How does addiction work?

[StarStruck]

I have friends who don’t drink because they can’t just have 1 wine and for me that seems very weird. On the other hand I have other substances that I can’t just use in moderation. For me food, drugs or other “matter” is not addictive. The only thing I’m addicted to was porn and I don’t use that anymore. How the fuck addictions work?   As far as I understand if you are addicted to something something else has sovereignty over you. Sovereignty is a huge element in understanding addictions. 

[Schizophonia]

It's an interesting question, i believe two things :

1)The more depressed you tend to be, the more likely you are to be attracted to a number of drugs.
The higher you are on the spectrum of mania, or even psychosis, the more you tend to be disgusted with drugs and prefer "being in control".

2)There is confusion on the issue of Dopamine (among other neurotransmitters, but I'll stick to it for simplicity), dopamine doesn't give pleasure, it's just the key to pleasure, the last thing you want is to go after someone on meth lol.

In the end, it all depends on the context and your energy.
I don't like cannabis, psychedelics (the experience is interesting but still relatively disgusting), pornography.
But I LOVE ketamine and a single dose creates a significant craving for several days.
Opiates too.

[Raze]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-H0_BlN2ac

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hpjM_NNFQw

Edited August 11, 2023 by Raze

[Ulax]

I'd say its any distraction that we are powerless to stop ourselves from using.

[Javfly33]

14 hours ago, StarStruck said:

As far as I understand if you are addicted to something something else has sovereignty over you. Sovereignty is a huge element in understanding addictions. 

Pretty much.

People that say that they are 'addicted' is people that have imagined and set as true that there is such as an inert thing (drug, drink, ...etc) that has power over them.

Of course this means that the whole 'addiction' ideology is bullshit. 

People that identify themselves as addicts are just people that haven't come to a place of accepting full responsibility for their actions and life.

So in summary addiction as modern society understands does not exist. It is built on a foundation of victimhood and illusory false sense of power. 

 

Edited August 11, 2023 by Javfly33

[Ulax]

3 minutes ago, Javfly33 said:

Pretty much.

People that say that they are 'addicted' is people that have imagined and set as true that there is such as an inert thing (drug, drink, ...etc) that has power over them.

Of course this means that the whole 'addiction' ideology is bullshit. 

People that identify themselves as addicts are just people that haven't come to a place of accepting full responsibility for their actions and life.

So in summary addiction as modern society understands does not exist. It is built on a foundation of victimhood and illusory false sense of power. 

 

Guessing you still believe in free will then

[Javfly33]

8 minutes ago, Ulax said:

Guessing you still believe in free will then

yes

[Schizophonia]

12 minutes ago, Javfly33 said:

Pretty much.

People that say that they are 'addicted' is people that have imagined and set as true that there is such as an inert thing (drug, drink, ...etc) that has power over them.

Of course this means that the whole 'addiction' ideology is bullshit. 

People that identify themselves as addicts are just people that haven't come to a place of accepting full responsibility for their actions and life.

So in summary addiction as modern society understands does not exist. It is built on a foundation of victimhood and illusory false sense of power. 

 

Of course.
The hell of withdrawal from heroin, benzodiazepine etc does not exist, it's a hoax
Move around

[Javfly33]

4 minutes ago, Schizophonia said:

Of course.
The hell of withdrawal from heroin, benzodiazepine etc does not exist, it's a hoax
Move around

Who said that withdrawal does not exist?  

Although after +5 years doing opiates on and off, I can say withdrawal is psychological and created by the ego (doing spiritual energetic practices reveal how the mind 'creates' constantly the illusion, and stopping memory can reveal how powerful we are, but that is another story).

I´m not talking about withdrawal or physical dependence, I´m talking about accepting the reality that one chooses to do the drug every day.

Trust me, my father used heroin for 30 years. I can guarantee you drug users are the best bullshitters in the world, but specially they bullshit themselves very brilliantly. In the perfect way to not see certain things to accept their responsibility. 

Edited August 11, 2023 by Javfly33

[StarStruck]

What does Leo say about free will? Lately Leo changes his metaphysics every 3 months. I can’t keep up with him and neither can he. He definitely sold his soul to the chemical inventing one breakthrough after another. 

Edited August 11, 2023 by StarStruck

[ZzzleepingBear]

It may depend on how deep the addiction is. But if I where to speculate about the differences in why addiction tend to be more sticky to the mind. I would say that a addiction has a higher and faster reward peak when it hits. While the reward that comes from genuine effort or eating clean comes in a more moderate hit over a prolonged time, and most importantly after you have done or eaten something.

So genuine rewards is understood and gained with knowledge how it works its way through you, it lands softly in your experience. You can work with it and develop it.

While something that is addictive rewards you through directly hitting your emotions here and now. No wait is required. And so addiction as a experience hits you. It does not come in as a soft experience. And the rewards are higher the shorter they come. 

 

Just my 2 cents on the matter

[Ulax]

7 minutes ago, StarStruck said:

What does Leo say about free will? Lately Leo changes his metaphysics every 3 months. I can’t keep up with him and neither can he. He definitely sold his soul to the chemical inventing one breakthrough after another. 

@StarStruck I mean I think a core belief of this whole actualized.org thing is that, in the relative sense, humans have no free will.

[StarStruck]

28 minutes ago, Ulax said:

@StarStruck I mean I think a core belief of this whole actualized.org thing is that, in the relative sense, humans have no free will.

I thought we have absolute free will because we are the creators of our own reality. 

[Ulax]

1 minute ago, StarStruck said:

I thought we have absolute free will because we are the creators of our own reality. 

