Dr. Aziz reflects on holiday social norms around drinking and drug use from a personal anecdote (a cold Christmas jog in Oregon). He recounts his own past reliance on alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs to ease social anxiety, describes the negative mental/emotional aftereffects (self-criticism, rumination), and challenges viewers to consider whether they want to rely on substances. He frames confidence as a muscle that can be built through study, practice, discipline, and support, and issues a new-year call-to-action to develop better tools for social ease and performance. He also invites viewers to join his Facebook group ("Confidence warriors").
Chapters
Hey, happy holidays. Let's talk about you, the holidays, Confidence, drugs, alcohol, the new year, and some other good stuff. So on Christmas day in the afternoon, I went for a little jog with my sweetheart Candice. And you know, it was a cold day. It was like in the 30s, a little rainy, kind of gray, kind of like this right now. Welcome to Oregon. And as we were jogging, it was about maybe 4pm or so, and we must have passed like four or five different houses where someone was arriving as a guest to go to that house. You know, it's not, of course, right, Christmas Eve, people are gathering and having meals and stuff. Of those four or five, every single one I saw was holding multiple forms of alcohol. Beers. One woman, like, I saw her walk to the house once with beers. And then she like also came back and got like this big bottle of vodka and ice and, you know, partying, right? Christmas, what are you gonna do? You gotta drink. What do you do for New Year's? Well, you gotta drink and maybe you gotta smoke and you gotta maybe take other stuff too. And I get it. I did a lot of that. For a good chunk of my life, I would drink and smoke pot and take different drugs. And I don't categorically say that's, oh, that's so bad or wrong. It's more just like what works for you and what's working. And I think a lot of stuff we do, we just kind of go along with the flow and we're like, okay, I guess this is what you do. Or we're kind of feeling bad. For me, I felt anxious. I mean, going to a big gathering with a lot of people, alcohol, please give me some comfort, give me some liquid courage, right? And that was especially true when I was younger. And then as I got older and started to develop more confidence, I still did it because I wanted to feel really good. But how good do you feel the next day? I certainly didn't feel very good the next day. And I don't mean just physically, I mean mentally and emotionally. I would feel bad, like even after a small amount of alcohol, let alone a lot. I would have this like intense inner criticism and negativity and pessimism and self judgment and then ruminating about what I did or said or the night before, even if it wasn't that bad, even if I wasn't like, you know, naked groping people. I was just talking a lot. Maybe I shared something, maybe I said something, maybe someone didn't like what I did. You know, I wasn't in total control. Maybe I wasn't. Was I keeping my front up? Did I have a good Persona on? Was I cool enough? You know, so more socially? So I said, I feel bad afterwards. I don't know what your experience is. That's just something to ask yourself, something to look at. And you can't change anything. Maybe from last week or yesterday, but what about moving forward? You know, we're at a powerful time right now, which is the beginning of a new year. What do you want? How do you want to feel? How do you want to live? Do you want to be able to walk into a party or walk into a group situation and feel totally confident in your own skin without alcohol or drugs? Do you want to be able to feel? I talk to so many people who are uncomfortable dating if they're not drinking or uncomfortable having sex with someone for the first time if they're not drinking, or uncomfortable interacting with people in a group setting if they're not drinking. Like, is there a better strategy? Do you want a better. We all know there's a better strategy, but do you want to use a better strategy? Do you want to have a better strategy, a better toolkit accessible in this new year? And what are you willing to do to create that? Are you willing to study? Are you willing to practice? Are you willing to build those muscles of confidence? Because remember, confidence is a muscle and you can build it. And I'll be sharing a lot more videos in the new year about how you can build it, specifically what we can do together to make 2021 the best year of your life. And that's not going to be due to circumstance. That's not going to be because one government does one thing or the economy does something or something else. That's not going to make the best year of your life next year. What's going to make the best year of your life is you stepping up and you deciding, I'm going to get better tools. I'm going to create the life that I want. How do I want to show up? How do I want to feel? How do I want to be at work, in a meeting? How do I want to feel on dates? How do I want to feel with my relationships? How do I want to feel when I'm giving a presentation or if I'm even giving presentations and stepping up to that challenge in my life and my career? How do I want to feel? How do I want to feel when I'm putting my music out there or my book out there or my videos out there or my heart out there? How do I want to. How do I want to show up this year? You decide that, and then you follow up. With courage, with discipline, with grit, with support, with guidance, with grace, with everything you got. With confidence, which comes from the Latin confidere, with faith. Faith in what? Originally, it actually meant faith in something divine, faith in something bigger. So whatever it is, whatever that source is for you, let's build it, and let's build it together. So thank you so much for being with me this year. What a gift to be with you, to be in this community. If you're not part of my Facebook group, Confidence warriors, go there. Just go to Facebook, type in Confidence warriors. You can get join group and we'll approve you, assuming you pass our rigid criteria to be in our club. But I would love to see you in there, and I look forward to hearing about what you're going to do with 2021. Until we speak again. May have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome.
