1.Increased energy

The days of feeling hungover are gone. The days of throwing poisonous alcohol through your system – blocking essential nutrients, opting for the unhealthier choices of foods – all of this poor fuelling of your system will do nothing for your energy levels.

After all, once you have burnt out any excess energy, where are you going to get that burst of life from? Remove alcohol, and start soaking up all of your vitamins and you will see a dramatic increase in your overall functioning as a human being.
Throw into the mix, when you are drinking there is a good chance that you are not getting the right amount of exercise. Or even getting a decent amount of healthy sleep – this will all burn out all of your energy storage.

Once you start sleeping and exercising again, your energy will increase ten-fold!
By choosing to live a teetotal lifestyle, you will reap the benefits with greater energy and a stronger zest for life.

2.Improved sex life

There is the school of thought that alcohol ‘puts you in the mood’ for sex’, and yes alcohol does reduce inhibitions and often get involved in sexual activities that might not have happened if alcohol was not involved.
But drinking to excess in the long term can cause issues for men and women when it comes to sex. I am sure we have heard of ‘brewer’s droop’ – the inability for a man to get or keep an erection, and the struggle to orgasm can happen with women who choose to drink to excess over a long period of time.
Reducing alcohol intake benefits your sex life. You will be more alert, comfortable with your partner and it simply becomes more enjoyable.
Try it, you will not regret it!

3. Feeling mentally more alert

Anyone who has consumed alcohol will be aware of the hangovers and muggy feelings that come with drinking. Live a teetotalism life – and those days are gone. Apart from the fact that you won’t be feeling drunk and all the confusion that can come with that, the morning after the night before will be a lot more clearer.

When I was a drinker, it was not uncommon for me to have forgotten nights or even days where I could not remember details of events. I remember (or rather I don’t remember!) that it was quite common for me to lose my memory, total blackouts of where I had been or what I had done. Scary stuff!! That is one benefit of being teetotal that I really appreciate, and always will.

3. Becoming teetotal will give you more money.

Alcohol expenses have increased year on year, so that alone makes the price of an alcoholic drink expensive. But it isn’t just the price of the individual drink. When people drink, they might consume 4-8-10 or even more drinks. This is far more than a non-drinker would actually purchase. We don’t get THAT thirsty when we are abstaining from drinking alcohol.

Personally, I did not see the financial benefit at first. This took time. I think this could be maybe because I compensated by spending more money on other things like food and bits to treat myself – I used spending to help occupy my time in the earlier days of quitting booze and keep my mind busy. But I could not do this forever – there are only so many things that you need!

Eventually, the money WILL pile up somewhere if you are not spending it on alcohol. Being financially better off is a benefit of stopping drinking that hits you right in the bank balance!.

It is not just the fact that you would have more money – but also how that impacts on your life in general. More money means that you can do more things – the benefits of being teetotal – the improvement of your quality of life really is mind-blowing.

Initially, I did notice bits of money around me whereas previously I had been living hand-to-mouth for many years. Nowadays, I actually have money in the bank! This might be a strange concept to some, but to others I am sure you will be able to relate to simply not having money.

I am not saying that I am rich by any stretch of the imagination, but I can comfortably go shopping and simply buy food that we need without the added worry of throwing a load more money on top of the bill with a load of beer or wine.

4. Maintain a healthier weight

Alcohol is full of ’empty calories’, and if you are trying to lose weight then this is definitely one of the major benefits of being teetotal.

Cutting down or even cutting alcohol out of your life will have positive impacts on your body’s own weight regulation, and it is very common to lose weight when quitting alcohol. We have written a separate post about this here as it is often a reason why people decide to become teetotal.

As mentioned earlier also, we are much more inclined to exercise more regularly and our body won’t be getting hammered by the poison that is alcohol.

As we continue along our sober timeline, our bodies will naturally become fitter, stronger and healthier due to a good diet, sleep and all of the ‘right’ things that we are doing to our body and mind.

