Maintaining Habits: Sober Leadership Superpowers in Healthcare
Maintaining habits, especially those related to sobriety, can transform how healthcare professionals lead and thrive in high-pressure environments. The journey of maintaining habits requires persistence, but the sober leadership superpowers that develop along the way can enhance both professional effectiveness and personal wellbeing. For healthcare professionals navigating demanding schedules and a culture where alcohol is often central to networking and stress relief, understanding these sober leadership superpowers offers a valuable alternative approach.
In a recent Transforming Healthcare Coaching podcast episode, Evala Rahm, a leadership coach with 41 years of sobriety, shared powerful insights about maintaining habits, the benefits of sober living, and how recovery principles can enhance leadership effectiveness.
Understanding the Challenge of Maintaining Habits
By March, most New Year’s resolutions have fallen by the wayside. Maintaining habits—especially those related to sobriety—can be particularly difficult for several reasons:
Deeply ingrained neural pathways: “We have a way of doing something that’s just going straight down this neural pathway, and it was formed a long time ago,” Rahm explains. These pathways can date back to childhood when “we learned how to perform to get what we wanted.” Changing these patterns requires creating entirely new neural connections.
The “concrete drain” effect: Rahm uses a vivid analogy: established habits are like smooth concrete drains where water flows effortlessly. Creating a new habit is like forcing water to leave that drain, travel through grass, flatten it into a dirt path, and eventually create a new channel. “It takes a minimum of 60 days to change a habit to where you don’t have to think about it so much anymore,” she notes.
Social and cultural pressures: With substances like alcohol, social expectations add extra challenges. “When I was young, I mentioned my ex-husband being in the military. We lived in Germany and it was really hard to get something that wasn’t alcoholic when we would go out to eat or to celebrate,” Rahm shares. These cultural norms remain powerful influences on our habits.
The Stigma of Substance Dependence in Healthcare
Healthcare professionals face unique challenges when addressing substance use. As Rahm explains, “There’s a huge stigma around people in healthcare because people in the healthcare industry are supposed to be healthy and role models.”
This expectation creates additional barriers:
Professional identity conflict: “When we look at people in the healthcare industry…there are expectations that we have societally that you have that I have of what a person who works in a healthcare industry…they’re supposed to represent that industry,” Rahm explains. This creates immense pressure to maintain appearances.
Fear of career consequences: As Dr. Lillian Liang Emlet points out, “The licensing boards for each state, if you actually do a report or have any kind of substance abuse or events such as arrests that are related to substance abuse can actually be a huge black mark and then you are worried that you don’t have an income.”
Hidden struggles: Many healthcare professionals don’t know where to get confidential help, even though they work in healthcare. The secrecy reinforces isolation, making it harder to maintain new habits.
The Sober Curious Movement
Interestingly, cultural attitudes toward alcohol are shifting. The “sober curious” movement represents a growing interest in examining alcohol’s role in our lives—whether or not someone identifies as having a substance use disorder.
Rahm notes that many younger professionals are questioning traditional alcohol use: “It seems like her age group, a lot of people are trying to not do it.” This broader cultural shift acknowledges that alcohol use exists on a spectrum, and many people can benefit from examining their relationship with substances.
This movement offers healthcare professionals an opportunity to reevaluate habits without stigma. As Rahm explains, sober curiosity helps people “make a decision. Do I have a problem? Am I trying to go through January or three months or a year…and I’m just angry all the time because everyone else can drink and I can’t?”
Maintaining Habits: Sober Leadership Superpowers
Recovery principles—whether from substance use or other challenging patterns—can develop powerful leadership capabilities. Here are some of the “sober leadership superpowers” that emerge through maintaining healthy habits:
1. Authentic Presence
One of the most powerful aspects of recovery is removing masks we’ve worn to please others or meet expectations. Rahm describes the burden of these masks: “Let’s just call that what it is, completely draining. It is draining for that person to have to carry that impossible task of always being on, of always being happy, of always being organized, of always being the answer person.”
