Drugs, Sex, & Alcohol

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This entry is directed at those who feel little to no shame in using drugs, getting drunk, or having casual sex.

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First off, if you think that you own your body entirely– that what you do with it is your business and nobody else’s, then consider this:  You don’t live your life in a vacuum.  Odds are, that if you’re hurting yourself, you’re also hurting somebody else.

Self-destructive behavior isn’t confined to you alone; it affects those who care about you too.  Those who love you don’t want to see you waste your time and your money on temporary feel-good solutions to your boredom or low self-esteem or whatever other problems you have.  They want you to be happy without the drugs, without the drinking, and without the promiscuous sex.

Misery loves company.  At the very least, don’t drag others down with you.

Secondly, I don’t buy into the notion that I have to try the same things that you’ve tried in order to make a case against them.  “Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it.”  No.  That’s unnecessary.  The idea that I need to make a bad decision in order to know for sure that it’s a bad decision is ridiculous.

Is it better to try these things out and give reasons why not to do them or is it better not to try them at all and stand as a model for resisting temptation?  The jury is still out on that one, but there are complimentary things to be said of a person who works hard to fight off his youthful curiosity and does his best not to rebel against authority.

If you intend to be a parent (or you are a parent already), then you ought to know that one of your goals is to encourage your kids to avoid harmful behavior.  When you say to your child, “don’t do it”, that means “don’t try it” and “put it out of your mind”– it does not mean “try it and find out for yourself why it’s bad for you”.  Either you slipped at some point and you don’t want your kid to slip, or you didn’t slip and you want him/her to follow your example.  Your goal is either to break a bad streak or prevent it altogether.

I don’t see why it’s necessary to use trial-and-error to figure out that you don’t want to abuse your body or your mind.

I won’t do any kind of drug.  I’m not bored or unhappy with my life, so I have no reason to escape reality.  I don’t need to feel accepted or respected beyond the things I’ve accomplished, so peer pressure means nothing to me.  And let me tell you how much I don’t need things like anxiety attacks, high blood pressure, or irregular heart-beats.  You pot smokers think you’re having so much fun– but you’re probably making yourselves more depressed every time you smoke.  (Now you can’t say that I didn’t warn you.)

Then there’s alcohol.  Sure, alcohol is generally less dangerous than drugs like marijuana and cocaine, but if you drink to get drunk, you might as well put it in the same category:  addictive and life-threatening.  People get clumsy and stupid when they drink.  It’s very easy to say “I won’t drink and drive” when you’re completely sober, but it’s not so easy to say the same thing after you’ve downed a dozen beers.  And I don’t know about you, but I don’t need to be slurring my speech and groping at people of the opposite sex in order to have a good time.  I don’t need to worry about tripping over my own two feet on my way to the bathroom.  I don’t need to feel like I’m going to throw up.  And I certainly would like to have the option of being able to bring myself home without taking the chance of hurting myself or someone else.

     And I don’t want to see people around me acting like idiots either.  I’ve walked out of several parties where I’ve either seen people acting like fools or I’ve just not felt safe.

     When I’m in charge of a get-together, alcohol is the last thing on my mind.  I choose people, places, and activities such that I know my friends can enjoy themselves without needing some artificial “social lubricant” at the ready.  Now, if you happen to have a bottle of Mike’s-Hard-whatever nearby, then by all means, help yourself.  But if you’ve convinced yourself that you need something like that to loosen up–  think again.  Because you’re basically saying that who you are is not only what people see on a daily basis– instead, you’re actually you + the alcohol you require.  “I’m much more relaxed after I’ve had a few.”  Look– if you don’t work in the medical field or serve in the armed forces or perform some other type of genuinely high-stress job, you can probably learn to relax without adding some foreign substance to your body.  Just, get your mind off of whatever’s bothering you lately.  Listen to some music, watch a comedy movie– maybe take a bath.  Find a way to ease that tension without the booze.  Then bring that attitude with you when you go out.

And, last but not least, the casual sex.

