Journey to the Sunnyside

You’re drinking less. You feel like you’ve turned a corner. And then one night something happens… you have more than you planned, or the old routine sneaks back in. The next morning a thought appears: “I thought I was past this.” In this episode, Mike explains why that moment is actually a normal part of behavior change. Drawing from neuroscience and habit research, he breaks down why progress with alcohol rarely happens in a straight line—and why those waves of challenge don’t mean you’re starting over. Understanding what’s really happening in the brain can help you move forward with more clarity, confidence, and self-trust.

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Disclaimer: This podcast is not intended as medical advice, and the views of the guests may not represent the views of Sunnyside. If you’re concerned about your health or alcohol use, please consider seeking advice from a doctor.

Creators and Guests

Host
Mike Hardenbrook
#1 best-selling author of "No Willpower Required," neuroscience enthusiast, and habit change expert.

What is Journey to the Sunnyside?

Journey to the Sunnyside is a top 1% podcast, reaching over 500,000 listeners every week. It’s your guide to exploring mindful living with alcohol—whether you're cutting back, moderating, or thinking about quitting.

While Sunnyside helps you reduce your drinking, this podcast goes further, diving into topics like mindful drinking, sober curiosity, moderation, and full sobriety. Through real stories, expert insights, and science-backed strategies, we help you find what actually works for your journey.

Hosted by Mike Hardenbrook, a #1 best-selling author and neuroscience enthusiast, the show is dedicated to helping people transform their relationship with alcohol—without shame, judgment, or rigid rules.

This podcast is brought to you by Sunnyside, the leading platform for mindful drinking. Want to take the next step in your journey? Head over to sunnyside.co for a free 15-day trial.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in our episodes do not necessarily represent those of Sunnyside. We’re committed to sharing diverse perspectives on health and wellness. If you’re concerned about your drinking, please consult a medical professional. Sunnyside, this podcast, and its guests are not necessarily medical providers and the content is not medical advice. We do not endorse drinking in any amount.

Speaker 1:

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another one of these ten minute Mondays. Today, I wanna talk about a moment that surprises almost everyone who's starting to change their drinking, and it usually doesn't happen that first week. I'm talking about something that happens later when things are actually starting to go well. Let's say you're drinking less than you used to.

Speaker 1:

Maybe you're taking more alcohol free days. Maybe you're deciding to stop completely and you're feeling clear. You're feeling great, better than maybe you have in a few years. Things like your sleep is better, your mornings feel better, you're proud of yourself, your mood is good. And pretty much for a while, it feels like you have turned a corner.

Speaker 1:

And then one night, something happens. Maybe you had more than you planned. Maybe you drank on a night that you planned to have dry. Or maybe kind of that old routine sneaks back in on one given night. And then the next morning, a thought shows up.

Speaker 1:

I thought I was past this. That moment confuses a lot of people. And honestly, this is one that I'm sharing a little from the heart because it is something that really got to me during my own journey. And I remember thinking that exact sentence and more than once. So today I want to explain what's actually happening in the brain when this shows up.

Speaker 1:

Because understanding it, it can help to prevent that moment from turning into discouragement. Because when we decide to change a habit, we tend to imagine progress being this straight line that it's totally linear. It's hard at first, then it gets easier, then eventually, hey, we're pretty much done with it. But here's the thing: the research in behavior change shows something very different. Progress almost never moves in this straight line.

Speaker 1:

It moves in waves. It moves in peaks and valleys. And there's a model in psychology called the transtheoretical model of behavior change. It's often referred to as the stages of change model. And one of the most important things is that it shows people don't move through change all at once They cycle through it.

Speaker 1:

Someone might move from thinking about change to preparing for change to taking action and then maintaining the new behavior. But over time, people revisit earlier stages, they reconsider, they reevaluate, and they adjust. The model doesn't just describe change as climbing a ladder, it describes change as moving through a loop. Which means when the old challenges appear again, it doesn't mean the process failed. It means that the brain is still learning.

Speaker 1:

And neuroscience research has shown that habits become encoded in deep brain circuits involved in automatic behavior. And those circuits, they don't disappear when we change. They actually remain stored. What changes is which circuit has influence in that moment. So think of it as this old road.

