Revisiting: Buffering with Alcohol
episode
Alcohol Minimalist: Mindful Drinking & Behavior Change
19 min
1 speaker
6 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is buffering and why does it matter for alcohol use?
Welcome to the Alcohol Minimalist Podcast. I'm your host, Molly Watts. If you want to change your drinking habits and create a peaceful relationship with alcohol, you're in the right place. This podcast explores the strategies I use to overcome a lifetime of family alcohol abuse, more than 30 years of anxiety and worry about my own drinking, and what felt like an unbreakable daily drinking habit. Becoming an alcohol minimalist means removing excess alcohol from your life, so it doesn't remove you from life. It means being able to take alcohol or leave it without feeling deprived. It means to live peacefully, being able to enjoy a glass of wine without feeling guilty and without needing to finish the bottle.
With science on our side, we'll shatter your past patterns and eliminate your excuses. Changing your relationship with alcohol is possible. I'm here to help you do it. Let's start now. Well, hello and welcome or welcome back to the Alcohol Minimalist Podcast. With me, your host, Molly Watts, coming to you from I'm gonna say it was an inspiring Oregon this week. I say inspiring because I got to travel throughout many parts of Oregon, southern, central, back to western Oregon over the course of this weekend, and the weather was Amazing the entire time. I mean it could not have been nicer and allowed me to enjoy the Very inspiring beauty of my own backyard here in Oregon. It was amazing. So it's inspiring me this week.
Hey, we hit a milestone here on the podcast this month we hit officially 550,000 downloads. 550,000. That is just amazing. And I want to thank you for being one of them and for listening and for supporting this show over the course of time. I really appreciate it. I'm so grateful. And uh wow, five hundred and fifty thousand. That's a big number. Yeah. Today on the podcast, we are revisiting an episode again here as I am out of town.
How does the brain’s lower‑brain drive us to use alcohol as a quick fix?
And uh this one is all about buffering and buffering with alcohol, buffering with other things, and I think this is one of those things that I still find myself having to work on, and I know I'm not alone in that, and whether it's uh Alcohol or not, we use things to try to buffer. And so that's what this episode was all about. It originally published back in sober October, I think back in 2023. But it's been one of the most popular episodes over time, so I know you'll get a lot out of it. Have a great week, everyone. I will see you on Thursday. Today we're doing a deep dive on buffering. Now I've talked about buffering before on the podcast, but I've never done an episode focused solely on it. And I think it's a great topic to dive into, especially during
More sober October. So what is buffering? Buffering in the context of human psychology involves the conscious or subconscious effort to dampen or mask one's true feelings, thoughts, or reactions. In response to various situations. And it can manifest in several ways. And of course, overusing alcohol or overeating are very common ways that buffering. does manifest. Buffering refers to the practice of suppressing. Or deflecting emotions, thoughts, or reactions. And often is a means of coping with stress or discomfort or difficult situations. Buffering is something that humans do that keeps them from fully experiencing their lives. And humans buffer when we don't want to face the facts or we don't want to experience negative emotions.
So Understanding that you're using alcohol or food as a coping strategy probably isn't too mind blowing, right? Most of us are aware we are doing it. And our first instinct might be to feel ashamed, embarrassed, or frustrated with ourselves, discouraged. And here's something I want you to understand. And we're gonna go deeper into this. But your lower brain is literally hardwired to seek pleasure. and avoid pain. And you most likely developed these coping strategies before you knew better, possibly with something like food. you did it when you were young and you simply weren't emotionally or physically mature enough to really make that cognitive leap. You may have developed a tendency to buffer with food, for example, because it works.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is buffering and why does it matter for alcohol use?
0:02–2:24
2
How does the brain’s lower‑brain drive us to use alcohol as a quick fix?
2:24–5:40
3
What other habits (food, shopping, scrolling) act as buffers?
5:40–9:34
4
Why do companies profit from our false‑pleasure buffering?
9:34–14:48
5
How does awareness break the cycle of buffering?
14:48–18:49
6
What happens when you stop buffering with alcohol or other comforts?
18:49–19:38
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Alcohol Minimalist: Mindful Drinking & Behavior Change
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