Ana Marie Cox
Appearances
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Yeah, just try to remember that. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Well, I'm not going to lie. Sometimes it kind of sucks. I mean, really experiencing life, like everything that there is in life. I mean, if it was great, everyone would do it. And if it was great all the time, there wouldn't be any reason to escape. But life has all the things. Life has terrible joys and it has horrendous pain. It is a...
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
is a challenge just to always be where I am in the moment to not be able to hurry things along pharmacologically. And you hear people say like, I'm grateful. I'm a grateful recovering alcoholic. And it's like, how could you be grateful? I am so grateful. I am so grateful to have the life that I have today. Cause if I was able to drink,
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
and not wreck lives, including my own, I wouldn't have the realness of the experience that I have today.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I wish that I could bottle it and give it to people. Maybe make some money. I don't know. That was a joke.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
First I want to say I honor anyone's decision to be mindful about their intake of something that's become habitual. Ana is a writer and journalist. That said, if you suspect you have a real problem... or that your relationship to alcohol is unhealthy. No time like the present.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
And the idea that you could not feel like drinking, I think has just turned everything a little bit.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
It is not as resilient.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I do think that living in this world without alcohol... is like visiting a different country or speaking a different language. Your brain has to work slightly differently. And you become conscious of other people in a way that you weren't conscious of them before. And I think that that's just healthy. It's always a good idea to be mindful about something that you had not been mindful about before.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
How is this chemical affecting my world? How is it affecting my relationships? How is it affecting my body? You know, how do I see differently if it's not an option to just have a drink after work? What does it do to who I see? And how much time I spend by myself? What does it do to the quality of time that I have by myself? So I think that's a worthwhile place to visit.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I think there is something happening. I think part of it has to do with the rise of marijuana as a option. Say more about that. Well, I think it's funny to hear people say, you know, I don't like what alcohol does for me. Instead, I'm going to smoke. Now, people have kind of always had the option of pot, right? Always. But it's so much more socially acceptable now.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Oh, it's also legal in many states as well. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm in Texas, so sometimes I forget. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Even more than legal, even more than socially accepted, it's just a part of people's lives. It's an option. And I think that having that as an option makes people think of drinking as an option, too. Hmm.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
And I think also, I mean, there's probably a sort of sad chapter here, which is about the rise of the opioid epidemic, which put young people by the hundreds of thousands in danger and gave them exposure to different kinds of sobriety. That's really interesting. I hadn't thought about it that way.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
The numbers of people who know someone who's been affected by alcohol or drug abuse in the past year or so, it's like the social fabric of it.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I welcome visitors to my country. What I feel like I want to note when you ask me that question is the change in my own feelings. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. about the rise in popularity of my neighborhood. Say more. At first, when this trend started to take hold, or I noticed more people becoming curious about sobriety and not curious about recovery, like to distinguish between the two, right?
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Like they just wanted to drink less or try sobriety, but weren't interested in like the recovery journey that I'm, you know, forced to be on. I felt very protective. Yeah. I noticed my own reaction of, like, resentment. Because these people are coming by choice. They have a choice. And they can leave. While I love where I live, if I walked out the door, I don't think I'd make it back.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
People come and they have opinions. The metaphor of a gentrified neighborhood actually worked pretty well. In some ways. Because people have opinions about it. They're like, oh, I don't like this. Or I don't like that. Or AA's, I don't know. You know? Like, oh. But you're like, this is my home. So... This is it for me, guys. This is it.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
But I think where I've landed is in a place where the neighborhood and gentrification metaphors fall apart, which is that there's always room for more. This is a wonderful place. The place where I am at can be hard to be because... There's no filters. I shouldn't say there's no options to distract myself or insulate myself. They're just not as immediate.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
But I'm not losing anything by more people coming. I'm not losing anything by there being more options. No one's going to knock down the neighborhood bar, as it were, and build something fancier. No one's doing anything for my property taxes. Why be suspicious of other people's motives? Why try to tell them that they got here the wrong way?
