What are you addicted to?

Hello sweet friend!

This is a continuation from the previous inSight on triggers, attachment and authenticity I did a couple weeks ago.

Gabor Maté explains addiction so well that if you are challenged in a behavior you want to move past, I recommend learning more through him. I’ll do my best to summarize some of it for you.

Addiction is all about trying to soothe pain. If you have unresolved emotional pain you might behave in unhealthy ways.

As he says often - it’s not why the addiction, it’s why the pain?

Addiction is manifested in any behavior where a person finds temporary pleasure or relief and therefore craves it but then suffers negative consequences and can’t give it up. Any behavior that causes pleasure, relief, craving, harm.

Sex, work, gambling, shopping, eating, cell phone, social media, gaming, extreme sports, self cutting, bulimia, porn, heroin, meth, cocaine, nicotine, alcohol.

According to this list, have you ever had an addictive pattern in your life? I know I sure have.

He asks us to ask ourselves - Not what was wrong with the addiction, what was right about it? What did it give you in the short term that you wanted?

Addiction isn’t a disease or a choice you make, it’s an attempt to supplement something in your life you desperately need.

Why the pain? (it’s not genes or inheritance). It’s typically from childhood. People get punished and they’re looking for love.

Trauma is a wound that hasn’t healed. It’s not what happens to you, it’s what happens inside of you. It isn’t that you were abandoned, it’s believing you’re not lovable. Then we defend it. Using power, grandiosity, people pleasing, overachieving, humor etc.

To heal, we need to treat ourselves with more compassion, not self ridicule and shame. It’s to recognize that addiction is often a coping mechanism and leads to emotional dysregulation and a difficulty connecting with oneself.
(This is for informational purposes only. For medical advice or diagnosis, consult a professional).

Again, this isn’t to shame us or blame where we came from. It’s to understand we live in a world where it seems ‘normal’ to use these coping mechanisms. When we’re disconnected we suffer. We do have the power to change and to become who we really are, if we want to.

I believe in you.

To hear it from Gabor, this is a good short 12 min clip - Is addiction a choice?

https://youtu.be/6ZKZ-GmgpzQ

All my love,
K 💛