Last Updated on January 26, 2026

For many, the word sobriety immediately brings to mind meetings, labels, and rules. Not so for psychotherapist and Sober Curiosity founder Jeanette Hu. For her, sobriety was never about conforming to a prescribed path. It was about understanding why alcohol mattered in the first place—and why stepping away wasn’t as simple as she expected.

Hu drank daily for years. A drink helped her relax, to connect socially, to feel alive. Life felt smoother and easier to navigate. For a while, there was no reason to question it.

Until there was.

As she’s explained, the real challenge was living inside the tension of wanting change while not knowing how to make it stick. For people who are thoughtful, capable, and self-aware, that internal tug-of-war is common — and it has very little to do with willpower.

So Hu turned inward. Becoming a psychotherapist, she studied belief, identity, and the emotional role alcohol plays in our lives. That work, combined with her lived experience, formed the foundation of her Four Pillars approach, focusing on clarity, understanding, and experimentation.

Watch The Related Podcast

When “Just Drink Less” Isn’t Enough

Early attempts at change met the usual advice: stop, cut back, try harder. Doctors, friends, family—they all said the same thing.

Hu knew they were right. She did. The problem wasn’t the advice. It was how to follow through.

The gap between knowing you should drink less and actually doing it is a struggle many people share. Smart, capable, self-aware individuals often get stuck here—not because they lack willpower, but because the strategies they try are misaligned with the reality of their needs.

Why Labels Didn’t Fit

Hu tried traditional recovery spaces. Her first AA meeting? Friendly and bright. With homemade cookies! But it didn’t stick.

“I couldn’t resonate with defining myself as an alcoholic,” she explains.

Another core element felt just as misaligned. “The idea of admitting that I’m powerless just didn’t resonate with me,” she says.

Over time, her view of AA has softened. She can now appreciate the program’s power and language without adopting its framing entirely. But at the time, what she needed was a way to understand her behavior without letting it define her.

Every Behavior Has a Purpose

One insight from graduate school changed Hu’s mindset: the idea that every behavior serves a function, even the ones that seem self-sabotaging.

As she puts it plainly, “Drinking always serves a purpose for the person who is drinking.”

Drinking isn’t random. It meets needs—emotional, social, and physiological. It can reduce stress, create connection, or help people feel at ease. But those benefits are short-lived and often come with costs: low mood, anxiety, and disrupted sleep, for instance.

This perspective, seeing the why behind behavior, became the backbone of the Four Pillars.

Pillar One: Values Before Alcohol

The first pillar isn’t about restriction. It’s about clarity: what do you actually want in your life? More presence, better sleep, space for joy, deeper connection?

When you focus on what matters, alcohol becomes contextual, not central. The shift is subtle but profound: less about stopping, more about aligning with what you truly want.

Pillar Two: Rethinking the Benefits

Many drink because of what Hu calls “perceived benefits”: the idea that alcohol helps them relax or connect. 

The short-term effect exists—dopamine release, temporary stress relief—but it’s fleeting. Often, the next day brings a “rebound”: fatigue, low mood, or mild anxiety. “There’s a hidden fine print about what they’re going to charge you later,” she says.

The goal here isn’t to judge yourself for seeking out those good short-term effects. Instead, it’s awareness about the long-term trade-offs: knowing what alcohol does, weighing it against the cost, and deciding consciously what’s best for you.

Pillar Three: Expanding Skills

Alcohol often fills functional gaps: relaxation, connection, stress management. Remove it, and something needs to replace it—or old habits creep back.

Hu’s third pillar focuses on skill-building. New ways to relax, connect, or have fun. These aren’t punishments. They’re tools. Skills that allow someone to thrive without defaulting to alcohol.

Pillar Four: Mindset Over Guilt

Arguably, the most transformative pillar is mindset.

Many come in believing they’ve failed already. Hu reframes this as learning, not judgment. Slip-ups aren’t moral failings—they’re information. And shame? Counterproductive. 

“Shame is not helpful,” Hu says. “Shame is one thing that really doesn’t work in this journey.”

A mindset built on curiosity and flexibility encourages resilience. Mistakes guide progress; they don’t derail or ruin it.

No One-Size-Fits-All

Hu’s system is flexible. Some clients aim for full sobriety. Others find moderation. Many start unsure. And that’s okay.

The four pillars offer something unique and compassionate: a system rooted in understanding, context, and experimentation. It doesn’t promise a perfect solution, but it does promise a process—one that is honest, flexible, and human.

Get started on your mindful journey with a 15-day free trial of Sunnyside.

What is Sunnyside?

Sunnyside is a mindful drinking and alcohol moderation app that can help change your habits around alcohol using a proven, science-backed method. Whether you want to become a more mindful drinker, drink less, or eventually quit drinking, Sunnyside can help you reach your goals. We take a positive, friendly approach to habit change, so you never feel judged or pressured to quit.

When you join Sunnyside, you’ll start by completing a 3-minute private assessment so we can learn a bit about you. Once that’s done, you’ll get a 15-day free trial to test out everything, including our daily habit change tools, tracking and analytics, community and coaching, and education and resources. It’s a full package designed specifically to adapt to your goals and help you reach them gradually, so you can make a huge impact on your health and well-being.

Sunnyside is a digital habit and behavior-change program that is incredibly effective on its own, but can also be the perfect complement to other work you’re doing to cut down on drinking, whether that includes talk therapy or medication such as Naltrexone.

Get your 15-day free trial of Sunnyside today, and start living your healthiest life.