Craving (23 page)

He found himself compelled to engage other Quakers on this issue in a most remarkable way. He didn’t proselytize or argue, and he didn’t criticize or judge. Instead, John Woolman went from farm to farm, meeting with Quakers on the East Coast for more than two decades. During this process, he simply asked questions, like “What does it mean to be a moral person?” and “What does it mean to have a slave?” Woolman began this gentle and genuine questioning of his peers in the mid-eighteenth century. By 1770, slavery was almost completely eliminated from Quaker homes, a century before the rest of America would catch up.

John Woolman’s authenticity, compassion, courage, and joy were not separate, disconnected ideas. Instead, he found that the act of being true to himself led him to a life where compassion, courage, and joy were inseparable and nearly inevitable. He had let go of selfishness enough to be free of worrying about what others thought of him. While others were blocked by greed, self-centeredness, or fear, he was free to do the right thing. When John Woolman died on October 7, 1772, sadly, slavery was still rampant in America. Despite that, those present with him recorded that his last moments were filled with “the happiness, the safety, and the beauty of a life devoted to following the Heavenly Shepherd.”

Communities of recovery have appropriated Shakespeare’s “To thine own self be true” and completely transformed its meaning in the process. Being true to oneself, that is to say, being authentic, does not just produce recovery but is also a result of recovery. It’s truly a gift to be free of the constant need for the approval of others. In the
Tao Te Ching,
Lao Tzu writes

Fill your bowl to the brim

and it will spill.

Keep sharpening your knife

and it will blunt

Chase after money and security

and your heart will never unclench.

Care about people’s approval

and you will be their prisoner.

The surprising result of finding your authentic self is not simply the discovery that you are worthy, but that your essence is worthiness and that compassion, connectedness, authenticity, and love are reflections of that worthy core.

Courage

What will it take to get there? Anaïs Nin said that life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. Twelve Step members frequently refer to “the courage to change.” Courage is, in fact, the most essential quality of recovery, because without courage, none of the other needed practices are possible. It’s impossible to be authentic without courage. Yet most people have tremendous courage without ever realizing it, and this is certainly true for those who have struggled under the burden of addictions. You are generally the last person to notice your own courage, although you may see courage in others. In my work helping those who suffer from addictions and cravings, I’ve noticed that people are really blind to their own bravery. In fact, the very act of reading this book is courageous. If you hear that statement and think to yourself, “Nobody would consider reading a book to be courageous,” notice that thought. The voice that tells you that you are not courageous, that you cannot do this, that you are ordinary, is precisely what blocks you from recognizing and engaging your own courage. It’s the inertia of addictive thinking.

Addictions are fueled by stiffness and inertia. Most people who suffer from them are profoundly afraid of change. They don’t want to change their environment, their routines, their habits, or their way of looking at the world. Of course, they want to change the misery, the loneliness, the pain, and the shame, but just can’t seem to do that or to do it consistently. The irony is that as much as people who suffer from cravings dislike change, their behaviors and their disease constantly produce precisely the type of changes in their lives that hurt the most. Their rigidity actually fuels self-destructive behavior. For the food addict it might be weight gain, and for the gambling addict, bankruptcy. But one way or another, resisting flexibility and sticking to routine produce changes that are far worse that the ones they were trying to avoid.

Recovery requires flexibility. People in recovery adapt. They are open to new ways of doing things, and as a result become open to new ways of looking at things and, ultimately, new ways of experiencing life. They recognize that context matters, and they are open-minded and willing to challenge themselves. They structure their lives so that they cannot rest on their laurels. They resist the idea that they’ve figured it out; rather, they are constantly seeking to learn more about themselves and about others. Their experience is like walking up a down escalator. If they stop walking, they will move backward. Many people in recovery describe recovery as a process, a journey, not something that is ever complete, but rather something that involves seeing the new in everything, even in what may be familiar and what may seem ordinary.

The nineteenth-century American poet Walt Whitman wrote in “Song of Myself,” “Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)” People healing from craving-related self-destructive behavior can hold opposite ideas without being torn apart. They can say, “I did something I didn’t want to do, but that doesn’t make me a bad person.” They recognize that things are far more amazing and complex than they could ever seem, and yet they are open to seeing the simplicity of things as well. They are aware of the infinite in themselves and their relationships, and in particular recognize that every day offers opportunities to see and experience life in a new, richer way, even if that new experience contradicts what they surely knew to be true yesterday.

I’ve emphasized connectedness as essential to spirituality. What does it take to connect? Take a moment and reflect on someone you met as an adult but are very close to. Someone you trust and with whom you feel connected. Now ask yourself, what brought you together? Did you say to yourself, “I want to be friends with her because she never makes mistakes?” Of course not. In most cases, we connect around our warts, our imperfections, and our woundedness. Perhaps a common adversity, a shared struggle, or just a tough moment? The truth is, people connect around their brokenness, around their imperfection. Denying our suffering and our pain is not simply inauthentic; it’s tragic. The tragedy is that this denial prevents us from accessing the very joy we thought we could attain by ignoring our own wounds. Ernie Kurtz, author of
The Spirituality of Imperfection: Storytelling and the Search for Meaning,
wrote:

A spirituality of imperfection suggests that spirituality’s first step involves facing self squarely, seeing one’s self as one is: mixed-up, paradoxical, incomplete, and imperfect. Flawedness is the first fact about human beings. And paradoxically, in that imperfect foundation we find not despair but joy. For it is only within the reality of our imperfection that we can find the peace and serenity we crave.
¹²¹

Allowing your imperfections, then embracing them, and ultimately celebrating them, is an important part of the joy of recovery. These are not new ideas; 2,500 years ago, Lao Tzu said, “If you want to become whole, let yourself be partial. If you want to become straight, let yourself be crooked.” Letting go of the need to be perfect and to be right results in a freedom that is otherwise impossible.

