"Addiction in the 21st Century"

Welcome to addiction help. A study of addiction and recovery. There is a lot of work to do and I suggest you go to the forum, sign up and get started. There is a lot of ground to cover so if you're in a hurry - that's to bad. We who have recovered had to look at the pain, fear, trauma, suffering, emotions - the causes present that led to unhappiness, frustration and addiction. If you're serious you can benefit from our personal experience with addiction - and now with the recovery process. Everything I've learned about life, people, feelings, thoughts, the brain, society, belief and so on is here.

Ending an addiction is not on anybody's list of fun things to do. When we decide to put a stop to our addictions we start to deal with pain. Pain, fear, anxiety, confusion and frustration are waiting for us. It's this that makes staying clean so hard. It's not something anybody wants to do. The same goes for becoming an addict. No one has ever planned on being addicted. Nobody I've ever talked to or heard about want's to be addicted. No one wants to suffer. There is a saying in the recovery community that goes - my worst day sober was better than my best day as an addict. When I was starting out I couldn't imagine what a good day would be like. I had no good feelings. No good ideas. I can say now that I agree with that statement. If I don't do drugs I have a chance of being happy. If I do drugs, if I practice any mood altering addiction, I only postpone the possibility of real happiness. That would be "my best day in addiction". Being insane and postponing any chance at happiness and sanity. Bad days sober are, at the very least, opportunities to make progress. Here is a promise I can make, when faced with the choice of practicing an addiction or not practicing the addiction - not practicing the addiction is always easier.

I've laid out most of what I've come to see as the "keys to recovering" from any addiction. The only thing you will need to do is make decisions. Make choices. Never more than one at a time. Let me know if you need anything or if anything isn't made clear. Like I said, this site is here to help you recover from whatever addictions or habitual behaviors you may have. Habitual behaviors include worrying, anxiety, stress, fear, anger and so on. I don't know anybody that doesn't suffer from this type of habitual behavior. There are differences in degree but I've never met anyone who is free from them. We are all in the same boat as humans. Again - dealing with the problem is always easier.

Addiction or Sanity

For all of us who are, or have been addicted, there is never the surety of our own sanity. Most of us are escaping from a world that we see as insane. Is what goes on in the world around us sane? For the most part I would have to say no. The problem with escaping is it leads us to our own form of insanity. In the end, instead of escaping, we end up becoming part of the whole insanity problem. Especially if we escape through drugs. Drugs eat away the brains capacity to function. That's the simplest way to put it. I could spend pages and hours in detailed explanation but it's already been written. I have included a lot of the writings here and you can get the details. But right now I want to get started on understanding the importance of sanity. Your happiness is directly related to your sanity. Your sanity is directly related to your understanding of life. All life. Everything that takes place around us and in us. Until we stop the addiction we can't move on to a deeper understanding of life. Granted a lot of addicted people may have a better understanding of life than some people who don't have a bothersome addiction. This is not relevant to our recovery process. If we think we have a good understanding of life but we're still addicted then our understanding isn't good - enough. There is nothing stopping us from improving our understanding - we can start right here, right now.

No one in this world has all the understanding necessary to give a complete picture of life or addiction. We have some information. Some observations. Some theories. Here is one observation about addiction I have found to be very helpful: What ends up as an addiction always begins as a reaction to an environment. Everything begins as a reaction to an environment. It's always a combination of the inner and outer environment. Addiction is a condition that takes form, over time, as a result of escape from an environment. We: our brains, our ideas, beliefs and understandings are part of that environment. These ideas, beliefs, understandings and so on...these thoughts...are what I refer to as "the inner environment". This is all explained in detail as we go along. If this, or anything, isn't fully understandable that's OK for right now. There's no pressing need to understand all aspects of addiction to stop practicing the addiction. The only thing that matters right now is that we start the process that leads to being happy and living happier healthier lives. Without the happiness part, why would anyone want to quit?