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Then you're going to feel like they know how to do it better than me, which is also like that's super annoying. Oh, yeah. There are these young, sober people that are like, I could also make money. I could commodify my sobriety in some way. I say the positive part of that, weirdly, is the actual commodity of low alcohol or non-alcohol beverages.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
And the less great part of that to me is sometimes the sobriety coaching stuff. What works for people works for people. And I don't ever want to take away something that's working for somebody. But that's also happening. It's an industry now. Coming up, what would it mean to live in a more sober culture? We Americans are going to need to like sub in stuff for a little while. Stick around.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I think if nothing else, it brings a specific commodity into all social interactions. Unless you're brewing your own beer and bottling your own wine, you're basically putting a tax on your friends. I mean, that's a really good point. It costs money to drink. Let me lay another one on you about this, which is that you're also asking them to donate some of their precious brain cells.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
That I did know. Yeah. I mean, alcohol is a poison. Not to put too fine a point on it, but you're saying like, all right, in order for us to really sit down and have fun together... Like what we're all going to need to do is like ingest a moderate amount of poison. I feel like I'm verging into like an alcohol is bad and no one should drink it territory.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I'm just putting together the argument a little bit here. You're saying we probably need something else among us to have fun. Like I don't trust that we're just going to be able to vibe. I don't trust that we can simply relax together. Like we're going to need this other thing. So everybody bring the other thing that we're all going to share. And.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
There are historical religious uses of various chemicals. I am an advocate of using what you need to feel better. I am not prohibitionist about this. But we need to be very aware and thoughtful about it. And I think my problem with alcohol in our culture is that we don't think about it. We don't think about what we're asking of people.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
We don't think about the message that we're sending when it has become so central to the ways that we relate to each other.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
I think, among other things, it would be a more active culture, just to be totally honest. Because I think one of the things that I've – when people ask, like, what can I do for my friends who are nearly sober? One of the things I say is, like, take them to do stuff. Let's go rock climbing. Let's go on a walk. Let's go paint something.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Let's go to the Michaels and buy some stuff for crafts, like doing things. Sober karaoke is one of my very favorite things in the world. Ooh, I love that. I mean, I love karaoke anyway, because I love attention. That's why I'm hosting the podcast. one of the sort of humps you have to get over if you're going to have like a non-drinking social situation is like, what do we do with our hands?
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Like, how do we talk to each other? And this is another thing that bars do, right? Is, um, It gives you kind of a context to be like, hey, what's up?
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Right. I really love that gaming has become so popular. Ooh, yeah. I did not grow up as a gamer. I remember going over to some other kid's house to play Dungeons and Dragons. Yeah. And I was I think what must happen is the guy that does a dungeon master wasn't very good. So it's just like, well, this I'm out. I don't like pretending to be an elf.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
But now I'm reconsidering because I love this idea that adults are getting together. And I know that some places they also drink while they do this. Right. But that's not what you're doing.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Yeah. I think people would just be doing more stuff. I think maybe other cultures that just don't have as much emphasis on alcohol are just more thoughtful in general. But I think that we Americans are going to need to like sub in stuff for a little while. We're not going to get straight to just the quiet contemplation in the comfortable silences that fall between friends.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
You make a really good point, though. Like when you're a kid, they have like...
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
If I was going to give advice, I guess, about dry January, I think In pop psychology in general, people talk about it's easier to add than subtract, right? To add a habit than subtract a habit. So do try January, but maybe it always should be paired with something else that you want to do, that you tap dance, you know. Needlepoint.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Needlepoint, bouldering, doing something out in the world, I think, is actually a wonderful option.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
Going out for drinks with everybody and your turn comes around and you usually order a wine, but you're doing dry January. Don't say like, no, I'm doing dry January. Maybe just... Just say like, all right, not tonight. Not tonight. This is going to sound really crazy, but maybe just don't crow about it too much.
It's Been a Minute
Sober-curious? Why your friends (and maybe you) are going dry.
You don't have to keep it a secret, but it'd be cool to just make it normal to not order a drink. There, that's what you could do. Yeah. I think a lot of people who do dry January are doing it just because they want to, but still find it something of a struggle, right? Still find themselves challenged by it. I don't know. I guess just know that it's not easy for everybody.