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Quick Sobriety Tip #1: Play the Tape Through

Advice for making it through “Dry January” and beyond.

Benya Clark
Exploring Sobriety
1 min readJan 1, 2025

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Photo by Seth Doyle on Unsplash

When I first got sober, there was always a voice in the back of my head saying: “Just take one drink.”

The most effective strategy that I ever learned for resisting these cravings was to “play the tape through.” This means that whenever I felt the urge to drink alcohol, I’d force myself to imagine what would happen next.

I visualized how “one drink” would lead straight into another, and then another. I thought about how I would lose control and end up having to start my recovery all over again.

“Playing the tape” is a simple strategy, but it saved my neck more times than I can count. When we’re honest with ourselves about the severity of our addictions, it becomes far easier to resist our cravings.

This is the first in a series of quick sobriety tips that I’ll be posting throughout January. The goal is to help people who have quit drinking by providing easy, actionable advice. If you’d like to read more about addiction and recovery, check out my recently published collection of 50 sobriety essays. Thanks for reading, and good luck with your sobriety!

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Benya Clark
Benya Clark

Written by Benya Clark

I’m a lawyer turned writer from North Carolina. I write about sobriety, mental health, and more. Subscribe to my weekly newsletter at exploringsobriety.com.

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