Meghann, this is an EXCELLENT question, and I’m a bit ashamed that I did not address this in the piece (definitely a future topic to discuss).

The new true joy that I experience now is the joy of getting excited about the “little” things in life.

It almost feels like I was when I was a kid in which there was no need for alcohol of any kind to have a good time and be excited about an event.

Now, the events that excite me are more focused on true experiences (plays, museum visits, traveling, hiking with my wife) rather than doing the same thing over and over (drinking at some bar and then ordering Uber Eats later).

The true nourishing joy comes from me pushing myself to experience a variety of different things to reclaim that novel feeling I had when I was younger and everything was so new.

Back then, many times, I was actually experiencing many things for the very FIRST time.

Without alcohol dulling my senses and handicapping my natural dopamine creation through its artificial manipulation, I’m now able to have those types of feelings again…something I wouldn’t trade for the world.