What is sobriety? I used to think this was a pretty straightforward question with an equally straightforward answer. But after nearly 18 months of seriously contemplating this question, I find myself confronting a bit of a sobriety paradox.
This is to say that sobriety isn’t quite what I initially thought it was or would be. In fact, I’m finding all things sober to be far more complex and nuanced than I ever could have imagined. A simple search of the definition of sobriety illustrates this nuance:
I absolutely love the contextual sentence for the word sobriety. I wish the price of beer had the same sobering effect on me! But alas, I’m a premium IPA lover… But getting back to the topic at hand, I hope you can see where I’m going with my sobriety paradox hypothesis: That the definition of sobriety and what it means for those living it can be vastly different as are where it begins and what it encompasses.
I always presumed that sober meant NOT getting F’d up and if you did get F’d up, not doing it all the time. AND if you did do it all the time, you stopped doing it altogether and then lived a sober life (not doing it ever, not even just a little bit).
The Sobriety Paradox Goes Deeper
So, as we dig into what it means to be sober, we find that sobriety goes way beyond abstinence and self restraint. It includes concepts ranging from seriousness to dignity to pragmatism.
As I work to strip away the layers of my own perceived addictions, it is like peeling an onion. The obvious addictions I face – alcohol & marijuana – are literally the tips of the abuse iceberg. And as I worked through each of these, others I never suspected continue to reveal themselves.
Sugar was one of the first to rear its ugly head. Sugar was the place to which I first transferred my alcohol addiction. Less alcohol translated into more sugar – plain and simple. When I realized what was going on, I swapped sugar for screen time. Before I knew it, I was waging a war against stolen focus. Then it was a single minded focus on weight loss and after that an overwrought pursuit of spiritual transformation.
Just like an onion or Russian nesting dolls, everytime I opened an addiction up for exploration there was another waiting inside. And another… And another…
It All Boils Down To Desire
I’m beginning to realize that this whole sobriety paradox issue boils down to insatiable desire. Because it goes beyond simply chasing chemical addiction. There is ever the dopamine rush we seek. Of course, getting there chemically is a quicker means to an end, but there is an endless array of worthy substitutes.
It’s like the old saying goes: “Beer and wine are fine, but liquor is quicker”.
And here’s where the sobriety paradox really gets traction. There’s a hole in each of us. And we try to fill that hole with whatever it is that makes us feel good. This might be alcohol or it might be gambling or even cosmetic surgery (as we desperately cling to our fleetingly impermanent youth).
Some of us are addicted to shopping or junk food or work or exercise.
And the fundamental problem we face is that the more we shove in the hole, the deeper and wider that hole becomes. Worse, the hole becomes obscured by the very things we toss into it, so we never see the deepening or widening until we decide to stop filling it. At this point we are abruptly confronted with the Grand Canyon of insatiable desire. It’s at this very moment we discover that one is too many and a million is never enough.
Terrified, we flail about trying to stuff that gaping hole full of whatever we can. And so the beat goes on…
Sobriety Paradox In All Things
Here’s the thing. How can we define sobriety in a world of massive disparity where over consumption of everything is not only encouraged, but absolutely expected. Humans are competitive by nature, and naturally acclimated to social hierarchy. We are taught from birth that we are individual and separate. Otherwise the rest of it doesn’t work. Advertising and marketing’s sole purpose is to tell us how inadequate we are. Their messages are simultaneously digging the hole even as they sell us endless fodder to fill it.
What then is the purpose of acquiring superfluous material objects, objects that we hope further distinguish us from everyone and everything else? And why would we subject ourselves to the anxiety and stress of the never ending hamster wheel of ‘keeping up with the Jones’. And isn’t this the very thing we are drowning in alcohol, drugs, and other addictive behaviors and distractions?
We come into this world naked and broke and we leave the same way. So what the hell are we doing?
True sobriety, then, is a fresh examination into what’s important for each of us. It means examining the upstream activities that drive our downstream behaviors. It implies a certain pragmatism, practicality, and gravity. We have to understand life’s stressors and implement healthy tools and coping mechanisms to alleviate them.
So What Does This Mean?
For me, the sobriety paradox requires each of us to take a deeper look at our intrinsic motivations. We also need to develop the ability to parse what is intrinsic (authentically us) from the myriad extrinsic (think societal) messages from which we suffer nearly constant bombardment.
If you put in the work and take a thoughtful approach, you soon come to discover that you are good enough just the way you are. If you feel you are not where you’d like to be, you realize that whatever state you are in is impermanent. And you have the ability to create a new reality for yourself at any time. I’m not saying it’ll be easy, but in the end, it’ll be worth it.
For example, if you feel a strong desire to acquire (insert whatever you’d like here), is that you or is it Madison Avenue? We all desire to remain young forever, but the fact is that the seed of our death was sown the moment we were conceived. It’s not a matter of if, but when. So why worry about it?
Why try to bury your fears in trinkets and baubles, alcohol, and youth serums?
Sobriety Ultimately Means What’s Right
The sobriety paradox really means finding what’s right for your authentic you, not the you that you’re trying to bury in baubles. And it’s not about the bottomless pit of depression, anxiety, fear, and inadequacy you’ll never have the ability to fill regardless of what the marketers promise. The true paradox is that it isn’t about ‘you’ at all. And that’s the whole fallacy we’ve been sold from birth. That there’s a separate you independent from the rest of this world. But that’s the subject of another post! The important thing to remember here is that your separateness is what allows the whole scheme to work in the first place.
The fact is that most of us have no idea who we really are, and that’s what we’ve been fighting against our entire lives, isn’t it? We think we know who we are, but each of us is nothing more than an agglomeration of all the messaging we’ve internalized up until this point.
“The world will ask who you are, and if you do not know, the world will tell you.”
― Carl Jung
We are who our parents, teachers, friends, enemies, acquaintances, advertising firms, and society at large say we are. Period. Until we decide we are not. Only then can the great unwinding begin in earnest.
Gradually, the pushing and pulling of life gets a little less pushy and pully. The interference messing with the needle of your internal compass lessens. And as it does, you find your own true north and are authentically drawn there, free of noise and distraction.
To be sober, to me, means sobriety in all things. And I’ll know when I arrive because I’ll finally be free. Truly.
