If you have ever bought something you did not need, opened a shopping app in the middle of an anxious night, or walked away from a checkout feeling a hollow mix of temporary relief and quiet dread, you already know something important: spending is not always about things. Sometimes it is about feelings.
This is not a character flaw. It is not a lack of willpower, poor financial literacy, or some failure of discipline that other people seem to manage effortlessly. Emotional spending is a learned pattern, and like all learned patterns, it made sense when it formed. The nervous system found something that worked, and it kept using it.
Read moreIf you have ever sat with the aftermath of infidelity and tried to understand how it keeps happening, you may have arrived at a question that feels both important and uncomfortable: why does something that costs so much keep feeling, in the moments before it happens, like something you cannot not do?
The answer is not found in your character. It is not found in how much you love your partner, or how seriously you take commitment, or how clearly you understand the consequences of your behaviour. The answer is found in the brain, and specifically in the way the brain's reward system builds patterns of compulsion that operate largely outside of conscious control.
Read moreResearch has shown that many people use alcohol to escape from stress and anxiety. In fact, it is well known that alcohol actually causes more stress in the short and long term. Although alcohol has the power to calm you down and make you feel more relaxed in the moment, it is medically classified as a depressant, because it slows down your brain, and changes the way you think, feel and act. Studies have indicated that alcohol may act as a negative enforcer to increase stress and anxiety. However, alcohol can also be a positive enforcer that eliminates unpleasant experiences or bad memories for a short time.
Read moreGetting together with friends on the weekends to catch-up over drinks is a very normal social activity, for a great many people. They may drink to relax after a long, hard week, or just to feel more sociable. However pleasant this might be, it is important to be aware of whether your social drinking is crossing the line into problem drinking. Studies have shown that social drinking should consist of alcohol consumption – for women – less than 7 drinks per week, and no more than 3 drinks a day. For men, it means no more than 14 per week and no more than 4 a day. If it is more than these recommendations you could be in danger of crossing the line into a problem area.
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