When our choices sit outside what's someone considers normal they can make people uncomfortable.

That's projection. And maybe why conversations about alcohol can become so awkward and defensive.

Ironically, stopping drinking 11 years ago gave me more balance in every area of my life.

More time, more energy, better mental health, more money, better work, better relationships and better fitness.

Alcohol wasn't bringing balance into my life. In fact it was the thing throwing me off balance.

So what is balance? Is it about what works for us, or drinking an amount that the person asking feels comfortable with?

If we want people to reflect on alcohol before harm occurs we need to normalise every point on the spectrum, from drinking less to not drinking at all.

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