The opposite of addiction is not sobriety, it's connection

I want to share with the steem community a TED talk that played an important role jumpstarting my journey to self-awareness. It's by Johann Hari, and is titled "Everything you know about addiction is wrong". Have you ever known something deep down inside that for one reason or another, remains dormant until someone articulates it to you? This is how I felt being shown this video for the first time while in rehab. Every addict struggles with the question "why can't I just stop?"and learning about the recent research on addiction by Bruce Alexander, and many others can bring a lot of understanding to a troubled mind, and without understanding why they have a problem, an addict can sometimes find sobriety, but never peace.

Everyone is aware of the research always quoted by government, law enforcement, schools, and other institutions to in reference to drug addiction. A rat was placed in a cage with one bottle of clean water, and a bottle of cocaine/heroin laced water and observed. Almost every time the results are the same, it ends with a drug-addicted rat dying of overdose. Obviously drug use causes addiction. Case closed. Lock up the drug users. Beyond the obvious variable that the human mind is infinitely more complex than the rodent mind, honest research can prove this to be false. Drug use does not cause addiction. The easiest argument to counter this narrative is that millions of patients are placed on prescription pain killers every year with only a small percentage continuing with illicit use once their prescription runs dry. Why is this? Dr. Alexander decided tried to answer this with his own rodent experiment with a few changes. Instead of isolating one rat in one cage, he built a rat park full of tunnels, toys, and most importantly, plenty of other rats to interact, and have sex with. His results we’re quite difference. In rat park, despite all of the rats trying the drug laced water, none became addicted, and they all lived. This changes everything we know about addiction.

Maybe there is no such thing as addiction. An amazing thing happens when you replace the word addiction with bonding. You're not addicted to heroin, you're bonding with it in a way that brings you a sense of belonging that you're not finding anywhere else. You're not addicted to cocaine, but you're afraid of life, and use it to escape reality. Maybe a sense of purpose, and belonging is all that’s needed for the addicted mind to ease. A new understanding of addiction begs the questions, how do our communities combat it, and how do we treat addicts? Does it work? In virtually all western countries, drug users are shamed, humiliated, and locked up only to come right back through the rotating door of prison and probation. No job prospects, no money, and usually no family left. Yet we expect them to never relapse again and double punish them when they do. In many places, they can be thrown in prison for their entire life for multiple possession charges. After decades of this, can we finally accept that it doesn’t work? No, it doesn’t work. Portugal recognized this and decriminalized all drugs, and used the money normally spent on prohibition measures, and spent it on recovery programs. They saw improvement in every measure. Drastic drops in addiction and overdose rates, and massive increases in employment and recovery.

It breaks my heart to see our communities being devastated by drug use, and our police becoming more militarized trying to combat it. I’m tired of seeing prisons filled leaving single mothers or fathers alone to raise children. I see more of the kids I grew up with dead or in prison then I see getting degrees, or starting businesses and families. I’m just, tired. I hope this video can bring some clarity so some of my brothers and sisters on the blockchain so we can start to heal our communites.

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”For 100 years now we’ve been singing war songs to addicts. All along I think we should have been singing love songs to them, because the opposite of addiction is not sobriety, it’s connection”

-Johann Hari

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Johann Hari Twitter
Bruce K. Alexander Website

Love you guys
-Daniel