Gray Area Drinking | Jolene Park | TEDxCrestmoorParkWomen

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Published 2017-11-28

In this engaging talk, Jolene Park shares her experience of gray area drinking — the kind of drinking where there’s no rock bottom, but you drink as a way to manage anxiety and then regret how much and how often you drink. Regardless of the cause of anxiety or discomfort in your life, and regardless of whether you’re using alcohol or another substance or behavior as an attempt to manage stress, Jolene uses her expertise as a Functional Nutritionist to explain the importance of replenishing your neurotransmitters in a comprehensive and consistent way, especially if you want to get off the stopping and restarting drinking merry-go-round.

Jolene Park is the founder of Healthy Discoveries — a corporate wellness company that provides coaching and training programs for high achieving business professionals who struggle with anxiety, stress and gray area drinking. She provides inspirational and empowering approaches for purpose-driven companies and business professionals to create a healthy body, mind and spirit in order to build a deeper internal zone of resilience and well-being. Jolene Park is a functional nutritionist, health coach and stress reduction yoga instructor who works with professional women who struggle with anxiety, perfectionism, and the gray area of drinking. She is the co-host of “Editing Our Drinking & Our Lives” podcast, an honest conversation about breaking the stigma and shame around quitting drinking. Jolene provides an inspirational, empowering way for women to come together and be part of a revolutionary health movement that reclaims their body, mind and spirit.

Through her company Healthy Discoveries — a corporate wellness training and consulting company, Jolene also helps purpose driven companies and business professionals break through barriers and create richer, deeper community and connection as a result.

Jolene is a Colorado native. She is the fifth generation raised on her family’s Centennial farm in Northeast Colorado. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx

All Comments (21)

@MaryJane-xd4sn 4 years ago

Today is my 1st day of sobriety
@sammierosetta 3 years ago

I am in residential treatment for alcohol and mental health. Many residents ask WHY so many salads? WHY yoga? WHY mediation and art? WHY gardening and sewing, etc. This TED TALK explains the reasons why in such a simplistic and optimistic way. I am going to pass this link to others in my community. THANK YOU! 82 DAYS SOBER FOR ME TODAY!!! Looking forward to yoga tonight at 6pm :)
@AllansStation 4 years ago

i can fully agree, After 40 years of regular and quite heavy drinking, i just decided for no particular reason - enough of that- 12 years ago and still on the wagon. That was it as simple as that.
@healinginreachtarot5064 3 years ago

I am three weeks sober. I feel encouraged by all the amazing changes i feel and that i am living.
@Dan-vy8he 6 months ago

Thank you for sharing your story. I'm two 15 days sober, not because rock bottom, because I want to live better..🎉
@TheDylan6908 1 year ago

Gray area drinker here. Age 71. Your story is so much like mine. I was a health care worker as well. I eat well and exercise regularly but drink too much too often. My 38 year old son passed away 2 years ago and the fall out from that has made reining in the drinking that much harder but to be honest I had a problem with liquor prior to Matt's death. I think I'm at a crossroads right now. Time to get serious about this before it's too late. Thank you. Great presentation.
@mgouley 5 years ago

I really relate to this. The next time my sister-in-law asks me to explain to her why I quit drinking, yet again, I'm going to direct her to this video. LOL! Coming up on 22 months for me.
@maryclayton7477 5 years ago

1677 days for me - this is the closest description of what I experienced that I have ever heard. I did have a BIG moment some may call rock bottom but it was not jail or anything like that. It was a spiritual rock bottom and THAT changed my life!
@TH-eb5ro 7 months ago

Gray area drinking seems to exist and telling people that 2 a day is fine gives them an excuse to drink. Anxiety is such a tricky thing. Any company that sells an addictive substance needs to donate a % to the rehab programs in each state. Rehabs have waiting lists or people do not have the insurance to even get on the lists.
@swissdaz1074 4 years ago

Like so many people in the comments... she has perfectly described where so many people find themselves. I am one of them, first week for me, but determined to make this work. 🙏🏻
@LadyWadey1 6 years ago