Those of you who are fond of “hooking up” are just shooting yourselves in the foot emotionally.  Men–  If you don’t have to put much effort into ‘getting it’, then you’re really never going to learn what it takes to please a woman over the long-term.  And why would you want to be a husband when you can get the sex way before that point?  Women– If you’re letting the guy get so far so fast, then you won’t know what to expect from him afterwards.  You’ll get emotionally involved but you’ll have no control over the relationship.

     It’s hard for me to understand how some people think they can separate love from sex.  It just doesn’t work that way.  Going through a series of “hook ups” means repetitively becoming attached to someone and then ripping yourself apart from that person.  That will wear on you over time.  Personally, I don’t want to become jaded like that– I’d still like to enjoy sex by the time I get married.

Another thing–  Many of you talk about “moderation”.  You like to spend Friday and/or Saturday night getting wasted and then you lock the alcohol away during the week; you spend 1 or 2 nights in an alcoholic haze and 5 or 6 days sober and you call that “moderation”.  Well it isn’t.  Open a dictionary and look the word up.  Moderation means staying consistently middle-of-the-road at all times– not flying between extremes.  Getting high is an extreme.  Getting drunk is an extreme.  Having sex with somebody who isn’t your steady girlfriend/boyfriend/spouse is an extreme.  So stop using “moderation” as an excuse because people like me simply don’t buy it.

     If you usually drive 55 mph home from work, but on Fridays you do 90, you’re not a safe driver.  If you live alone in a city and you’re back home by midnight most of the time, but on Saturday nights you walk home from the bar at 3 AM, your personal curfew is not a responsible one.  If “every once in a while” you act with piss-poor judgment, you really don’t have much self-control.

     Let’s keep some perspective here–  We spend most of our time not confronting decisions about doing those types of things.  Every so often, though, an opportunity to do something stupid is presented to us.  It’s making the right decision at those times that allows us to say that we “usually don’t do that”.  It’s our track record of the decisions we make when we’re tempted that counts.

Now, I can see that — if you’re bored — doing something stupid provides a thrill.  But if your life is, in fact, so mundane that you need drugs, alcohol, or sex to make things interesting, let me remind you that there’s a lot more to try out there.  Why don’t you try reading a book– maybe a comic book or a fantasy novel.  Or why don’t you try learning a new game– maybe a sport you didn’t like as a kid.  Or how about you try writing a journal– not necessarily a diary; you could just put together a collection of your favorite memories.  Or maybe try making a gift for somebody you love for the next special occasion, instead of waiting until the day before to go shopping.  Whatever the case, don’t just sit around wallowing in self-pity and turning your miserable mental state into an ugly physical condition.  I don’t want to see you like that, and neither do your friends.

And for those of you who just rolled your eyes at my last paragraph–

Some people might ascribe a measure of respect to a person who tries marijuana — or maybe something a bit more potent, like ecstasy — and lives to tell the tale.  I don’t.  Some people might think they’re hot-shots for being able to pound down a dozen shots in a row.  Whoop de doo– I don’t care.  Some people might think that — just because they’ve already had sex with half the town — that everybody wants them.  Well, not me.

You want respect?  Prove that you don’t need to occasionally gamble with your health and still be happy with who you are.  You want to impress people?  Accomplish something other than winning beer pong.  Go for your master’s degree, your teaching certification, your vet tech license, your nursing license.  Don’t just pass your classes, glide through the system, and grab the first dull 9-to-5 job that comes along– Do something noteworthy, something that will make you feel good about yourself for more than just an hour or two.

You want to take a risk?  Move to a new town.  Start a new job.  If you’re unhappy where you are or you simply feel no new thrills, then shake things up.  Risk losing whatever cozy (boring) situation you have now in order to find something better.  That’s a lot more gutsy than drinking yourself to the edge of sickness.  It won’t kill you, and at least you’ll have a story to tell which doesn’t start with “well, last night we were so drunk…”

All those stories are the same to me.  So tell me a new one.