Does going alcohol-free over the Holidays sound impossible?

We spoke to the world’s premiere Party Coach to find out how get alcohol-free glee

The Holidays: The calendar event of the year for families and friends to come together to celebrate, relax after a long year, and for many…drink.

Drinking has become so synonymous with ‘winding down’, partying, celebrating and ‘the Holidays’, it’s probably hard to imagine the silly season without it. I mean, can you actually still have fun without it?

We sat down with the world’s first Party Coach, Evan Cudworth, to ask all of your burning questions around how to tackle the Holidays, alcohol-free. And spoiler alert: Can you still have fun? The answer is a resounding yes.

The Christmas/New Year break can be a really challenging time whether you’re trying to cut-back or you’ve quit drinking altogether — what are your top tips for staying motivated when you’re tested the most?

During the Holiday season, it’s really important to stay connected with the friends and family who lift your spirits most, and who will enjoy sharing a non-alcoholic beverage, or alcohol-free activities with you.

We often associate this time of year with ‘joy’ and ‘treating ourselves’. So it can be really beneficial to rethink the way you view ‘rewards’ and ‘joy’, and what you associate those ideas with. Booze and beer and wine aren’t the only things that can make us feel cosy and comfortable. Joy can actually be really simple: a cozy blanket; laughing with family and friends; or a cup of hot chocolate. So my advice is to really think about other ways you achieve those feelings and be more intentional about pursuing them — instead of just passively consuming what’s around you.It can be talking to friends about the highlights and lowlights of the year, and simply laughing and connecting over the unpredictable and amazing things that happen to us over the year.

It can mean doing a similar exercise with your family: getting people together and doing something joyful — perhaps it doesn’t involve drinking, but involves celebrating each other.

Whatever it is…make it authentic and you will feel true joy in celebrating this time of year together — without the booze and lingering hangovers.

You’ve navigated all sorts of party situations sober (not just the Holidays) — from raves to festivals and everything in between — what were some of the biggest fears you had to overcome and what were the most surprising gains you experienced?

In the Holiday season, one of my biggest fears was giving up drinking and how it may separate me from my favourite memories. At age 20, I hosted a Christmas Power Hour: where we created a playlist and when one minute of each song plays, we drank a shot of beer. We would play rounds of 10 minutes, and at the end of each round we would take a shot of fireball or whiskey — to our favourite Christmas jingles.

In College this was super fun, and it also became a way where all my friends would get together. When I moved to New York and then LA, this was still a way that my friends and I got to celebrate the Holidays together.

I used to fear that if I stopped drinking, I wouldn’t have this tradition anymore. But luckily I was wrong, and since then, I’ve developed new rituals and traditions that I share with my friends and family.

Now, I host an open mic night where we play Christmas carols, and I play my cello and my next door neighbour plays piano and violinists come over and people come and sing carols.

And the best part is, I now remember more of it and have a lot more fun. Some people who come still drink, and that is okay because we’re still enjoying each other’s company and it’s a safe space to get silly and be creative — and that’s the true magic of those moments. Connection, joy and company — not shots.

Is it possible to break-free from alcohol-fueled fun, even if you’ve been doing it for so long, and it’s sort of become a ‘Holiday tradition’?

I think a lot of times we think about alcohol as a sense of freedom and as a reward.

There’s this idea that the Holidays are like freedom from whatever else the rest of our life looks like. What helped me break free, was flipping the script a little bit by thinking about what kinds of freedom you’ve been missing out on.

And that can be a huge source of motivation for you to be like “Yo, what if this is the Holiday that I break free from the thing that’s been holding me back?”.

For me, it so happened that every time I started to become successful, I would want to go celebrate with alcohol, and then that celebration would set me back. I would lose the progress I made in the gym, I would lose the joy that I had experienced with my family, I would lose the progress that I was making in my career.

So if we flip the script and think about what really is freedom for you?, you can redefine yourself and remove what’s holding you back. The answer is often more powerful than you think.

The festive season also brings a lot of socializing, parties and events — how would you prepare for these, and what would you be mindful of, if it’s your first time cutting-back or going sober?

Use a practice of setting intentions: What feelings were you chasing before cutting back? What did you want to get out of celebrations? Write a couple of those things down. Were you looking for an escape? Were you looking for a connection? Were you looking for comfort?

Figure out what those things are, and then plan in advance. How are you going to feel those feelings without using alcohol? And once you’re sure that you’re going to get some of those feelings in the Holiday season, then take a step back and assess. How am I going to get joy out of these places and be prepared? Instead of thinking about it as saying “no” to things, think about where you’re saying “yes” to. Saying “yes” to feeling those feelings in ways that are going to support you (and knowing that there’s going to be some discomfort in this).

Don’t be hard on yourself — there might be some sadness, there might be some anxiety, but know that you can get these feelings of comfort and joy and escape, in so many other ways. They’re just sitting there waiting for you to explore them.

What are your top go-to alternatives to alcoholic drinks at parties?

I’m pretty basic. I really like Bang energy drinks, Sugar-free Red Bull if I’m going out. But for more holiday stuff, I always really like non-alcoholic ciders, and I make a mulled cider with apple cider, oranges, cloves, and cinnamon. And then for people that want to drink, they can add liquor to it, but it tastes really good on its own, and is a crowd-pleaser no matter what.

If you want a non-alcoholic beer, there’s a lot of really good stuff. Like most things out there, you just have to try things out and see what works for you. But the important thing to remember is, you have options. Many, many options.

You’re now leading a more soberful life, how have your celebrations over the Holidays changed?

My family actually are not very big drinkers. But I noticed that my own behaviour around the Holidays was that even if I wasn’t drinking with my family, I still wanted to go out and drink with my friends. I would be going out and I would just be out all the time with them. And then by the time I got back to be with my family, I was either too hungover or I just wasn’t able to be fully present. I was grumpier. From a human connection standpoint, not having the blurry fuzz over my eyes and my heart allows me to listen better, to not get agitated or annoyed at things. I now just enjoy, listen to and meet my family where they’re at — and that is one of the best gifts of stopping drinking. You get to become a person who is happy to be present. It’s not all the time and I’m not perfect at it — and I’m still very, very much working at being better in those areas — but that’s a true gift.

If you were share one piece of advice to people reading who might be thinking about cutting back or quitting alcohol these Holidays, what would you say?

There’s a reason why you’re interested in changing your relationship to alcohol. And if you are wanting to wait until after Christmas or the Holidays “I’ll change or then I’ll shift”, just don’t wait. People who have stopped drinking often say “When I was drinking, my life felt like a merry-go-round, and when it stopped, it felt like a rollercoaster”.

I noticed that I always had another excuse, I wanted one more round on the merry-go-round. But actually, I was getting the same thing every time. And every time I wanted to celebrate a Christmas or a birthday or whatever it was, I wanted to hold onto alcohol a little bit longer, and I was still on the same merry-go-round.

This is your chance now, to hop off that merry-go-round and get on the rollercoaster. You’ll get to experience some bigger ups, but that is only going to be available to you if you are willing to step off that merry-go-round and start heading to new places. I’ve been there, so I know for sure that joy is possible if you stop letting the merry-go-round rule your life.

To learn more about how to party and find more alcohol-free joy, you can listen to Evan’s Courses on the Lived app here.

Lived is an app that supports people to quit, cut-back, or explore their relationship with alcohol, by learning from people who have been there and done it (and know what actually works).