Olivia’s Advice on Quitting Cannabis

First thing’s first, when you’re considering making any big life changes or decisions, it’s so crucial that you pause, get still and reflect on what steps your higher self is asking you to take in this moment.

The next thing I want you to remember is that when it comes to substances, your “addictive personality” may actually be part of your gift. The truth is, some of our brains require a lot more friction than others to feel challenged, stimulated, alive, whatever emotion it may be. And if we don’t have it, we become very unhappy and unfulfilled. That’s why we turn to substances in the first place – to deal with the discomfort and experience a dopamine boost.

As I started seriously exploring my relationship with cannabis, I relied heavily on my journal to reflect on what exactly I was distancing myself from by using cannabis. What was it giving me a break from in my life? I wrote a LOT about my grief and I wrote a lot about my sadness. But I also realized that cannabis was giving me a reprieve from a certain type of self-loathing, a certain type of shame that I didn’t want to feel. 

I also noticed myself only wanting to hang out with people who smoked, or needing to use cannabis before or after hanging out with certain people to make myself feel more comfortable. So I had to ask myself, are these connections that I’ve built around my habit, or are they genuine connections? 

Let’s get into the actual quitting part of it all.

In the beginning when you quit, it’s not going to be fun. Especially when that initial withdrawal is happening, you have to remain steadfast in your reasons for wanting to stop. Honor the relationship with yourself that you’re ready to build. Be so committed to fully meeting the fullness of your life with clarity of mind and heart that you have no other choice but to stick to this plan. 

You’re naturally going to be in a dopamine deficit for at least 30 days while the seesaw scales of our dopamine receptors are adjusting. This is because any time you artificially increase pleasure through your dopamine receptors, your body has to dip below its baseline in an equal amount to bring you back to normal. So you’re going to feel some very bored brain pain for at least a month when you’re quitting.

Be sure to fill your time with a bunch of other things that will boost neurotransmitters like serotonin and oxytocin in a more sustainable way, like walking your dog or creating art or dancing to music. And remember that it’s normal to be in a state of anhedonia, where your brain feels like it’s lacking pleasure. It’s also normal to feel bored, have headaches, be extra thirsty, not have an appetite and have a tough time sleeping.

I’d highly recommend leaning on passionflower (in Sleep Juice), L-theanine, and grounding nervine herbs like those in Peace Juice. They’ll help to ease those physical symptoms and let your body rest up.

On the emotional side of things, you have to truly see your life for what it is now. Notice and write down the areas where you feel dissatisfied, disconnected, misaligned or unfulfilled. 

I will say, one of the most beautiful gifts that cannabis gave me is the power of ritual. The act of smoking, of course, but also that it made any moment more special because I was present in whatever I was doing. But you do NOT need this plant to experience this. You can slow way down when you’re doing a seemingly mundane daily chore (like the dishes) and be so present in each moment of the task that you actually get to enjoy it simply because your mind is not somewhere else. So much of the time we don’t enjoy things in our lives because we’re absently rushing through them. 

One of the big things that I hear is “I’m just not creative without cannabis”. The creativity is already in you, cannabis cannot take that away from you. After all, it’s you that’s creating, not the plant. 

Keep coming back to these two questions:

1. Who am I when everything else is stripped away?
2. Who am I when I let pain change me? 

If you never fully feel the pain of your life, you’re going to stay stagnant. 

What I really want to leave you with is that a lot of us who are drawn to using cannabis are doing so because we’re very spiritually inclined people. We like to be aligned with that higher version of ourselves. We want to take action from that state. We want to feel connected to our sense of creativity and that higher self that we all have within us, but that cannabis does make a lot more easy to access in the beginning. You can build your spiritual resilience and your spiritual consciousness with things like meditation, reflection, journaling, spending time in nature, making art, and unplugging from our phones and substances. 

That power, that creative person that you love, that wisdom, that wiser, higher state, that part of you that’s your true self… that person is in you no matter what. You’re here to do some really wonderful things. Is cannabis helping you accomplish those things, or is cannabis creating more distance between you and those things? Take your life, your gifts, and the work that you were put here to do seriously. And I can’t wait to see what you accomplish. 

For a deeper look into my cannabis journey, tune into my latest podcast episode linked here.