Love this , I am 1005 days without alcohol, I didn't quit when I was rock bottom, I quit when I was flying high with health, it was the last thing to go :)
@PC-mx9xc 1 year ago

This reminds me of goodwill hunting. Robin Williams telling Matt Damon it's not your fault so many times they cry together, so inspirational
@karenkaren3189 3 years ago

I quit eight years and four months ago. I had cut back gradually for the two years before I quit. I didn’t have a physical dependence, I never got in trouble with the law, never drove drunk, never went to work drunk. However I gradually became emotionally dependent on my wine ( beer, occasional scotch) a bit too much. I think millions of people fall into this grey area drinking. I know I did.
@gretchenhora639 4 years ago

I am a gray area alcoholic! Thank you for sharing!!!! I have has 24 hrs sober.
@keleysmith-keller8140 4 years ago

Love this as well. I didn't quit drinking because I was at rock bottom, either. I just didn't like the trend line I was seeing in my life. The biggest benefit, among many: the quality of my sleep is so much better!
@eileenfuentes6975 1 year ago

To all of you working on getting sober, I am so proud of you. I grew up with an alcoholic parent and it's hard. I wish you all the best, you can't change anything you don't acknowledge so making this choice for yourself is all the different verses you being forced to give up drinking when you really don't want to. Be kind to yourself, it's progress and not about perfection. You are not a bad person, the addiction is the bad guy and you can and will break free if you trust yourself, your mind and your body. Whatever it takes, everyday is a progress. Even if there's bumps along the way you are not a failure just keep pushing forward. You've got this. I can see things from a dual perspective and I've seen how someone can hit rock bottom grasping for their life at a single strand perhaps thinner than a string on a spider web. That was my father. The illness affected the entire family and even at 39 years old, I can see how it affected me as a child all the way up until now. It's all in my subconscious mind when certain things happen that bring me back to memories that haven't thought about in years. There's help and support in so many different paths and you just have to find the one that works for you. Be kind to yourself, as humans we are resilient and take advantage of that before it's too late whether it's affecting your family, your job, your life, your health. Do not let this become the reason you are on your Deathbed one day. The the body and mind are amazing at healing themselves or repairing themselves. The 10 steps with alcohol anonymous can be applied to anything in life whether you are spiritual, religious or whatever. Fill in the wording to suit you. The 10 steps can even help people with stopping smoking or binge eating, anything. Put on your seatbelt it's going to be a ride but the destination is worth it and you will think yourself for doing it sooner and not later. Perhaps you will ask yourself why you haven't done it sooner. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself and you may be scared of what life will be like without alcohol but the gaps that you are uncertain of, how living life without alcohol will be enjoyable, they will definitely fill in with the better version of you. You have made the decision and that is a big percentage of your recovery. Keep a journal, make voice recordings to yourself from yourself, make a video of you talking just to you and save it like a video diary. When you know that drinking alcohol is not adding anything worthwhile to your life, even if it seems like it at the moment, you have nothing to lose. Don't be afraid of life without alcohol, like I said newer and better things will fall into place to fill those voids. You can look it up, each and every one of us, the chances of us even existing or being born is one in 400 trillion. You are here for a reason stronger than you will ever know. I'm sorry to anyone who is reading this, has gotten to the point where it's become a problem. But on the bright side, every problem has a solution and this one is pretty self-explanatory.
@leesalovely2782 4 years ago

142 days of sobriety for me...thank you for sharing your experience.
@larissapritkovs5712 3 years ago

I’m 23 and ready to make the leap. This talk is so inspiring!
@LONEWOLF..314-S-T-L 4 years ago

Grateful for the opportunity to see this 🙏💯💪.. I'm 32 months sober now and looking forward to the rest of my life sober. ( Very informative and interesting )
@anastasiabellone 6 years ago

Omg! Jolene just described exactly my situation and the reasons why I stopped drinking 1.5 years ago! I intuitively started meditating, chanting, and doing yoga, but never thought of it from the point of neurotransmitters! Great encouraging message! There is so much beauty in being fully sober! It brings purity to so many aspects of life! Thank you!