addiction

In the past, I assumed that to be a paramedic was to be superhuman.

But as I’ve become more aware of the power of trauma on the human psyche, I know that isn’t the case.

It’s just not possible to remain unaffected by trauma. And a new documentary, After The Sirens, makes that abundantly clear.

Unaddressed trauma is the cause of PTSD.

PTSD often shows its face as addiction and we are really good at judging addicts. We label ourselves authorities in regard to what warrants compassion and kindness, instead of trying to understand why a person turned to drugs or alcohol in the first place.

I’ve learned over the years that no matter how hard we try, judgement and turning the other cheek doesn’t dissolve a person’s pain.

Only understanding can help a person recover.

Through courageous first-person accounts, After The Sirens shines a light on what happens to our first responders when they don’t receive the support they need. Paramedics experience extensive amounts of on-the-job trauma and because of that, a shocking number of them are experiencing PTSD, turning to drugs and alcohol to quell the symptoms, and in many cases ending their lives.

This documentary provides an opportunity for us to understand the repercussions trauma has on the human psyche. It gives a face to the pain someone feels when they don’t feel safe enough to come forward with career-created PTSD.

Because let’s get clear on this: it’s not career-related, it’s career-created.

We need to hear these stories so we can work on releasing the unproductive beliefs we hold about what it is to suffer from mental health issues and addiction.

We need to stop denying those who are suffering the compassion, kindness and support they need to recover.

It’s not that I don’t have hope and I don’t see hope, it’s that I just wish there was more of it. – Paramedic Clive Derbyshire

Hope is born of being understood and supported, and the process of validating a person’s pain can help cultivate the hope they need to recover.

We support paramedics by validating their PTSD on both a government and social level.

We need to start listening to their stories. The statistics make it a necessity: In 2016, 56 per 100,000 paramedics died of suicide. And that number doesn’t include the deaths that weren’t reported by family as being paramedics.

Educating Ourselves = Understanding = Social Change. So let’s get educated and make change happen by watching this documentary.

Show your support by watching the World Broadcast Premiere of After The Sirens on Sunday, April 8th, 2018 at 9:00 pm (9:30 NT) on CBC DOCS POV

You can also watch it online at cbc.ca/cbcdocspov/ on Friday, April 6 from 5:00 pm ET

RESOURCES FOR PARAMEDICS SUFFERING FROM PTSD: 

Steps to take after watching After The Sirens**

Sometimes you gotta suck it up and let that stupid comment go.

You’ve got to ignore the messages from the person who refuses ownership – who refuses to acknowledge their part in what you’re parlaying.

And it sucks because in order to be free you need to let some people continue to just not get it. Maybe even let them think you’re the one to blame.

We’ve got our hands full because we have this buddy of ours, our ego, who really wants us to get all up in someone’s inbox, and let them know that what they’re dishing out isn’t OK.

I love my ego – It cracks me up. It teaches me to stand up for myself. But there are many, many times where I’ve had to say, “Thanks for the motivation bud, but I’m tapping out on this one. There is no point in pursuing the need to be right with this particular person.”

Sometimes you have to suck it up and let someone think you’re wrong in the name of self-care.

Even when people try to displace all the wrong right back on to you, you have to hit delete and carry on.

Especially when it comes to addicts. Because you can’t expect truth and generosity and bravery from someone who is locked in an addiction. It is simply not possible, and to try for it is a disservice to your health. 

Addicts are living in survival mode, which skews their ability to witness or acknowledge reality.

A person with a heavily ingrained addiction will do whatever they can to protect and defend it and the lifestyle it requires to survive. (Think dissociation. Heavy doses of it.)

I’m not saying the folks without hardcore addictions are always right. No one is immune to being arrogant, narcissistic or selfish on occasion (Because we are human, through and through.)

But when you don’t have a crutch killing off brain cells faster than you can make them, you’ve got a lot more clarity than those who do.