Let me assure you that happiness is possible. For everyone. My objective is that you and I be sane and happy. All the addiction stuff is just stuff. The only reason it has any significance to us at all is that, in order to be completely sane and happy, it needs to stop. All insane behavior stands in the way of our happiness. Addiction is insane behavior.

"Old Ideas"

Old ideas are those which stand in the way of ending our addictions. They are what causes our unhappiness.

The ideas and methods here will help overcome any problem: including all addictive or obsessive behavior. The following statement sort of sums up my initial approach to the whole addiction/recovery/happy idea, "If you want to solve a problem - it's a good idea to know what the problem is". First and foremost we must understand the problem. Any other approach is a waste of time and energy. I'll focus a lot of attention on - identifying and separating fantasy from reality. When the lines between fantasy and reality become blurred all forms of discomfort and confusion arise. All personal and global problems, destructive behaviors, bad habits, addictions and just plain old suffering are symptoms of this mix up.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about. Lets call the mix up - a mistake. Think about any recipe. You're trying to make something by combining certain ingredients. You're looking for a particular result. So you add the ingredients and if you've followed the directions you get what you were after. If in the end what you've got is not what you wanted - what would you do? You could say, "this recipe isn't right". Or it could be that you simply made a mistake. Either way, a mistake was made. It's yours, or it's the recipes. Happiness is like that. All the things in this world, are like that.

If our end result isn't what we were shooting for we've either made a mistake, or our recipe is no good. These are the only possibilities. This is what stands between a person and a true sense of happiness and joy. The first step on the road to complete freedom is the recognition and acceptance of this concept.

There are millions of self help books and websites available. People promise you they have the answer. But still our problems persist. The global anxiety level continues to rise. I want to be very clear about this one thing: there is no magical cure. Our problems don't come about mysteriously or magically. So in turn they won't be solved in a mysterious or magical way. So we can stop looking for magic potions. Stop thinking about them. It's fantasy. It's part of the problem. The good news is that all our difficulties come about through a very simple, explainable process. It's really not complicated. As is most often the case with people, change seems difficult. But that doesn't mean it's complicated. Changing is very, very simple. This may seem a bit confusing. Isn't changing ones thoughts and behaviors really hard? The answer is, yes and no. Sometimes we change ideas and behaviors and don't even realize it. Sometimes we can work at changing something for years and stay the same. Sometimes we're worse off than when we started. Wanting to change and not making the change is really frustrating. For people with addictions the only thing harder than changing, is not changing. But, it's still very simple. Here's an example of simple but hard. Do we want to be happy? Pretty simple yes? Then why aren't we? That's harder to understand isn't it? Does that mean it's complicated? First we have one simple decision to make: do we really want to be happy. The second decision is equally simple, but a little harder to make. It is this: am I willing to give up those things that cause my unhappiness. Sound to simple? Giving up, discarding, "letting go" of "things" is all that ever stands in the way of our complete happiness.

For all of us who want to be happy: we have very little to do. We have done enough - too much. We have, very simply put, assembled our individual difficulties, addictions and sufferings. We've gotten recipes and formulas that didn't work, or we've made mistakes with our ingredients. It simply needs to be undone. Dismantled. Then we start again. For those of us who've suffered under the yoke of addiction - principles were the key ingredients in the formula for attaining happiness in our recovery.

Honesty, Open-mindedness and Willingness are the key principles involved in this process.

"The closed mind is a captive, a willing prisoner of old ideas."

Keys to recovery

It has always seemed to me that getting off whatever we want to get off of should work the same as everything else we run into in this world. But I hear and see people all the time who have done what was suggested and put forth a fair amount of effort with no lasting success. I couldn't help but ask myself why. I didn't accept the, "They just didn't want it bad enough", story. Granted some didn't, but by no means all. I thought that there was more to it and set out to find out what it was. I have come to some conclusions and these are what we'll go over in the following sections.