5. A teetotaler has younger looks and a healthier complexion.

Alcohol is physically a strong toxic fluid to put through your body – and anyone who drinks alcoholic beverages to excess will show long-term effects. Think ‘drinker’s nose’, or reddening and blotchiness of skin – just two of the side effects of drinking. An absolute benefit of being teetotal will be present in your looks

Alcohol dehydrates your skin and also stops essential nutrients that maintain and heal your body from daily life.
Becoming teetotal will leave you looking healthier, younger and well-rested. Prepare yourself for compliments of how well you look!

As a person who hammered drinking more than anyone I personally knew, I cannot believe the benefits that stopping drinking has brought with it.

When we are contemplating our drinking levels, a great motivator is to consider the actual benefits of stopping drinking alcohol – if we did manage to knock the booze on the head – what will we actually get out of it. Quite a lot, actually.

6. A nicer night’s sleep

Sleep is a thing that you take for granted as a child, and as you go along your drinking career it dissolves into a mess of drink-induced dozing and dragging yourself up for the next day ahead of you. When you quit drinking, sleep comes back like one of life’s true gifts.

Once you stop drinking, one of the first things you will notice is how much more energy you have. It is a lovely feeling.

Drinking one bottle of wine per week equates to around 27,000kcal per year – around 50 Big Macs! Make no mistake, alcohol is heavy in calories and quitting alcohol is one of the best ways to lose weight and control calorie intake.

7. Your mood state will improve

There is a known link between alcohol, depression, self-harm and even suicide. Alcohol is a very addictive substance that affects both the physical body and the mind. One of the benefits of stopping drinking – within weeks of stopping you will notice a marked improvement in your mental sharpness. You will think clearer and be more aware of your day-to-day ‘self’. By living a teetotal lifestyle, you will make decisions and feel more positive in your choices.

Your mood state improves as you go along your own alcohol timeline. Waking up fresher will impact on your overall day. Your mornings will seem brighter and overall you will face your day with more gusto than the hungover version of you.

Ok this is simply a case of basic mathematics. Work out how much money you spend on alcohol per week or per day. Work out how much that equates to per month, then per year. It all adds up. Quitting alcohol can be a lucrative hobby indeed!

8. Generally you will look better – my most enjoyable benefits of stopping drinking

When you become sober, your skin will be more hydrated, you will look and feel more rested from all of that beauty sleep and you will have more energy, and weight loss as already mentioned. What does all of this add up to? A much fitter and healthier version of you – that is what!

Quitting alcohol, you will notice people around you telling you that you look really well, passing positive comments on your appearance. This will happen A LOT when you stop drinking alcohol. Personally, this is something that I will never tire of hearing

9. You will gain more self-esteem.

This will happen. For me, it happened without me really noticing that it happened…if that makes sense? Quitting alcohol changed my life, bit by bit, but it all added up. I started looking healthier because I had lost a bit of weight. I started dressing smarter because I felt better in my clothes and also quitting alcohol gave me a bit more energy and motivation to be bothered with my appearance.

People commented on it, again it was these bits of changes that turned into bigger ‘bits’ as I went through my journey to free myself of alcohol.

All of these benefits of quitting the booze – some of them massive, some of them not so evident at first. Some of the benefits, I did not even consider would happen…but they did!

10. With all of these benefits to stopping drinking – why would you even consider continuing???

With all of this to look forward to – what choices do you really have? I mean, we all have choices to drink or not to drink. But, let’s put this all in perspective here. Take a look back at all of the benefits of being teetotal that we have just read. Imagine actually experiencing each of these benefits when you quit alcohol….imagine each one becoming part of your life. Fitter, healthier, more confident, more money….and so on.

And I think that we have barely scratched the surface of the benefits of quitting alcohol. I could get on my high horse and talk about the social benefits of teetotal lifestyles, but we will leave that for another day. For now, the benefits to an individual and those surrounding you are immense. And they are there for the taking.

So take them.

Just for the record….