No New Year’s Resolution ever got me sober.

“Drink less.”

I wrote this on my list of new year’s resolutions for about 5 years running.

But by 5pm, I’d already forgotten it.

And having started drinking, I figured the hell with it. I’ve already broken my resolution so let’s go!

If “drink less” or “stop drinking” or “try Dry January” appear on your list of resolutions for 2022, try these 5 decisions instead.

A decision is a different animal than a resolution. If you make a resolution, “you decide to try very hard to do something.” (Collins) When you make a decision, you “choose what should be done or which is the best of various possible actions.” (Collins)

“Do. Or do not. There is no try.” (Yoda)

1. I decided to not drink. For the next 24 hours.

I worried about what I would do at my wedding. (And I wasn’t even dating anyone.)

I worried what I would say when someone demanded an explanation for why I wasn’t boozing.

I didn’t know how I would fly without a drink.

But none of that was happening the first day I decided to not drink.

Sometimes I have to decide to not drink for an even shorter period of time. For the next 5 minutes. Until we get to the next stoplight. For this breath.

2. I committed 100% to not drinking (for 24 hours, see above).

It’s easier to commit 100% to something than to commit to 98%. Why?

Because once you commit 100%, you don’t have to think about it anymore.

If I commit to drinking “less,” I don’t quite know what constitutes less. Is it 4 glasses of wine instead of a bottle? Is it drinking on Saturdays but not Fridays?

Each of us makes 30,000 decisions a day. From when to take the tea bag out of my cup to what shoes to wear. We decide a lot. And our decider gets tired and a bit sloppy after decision 23,461.

A fatigued decider makes shitty decisions.

It’s easier to pour a glass of wine at the end of the day than to judge whether or not this is an okay time to drink or not.

Can you make a 100% commitment to not drink for the next 24 hours?

3. I decided to spend time around other alcohol-free people.

A study in 2007 published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that our close friends influence who we are and how we behave. In fact, having a close friend who is obese increases the likelihood of you being obese by 171%.

Structural coupling is a term in philosophy defined as “the process by which several organisms establish working synergies after they have developed habits that correspond to the other’s behavior.”

Much more simply put, we become like the people we are close to.

In order to start being alcohol-free, I decided to spend time around alcohol-free people. I could not begin to imagine what they did for fun. Or how they dealt with stress.

(News flash! Most people don’t get shit-faced at weddings. Shocking, right?)

To my amazement, they were fun and funny. We went dancing. We ate ice cream. Saw movies. Went horseback riding. Played games.

All without the remorse of trying to remember how I’d pissed everybody off the night before.

4. I decided to start acting like my Ideal Future Self.

I always had a vision of a successful future. And I had the sinking sensation that my life was not on the “successful future” track.

I knew something was wrong, and I knew I drank a lot. But I didn’t put the two together. Until I did this thought experiment.

I envisioned what my Ideal Self would be doing three years out. What work was I doing? What had I accomplished that made me feel great about the progress I’d made? What were my relationships like — romantic, with my kids, with my mom and dad, with friends? Where did that ideal self live? What did that ideal future self wear? What did her hair look like?

Then I imagined (and wrote down), how that woman I envisioned took care of herself. What she ate. How she exercised. What she drank.

Last, I wrote down how she must feel (e.g., grateful, humbled, awash in love) and what she must believe.

I picked which belief or behavior was the lynchpin to all the rest, and I decided (and made a 100% commitment) to put that one into action every day for the next 30 days.

Obviously, being hungover 50% of the time was NOT part of that future ideal self.

5. I decided to practice one spiritual principle a week in all areas of my life.

I was inspired by Benjamin Franklin’s practice of one “virtue” every week. He first listed 12 of them and sent them to a friend for feedback. The friend shrewdly suggested adding “humility” to the list ;) for a total of 13.

Since there are 13 weeks in a quarter, Benjamin Franklin practiced one virtue a week for 13 weeks. Then he would start at the beginning of his list of virtues and repeat.

He created a pocket calendar on which he would make marks indicating if he’d been successful in remembering to act in accordance of that week’s principle. And that was the genesis of the Franklin planner. But I digress.

I loved this idea so much that I started implementing it.

I have a list of 72 spiritual principles. And 15 ways to practice each of them.

But for now, let’s say this week I’m focused on amusement. (Currently my favorite spiritual principle.)

Instead of reacting with a need to control my daughter’s ongoing health issues, I decide to laugh at the absurdity of having three doctors, each of whom contradicts the others.

When a boarder cuts me off on the ski slope, I decide to be lighthearted and instead of swearing at him, I make a motion to usher him ahead.

When it’s time to clean up the kitchen, I turn on the music and dance while I work.

Lightheartedness allows me to not take absolutely every single think I think or feel so damn seriously.

Anne Lamott says that laughter is “carbonated holiness.” And I know she’s right.

What decision are you going to make — to commit to 100% — for the next 24 hours?

If you identify with my story, congratulations! You probably have a drinking problem. Experiment with being AF for a week. Sign up for my FREE 7-Day Stop the Spiral Challenge.