About this site

I've written a guided diagnostic of the 12 step process used by the founders of the AA program. As an introduction to principles I think it's unsurpassed. I do find that some points are not covered. I go over these in depth. One thing we find out, if we go to some meetings and observe the people who have been there a while, is that anyone can stay clear of their primary addiction. Not just anybody in their right mind. Not just people with a modicum of good sense, of good character or exceptional discipline but Literally anybody. So it's not a matter of ones mental or biological make up. Also, it's not just going through the steps. I know people that have been sober for years and never taken the steps. Others claim to have taken the steps and continue to slip.

I reasoned that there is a cause and effect system that works universally and I have done my best to include a clear explanation of that system here. I write more as I discover it and update the "addiction help" sections at least once a week. At the time of this writing: may 6th, 2009; the site has officially been up for four months. Get in touch with me, and others, through the Forum if you want to share helpful information and ideas.

"How to use this site" This site was made primarily to offer methods and guides to people suffering from, standard definition, addictions. (heroin, sex, alcohol...) But it's not written exclusively for any group. Nor should any person exclude *himself thinking the information on the site won't address their particular issues. What initiates addictions is what initiates all human suffering and alienation. If you are looking for answers because you're just feeling a little lost, the solutions (formulas) are the same. If you just want to understand people, society, life, politics etc., this is a good place to get started. All that is part of, how I view and work at recovering. I'm recovering from every bit of nonsense that got jammed in my head.
[* that's himself as in mankind. It doesn't mean just boys...I mention this because I'm not going to play those silly political games. We're dealing with a life and death issue...]

The part that's not here

That would be anything that is presently unknowable. You can find miles of this on the internet, in libraries, colleges, history books and religions. The other day I came across an excerpt from one of the most published gurus of our time. The title of this writing was, "What happens when you die". There is nothing wrong with making things up, as long as we know we're making things up. It's fun...it may even turn out to be real. Telling people things are real, when you really "can't" know what you're talking about, has caused a world of grief. One of my main objectives is finding and eliminating belief in the not-real. Not adding more.

Personal Addiction Experience

It has been suggested that I include my personal experience with the issues being discussed. At the age thirteen or fourteen I did heroin and it relieved me of my problems. They just went away. I looked at all the things, people, peoples actions, peoples schools and ideas that used to bother me and although I could still see them, it no longer concerned me. For the next 35 years I had one primary goal. To stay in that state of non-concern. I drank until I could no longer physically tolerate it. My liver could not deal with any more alcohol. I was able to stay submerged with heroin but that also had it's physical consequences and limits. Although I'm not going to get in to detail I will state for the record: I've seen some very bad things, done a lot of things I'm not proud of and lived through the guilt, anger and fear associated with "my life". Although I can still experience these unhealthy emotional states they are, for the most part, gone. I'm no longer confused or overwhelmed by what goes on in the world of people. This is not to say I'm not affected from my involvement with it. It's just that when negative emotions arise, I no longer have to react to them. After all, I made them.

When I went into my last chemical detox facility I weighed 146 lbs. I now have a healthy weight of 190 lbs. I was at the end of the line and followed all the suggestions made by the people in the facility. I just went where they said I should go and did what they said I should do. At 90 days I slept for 4 hours without waking. Up until then barely a solid hour was to be had. So I was, as you can imagine, quite crazy and very unhealthy. There was nothing to do but take it. So that's what I did.

We are all able to progress towards a self determined path.

What can you expect? Like I was told by a mentor who collected me from detox, "It's all uphill from here". Having made the climb I can tell you this: I have no desire to go through it again. Ever...

"Keys to understanding"

from Author, Machaelle Wright

"During an expansion of consciousness, our intellectual understanding of what we are experiencing is challenged because it is new to us. Like anything new, if we try to force an understanding of it through the framework of what we already know, we end up confused and possibly misinterpreting the experience. If we truly wish to expand our consciousness, that expansion can only serve to render our old framework obsolete.

"We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come." Joseph Campbell

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