Speaker 1:

Even if you start taking a new route every single day, that old road, it doesn't vanish. You're just not driving it as often. And over time, that new route, it becomes the one that you naturally take. But every now and then, especially under certain circumstances, that old road starts to look familiar. That's what people experience when those surprising moments show up later in the process.

Speaker 1:

It's not a sign of failure. It's just the brain remembering a path traveled many, many times before. Now there's another concept in learning science that helps to explain this as well. It's called extinction learning. So when behavior weakens, the brain doesn't delete the old memory instead, it builds new learning that overrides it.

Speaker 1:

And because of that, researchers often observe something called spontaneous recovery. And this is a behavior that appears to have gone, but then briefly reappears and then it fades again. This happens with habits, with fears, with routines, with cravings, all kinds of learned behavior. The brain, it just it doesn't flip switches. It updates patterns and updating patterns, sometimes it takes repetition over time.

Speaker 1:

Now this all can show up differently depending on what somebody's goal is. So for people cutting back, the early challenges is usually structure. Planning ahead, tracking for drinks, deciding which nights to drink and which nights to skip. And in the beginning, that takes a lot of attention. But after a while, something interesting happens.

Speaker 1:

Those decisions start becoming easier and the new pattern starts to feel more normal. And then something throws you off. Maybe it's a stressful week. Maybe you're traveling. Maybe a friend's in town.

Speaker 1:

Maybe you're at a social event that used to revolve around drinking in a specific way. And then suddenly, you've had more than you planned. And the next morning that thought appears again. I thought I figured this out. But what's actually happening is that you're interacting with that habit from a different stage.

Speaker 1:

The positive, you're noticing it sooner, you're aware of it faster, and you have more options than you did before. Now for people who decided to stop drinking completely, it's still a similar pattern. After some time passes, the brain sometimes starts remembering selectively. It remembers the ritual. It remembers the familiarity.

Speaker 1:

It remembers the environment. And, of course, it remembers the good times and overlooks the bad times. But whatever it is, it never replays the full picture. And when that thought shows up, people sometimes interpret it as a sign that something's wrong. But again, it's not the brain resetting.

Speaker 1:

It's not a setback either. It's the brain revisiting an old memory. And memories, they don't control behavior. Attention does, awareness does, and ultimately choice and action does. There's also a psychological piece here.

Speaker 1:

Our identity often lags behind our behavior. So you might already be drinking less, or maybe you're not even drinking at all, and it could be for months, but part of the brain is still running that old story about who you are. It still expects the same old routines. So when a surprising thought appears, it can feel like something's wrong. There's a problem or maybe a glitch.

Speaker 1:

But it's not really a glitch. It's the brain slowly updating this model of you and that update, it usually takes longer than the behavior change itself. Which means those moments of friction later in the process, they're not setbacks. They're just the brain catching up. And every time you move through one of those moments and then choose differently, you're reinforcing more than the behavior.

Speaker 1:

You're telling the brain, this is who I am and this is how I behave now. And over time, something interesting starts to happen. The thoughts might start to appear occasionally, but they pass quickly. They don't take over the evening. They don't drive the decision.

Speaker 1:

They're just kind of these signals that pop up in the brain and you recognize that it's just the brain producing these. They aren't the commands that are telling you, this is what I have to do. It's just, Oh, there it is again. See you later. So if you're early in the process and things feel difficult right now, of course, that's normal.

Speaker 1:

You're interrupting patterns that the brain repeated many, many, many times. And that takes attention. But I'm here to tell you, it gets easier. And on the other side, if you've been working at this for a while, it was going really good, and then something like this happens again, that's also normal too. The brain stores patterns.

Speaker 1:

It doesn't delete them, but you can learn new ones. And here's the best part. Every time that you move through one of those waves, those peaks and valleys, the new pattern, the new behavior gets stronger. So remember, progress is not linear. Success is not linear.

Speaker 1:

You know, think of a graphic, think of highs and lows. Progress moves in waves, peaks and valleys. But every single wave teaches your brain something. And over time, those lessons begin to shape which version of you shows up most often. Okay.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for hanging out with me today. If you got anything out of this episode, please rate and review wherever you're listening. Of course, send me an email, mike@sunnyside.co. Love to hear from you. And until next time, cheers to your mindful drinking journey.