Ego has a field day with hangovers and withdrawals, using it as prime time to make sure everyone knows that no matter what, it is never wrong.

It remains committed to denying ownership or responsibility for any chaos that results from its wake.

And sadly addicts don’t know how to be emotionally generous, specifically in situations where they are being called on to step up and take ownership of the outcomes of their behaviours.

As much as we want to clap back and let them know how we really feel – that what they are dishing out is grade A bullshit – we need to be strategic about our efforts.

As my friend Jen used to say: “Choose Your Battles.”

Self-care is more important than attempting to convince someone who isn’t capable of being generous that you’re right.

Which means sometimes you just have to walk away. Or hit the delete button. Or mute the conversation. Whatever works. 😉

Thanks for taking time out of your day to read this post. 🙂

I’m going to talk about something no one will admit to doing in this fentanyl-laced society, but a lot of people still do: cocaine.

If you do a quick google search you’ll see loads of articles about all the fentanyl deaths due to drug use these days. It’s horrifying, to say the least.

What you don’t know is that these headlines aren’t stopping people from doing it. There are loads of folks who still use it on a regular basis.

These are people with nice cars, good jobs, mortgages, vacation funds. They are mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters.

It sounds weird, right? Why would people who seemingly have their lives together, and have so much going for them risk losing it all for cocaine?

And it’s hard not to judge them, right? I mean on the surface it appears to be the dumbest thing you could do: risk your life for a temporary high. And it’s not like they’re all using it daily either. For some, its one-offs a few times a year. Why bother?

I’m going to explain why a person would risk everything for cocaine.

I used to use cocaine – a lot. I was a severely depressed person who spent years self-medicating with alcohol. Cocaine worked in conjunction with booze. It boosted my dopamine levels more than any anti-depressant ever could or did. It made me feel better. It allowed for a temporary reprieve from my intense depression.

Here’s how it would go: I’d feel depressed and start drinking. Shortly thereafter my inhibitions would go out the window and I’d make the call. By “make the call” I mean call a drug dealer. There was always some guy to pick it up from. Some of them would even deliver.

I could have killed myself. But I made it out the other end of what research and psychologists acknowledge as being the hardest cycle of self-medicating to get out of.

That’s right: the cycle of a depressed person using cocaine and alcohol to self-medicate is the hardest addiction to recover from.

Why? Because for every high you experience from a line of coke the lows are devastating. You end up even more depressed than you were before. So you drink to feel better. And a couple of glasses of wine in you think, “gee, I know what would make me feel even better.”

Then you are depressed for days afterwards. And if you just can’t take it anymore you decide to pick up another bottle of wine and the cycle continues.

At my worst, I used cocaine most weekends and sometimes during the week. I know people who have the same schedule today. And I also know people who use it less frequently.

What I want everyone to understand about people who use cocaine is that they aren’t pieces of shit. They aren’t terrible human beings who should be given up on.

They are people who are suffering. And I know they are suffering because they wouldn’t feel the need to escape from their lives to such a degree if they weren’t.

They wouldn’t feel the need to risk their lives whenever they make the call to that drug dealer who is “cool and would never sell coke with fentanyl in it.”

They try to justify using coke with statements like, “I just want to have a good time.” or, “it’s just once in a while.”

But let’s deconstruct these troubling statements. How much self-hatred exists in a person if they attribute staying up all night, risking their lives to do cocaine and binge drink with having fun?

How much pain must be hiding behind that surface-level success we see from the outside?

Therein lies the problem: Too many people don’t like themselves. Too many people are hurting. Too many people are living in survival mode with zero self-worth or sense of self, doing their damnedest to justify their high-risk behaviour by labelling it as a good time.

Here’s what isn’t a good time:

• The pain loved ones feel when they find out their parent/sibling/wife/husband/child risked his or her life for a good time.
• The devastation someone feels when they realize they can’t have said person in their lives anymore.
• The betrayal a person feels when the drug use get’s minimized like it’s not a big deal.

