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by JonShartwell
1526 days ago
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I have been in and out of AA (thankfully in a good place currently) and I think this idea that addicts are fundamentally different from everyone else is a complete myth that only makes people with addiction problems feel more hopeless and separate from society. Have you ever had a harmful habit you have had difficulty breaking, or been unable to do something that you know will improve your health? Then you can relate to an addict. Their habit is likely a lot more harmful than yours, and affects their brain chemistry, but it’s the same mechanism that prevents you both from stopping even though you know it would help you. Judson Brewer is a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who researches addiction and advocates this view. I found his book The Craving Mind[1] to be incredibly illuminating and true to my experience as a person who has struggled with drug use. [1] https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300234367/craving-mind/ |
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That's absolutely not what I said, nor what I intended. Of course, addicts aren't any different to anyone else in the general sense (that of being human beings).
Nevertheless, their worldview is different to mine and to that of others - no two worldviews are the same, everyone has a fundamentally different worldview or we'd all be clones.
Yes, like everyone else, I have my addictions - cravings for certain foods, rich cheeses, certain types of cakes and so on but I simply never buy them or my belt would be about four notches larger. I'm constantly aware that I can't afford to give in to temptation and it's stressful.
However, that doesn't stop me looking at these foods and drooling over them whenever I go shopping.
Same with coffee: I drink coffee so strong that no normal person would ever touch it. Unlike those other foods mentioned, I do imbibe in this superstrong coffee and I have no intention of giving it up even though I know that it is not good for me.
The difference between my food addictions and alcohol addiction is the sheer scale of the damage alcohol does to the individuals involved not to mention the havoc it does to their families and to society at large.
Comparing my food addictions to alcohol or full-blown opiate addiction is a non sequitur, essentially there is no comparison even though they all initially started out as the cravings of one's mind. By comparison, my food addiction compared to alcohol or opiate addiction is like comparing a pop gun to an AK47.
We must be very careful when we equate all addictions down to a commom cause - one's craving mind and then proceed to imply that in the end there's little to differentiate between them. To say there's little between them is postmodernist nonsense in its extreme and it's very dangerous thinking. In the end, black is black and white is white and not some shade of nondescript amorphous gray.
That said, I'll restate the fact that I've just watched a longtime friend die of alcoholic poisoning and I've great sympathy for anyone who's in the grip of alcoholism.
If you think I'm being a righteous bastard for saying what I've just said then I can only say that it's definitely not true. I am only too well aware that there's the thinnest of thin lines between me (and most of us) and the alcoholic or opiate addict - or the haplessly addicted and desperate gambler.
As the old truism states, it is only but for the grace of one's deity go thee.