“We must have a drink before the end of the year!”
December is a perfect storm for anyone trying to cut back on drinking. Between end-of-year deadlines, work parties, family gatherings and school events, alcohol is suddenly everywhere.
It can make drinking feel not just normal, but expected.But if you want to drink less (or not at all) this silly season, you don’t have to rely on willpower alone. Having a plan can help.
Some evidence suggests when goals are focused on how you’ll approach something – such as a not-drinking strategy – rather than what you’ll avoid (alcohol), it’s easier to follow through.
So here are some simple strategies, backed by evidence.
1. Make a plan
When making decisions, our brains tend to prioritise immediate goals over long-term ones. Scientists call this “present bias”. This means it’s harder to keep your long-term goal (cutting back on alcohol) in mind when confronted by the chance for immediate gratification (having a drink).
But if you plan when you will and won’t drink in advance, you reduce the need to make this decision in real time – when alcohol is in front of you and your willpower may be lower and you’re more driven by emotion.
Look ahead at your calendar and choose your drinking and non-drinking days deliberately. Committing to the plan ahead of time reduces the chances of opportunistic drinking when social pressure is high.
2. Track your drinks
Tracking when and how much you drink is one of the most effective and well-supported strategies for reducing alcohol use and staying motivated.
You may be surprised how much tracking alone can change your drinking, simply by being more mindful and helping you understand your patterns.
It doesn’t matter how you do it – in an app, a notebook or even on your phone calendar. Writing it down is better than trying to remember. And doing it consistently works best. Aim to record drinks in real time if you can.
There are lots of free, evidence based apps, such Drink Tracker, that can help you track your drinking and drink-free days.
3. Try zero alcohol drinks
For many people, the rise of alcohol-free beer, wine and spirits has made it much easier to enjoy the ritual of drinking at social events, without the intoxication.
But they’re not for everyone – particularly those who find the look, smell and taste of alcohol triggering. Know yourself, see what works, and don’t force it if it’s not helping reach your goals.
4. Slow the pace
If your aim is to cut back, try alternating each alcoholic drink with something non-alcoholic.
Water is best, but zero, low or non-alcoholic drinks can still reduce how much you drink overall – and as a bonus they can also help you stay hydrated, which may reduce the chance of a hangover.
Eating something healthy and filling before and during drinking is also a good idea. It prevents rapid spikes in blood alcohol levels, as well as slowing the absorption of alcohol into your system. This means your body has a better chance of metabolising the alcohol.
Eating well can also help calm the cravings for sugary, fried and salty foods that are often triggered by alcohol.
5. Beware of an all-or-nothing approach
Don’t fall into the “goal violation” trap (sometimes called the abstinence violation effect). That’s the when slipping up makes you abandon your plan altogether.
Maybe someone talks you into “just a splash” – or one drink somehow becomes five – and you tell yourself: “Oh well, I’ve blown it now.”
But a slip is just a slip – it doesn’t mean you have to give up on your goals. You can reset straight away, at the next drink or the next day.
6. Set up accountability
Letting a friend or partner know that you are trying to drink less helps you stay accountable and provides support – even better if they join you.
7. Have responses ready
People may notice you’re not drinking or are drinking less. They may offer you a drink. Try a simple “I’m good” or “I’m pacing myself tonight”. Work out what feels OK to you – you don’t need to give long explanations.
8. Be kind to yourself
When you’re making a big change, it won’t always go smoothly. What matters is how you respond if you slip up. Shame and guilt often lead to more drinking, while self-compassion supports longer-term behaviour change.
Instead of seeing a slip as failure, treat it as information: What made it hard to stick to your goals? What could help next time?
December doesn’t have to derail your goals
Change comes from consistent small steps, even during the busiest month of the year. Focus on developing a relationship with alcohol that you are in control of, not the other way around.
Katinka van de Ven is alcohol and other drug specialist at UNSW Sydney. Nicole Lee is adjunct professor at the National Drug Research Institute, Curtin University.
Thunderstorms are noisily kicking off summer in NZ – what’s driving them?
The rumble of thunderstorms across the country this week is a noisy reminder that summer is arriving – and with it, the mix of heat, humidity and unstable air that fuels these bursts of wild weather.
