This post discusses five useful tips on how you can cut alcohol out of your life. Read on for an actionable list of steps to get rid of your addiction and embrace a healthier lifestyle. 

1. Take some time to understand your drinking habits

Before you embark on this life-changing journey, understand why you want to do it. What is it that’s motivating you and making you wish to quit alcohol. Here are some questions to help you ponder:

• Why do you drink so often?
• How much do you actually drink?
• What habits do you do after drinking that make this problematic?

Next, consider your approach. Figure out ways to have a healthier relationship with alcohol in such a way that you control it, and not the other way round. You should only drink when you consciously wish to, and not when your body compels you or you feel you absolutely have to drink now.

Once you’ve got this figured, you can move on to the next steps.

2. Find a community

Involve your friends and family. Talk to them about why you plan to quit alcohol and how you intend to go about it. You can also join groups and find a community to do it together with.

In case you still struggle to hold yourself accountable, you can download a free habit tracker to maintain your progress. When you mark the days on the calendar when you’ve gone without alcohol, it will compel you to keep that streak up and not break it. 

You can also hire a certified accountability coach from the directory of coaches to track your progress, celebrate your small successes, and help you get back on track if you sometimes fall off the wagon.

3. Change your environment

If you keep your fridge stocked with alcohol or your minibar constantly in sight, you might feel your motivation weaken. Instead, change your environment and get rid of all the alcohol at home.

If your daily commute from work to home involves driving through a bar, change your route and pick one that doesn’t involve you seeing a bar or an alcohol shop. When you get rid of the triggers, you will find it easier to stick to your habit. 

Varying your routine and filling your usual time for drinking with other activities can help. You can also find a new favorite drink — if sipping while working has become a habit.

4. Prioritize self-care

While embarking on such a life-changing journey as quitting alcohol can require a lot of determination, you can make things easier if you prioritize self-care. 

• Make it a point to eat healthily and exercise regularly.
• Stay hydrated.
• Make time in your schedule to rediscover old hobbies.
• Explore new ways to cope like reading a book or maintaining a journal.

These activities will keep your spirits high (no pun intended) and make sure you don’t fall into the need for alcohol again. It might seem you’re being extraordinarily hard on yourself, but finding ways to reward yourself in other ways will help take care of your mental and emotional well-being.

5. Learn from experts

You can learn from the experts at Better Humans and follow all the steps they took to get rid of alcohol from their daily routine. Such a huge habit change is not meant to be easy, but reading stories from people who have successfully done it will make you feel like you’re part of a community and not in this struggle alone. 

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“Whilst searching for different methods of accountability online I came across coach.me. I’d been toying with the idea of Skype hypnosis and alcohol counseling. I couldn’t yet bring myself to admit my addiction to someone’s face, be it virtual or real. Coach.me offered different communities to join and track habits. Everyone else in the community can see your progress and give props to anyone they chose. The idea of tracking progress with anonymous accountability appealed. I joined the “no alcohol” group which seemed a busy community. My goal was set at being alcohol-free five days per week and I started checking in each day I didn’t drink.

There was an app version that I put on my phone and checking in each day became an important ceremony. I and others could see each day I met my target and how many days alcohol-free I was. People also posted and answered questions about alcohol. There were a lot of them, much more than any other goal I checked. There was the possibility to hire a virtual coach, but I preferred going at my own pace. The questions and answers helped me gauge how my habit measured up against others. Though it’s never apples to apples. I was still searching for the definitive answer if I was an alcoholic. It struck me how people with huge figures of alcohol-free days took time to give their wisdom and advice for free. These were people with multi-hundred-day streaks.

The same community members started giving me props each day I checked in and so I did likewise. It was a sort of small community within a community. It became an important act to check if those members had checked-in and give them props. It also became important I checked in to show my progress. I felt a small bond form with these completely anonymous community members. In a small way, I realized I’d become accountable to them and they to me. In doing so we helped each other like in a real-life community. I’d found a method of accountability I was comfortable with where I could set goals and track my progress. It was a big step.

By linking people in a virtual community coach.me created mutual symbiotic relationships. The beauty of this was everyone is anonymous. The ability to be anonymous is an immensely powerful motivator in this situation. No involved party has any motive except to help the other achieve their goal. Tracking goals and checking in shows your achievement. Supporting others and in the community helps the self-growth of the support giver. The mutual benefits of this cycle give its members a sense of belonging. They are not alone and see their progress and that of others on the same journey. But even though it was a valuable resource it wasn’t going to stop drinking for me. I still needed to get to that place in my head. The ultimate responsibility is individual.”

If you’d like to track your days of abstaining from alcohol, check out the coach.me habit tracker for free here.

In case you need an accountability coach to help you stay on track, make sure to go through our list of coaches.