Raise a glass to your health
The health benefits of moderate consumption of alcoholic beverages make the news from time to time, to the consternation of habitual boycotters of "demon drink." A recent research report focused on the affects of drinking on stroke and scarring in the brains of the elderly. Light drinkers (one to six drinks per week) seem to be benefited by imbibing, while heavy drinkers show brain shrinkage, a sign of dementia. Researchers, as usual, wonder what is the active ingredient in alcohol that improves health.
In most studies of alcohol consumption and health, light to moderate drinking seems to be correlated with good health, while heavy drinking and no drinking at all are correlated with diminished health. Some who have no interest in drinking read this information as a prescription and take to downing a daily glass of wine like medicine while screwing up their faces in distaste.
For the student of mind-body health, the active ingredient in alcohol consumption is not to be found in the drink itself. It is in what drinking represents to the drinker and the beliefs held by those who inflexibly abstain, drink moderately, or drink to get drunk.
Moderation is generally assumed to predict a healthy and balanced approach to life. Moderate drinking can be an indicator of the balanced attitudes of someone who can apply self-medicating strategies with a light hand, avoiding health-sapping dependencies on external factors for escape from inner demons. However, moderate drinking may be more of an indication of the absence of harmful beliefs than it is of especially health-promoting attitudes.
If you don’t drink because alcoholic beverages do not appeal to you, your attitude about drinking is neutral. But modern day prohibitionists often avoid alcohol because of strong negative beliefs—seeing it as a sinful, demoralizing influence that promotes dangerous loss of control and violence. Such beliefs could reflect an overall tendency toward health-diminishing inflexible and negative attitudes that lead to chronic tension and stress.
Using alcohol to "drown your sorrows" also points to attitudes that don’t contribute to health. Rather than feeling comforted and calm in the presence of others, negative beliefs about self-worth, personal power, and belonging lead the heavy drinker to feel distressed. Instead of seeing a drink or two as a signal to relax, the heavy drinker uses anesthetizing doses of alcohol to mute negative attitudes that undoubtedly affect general health.
Scientific studies show that relaxation and social ties are associated with good health. Moderate drinking is commonly called "social drinking," referring to the convivial ritual of alcohol consumption at end of the day "happy hours" or during social gatherings. Having fun and sharing problems over drinks contribute to health-promoting intimate bonding, as well as relaxation. In addition, the ritual of having a drink in the evening, alone or with friends, marks the end of the concerns of the day, signaling mind and body to let go of cares. It’s not as high-toned as meditation or a 15-minute session of practicing the Relaxation Response, but it is a time-honored way to transition from tension to a state of calm.
Caught up in the assumption that the harm or benefits of alcohol consumption come solely from what is in the alcoholic beverage, scientists have not been able to notice that mind-body factors are the active ingredient they seek. Perhaps it will come to them after work someday as they relax over a few drinks.