Strolling to the Meteorological Society of New Zealand’s annual conference in Hamilton this morning, I could sense this atmospheric shift about me.
These early storms sit in a transition zone, where strong daytime heating combines with lingering spring volatility. Put the ingredients together and thunderstorms can form readily.
The influence of La Niña, now present in the tropical Pacific, can also provide northern parts of the country with background conditions that make for heightened mugginess, heavy downpours and thunderstorm activity.
But this is a weaker event than the La Niña summers earlier in the decade – which helped set the stage for Cyclone Gabrielle and the Auckland Anniversary floods – and it may well fade by season’s end.
Sea surface temperatures, however, have recently increased sharply, with widespread and abnormally warm marine heatwave conditions returning to our coastal waters.
This ocean heat is likely to last through summer, with the potential to boost evaporation and humidity, and add energy to the lower atmosphere. When weather systems arrive from the north, that extra moisture can drive heavier rain and more vigorous convection.
These conditions may point to a greater risk of significant rain events later in summer, especially for the North Island, with a normal or slightly elevated chance of ex-tropical cyclone interactions.
In short: expect more heat, more humidity and occasional bursts of very heavy rain.
So how do thunderstorms like this week’s fit into the mix – and what does a warming climate mean for them?
How thunderstorms build their power
Thunderstorms form when warm, moist air rises into cooler layers above.
As the air ascends, water vapour condenses into cloud droplets, releasing heat that adds buoyancy and lifts the air further. This fuels a strong up-and-down circulation inside the storm.
Within this turbulent environment, electrical charges separate. Collisions between droplets, ice particles and graupel (soft hail) build positive charges near the top of the cloud and negative charges near the base.
When the atmosphere can no longer insulate that imbalance, lightning discharges. The air around the lightning channel is heated to tens of thousands of degrees – hotter than the surface of the Sun – and the rapid expansion generates the shock wave we hear as thunder.
As impressive as this latest event has been – Metservice has counted more than 3,600 lightning strikes since midnight, of which nearly 730 reached the ground – New Zealand’s thunderstorms are usually small by global standards, often measuring just a kilometre across.
Most are single convective cells, though they can occasionally line up into squall lines that bring intense local rain, strong winds and small tornadoes. Lightning deaths are extremely rare here.
Climate change means more active weather
According to the World Meteorological Organisation, 2025 is likely to finish up as the world’s second or third warmest on record, with record greenhouse gas concentrations continuing to drive severe heatwaves, melt glaciers and warm oceans.
A warmer climate also means more energy and moisture in the atmosphere, making it easier for thunderstorms and heavy rain to develop when conditions allow.
Air holds about 7% more water vapour for every degree of warming, and when that moisture condenses, it releases heat that strengthens the storm’s updrafts. That draws in even more warm, moist air from below, allowing rainfall totals to exceed the 7% rule of thumb, especially in short, intense bursts.
NIWA (now part of Earth Sciences New Zealand) has estimated that every degree of warming leads to a median 13.5% increase in hourly rainfall in a one-in-50-year event.
Atmospheric rivers – long, narrow plumes of tropical moisture – are also expected to become more frequent and intense in a warmer climate and already drive many of our heaviest downpours.
Attribution studies, meanwhile, are increasingly showing the handprint of human-driven climate change. Scientists have found this made for more intense rainfall in the Canterbury and West Coast flood events in 2021, and during Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023.
This signal translates directly into losses: nearly a third of the damage from New Zealand’s 12 most costly flood events between 2007 and 2017 – about NZ$140 million – was directly attributed to climate change.
Yet, how a warming planet is likely to affect the frequency of thunderstorms themselves is still uncertain. International studies suggest increases in some regions, but the processes are complex and not yet well understood for New Zealand.
The broader picture, however, is straightforward: warmer seas and a warmer atmosphere mean more moisture, more energy in the system, and possibly more instability in the atmosphere. When thunderstorms do form, they have more to work with.
Weather systems like this week’s will come and go, but the wider, long-term trend is something we all need to be concerned about.
We are tipping the odds toward more intense downpours – and the challenge now is acting quickly enough to spare future generations a much warmer, wetter world.
James Renwick, Professor of Physical Geography (Climate Science), Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
