The T on Caffeine:
- 90% of the world’s population consumes a meal or drink that has some caffeine in it every day.
- 70% of caffeine is consumed as coffee.
- America is the largest consumer of coffee (followed by Brazil), with over half of American adults drinking it daily.
- The physical effects of caffeine we experience are mainly due to the placebo effect.
Experiment: No coffee for 2 months… after an initial two-week weaning period, no caffeine of any form for the remaining 6 weeks (aside from trace amounts in dark chocolate… let’s not get crazy now).
I’m moderately terrified of this challenge, a sign of its worthiness. I have given up meat, dairy, dessert/sweets, alcohol, TV, breakfast, “adult activities,” and social media for periods of time before. Each had its challenges, but none intimidated me the way giving up caffeine does. I’ve thought about giving it up for years but have never pulled the “drip” cord.
Ok, so why…
- The people have spoken. Thanks to all who suggested I take on this experiment next… we’ll see how thankful I feel when it starts, haha.
- I’ve become caffeine dependent, even if it’s largely mental, and would prefer to not let any substance hold that much control over my behavior. While I only have 1-2 cups a day, the thought of not having that first cup in the morning is like the thought of not putting on any clothes in the morning. I could do that when I’m working from home and shut all the window shades and maybe it would feel briefly liberating but a) it would be cold—at least in the morning/evening, b) it wouldn’t be super comfortable on furniture, and c) why? The mere discomfort with the thought of giving up caffeine is motivation enough to try grinding it out.
- This challenge falls right in the Goldilocks zone of personal growth… Tackle something too vast in scope and you can feel helpless and overwhelmed. Tackle something too easy and there’s no real sense of accomplishment or growth. Finding goals in the optimal zone—challenging yet achievable—can be a great source of happiness.
Uh oh…
- Another reason I haven’t tried to cut the morning buzz yet is productivity. Coffee in the morning feels like my own little fairy work-mother, at its worst clearing away the morning brain fog—and sometimes crankiness—and at its best giving me that glorious, let’s-f’n-go I-can-do-anything-right-now feeling. None of the other indulgences I’ve given up before could have a negative impact on my work, and many benefitted it. Hence my wariness to pull the plug on the electric kettle. But I plan to be a father in the near future (hopefully next year) and the challenge of reduced sleep that parenting a newborn produces will be greater if anything. In fact, this experiment seems like good initial training for that new challenge.
- Another concern: with Intermittent Fasting, I look forward even more to my morning cup of coffee. Even though I wait 60-90 minutes after I wake to enjoy my first hot cup o’ brew (Why? See this 2-minute clip from one of my favorite authors, Dan Pink), it is often among the 1st things I think about in the morning. How will I cope with this… perhaps herbal tea or some other new reward/indulgence as a replacement?
About that…
Two months… why so long? As my cousin pointed out, it takes some time for your body to adjust to the removal of caffeine from the system. To set myself up for success, I will be phasing caffeine out like an awesome t-shirt you don’t want to admit has stains in it—maybe from coffee? Meta. The first two weeks I’ll be sipping on some green tea or yerba mate–each of which has just 30-40mg of caffeine via tea bags, as a weening period. After that, it’ll be all caffeine-free herbal all the time, baby.
Let’s be clear… practicing discipline builds inner strength and can teach us to want less, which can make it easier to be happy. The less you feel you need to be happy, the happier you are with what you have. However, the goal is not to punish myself or remove something that brings me joy. In other words, the intention is not to give up drinking coffee forever. The goal is to change my relationship with caffeine, i.e. maintain the joy I get from the experience of drinking a warm, rich cup of coffee without the daily caffeine dependency.
I betcha…
After experiencing an initial dip in energy, I’m wondering if this will improve my overall energy. This is my hypothesis and my hope. I’m envisioning a graph showing time without caffeine on the horizontal axis, energy on the vertical axis, and a line resembling a Nike swoosh that eventually flattens out, but we’ll see soon enough… here we go!
References:
https://medium.com/better-humans/how-to-quit-caffeine-in-one-week-e041892698ec
I think your hypothesis will be correct. More constant energy overall throughout the day and no initial brain fog. You got this!
Spoiler alert: you’re right… so far, so good!