442: The Lie of Sobriety as Self-Punishment
Take a Break from Drinking
Rachel Hart
4.8 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 14 October 2025
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Ever notice how sometimes choosing not to drink feels less like a positive choice and more like self-punishment?
Maybe the commitment was clear in your mind - tonight, no drinks. But then you watch someone order that dirty martini while you sit with your water, and suddenly saying no feels like you're punishing yourself. That familiar tension rises up: the part of you that wants to stick to your word battling against the part that feels resentful.
If not drinking feels like punishment, you're not alone. Listen in this week to discover why you might be relying on virtue as a way to decline a drink, the reason self-punishment doesn't work, and what to do instead to create lasting change.
Find a personalized approach that helps you change your habit in my new book, The Ultimate Guide to Drinking Less, here: https://rachelhart.com/guide/
Discover alternative approaches to drinking less inside our membership program, Take a Break: https://rachelhart.com/tab/
Get the full show notes, transcript, and more information here: https://rachelhart.com/442
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | all of these stories, all of the reasons that we come up with the next day for why did I drink too |
| 0:06.0 | much, why did I break my commitment, whatever it is, all of these stories that chalk up your drinking |
| 0:11.2 | to who you are as a person, all it does is strip you of your power. Because now you're explaining |
| 0:18.2 | why you drank as the product of your essential self. |
| 0:23.2 | When the decision to drink is just a product of a sentence you believed in the moment to be true |
| 0:27.7 | and you may not have even been aware that that sentence was there. |
| 0:33.2 | Whether you want to drink less or stop drinking, this podcast will help you change the habit, |
| 0:38.7 | from the inside out. |
| 0:40.4 | We're challenging conventional wisdom about why people drink, and why it can be hard to resist temptation. |
| 0:46.8 | No labels, no judgment, just practical tools to take control of your desire and stop worrying about your drinking. |
| 0:56.0 | Now here's your host, |
| 1:06.6 | Rachel Hart. All right, welcome back, everyone. We've got a really good topic today. I'm talking about when not drinking feels like punishment. And you know what I mean. I know a lot of |
| 1:15.0 | you can relate to this. I could relate to this for a very long time. So you make a commitment |
| 1:19.4 | not to drink. Maybe you're taking a break for a week or a month or a year. Maybe you just |
| 1:24.5 | promised yourself, you know, that tonight you're going to say no. |
| 1:33.1 | And then the moment comes when it's time for you to make good on that commitment. And saying no to your desire feels like punishment. This is something that I work with people |
| 1:39.4 | on all the time inside take a break. Because I really deeply believe that if not drinking feels like |
| 1:48.0 | punishment, if saying no to another round feels like punishment, if saying no to your desire |
| 1:53.1 | feels terrible, you can't create the change that you want. You can't change the habit or your |
| 1:59.1 | relationship with alcohol. Now listen, that's not to say |
| 2:03.3 | that when you're starting out, saying no should be a breeze. That's not to say that it won't be |
| 2:09.6 | uncomfortable at first. That's normal, but it certainly shouldn't stay that way because something |
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