I don’t know how to fix this issue. I don’t know how to make people love themselves enough to stop doing drugs like this.

All I can say is that I see you, I hear you, I care about you, and that you are loved. Because I’ve been there. And I know it’s not easy to change. 

But please do whatever it takes to find a spark of self-worth big enough to motivate change. I’m begging you, no matter what your usage levels are, do whatever it takes to consider a life without this deadly crutch.

Because you deserve so much more than throwing your life away over a night of coke. 

Truth: People who love themselves don’t risk their lives for drugs. People who hurt do.

If you want to understand the cycle of addiction and what leads to it I recommend reading Dr. Gabor Mate’s book, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts, and watching the documentary, In Utero.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share it so we can help release the stigma about drug use and mental health.

I might have spent 20 plus years on a convoluted quest to feed an addiction to things, like alcohol, cigarettes, shopping, and drugs. But the act of avoiding my fears was the soil that these socially unacceptable vices of mine grew out of.

I embraced fear in the early double digits — around 12 or 13. I started to believe that to live was to suffer and there was no way around it. I thought I was destined to experience a lifetime of discontent.

So I began to worry a lot, about everything: making mistakes and being rejected for it, not being perfect and being abandoned by my friends and family because of it, never being able to make enough money, and not being able to sleep.

Needless to say, all that fear caused a lot of problems. I struggled with intense bouts of depression and anxiety, got sick a lot, and had major sleep issues. And I was forever feeling terrible, both mentally and physically.

So to distract myself from this learned addiction to fear and the feelings surrounding it, I began to commit my life to the act of avoiding it.

It all started with shopping. As a kid, if I had a really bad day or week, my mom would buy me clothes. And I’d feel better, albeit temporarily. So when I could, I started doing it on my own, the problem being that I didn’t have the money she had.

I was ruthless about it: I would go to any means possible to get what I wanted. All that mattered was the rush I got in the immediate moment of purchase, and the subsequent feelings of comfort surrounding getting the items home and hung up in my closet.

I coveted anything new and expensive, and I became obsessed with the constant pursuit of acquiring things that made me look good on the outside. And It was all done in the name of avoiding feelings of inadequacy that stemmed from that dreaded emotion, fear.

Shortly after I began to embrace shopping as an avoidance tactic I found alcohol. 

I loved it — another escape, albeit a more powerful one. I essentially became a functioning alcoholic in my late teens, until I reached my mid 20’s, and there was no way to hide the fact that I’d lost the ability to do so.

And then there was the smoking that started in my teens, and the drugs that came into play in my 20s – the use of which evolved and intensified as the years passed.

I could go into great detail about how my life fell apart because of all these destructive activities that I felt I needed to survive and be happy. But I’d rather focus on the motivations behind these addictions, as I feel they are most important.

Straight up, I didn’t know how to love myself.  I was never taught how to. And when you don’t have self-love you get the opposite of it, fear.

Based on my views of life, and how terrible I believed it was destined to be, I began to embrace behaviors grounded in fear, like negativity, and aggression.

The logic behind my commitment to negativity and aggression goes like this: If I called out the world as being terrible, rather than letting the flow of terrible only be directed at me, I could feel like I had more power and control.

So I became a beacon for aggression and negativity. I was sending and receiving it and it dictated the direction my life went for many years.

You can imagine how difficult it would be to wrangle in an ego that out of control. That sucker was like a wild horse. To spend 20 years being scared, angry, and bitter, and then to attempt the work involved in removing that toxicity from my mind and soul has been one hell of a process. And it’s not over.

Negativity and aggression is like a blanket with thorns. I get scared and cold, so I want to wrap myself in it, but every time I do I end up scratched  to shit.

And I can’t even get frustrated at myself about it anymore — I know it’s my subconscious trying to protect me.

Because all addictions, whether to things, feelings and emotions, or behaviors, come about as a means to keep us safe. Even though they end up doing the opposite.