By maintaining sobriety and other healthy habits, leaders develop the ability to show up authentically. “The relief that comes from being able to take that mask off at work, it will then transfer over to your personal life,” Rahm explains.
2. Values-Aligned Decision Making
Recovery programs emphasize living according to core values. This creates a powerful decision-making framework for leaders:
“When we can be in alignment with that purpose and take actions based on that…we know what our values are and we know what decisions to make. And we can make a decision based on, is this in alignment with my value or not?” Rahm explains.
This clarity helps leaders maintain integrity even in challenging situations. Rather than reacting habitually, they can respond intentionally.
3. Effective Boundary Setting
Maintaining sobriety requires establishing clear boundaries—a crucial leadership skill. Rahm emphasizes the importance of leaders being able to say, “I don’t know. Could you ask Bob? Could you ask Susie? I don’t have the answer to that. Let me get back to you tomorrow. Not in five minutes because I’m not going to put that question above everything else that I already have to do.”
These boundary-setting skills help leaders avoid burnout while modeling healthy work patterns for their teams.
4. Purpose-Driven Service
One of the most powerful aspects of recovery is the opportunity to help others on similar journeys. As Rahm explains, “Being able to be there, to be of service to someone else. It’s so rewarding…The feeling of purpose, which I believe everyone who’s a human being is looking for.”
This service orientation translates directly to effective leadership. Rather than focusing on status or control, recovery-minded leaders often emphasize how they can support their team members’ growth and development.
5. Community Building
Recovery emphasizes the importance of supportive community—a principle that translates powerfully to leadership. Rahm uses the analogy of animals on the savanna: “The antelope that are on the edges of the herd are the ones that get taken down. But the ones who are in the center of the herd are the ones who stay safe.”
Leaders who understand this principle create psychologically safe environments where team members can be vulnerable, share challenges, and support each other’s growth.
Practical Strategies for Maintaining Habits
How can healthcare professionals begin to develop these sober leadership superpowers? Rahm offers several practical approaches:
Find supportive community: Whether through formal programs like AA or other recovery groups, or through carefully selected trusted individuals, community is essential. As Rahm notes, “When we can share with each other…that vulnerable yucky part that we like to keep hidden away because we’re worried that you aren’t going to like me or I’m going to get rejected or made fun of or judged.”
Understand the neural pathway process: Recognizing that habit change is a biological process that takes time can help reduce self-judgment when progress isn’t immediate. Rahm suggests visualizing the process of creating new paths through grass until they become established routes.
Focus on self-awareness: Regularly checking in with yourself helps identify when old patterns are emerging. “Having self-awareness and being able to check in and hear the signals that are coming up to you because they’re important,” Rahm advises.
Seek professional support: Working with a coach or therapist can accelerate growth by providing accountability and perspective. As Rahm suggests for those struggling with maintaining a professional “mask”: “Get a coach, get a therapist, talk to someone about what’s going on.”
Practice self-compassion: Habit change isn’t linear. As Dr. Liang Emlet observes, giving ourselves grace is essential: “Maybe you only took a couple of steps along that grass. It’s time to go try again.”
The Bottom Line
Maintaining habits—particularly those related to sobriety and authentic living—can transform healthcare leadership. While the journey isn’t easy, the sober leadership superpowers that develop along the way create more effective, sustainable leadership practices.
As Rahm’s 41-year sobriety journey illustrates, the principles that support recovery can become the foundation for exceptional leadership. By embracing authenticity, values-aligned decision making, effective boundaries, purpose-driven service, and community building, healthcare leaders can navigate complex challenges while maintaining their wellbeing.
In an industry where burnout remains pervasive, these sober leadership superpowers offer a path toward more sustainable, meaningful careers. The commitment to maintaining habits, especially those supporting sobriety and authentic presence, provides healthcare professionals with unique strengths that benefit both their teams and the patients they serve.
Looking for support in developing your own leadership superpowers?
It starts with a single conversation. Book a discovery call to connect with a coach who understands your world.
Want weekly tips for thriving in healthcare? Join our community of healthcare professionals making positive changes in their careers and lives.
