How My Quest For Perfection Sabotaged My Sobriety
I tried to live the perfect life. I should have set a realistic goal.
My mid-twenties was a time of contradiction. On a superficial level, it was arguably the most successful period of my life: I attended an incredible law school on a full scholarship. I was in the longest romantic relationship that I’ve ever maintained. I lived in a nice apartment in the center of Chicago.
And yet, below the surface, my life was at its very worst: I was drinking heavily every day. Despite the generous scholarship, I was still managing to build an immense amount of debt. My social life had completely disappeared.
During those years, I was an archetypal “high-functioning alcoholic.” I went to an elite school and excelled there, which masked how badly my addiction had crippled other areas of my life.
When I woke up in the morning, I’d immediately start drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes, but I wouldn’t touch alcohol. I stayed sober throughout the morning and afternoon as I attended class and rushed through studying the material for the next day. However, on my way home from school, I’d inevitably stop in the grocery store for a 6-pack (or more) of beer.
I almost always started drinking the moment that I got home, and I was normally drunk within a few hours. My evenings sometimes began with studying, but the bulk of my free time was spent drinking, watching television, playing video games, and surfing the internet.
I tried to tell myself that this was a healthy way to unwind from the stresses of law school, but I knew that it wasn’t. It’s depressing to think back on how little of a life I had outside of school.
One of the strangest things about that period of my life is that I always had myself convinced that I was just one day from turning everything around. Every day as I stopped in the grocery store, I told myself that it would be the last time I ever drank. I thought that I would get drunk, forget the stress of the day, and then wake up tomorrow and begin a lifetime of sobriety.
In fact, I tended to take things even further than that. Late at night, normally after already getting pretty drunk, I’d start imagining how I could fix every problem in my life at once. I often went to sleep thinking to myself that the next morning, I would live my life perfectly.
What did I mean by that?
I wouldn’t have another sip of alcohol.
I’d never smoke another cigarette.
I would start working out regularly.
I’d stop eating so much junk food.
I would quit surfing the web for hours on end, and spend the time productively—I often thought about teaching myself a foreign language.
Most mornings, I’d wake up and immediately forget about all of these goals. I’d have my normal cigarette and coffee, and my day would play out like normal.
Occasionally, however, I’d give it a try. I would go to school without my morning cigarette. I’d resist buying a pack of beers on my way home. I’d arrive back at my apartment and boot up Duolingo.
However, on those days, I almost never made it all the way through without giving up. Normally, the cigarettes were the first thing to go. I’d even end up buying a pack on the way to school. Other days, I’d give up on the alcohol first.
As soon as I gave up on one part of the “perfect life” plan, I’d immediately give up on everything else too. For example, I’d use my failure to quit smoking as an excuse to also go back to drinking. I’d tell myself that I would try again the next day.
This response reveals the fatal flaw in trying to live a perfect life: It can become an excuse to fail, rather than motivation to improve. This black and white thinking often leads us away from the goals that we’re trying to achieve.
In retrospect, I think that by pursuing so many goals at once, I was subconsciously trying to sabotage my sobriety attempts. Instead of focusing on the most important problem in my life—my drinking—I split my attention between everything that was wrong. In doing so, I downplayed the impact of my addiction and allowed myself an “out” to go back to drinking each night.
I eventually was able to quit drinking, but to do so, I had to focus on just my sobriety. I didn’t quit smoking until a couple of years later, I didn’t worry about my diet until a couple of years after that, and I still don’t spend every minute of every day productively.
I don’t have a perfect life, and I never will, but by tackling my problems one at a time, I’ve managed to build a far better life than I had ten years ago when I was a drinker.
These days, the self-improvement culture is stronger than ever, and I see a lot of people going down the same dangerous path that I was on in my mid-twenties. They recognize the problems in their life, but then try to fix everything at the same time, sabotaging their chances at success.
Working out, reading more, learning a language, eating healthier—these are all great goals to pursue. However, if you have an active addiction, all of those other goals need to take a backseat. If you’re drinking six beers a night, it really isn’t so important whether you’re having a salad or chips for dinner.
Those secondary goals should only be a focus insomuch as they support the primary goal of staying sober. For example, I found that running was a great distraction from my alcohol cravings, so starting to run more helped me to stay sober. However, the goal was still to stay sober—not to become a competitive runner.
To make meaningful self-improvement, we need to focus on just one or two things at a time. For overcoming an addiction, sobriety has to be our main goal.
Pursuing perfection may sound like a noble goal, but all too often it’s an excuse to avoid making any real improvements. Our other goals can come later, but if we don’t beat our addiction first, we never will get to anything else. While we focus on staying sober, it’s OK to be forgiving toward ourselves regarding other shortcomings.