You are far stronger than you realize.
No matter where you find yourself at this moment, you are a son of conquerors. Your heritage is one of triumph, not of failure.
Your ancestors were fighters.
Now what would they think if they found you in a drunken haze while trying to cope with the breakup you’re going through?
Let me tell you a secret: drinking after a breakup isn’t going to make you feel better.
In some way, you already know this to be true.
But you keep on drinking anyway.
All it’s going to do is burn a hole in your wallet and leave you feeling worse than before in the long run.
Sure, it might feel good in the moment, but if you actually want to feel better, you’ll need to address the underlying cause of the problem: you’re trying to hide from how you feel.
You’re trying to take the easy way out.
And honestly? I can’t blame you.
No one teaches us how to cope, and there’s 101 shitty country songs about sitting in the back of your truck slugging brews to try to numb the pain.
Side note: don’t take advice from country songs.
So today, I want you to give yourself a break. It’s time for a fresh start.
I want you to be able to kick this habit before your reflex turns into a true addiction and it starts to ruin your life.
The key to not drinking after a breakup is to first, get rid of any triggers, and then address the underlying pain you feel.
It’s time to stop drinking, and work on really feeling better.
Understanding If You Have A Problem
I’m not coming after you if you’re sipping a few brews with your buddies on the weekend, or even if you’re going out a couple nights a week a party.
It’s when you’re using it regularly, and as a coping mechanism where it becomes a problem.
If you’re using the bottle to stop feeling anything, the rest of this guide is for you.
I’ve been in your shoes before, and I can promise you that your life will be all the more vibrant once you kick the drink and start living your life for something other than your next sip.
Because drinking isn’t going to make you feel better, and it’s damn sure not going to help you get her back.
Want to feel better? Stop Drinking. Want Her Back? Stop Drinking.
Here’s a secret that’s not really a secret.
I know why you’re really reading this article.
You probably want 3 things.
1: To stop hurting so much
2: To feel like yourself again
3: To get your ex-girlfriend back
I’ve been in your shoes, and so have millions of other men the world over.
And I, like the many other men who’ve managed to themselves out of the downward spiral of post-breakup alcoholism will tell you that these things you want will only slip further away from you the more you drink.
You want to stop hurting so much?
Drinking has been proven to make depression worse, and it makes you prone to doing stupid things.
Like blowing up your ex-girlfriend’s phone, while begging her to take you back.
If you’re using alcohol to numb your pain, you’re doing the same thing we vilify politicians for: you’re kicking the can down the road, in the hope that if you ignore it long enough, it’ll go away.
Now you can hide from the pain you feel, and let it grow and twist inside you, or you can choose to be honest with yourself.
You can choose to embrace the suck like I know you’re capable of, or you can put it off indefinitely and never quite recover.
There’s a great example of this in the AMC Hit “Hell On Wheels” where the main character, Cullen Bohannon becomes a nominal Mormon and stops drinking and renounces violence.
It’s at this point his story arc where his gruff facade begins to wear thin and you see the raw hurt he has inside.
But, as he starts to let that out, a funny thing happens.
His life begins to improve and his character arc begins to look upward again.
I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
You want to feel like yourself again?
Booze puts you in a state of altered consciousness where you’re unable to focus on what really matters.
The goals and aspirations that make you who you are don’t seem as important as the next drink.
What you do is a huge part of who you are. When you do something repeatedly, you identify with it.
We all want to be something that we’re proud of.
But no one is proud to be an alcoholic.
The real reason you don’t feel like yourself is because you’re using booze instead of doing the things that make you, you.
In my case, I stopped working out. I stopped windsurfing. I stopped working on my business.
It’s easy to see in hindsight, but in the moment, I had no idea why I didn’t feel like myself!
All along, the answer was right in front of me.
You are what you do regularly.
And it’s right in front of you, too.
Drinking more will not help you get her back.
Look, the “secret” to getting your ex back is to become a better man.
If you become more confident, and improve your skills with women, you’ll stand a much better chance of getting her back.
A man who’s in control is exactly what your ex-girlfriend wants.
By definition, if you’re drunk, you’re not in control.
But it goes further than that.
You already know you are what you do.
And it’s that purpose, that sense of knowing that translates to confidence.
Confidence makes the difference with women, and if you don’t have it, you’ll be ignored.
This is especially true with your ex-girlfriend.
She’s not going to take you back if you’re the same, or worse then when she left you.
She’ll want to see improvement. She’ll want to see confidence, instead of neediness.
She’ll want to see you ply a silver tongue and slowly seduce the clothes right off of her.
Both of these take repeated practice and honest self-reflection, neither of which you can do if you’re drunk.
Plus, if she sees you spiraling down into addiction, she’ll know she was justified in breaking up with you, and avoid you like the plague.
My own girlfriend has said it best.
She would have taken back the first guy she dated, but when she found out that he had become an alcoholic, she didn’t even give him the time of day.
So, if you want to end up like him, sad and alone, by all means, keep drinking.
But I don’t think you want that, do you?
The good news is, if you’re really ready for a change, I’m going to give you a way out.
How To Stop Drinking After a Breakup
The last time I was in London, I stayed in Kensington and went to a cheery pub that was essentially an ode to Winston Churchill.
Besides being a great fucking time, this particular night still stands out to me, over a year and a half later.
There were a few piss drunk lads sitting next to me, including one that still sticks out to me to this day.
His eyes said it all.
They were watery blue and framed with red. He had been crying, and his mates were trying to cheer him up.
Throughout the course of the night, I watched the group go through pint after pint.