I’d like to say I have it all figured out — that I have it all under control. I’d also like to be able to share a clear explanation for how I released my addictions, and learned to deal with my fear in a more constructive way,  because I think that could help a lot of people.

But the truth is I’m still trying to figure out how to keep some of my go-to’s,  like negativity and shopping, at bay. I still default to them when I feel the rush of fear, telling me to put up my guards of aggression, or my credit card.

And while I’m still working on understanding and explaining exactly how I managed to pull myself out of the darkest times in my life, I’m also trying to deal with fear in a different way.

I still feel it. In fact, I feel it more than I’d like to or know to be healthy. But whereas before my greatest fears stemmed from being abandoned or ridiculed, the scariest moments I experience now are when I realize I no longer have my addictions to comfort me.

I feel a deep ache of mourning every time I realize that my fear or anger can’t be helped with a bout of rage, a cigarette, a bottle of wine, drugs, or some emotionally charged shopping.

And In some ways I miss my addictions like one would miss an old friend who passed away. I mourn the loss of them every single time I am upset.

This new response to fear, which encompasses the realization that I have to feel this – there is no way out – is bewildering to me. It’s such a foreign concept, to know there’s nothing that can be done but just feel what I’m feeling until it passes.

But I have no other choice. This is what life has offered me. I can only surmise that the fact that I’m experiencing the feelings or emotions I’m experiencing, is so I can learn that I can and will survive them –  if I only choose to surrender.

Surrendering to everything — every good experience and every bad one — is how I choose to live these days. Some days I really struggle with it, because I’m human, and I have this ego that wants its own way, all the time. But on others I handle everything in spectacular fashion, and really amaze myself in the process.

Every day though, I continue to train myself to get used to the idea of a bad feeling not being life ending. And in doing so I teach myself to fear less, trust more, and make better choices that contribute to my health and wellness — not my addictions.

If you likes this post, please share it. 🙂

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One of my best girlfriends and I have been working on committing to a less-is-more life.

She wants to focus on being in the moment for herself and for her family. And get rid of a bunch of stuff, because too much stuff means stress.

I feel the same way. Particularly about the stuff part. Most of my life I was obsessed with the pursuit of it. And although the desire for more has lessened in intensity, it’s still very much alive and well.

So what are the things I find myself wanting? Usually, things to do with making my exterior look better. Sephora has never been a safe store for me. It’s pretty easy for me to become consumed with all the high-end lipsticks and convince myself that I need one.

I’m getting better at it. I can talk myself off the consumer ledge and say, “hey, you know this will be around after pay-day, and you can come back then instead of stressing yourself out with guilt by buying it now.”

But it’s not even the timing of the purchase that concerns me anymore. And it’s not that I have a major issue with buying myself a lipstick either. I appreciate quality items, particularly when it comes to cosmetics. The issue I have is that I already have all of these:

evidence a

I don’t NEED any new lipsticks. I’ve got everything on the colour wheel that matches my skin tone. And I hardly wear any of them anyway.

So what’s with my drive to get a new one, even though I don’t need it?

Something inside doesn’t feel good, and I think lipstick will fix it.

This isn’t the worst case scenario. Wine used to be my fix-it of choice. So much so that there was a time I considered myself to be fully addicted to alcohol.

I can happily say that those days are behind me, but I still have this tick: this void that I try to fill with stuff.

I’m not in hoarder territory (full disclosure: that’s an insignificant detail my ego feels the need to include so I don’t feel ashamed about what I just shared.) The issue is that I still feel the forever empty.

And although the intensity of it has subsided, it’s still there, and it still runs the show at times.

Hence the lipsticks.

It doesn’t affect my life the way alcohol did: with a new lipstick I can still write. But it remains an overpriced band-aid that siphons from my physical and emotional bank account.