Letting Go

So the process of recovery is a process of letting go. A common expression in Twelve Step recovery circles is “Let go and let God.” Letting go is not intuitive or obvious; our natural tendency is often to hang on to things that are impeding our growth. I’m reminded of a story, two stories really, that are nearly identical, although they occurred forty-five years apart. The first is the story of a wildfire that occurred in Mann Gulch, Montana, in 1949. The second, nearly identical story is of a wildfire in South Canyon, Colorado. In 1949, thirteen firefighters lost their lives, and in 1994, another fourteen died. In both cases, scientific analysis revealed that these men and women lost their lives because when the fires intensified, and they needed to retreat,
they refused to drop their tools.
They refused to let go. In fact, since 1994, several more firefighters have died for the same reason. There are similar stories among fighter pilots, and this principle has even been used to explain underperformance in everything from athletics to business.

One of my mentors, Dr. Lynn Isabella, Associate Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia, pointed out ten reasons why these firefighters did not drop their tools. I won’t review all the reasons here, but a few are worth mentioning. First, the firefighters were able to maintain a sense of control by hanging on to the tools. Earlier in this book we learned about cognitive bias and how maintaining a sense of control is so important that people will sometimes destroy themselves just to maintain that feeling.

Second, the firefighters had no skill at a replacement activity. “If I drop my tools, if I let go, what will I do instead?” The things that hold people back are often the only things that feel familiar. People may hang on to self-destructive behaviors because they know and have practiced no other way. Third, for many of the firefighters, a core belief was “we are our tools.” People who are early in the recovery process often describe a fear of change because they will lose themselves. They may fear that they
are
their self-destructive behaviors. This is, as I noted above, a distorted belief, because we are so much more than we could ever imagine. Other reasons that these brave men and women didn’t let go of their tools included not trusting the messenger that advised them to do it and not wanting to admit failure.

However, the one reason that really stands out is that the firefighters believed that the small changes associated with dropping their tools seemed too trivial to really make a difference. In the 1949 incident, it was calculated that dropping their tools would have enabled them to move 8 inches per second faster. Seems trivial, right? In the end they made it 260 feet. Sadly, safety was at 263 feet.

The same phenomenon happens over and again in people struggling to gain freedom from cravings. On countless occasions people have told me, “That won’t make a difference—it’s a minor thing.” “Do I really need to call someone every day?” “Do I really need to tell someone
all
my secrets?” Many people who struggle with cravings refuse to let go of the things holding them back, only to stop three feet short of safety. In AA parlance, they “quit ten minutes before the miracle.”

Don’t underestimate the power of letting go. On your new journey of recovery, your practices can help you let go of the need to be right, the need to control, the need to please others. You can let go of the need to always have all the answers. Earlier in this book we learned about the power of habits and the way that these are etched deeper and deeper like grooves. Letting go can help you produce new habits, actions that can support your ongoing growth and recovery from the toxicity that acting out on cravings has produced in your life.

***

My experience working with thousands of men and women is that what stands between you and freedom from cravings is mostly related to what you think, but that to change what you think you must change what you do. Recovery is a lifelong journey that involves doing just that.

Best wishes as you progress along your path. If you discover something that might be helpful to others, I’d love to hear from you.

…

Finding Help for Alcoholism or Drug Addiction

Are you worried about your drinking or drug use? Is your drinking or drug use negatively affecting other areas of your life? Have you made a decision to stop drinking or using drugs but don’t know how to stop? The following list contains resources that can help you.

• Find meetings and information about Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) or Narcotics Anonymous (NA) by going to
  AA.org
  or
  NA.org
  . Click on the meeting finder to locate a meeting near you. Open meetings are open to everyone. Closed meetings are limited to persons who have a desire to stop drinking or using. You decide which meetings are right for you.
  
• Family members and loved ones of alcoholics and addicts can attend Al-Anon or Nar-Anon meetings, which can be found at
  al-anon.org
  and
  nar-anon.org
  .
  
• Teenagers who have relatives with alcoholism or another addiction can benefit from Alateen. See
  www.alateen.org
  for more information.
  
• Alcoholics and addicts who are interested in Christian-based programs may be interested in Celebrate Recovery. Find out more at
  www.celebraterecovery.com
  .
  
• To learn more about addiction to alcohol and other drugs, including alcohol’s affect on your health, underage drinking, fetal alcohol exposure, and other topics, see the brochures, fact sheets, videos, and other educational materials from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) at
  www.niaaa.nih.gov/publications
  or the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) at
  www.drugabuse.gov
  . These publications are generally of a very high quality, evidence-based, and informative.
  
• For those interested in receiving treatment for alcohol or drug abuse, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) provides an online treatment locator. The locator can be found at
  http://findtreatment.samhsa.gov
  .