The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
-
Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
-
Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
-
Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
-
Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The other replies are exactly what you'd expect.
Absurd to pretend like food and TV isn't sometimes improved with alcohol. Or that the ballmer peak of sociability doesn't exist.
Or that drinking until you're hungover is a requirement? All these supplements, when a pickle, 2 cups of water, and ibuprofen, will completely solve your problem.
Yup. It is like this here and on slatestar. Bunch of tea totalers. Social drinking would solve 80% of the "I'm lonely" posts.
Between that and acting like getting into a fist fight is mortal danger, I sometimes feel like I've been beamed to another planet.
Yup I've had 2 replies already that have straight up called me an alcoholic for suggesting drinking might be fun and improve your enjoyment of certain activities. Which it 100% without a doubt does. Same people would probably think I'm suicidal for skiing without a helmet or picking fights when the singing is done on south bank of the Liffey. Life is for living. Not sneering.
I feel sorry for people that don't drink, because when they wake up in the morning, that is the best they are going to feel all day-” ― Frank Sinatra/Dean Martin
No, people called you an alcoholic because you suggested drinking as a solution to someone's problems. Which I think is harsh but I get it. If someone needs alcohol to enjoy activities, then that's a strong sign of alcoholism.
I said they make them better and more enjoyable. He said he wanted to start drinking again to have more enjoyable interactions. I think it is a good idea. No one said anything about need. I was just pointing out what billions of people know already. Alcohol makes a lot of stuff more fun. Apparently that is a trigger in online rationalist adjacent spaces.
I mean I disagree with the idea that alcohol makes things more fun, as I said in another comment. But even if I did think that was true, I think that while you might not need alcohol to enjoy life, it's still bad advice to tell someone "hey if you aren't enjoying life you should drink". Because in that case, the person you are talking to would wind up needing alcohol to enjoy life and that's a terrible thing.
"Needing" a couple beers to enjoy hanging out with your buddies at a bar is not, in fact, a terrible thing. This is particularly true for definitions of "need" that aren't fully compulsive.
Well I think it is a bad thing. Since neither of us is really speaking about facts here, but about our opinions, I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
He was proposing drinking in a social situation once a week. Hardly the path to addiction and death. Billions of people drink, it is because it makes them feel good and makes things more fun.
I disagree. I think that the path to addiction starts precisely in small places. Nobody starts by drinking several bottles of liquor a day. It starts when you treat alcohol as something you need to get by in this small way. Then once you normalize that, you start using it more often, or in other situations, and it snowballs from there. As such, when someone is asking for advice I think "you should drink" is always bad advice.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
How does that solve the long term problems, i.e. significantly increased risks of all sorts of illnesses?
I think drinking 2-3 times a week is absolutely worth the cost, from all the articles I've read.
I make the same decision about Philly Cheesesteaks and fast food.
If you're maximizing longevity of life over quality, that's a valid decision, but I've never been interested in that.
Fair, but I'll just add: Longevity is likely to affect quality, too. Low quality years marred by sickness are likely to come sooner and take up more of your lifespan if you haven't respected your health.
I agree with you there, too.
Alcohol is the opposite of a wonder drug. I've drank it 5 days a week and 0, and the latter is preferable. Especially as I age, I see it's role as far more minor in my life.
All that being said, some of the best nights of my life have involved it as a central theme. The best relationships have had it greasing the skids. The most delicious foods have been complimented by some form of alcohol. Those of you who are eschewing it completely while your body can handle the downsides of the toxin may be missing out on more than a bit. I don't think a drug lasts this long and has such a stranglehold on our species for 0 reason.
My experience with alcohol is completely different. I will not offer studies and data but only my personal anedcotes - my "lived experience" if I may.