So yeah, I have these little ways in which I try to suffocate the inadequate feelings. And one of those happens to be by buying things.

evidence b

Lately, it’s been vitamins and supplements. As soon as I get paid, I’m off to the local health food store to pick up a slew of concoctions I’ve convinced myself I need. And while I tell myself I need it (“it’s for my health”) I don’t know that I really do. At least not all of it. (see evidence b)

I’m spending too much money. And I’m doing the same thing I used to do with alcohol: putting it before everything else, even before groceries at times, because I believe I must have it.

My spending sprees aren’t working. And there’s no proof the vitamins are working either.

What I’m ending up with is a new addiction and a sad-looking bank account. So I think it’s time to go back to the beginning and simplify. Release the false need for stuff, and step up to focusing on the activities that are proven to make me feel good, such as:

1. Meditating twice a day
2. Stretching/yoga
3. Walking in nature
4. Writing
5. Eating and preparing whole foods with an emphasis on plant-based
6. Reading inspirational books

Sometimes we just need a reminder of what’s really important, and what works best for us in order to be in our optimal state. That’s what this is for me.

I’m open to taking some vitamins, but the amount I have convinced myself I need is excessive. And it’s been a good beard for the truth:

Wellness comes from within.

I’m going to commit to focusing on how I can make myself feel better – all by myself. Without the high-priced supplements. And sadly, the lipsticks. (Even right now as I type that I’m wanting one. Yeesh.)

I can start the process by answering the following question, courtesy of Danielle LaPorte*

How do you want to feel, in order to achieve this less is more life?

Here are my answers, in no particular order:

Peaceful

Calm

Secure

Safe

Confident

Strong

Healthy

Generous

Lighter – mentally and physically

Energetic

Balanced

Grateful

Free

Creative

Prosperous

Abundant

So after writing that list, it’s pretty clear to me that I’m not going to experience those feelings by taking a supplement or buying an expensive lipstick.

That being said, I think I know what I need to do. At least I know where to start.

xo

A

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I took the first step towards my emotional undoing in college.

At the time it was very important to me that I attend because it meant I was intelligent. A college degree in a frame would validate that I wasn’t a screw up: I was a legitimate human being deserving of respect.

Unfortunately, I started to hate it.

Not college per se, but the program I was enrolled in. The lectures on theories that didn’t stimulate my interest in any capacity were sucking my soul dry. And I felt stuck. I had chosen the area of study, was three years in, and had put a lot of money into my courses (as had my parents). I truly felt it wasn’t acceptable for me to change my mind.

Plus I needed that damn piece of paper to prove my worth.

It all started the day I was born. In my family, being a girl wasn’t valued. Women were considered untrustworthy: they wanted your money to buy purses, were less intelligent than men, and were incapable of offering anything of substance to a conversation.

I know now that it wouldn’t have mattered what I accomplished in school. I could have become a Dr or a lawyer, but the truth would always eradicate the perceived value in the details: I was female, and a professional designation wouldn’t change that fact. The societal status it garnered might put me on the mantel for a while, but my inherent defect would always pull me down again.

Part of me accepted the degrading masochistic beliefs, but my heart stayed loyal to my spirit, which knew I was worth something more than the limitations I was born into. I spent much of my life distraught over the internal struggle between my brain and my heart.

And I carried the battle with me to college, where I found it incomprehensible that I might be worth the effort change would take, and the ensuing happiness it could bring.

I knew where my heart wanted to be: creative writing. I felt overwhelmingly blissful in my stylistics class, where I was given the chance to let the words that came to me pour onto the page. My efforts were valued there, and I received an A+, along with special recognition from my professor and classmates.

But the delight I felt in that class was so foreign to me that it seemed wrong. I didn’t believe I had the right to be that happy. I was generally joy-deficient, which was familiar to me, and therefore comforting. Bliss was foreign and scary.

I felt guilty when I was too happy.