They laughed, and he went through the motions with them.
But his smile never crept all the way up his face, and his eyes never changed.
As I was about to retire to my hotel for the night, I looked over one last time while I watched him push away his pint and go to walk outside.
His mates looks dejected, but chose not to follow him.
I didn’t see him on the way out, but I heard someone humming a tune I didn’t recognize.
I’m telling you this story now for two reasons.
One, because what he did is exactly what you need to do to quit drinking.
Two, because even though he was drinking, it didn’t stop whatever was eating at him.
If you want to quit drinking: you just need to stop. Don’t “wean” yourself off of it.
You just quit, cold turkey, and walk away from anyone, or anything that makes you feel compelled to drink, much like the hero of our story did.
There’s no hack, or other shortcut to make it happen. It’s up to you to stop.
The easiest way to do it is to take it day by day.
A Practical Plan To Quit Drinking
The first thing you need to do if you have poor self control is plan for future weakness.
You might be motivated to stop now, but who’s to say you’ll be as motivated in a week?
Chances are, you won’t.
You need to plan for your future weakness.
I’ve talked about this principle before in my post about quitting masturbation, which you should also avoid.
This means getting rid of any booze you have where you live.
Whether you store it somewhere, or give it to someone else, it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s not easy for you to access. You don’t want to give yourself the opportunity to reach for a bottle if you’ve had a bad day.
The second step is identifying any triggers that cause you to drink.
If your ex is one of those, start using no contact immediately and block her on social media.
Your friends can be triggers too, much like the English lad I mentioned earlier.
That doesn’t mean you should avoid them, but it may mean declining a night out if you know you’re going to get wasted.
Once the triggers are gone, you need to change the hardest thing of all.
Change Your Routine
More likely than not, if you’ve got a serious drinking problem like I did, it’s because drinking becomes a routine.
You’re probably not using it reflexively – as you only start doing that once you’re truly addicted.
I would come home at 6, crack open my first beer, and by the time I’d pass out 4-5 hours later, I’d have gone through around 8 or more of its companions.
To stop, I changed my routine. Instead of coming home at 6, I went to the gym for a few hours instead, and had dinner away from my house.
When I’d get home at 9 or so, I wanted to sleep, not drink.
The moral of the story is, once you identify your triggers, get rid of them.
After you’ve gotten rid of your booze and the triggers, take it day by day. Don’t worry about what tomorrow will bring. Just focus on saying no each day.
And if you fail, don’t beat yourself up.
Just pick back up where you left off.
As long as you’re headed in the right direction, a small detour isn’t going to stop you.
Just keep moving in the right direction.
Deal With The Underlying Issues Causing You To Binge
The real reason you feel like shit isn’t because of the drink.
It’s because you have unresolved feelings towards your ex-girlfriend that you have to deal with.
It might be anger, sadness, disappointment, or even jealousy. More likely than not, it’s a combination of these things.
This is a very complicated topic I’ll talk about at another time, but let me give you the gist now.
You need to forgive your ex-girlfriend for the pain she’s caused you.
There’s a book called Maximum Achievement by Brian Tracy, which is excellent on a lot of levels, but particularly relevant here.
A lot of what Brian talks about is winning the psychological battle inside and mastering yourself to win at life.
I happened to be reading it at the same time as I was dealing with my own alcohol related issues. The last chapter was about forgiveness, and the power of forgiveness.
See, boozing to cover it up is you lying to yourself and playing into a false internal monologue where you think you don’t care, and you’re unaffected by the breakup.
But you do. You know it, and I know it.
If you want to get over your breakup, and your problem with drinking, once and for all you have to do one of the hardest things a man can do when it comes to a girl that had his heart and then ripped it away.
You forgive her. For everything.
Make a list of all the things she did to you, and how you felt. The anger, the sadness, the loss. Look at all of it. Face it. Then commit yourself. Say it out loud “I forgive you, I forgive you for everything”
“I forgive you for making me angry. I forgive you for not wanting to be with me anymore. I forgive you for everything you’ve done”.
When you forgive her, you’re really forgiving yourself, and you’re allowing yourself to let go of the cognitive dissonance that’s got you hooked to the bottle.
Don’t be afraid of what comes next. Over the coming weeks, if you finally cut the booze, and practice forgiveness towards her, you’re going to feel sad.
But you need to let it out if you want to get better.
Forcing it down just doesn’t work.
Focus On Healthy Habits
Everyone will tell you this part, so I’ll keep it brief.
Focus on more healthy habits. Replace the bottle with something that will actually get you somewhere tomorrow.
Shit, even picking up loads of women is more productive then drinking yourself into a coma.
Get into the gym.
Go on a run.
Work on your business.
Whatever it is, do it as long as it has meaning for you.
It’ll keep your mind off your ex, off booze, and it’ll help you get back to feeling like yourself again.
How Long Should I Avoid Booze?
As with everything I teach here, you should stay away for as long as it takes.
For most people, that’s going to be until the really bad pain subsides, which is usually about a month.
Again, it all depends on your relationship with the bottle.
You’ll know when you can have a drink and not need a second one.
Personally speaking, I don’t enjoy alcohol or what it does to me. That’s why I’ll maybe have 1-2 drinks a year.
It works for me.
In your case, it’s about finding a balance.
In life, balance is everything.
So stop binging and start getting back to being the awesome motherfucker I know you are, and the amazing man I know you will be.
Talk soon my friend,
Coach Jack
PS: Need help processing the breakup so you can get back to feeling like yourself again? Click here to learn how I can help you.