I find even the smell of alcohol nauseating and I had never tasted alcohol until 18 despite the Italian legal age being 16. Due to this I've gotten drunk only once and it was an experience that I can descrive only as the one of the most horrible things that I've ever happened to me. It was not the hangover that upset me so much as the emotional state that alcohol provoked. It turns out that alcohol makes me really really depressed, in a very existential way: I start to think about how everything is useless and life is ultimately meaningless and worthless. On one hand, this is what I actually think, on the other hand these thoughts generally stay in a way analytical, cold part of my mind; alcohol makes me feel these thoughts, they become emotions: the terror, the despair, the feeling of the Nothingness that was, is and will be beyond. It was terrifying. For me it was a "Never again" moment.
As with everything, I think there is a strong genetic component in people reactions to alcohol.
For sure. And, for what it's worth, despite being an advocate of 2-5 drinks (depending on body weight and tolerance) I also get unbelievably morose and existential beyond that.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
IDK man. I drink occasionally, and I disagree that it actually makes food taste better or makes relationships better. I drink because I enjoy the taste of some drinks, not because it actually enhances other things.
Red wine with chicken parm, and white with piccata? Bourbon with Conecuh or steak? A beer before barbecue? Margaritas and burritos? We're talking about our individual palates at one level, but these are classic pairings.
For relationships, alcohol is an intimacy accelerator. When you only have one night to get someone's attention, it's incredibly valuable. Most people aren't capable of talking deeply about philosophy or what they need from a relationship within 5 minutes of meeting you, in fact, it's creepy unless you've had a drink or two.
I'm a huge fan of beer, wine, and particularly whiskey, but I'm with /u/SubstantialFrivolity personally on that alcohol doesn't enhance the experience of eating foods, except for the intrinsic quality of the drink itself. Like, it's nice to eat beer with a burger at a bbq or have Margaritas with burritos or even red wine with chicken parm, but I see those as more aesthetic preferences than anything about the way the tastes go together. Same reason why I prefer to have East Asian-looking servers when I go to a Korean restaurant.
I'd say being drunk can sometimes increase the sense of hunger I feel, which indirectly makes the experience of eating foods better, but in terms of the influence on the direct experience of the taste, it actually dulls it, if anything.
Everyone has a different palate, of course, but I am sort of blown away that the complexity of an aged whiskey and how it interacts with food is just.... lost for some people? I'd concede that a majority of the "to go with" properties of food + alcohol have more to do with how the latter changes your tastes than the drink itself. But I think the contrast of experiences between a red vs white before delicate fish would indicate the flavor itself factors in as well.
Alcohol isn't easy to enjoy. Neither is coffee. They both require some patience and development, and I enjoy the side effects of the drugs within them quite a bit.
More options
Context Copy link
To each their own, but the tannins and acidity in a cabernet really do act as an effective palate cleanser for a rich, fatty ribeye. I wouldn't say that they directly enhance the steak, but each bite is tasted more fully with such an effective balance from the wine.
My subjective experience is something similar with bourbon and BBQ brisket, but that one really might be nothing more than an aesthetic preference.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I mean... wine and beer both taste horrible imo, so those aren't going to work for me. But yeah even with drinks I actually like, I have never found that alcohol enhances food.
edit: forgot the other half of your comment
I don't personally find that anyone is incapable of having deep conversations about philosophy or whatever even if they don't know you well. If they found it creepy, as you said, then they obviously aren't someone I'm going to ever get along with. I fail to see why I would want to try to use alcohol to make us get along in that case. There are lots of other people to hang out with, if we don't click it's not a big deal.
Discarding people because they can't have deep conversations quickly is a mistake. You need to invest effort into relationships, as a rule. Alcohol allows you to be more effective per unit of time. Some of the "deepest" people are those who aren't comfortable dumping their trauma on you once you've met them, and frankly that shouldn't be a controversial statement.
That's just my opinion after knowing many of these people. If you don't have any issues with your breadth and depth of relationships, then you've done what you want. I do know I am less "picky" than average.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I agree that it can have real upsides. I drink a couple of units sometimes, like with a gourmet meal or when meeting a friend I haven't seen in a while. It's just the habit that I want to remain free of. Better to wait for the right occasion, and then drink something especially delicious, than to try to use alcohol to create an occasion. :)
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link