Loaded with all of that luggage, not finishing what I’d started wasn’t an option to me. Failure was worse than self-suffering. If I completed my program, maybe I would be valued, and held in a more positive light. If everyone held me in high esteem for what I had accomplished, then maybe I could learn to love myself. What a truly sad and hopeless undertaking.

So I continued half-assing my classes until the grades started to match the effort: I got a C- on one of my tests. I couldn’t bring myself to do the work, and the bad grade added more fuel to the self-deprecating fire. Sadly, there are times when that C- still haunts me.

But back then, I needed a distraction. I needed to get rid of the continuous feelings of distress. So I made a choice.

It was a weekday, early evening. I was in desperation mode. It was a bit of a joke between acquaintances that if you drank by yourself, you had problems. And up until that point, I could never push through the shame I anticipated feeling if I had drunk alone to actually do it.

But something was different that night: the need to anesthetize the misery was stronger than my want to not feel shameful for drinking alone.

So I ran away from the feelings. I ran by getting completely and utterly wasted. And then I did it again and again, off and on, to varying degrees of intensity, for over 15 years.

I’ve always been wary of anything that seems easy. “What’s the catch?” I’d say. And this appeared to be just that: easy. I could start to feel better one glass of wine in, with happiness intensifying after every sip.

At the time the short-term repercussions appeared to be a hangover, which I’d had plenty of experience managing since a teenager. But the long-term effects were much more damaging.

The depression, aggression, guilt, shame, anxiety, and brain fog for days afterward – they were merciless. So I’d drink to get rid of them too. Soon alcohol became my go-to solo-escape mechanism. Removing the unmanageable feelings became #1 on my to-do list.

I experienced a lot of backlash. Family members said a lot of nasty things. I can only imagine what other people thought or said about me. None of that helped. I was a shell of a human then, and for many years following. I was in survival mode, caught in a self-medicating loop.

I learned the hard way that bullying someone who is suffering never creates a positive outcome.

I’ve also learned that it’s best to air on the side of compassion when considering a scenario you don’t understand, particularly when you know nothing of the history behind the behavior.

Drinking wasn’t about me wanting to have a good time – it was about me not wanting to feel. 

If I’m being real, hell yes I’m still pissed off about how mean those people were. But I also know we aren’t owed anything in life, and I’m 100% sure I was no angel back then.

There’s some good stuff that came of it though: my ability to feel and show compassion and empathy for those who suffer has intensified.

And while it really hurt to know that my pain fuelled merciless judgment, it’s always good to know what people are capable of.

I can now make the choice to keep my distance from people who aren’t capable of being kind, and I can work on offering others the love and support I had wished for all those years ago.

Logic would dictate that I should have changed my circumstances in college, helping rather than hindering myself. But fear is one hell of a drug.

I was terrified of facing the feelings and emotions tied to my discontent, and I made the choice to numb myself through self-medicating, a practice commonly used by those who suffer from anxiety, depression, and unresolved trauma.

And now, everyday I must choose to make better decisions. I have to work hard at not taking the easy route when things get scary.

When fear comes knocking, I want to shut it out as quickly as possible.

I’ve had to practice choosing to not get wrapped up in the Facebook and Instagram posts attempting to legitimize alcohol as being a great escape for anyone who’s had a bad day.

Social media encourages us to maintain our addictions, and much of what we see (or don’t realize we see thanks to our subconscious mind) is dangerous noise, particularly for someone who is susceptible to depression and anxiety.

The bottom line is this: it’s very easy to convince yourself that every day is a bad, worthy-of-getting-wasted day, particularly when you’re continuously juggling shame, fear, and unresolved trauma. And it’s very easy to find other people who believe it’s totally acceptable to alter ones mental state in order to avoid sub-par feelings.

But the feelings will always be there to greet you in the morning, ten-fold in intensity, begging to be acknowledged. So what do we do?

We stop running from the bad feelings.

