E332: “Am I Bad Enough?”

One of the most common questions that people ask when they're trying to figure out their relationship with alcohol is, am I bad enough to quit? And then they start thinking about how maybe they don't drink every day.

They still go to work and take care of all their responsibilities.

They haven't lost everything.

Nobody in their life tells them that they have a problem.

Other people are way worse than them.

So then we keep measuring ourselves against this invisible standard, trying to decide if we're bad enough to stop.

But bad enough is a moving target.

If you compare yourself to someone who drinks more than you, you can tell yourself that you're not that bad.

And if you compare yourself to someone who's lost more than you or who got a DUI and you didn't, then you can tell yourself you're not that bad.

And every single time you decide you're not bad enough, alcohol gets to sink its claws in a little bit deeper.