Writing about shadow for the past few weeks brought me to thinking about addiction. My own journey through addiction is one of the most powerful experiences I've had with shadow. Hitting bottom in my early twenties pushed me to consciously meet my shadow for the first time.
I went to rehab in the mid eighties when addiction was first coming to forefront in this country. I was the youngest person in treatment. After a few relapses I became willing to go to any lengths to stay clean.
I went to NA and AA regularly. I got a sponsor and worked all twelve steps several times. I chaired meetings and did service work. I sponsored other addicts. For almost five years I worked as a psych tech in three inpatient rehab centers. NA and AA saved my life.
I realized pretty early in my recovery that not everyone in meetings was doing recovery the same way. For some not getting high was enough. For others staying clean meant spiritual growth and ongoing change. It was rude awakening to discover that not getting high didn't magically make me different. The baggage I got high to ignore was still there. So was my self-loathing and fear that if anyone really knew who I was, they wouldn't like me. I needed to be different to live in my own skin.
I used the twelve steps as a foundation to begin working on me. I also worked with several therapists, both traditional and nontraditional, and explored other forms of spirituality that resonated with me.
I changed. I lived "clean" for seventeen years. On my fortieth birthday I had a beer. That was not a relapse or a slip. It was a conscious choice made after a year of sitting with the idea. That beer didn't lead to my old addiction coming back to destroy my life.
When I share that story with people, I am generally met with disbelief, concern or confusion. I once had a retired therapist respond with "So you weren't really an addict." Yes, I was an addict. Addiction is part of my shadow and will always be part of who I am. Like any of my little monsters, meeting my addiction head on allowed me to create a conscious relationship with it.
That relationship is what changed in the years I was "clean". When I lived my addiction, my life was about avoiding myself. Now that my life is no longer about avoiding me, substances aren't an issue.
I heard over and over in twelve step meetings that alcohol and drugs weren't the problem. My reaction to them and the way I used them was. I experienced the truth of that statement. For many years I transferred my addiction from drugs and alcohol to twelve step programs. That became the focus of my life. I was just as immersed there as I'd been in my using. In the last few years of my involvement with twelve step programs I saw how my using and my focus on not using were equal partners in making my life about addiction.
I saw the same addiction process to varying degrees people who didn't attend twelve step meetings. This brought me to questioning what addiction is really about. It obviously wasn't as black and white as I believed. Human beings are creatures of habit. In a sense, that makes us all addicts.
When I looked around in twelve step meetings I could rarely find a single person who was addiction free. They were "clean" and smoked, exercised all the time, drank enormous amounts of coffee, worked 60 hours a week or ate enough sugar to send a mastodon into a diabetic coma. When I looked a bit deeper at the people who seemed eat well all the time and had everything under control, I realized their addiction had transferred to controlling themselves.
Outside of meetings I met people who were just as addicted to their persona and their image of who they are as a heroine addict is to dope. In the long run that addiction is as self-destructive as alcohol or meth. It's simply more socially acceptable.
So I can't say the line between habit and addiction is whether or not it becomes self-destructive. I haven't yet met a human being who doesn't cycle through using their favourite escape excessively. Even if it only goes on for a few days or weeks, that excess is a bit self-destructive. The tendency toward self-destruction is an aspect of the human races shadow. I suspect consciously indulging that destructive tendency is a way to give the shadow its due.
At the height of my addiction, my life was about using. I'd surrendered my life and myself completely to my addiction. Stepping away from the object of that addiction for seventeen years allowed me to rebuild a life that was focused on growth and change rather than on using. I couldn't have done that without meeting what was behind my addiction: self-loathing, fear of who I am, wounding and shadow.
My addictive personality is part of my shadow. It cannot be removed or destroyed. In my relationship with it I have the choice to deny, avoid or integrate. My choice to deny and avoid my addiction for years only served to feed it. That resulted in me being owned by my addiction.
The obsession component of addiction is still a part of who I am. When that little monster comes out to play, I flop down on the couch and watch an entire season of Orphan Black in a day. The flip side of obsession is the ability to single-mindedly focus on one thing for an extended period of time. I use that when I work with clients, when I'm writing and to problem solve. It also strengthens my ability to be the observer and to witness.
Being creatures of habit, we are all addicts. I wonder if our first addiction isn't to our need for habits which provide stability and comfort in an uncertain world.
For years I heard "Once an addict, always an addict" in twelve step meetings. I still believe that. Like any other part of my shadow, addiction is mine for life. During my last few years in twelve step meetings I wondered if my focus on staying out of my addiction wasn't just a new way to repress it. I knew there had to be another option beyond living in fear of my addiction and putting constant effort into avoiding it. Use or make your life about not using was too black and white, too much of an either/or.
There is another option, integration. After nine years drinking socially, my addiction takes up less head space and has less affect on my life than it when I was nine years clean. I'm not about to say this is the best route for all addicts to take. I just know it worked and is working for me.
I also heard over and over in twelve step meetings "You know what happens to people who stop going to meetings." For years I believed that. But what I really knew is what happened to the people who stopped going to meetings, surrendered again to their addictions and came back. Since stepping away from twelve step programs I've met others who chose integration and have built lives where addiction is a minor player rather an ongoing focus.
So I can't say the line between habit and addiction is whether or not it becomes self-destructive. I haven't yet met a human being who doesn't cycle through using their favourite escape excessively. Even if it only goes on for a few days or weeks, that excess is a bit self-destructive. The tendency toward self-destruction is an aspect of the human races shadow. I suspect consciously indulging that destructive tendency is a way to give the shadow its due.
At the height of my addiction, my life was about using. I'd surrendered my life and myself completely to my addiction. Stepping away from the object of that addiction for seventeen years allowed me to rebuild a life that was focused on growth and change rather than on using. I couldn't have done that without meeting what was behind my addiction: self-loathing, fear of who I am, wounding and shadow.
My addictive personality is part of my shadow. It cannot be removed or destroyed. In my relationship with it I have the choice to deny, avoid or integrate. My choice to deny and avoid my addiction for years only served to feed it. That resulted in me being owned by my addiction.
The obsession component of addiction is still a part of who I am. When that little monster comes out to play, I flop down on the couch and watch an entire season of Orphan Black in a day. The flip side of obsession is the ability to single-mindedly focus on one thing for an extended period of time. I use that when I work with clients, when I'm writing and to problem solve. It also strengthens my ability to be the observer and to witness.
Being creatures of habit, we are all addicts. I wonder if our first addiction isn't to our need for habits which provide stability and comfort in an uncertain world.
For years I heard "Once an addict, always an addict" in twelve step meetings. I still believe that. Like any other part of my shadow, addiction is mine for life. During my last few years in twelve step meetings I wondered if my focus on staying out of my addiction wasn't just a new way to repress it. I knew there had to be another option beyond living in fear of my addiction and putting constant effort into avoiding it. Use or make your life about not using was too black and white, too much of an either/or.
There is another option, integration. After nine years drinking socially, my addiction takes up less head space and has less affect on my life than it when I was nine years clean. I'm not about to say this is the best route for all addicts to take. I just know it worked and is working for me.
I also heard over and over in twelve step meetings "You know what happens to people who stop going to meetings." For years I believed that. But what I really knew is what happened to the people who stopped going to meetings, surrendered again to their addictions and came back. Since stepping away from twelve step programs I've met others who chose integration and have built lives where addiction is a minor player rather an ongoing focus.
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