SoberRecovery : Alcoholism Drug Addiction Help and Information - View Single Post - Anyone have any thoughts on Stanton Peele's Approach?

leviathon · 07-09-2006, 11:04 PM

An Excerpt from Peele that I found most informative...

The Experience of Addiction
Addiction is not caused by a drug or its chemical properties. Addiction has to do with the effect a drug produces for a given person in given circumstances-a welcomed effect which relieves anxiety and which (paradoxically) decreases capability so that those things in life which cause anxiety grow more severe. What we are addicted to is the experience the drug creates for us.

The most powerful addictive drugs in our society are, along with the narcotics, the barbiturates and alcohol. What these drugs have in common is not their chemical structures, which are widely diverse, but their common pharmacological property of depressing the action of the nervous system. In this way, they act to lessen a person's feeling of pain and sense of the difficulties in life at the same time they cause the person to be less able to deal with such difficulties. Thus begins the cycle of addiction. For as the person retreats to the drug to avoid coping, those things with which s/he must cope become less manageable and more frightening to contemplate. So potential addicts turn increasingly to the drug to gain the rewards which they are no longer capable of gaining from life, until, at some point, we may say that the main rewards are coming from the drug itself.

At this arbitrary point, people can be said to be addicted. They view those other aspects of their life with which they have ceased to deal seriously and from which they no longer gain satisfaction only in terms of how they relate to their addiction. People, jobs, other activities are all either impediments to or vehicles for obtaining the one thing they want to pursue-intoxication and loss of self-consciousness at the hands of the chosen addictive substance.

An important part of surrender to the drug is the feeling that they are not strong enough to resist it-not worthy to resist it. In some sense, they see addiction as the proper state of affairs. This negative self-image and the low self-esteem on which it is based are key points in the cyclical descent into an addiction. For the addict is someone who does not feel good about self, who dislikes the person s/he is. Addiction is predicated on a fear of the world, which is mainly an anxiety about one's own ability to cope with it. Whatever his or her actual ability, the addict believes s/he is incompetent in some significant way or area of life.

An addict welcomes the opportunity to resolve doubt and unease by being protected by some larger force, some greater power. A powerful drug, of course, fits this bill. But there are many other external structures and mechanisms to which a person can sacrifice control.

Hmmm, I can see myself in this description... also part of my problem with accepting a "higher power" to remove it all... abdicating my responsibility for myself led to my situation, I do not accept that abdicating my responsibility again by "turning it over to a higher power" can resolve it... Just my view.

Peace, Levi

07-09-2006, 11:04 PM	#27 (permalink)
leviathon Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Somwhere over the rainbow Posts: 1,176	An Excerpt from Peele that I found most informative... The Experience of Addiction Addiction is not caused by a drug or its chemical properties. Addiction has to do with the effect a drug produces for a given person in given circumstances-a welcomed effect which relieves anxiety and which (paradoxically) decreases capability so that those things in life which cause anxiety grow more severe. What we are addicted to is the experience the drug creates for us. The most powerful addictive drugs in our society are, along with the narcotics, the barbiturates and alcohol. What these drugs have in common is not their chemical structures, which are widely diverse, but their common pharmacological property of depressing the action of the nervous system. In this way, they act to lessen a person's feeling of pain and sense of the difficulties in life at the same time they cause the person to be less able to deal with such difficulties. Thus begins the cycle of addiction. For as the person retreats to the drug to avoid coping, those things with which s/he must cope become less manageable and more frightening to contemplate. So potential addicts turn increasingly to the drug to gain the rewards which they are no longer capable of gaining from life, until, at some point, we may say that the main rewards are coming from the drug itself. At this arbitrary point, people can be said to be addicted. They view those other aspects of their life with which they have ceased to deal seriously and from which they no longer gain satisfaction only in terms of how they relate to their addiction. People, jobs, other activities are all either impediments to or vehicles for obtaining the one thing they want to pursue-intoxication and loss of self-consciousness at the hands of the chosen addictive substance. An important part of surrender to the drug is the feeling that they are not strong enough to resist it-not worthy to resist it. In some sense, they see addiction as the proper state of affairs. This negative self-image and the low self-esteem on which it is based are key points in the cyclical descent into an addiction. For the addict is someone who does not feel good about self, who dislikes the person s/he is. Addiction is predicated on a fear of the world, which is mainly an anxiety about one's own ability to cope with it. Whatever his or her actual ability, the addict believes s/he is incompetent in some significant way or area of life. An addict welcomes the opportunity to resolve doubt and unease by being protected by some larger force, some greater power. A powerful drug, of course, fits this bill. But there are many other external structures and mechanisms to which a person can sacrifice control. Hmmm, I can see myself in this description... also part of my problem with accepting a "higher power" to remove it all... abdicating my responsibility for myself led to my situation, I do not accept that abdicating my responsibility again by "turning it over to a higher power" can resolve it... Just my view. Peace, Levi __________________ Hope springs eternal!