Abraham Maslow developed what is called the ‘hierarchy of needs’. This concept, which is illustrated through the use of a pyramid visual, describes how basic needs (i.e. food and water) must be met before more moving up the pyramid to the next most important needs, much as safety and security. The idea continues up each level to more complex, sociological needs including the need to feel part of a group. I notice that when my basic needs were not met on scene or over a long call shift, I can not connect as well with myself or others. When you stay in this state, never feeling safe or secure, long term issues arise.

If we’re willing to really look at the reasons we’ve come to believe cause our drinking, we might find out that some of those reasons are part of this process - our needs that aren’t being met in life, we now believe that alcohol is the answer to meeting those needs. We’ve fooled ourselves into thinking that if we drink, we might connect better with our work partners, friends, or families - this satisfies that need to be accepted. Maybe the belief that alcohol makes you more fun is a reason that you’ve been drinking? Meeting the ‘release and reset’ you so desire. It’s definitely worth exploring if we want to get to the root of the reason we drink. It’s difficult for some people to admit that they drink because certain needs aren’t being met, but this is important. It’s important to bring this topic into our conscious minds and shed light on it and explore. Doing this ultimately challenges us to swap out an unhealthy belief for a healthy one.

PS - Today’s ACT is titled Alcohol and Sadness and we’re going to become aware of the belief that alcohol is meeting your needs (whether it’s sadness, stress, etc). We’ll talk about how this belief was formed and in doing so, I will share some physiological facts about how blood alcohol content falls and rises, contributing to the formation of the belief that alcohol helps us fulfill a need. To begin to turn that belief around, we will discuss how alcohol doesn’t make me happy.....in fact, it makes me sad, and why would I want to purposely feel sad?