Everyone is running, they just don’t have their runners on. Some people are running while they sit on the couch, bingeing on video games or Instagram feeds instead of creating a clean, loving and safe home for their children. Some people run by binge-eating at 2 am when the whole house is asleep, even though they are severely overweight and diabetic.

And some people run by drinking alone to avoid their feelings of inadequacy and shame, even though they know the alcohol will intensify their anxiety and depression.

I’m learning that it’s OK to be raw and real. In fact, I’m working on normalizing the idea that facing it all, instead of running, is powerful. Because it’s perfectly OK to crumble, even if other people tell us it’s not.

Why are we so desperately committed to pretending we have it all figured out all the time anyway? No one was born with a golden scroll containing instructions on how to kick-ass at everything in life.

Life is challenging and entails making tough decisions, specifically, getting serious about who and what we allow into our lives. Relieving myself of the people who don’t have it in them to be supportive in the ways that allow me to flourish instead of flounder is #1 for me.

Those who only want me for how I can serve them aren’t likely to be giving off inspiring vibes. And I need to be around good vibes to become the person I want to be.

I need to be the good vibes. 

Whatever I need to do will be original, in that it’s based on what I feel is right for me. No longer can I live my life based on pleasing the cool kids, and living up to unrealistic standards. I’m sure the task list will evolve (I’m actually hoping to lower the number of tasks so I can focus on the truly important ones).

But regardless of what I end up doing, it’s pretty great to have come to a place in my life where I believe I am worth the effort it takes to change when I feel the need to.

I’m ready.

I’m ready to open my heart and mind to the idea that I am worth more than the limitations I was born into.

I’m ready to forgive myself for past digressions and accept that no matter what happens, I am worth the effort change may take.

I’m ready to create a new template for my life. And if you’re suffering, I hope you’ll consider doing the same.

 No one is immune to the waves of addiction.

They come and go, and we ride them to avoid facing the feelings on shore.

But we have to return to shore at some point, or we’ll drown.

There are lot’s of options for us to choose from if we want to run from our pain. Some tactics are accepted with ease, while others aren’t.

Fitness addict? That’s cool. Food or alcohol addiction? what a loser…

People discriminate; addiction doesn’t.

Judgement is another form of addiction, a much relied upon avoidance tactic. Judgement distracts us from our own issues. Pettiness overrides love, which happens to be the very thing an addict is looking for…

Addicts are too distracted by fear to see the possibility of love through the fog.

Addiction says you cannot handle life on your own.  It’s a constant, pessimistic, invasive reminder that you alone are not good enough. It says, “You are not powerful enough. You don’t have what it takes to thrive in this body and soul on your own. You need me to be and feel love.”

Addiction is about control.

Sensitive and empathetic people are prone to addiction. When you are born into a family with sharp peaks and unpredictable alienation, every feeling permeates your spirit. You aren’t just handling your own inherent fears, you are feeling yours AND every other family member’s individual degree of trauma.

Who the hell wants to feel that? And what kid is born with the skills to handle themselves well in that scene?

Why wouldn’t you want to avoid the feelings that scene feeds you? You didn’t sign up for that!

Pity is addiction at play.

Don’t take the pity road.

Pity says because we had a hard day we deserve more of that which takes us further from ourselves. Pity delivers us into the arms of bad decisions and invariable hangovers from whatever our drug of choice may be.

Addiction convinces us that bad decisions are OK. You know, the ones we try to justify, but because our competency is compromised by our addiction, no one is supportive of…

Try telling someone in the throes of addiction that their behavior is wrong: it won’t work. That would take ownership, and how can a person take ownership of themselves when they have no idea who they are?

Addiction keeps us from seeing what’s beneath the fog.

So how can we expect to become greatness if we bury ourselves with addictions?

We can’t.

We can have all the so-called fun we want, avoiding chances and opportunities to be great, but there are consequences.  If we want to change the world, we must find ourselves among the chaos, and stop hiding. We must become that which we are.

Validate yourself. Accept the truth. Face your pain.