Could you elaborate please. I.e. what do you define as 'I'?

[StarStruck]

37 minutes ago, Ulax said:

Could you elaborate please. I.e. what do you define as 'I'?

The agent 

[Grateful Dead]

Addiction = attachment

People are attached to different things and therefore have different addictions.

[UnbornTao]

Addiction seems to be about repeatedly craving pleasurable experiences. 

Pain and pleasure are the same. The search for pleasure is motivated by pain. 

Seems as though something in your experience is not entirely accepted and experience for what it is. We want to avoid pain, the mundane, boredom, loneliness, an emotional need. 

Maybe. Look into it.

[Nilsi]

I view addiction as more of a historical curisoty, as opposed to being some underlying biological reality. It's THE symptom of Nihilism and works as follows:

1. Late-stage capitalism and consumerism offers us unprecedented access to all of human culture and history, ironically resulting in a profound sense of alienation from all tradition. The historical process is rendered completely meaningless and self-knowledge is turned into yet another commodity. Think about Fukuyama's prophecy of the "End of History" - the perceived triumph of the enlightement, as embodied by American liberal democracy, over all other ideologies.
2. The dominance of modern science and it's cultural monopoly on "truth" (privileged over any other epistemologies, or aesthetic/moral claims), culminates in someone like Bryan Johnson literally selling their soul and free will to the mechanistic clockwork of scientific realism. Take this guys supplements away and I guarantee you he would suffer from a panic attack.
3. And of course, how could we forget Hegel and dialectical Christianity - the ghost that keeps on haunting; throwing us into the eternal rat-race of becoming more "whole;" an incessant cycle of so called "self-development;" the carrot of "perfection" dangling in front of us - always BARELY out of reach -- while we remain forever "ignorant" to some new "injustice" that is yet to be taken responsibility for.

The outcome of this mess: the historical alienation, scientific hegemony, and quasi-philosophical pursuit is a self-imposed, sealed fate. We find ourselves trapped in an endless rat race; the Wheel of Ixion, where we spin ceaselessly in a desolate landscape of nihilism.

As we grapple with addiction, it becomes the lifeline we cling to in this seemingly bleak world of perpetual anguish. It is the coping mechanism that provides a semblance of control and comfort in a reality that appears futile and unendingly miserable.

So, addiction is the proverbial straw we cling to in a world seemingly devoid of meaning.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Nilsi

[Nilsi]

7 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

I view addiction as more of a historical curisoty, as opposed to being some underlying biological reality. It's THE symptom of Nihilism and works as follows:

1. Late-stage capitalism and consumerism offers us unprecedented access to all of human culture and history, ironically resulting in a profound sense of alienation from all tradition. The historical process is rendered completely meaningless and self-knowledge is turned into yet another commodity. Think about Fukuyama's prophecy of the "End of History" - the perceived triumph of the enlightement, as embodied by American liberal democracy, over all other ideologies.
2. The dominance of modern science and it's cultural monopoly on "truth" (privileged over any other epistemologies, or aesthetic/moral claims), culminates in someone like Bryan Johnson literally selling their soul and free will to the mechanistic clockwork of scientific realism. Take this guys supplements away and I guarantee you he would suffer from a panic attack.
3. And of course, how could we forget Hegel and dialectical Christianity - the ghost that keeps on haunting; throwing us into the eternal rat-race of becoming more "whole;" an incessant cycle of so called "self-development;" the carrot of "perfection" dangling in front of us - always BARELY out of reach -- while we remain forever "ignorant" to some new "injustice" that is yet to be taken responsibility for.

The outcome of this mess: the historical alienation, scientific hegemony, and quasi-philosophical pursuit is a self-imposed, sealed fate. We find ourselves trapped in an endless rat race; the Wheel of Ixion, where we spin ceaselessly in a desolate landscape of nihilism.

As we grapple with addiction, it becomes the lifeline we cling to in this seemingly bleak world of perpetual anguish. It is the coping mechanism that provides a semblance of control and comfort in a reality that appears futile and unendingly miserable.

So, addiction is the proverbial straw we cling to in a world seemingly devoid of meaning.

Many indigenous societies have access to enough dope to be shitfaced till the literal end of history, yet in 9/10 cases they are extremely functional and healthy - that says it all.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Nilsi

[Nilsi]

14 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

I view addiction as more of a historical curisoty, as opposed to being some underlying biological reality. It's THE symptom of Nihilism and works as follows:

1. Late-stage capitalism and consumerism offers us unprecedented access to all of human culture and history, ironically resulting in a profound sense of alienation from all tradition. The historical process is rendered completely meaningless and self-knowledge is turned into yet another commodity. Think about Fukuyama's prophecy of the "End of History" - the perceived triumph of the enlightement, as embodied by American liberal democracy, over all other ideologies.
2. The dominance of modern science and it's cultural monopoly on "truth" (privileged over any other epistemologies, or aesthetic/moral claims), culminates in someone like Bryan Johnson literally selling their soul and free will to the mechanistic clockwork of scientific realism. Take this guys supplements away and I guarantee you he would suffer from a panic attack.
3. And of course, how could we forget Hegel and dialectical Christianity - the ghost that keeps on haunting; throwing us into the eternal rat-race of becoming more "whole;" an incessant cycle of so called "self-development;" the carrot of "perfection" dangling in front of us - always BARELY out of reach -- while we remain forever "ignorant" to some new "injustice" that is yet to be taken responsibility for.

The outcome of this mess: the historical alienation, scientific hegemony, and quasi-philosophical pursuit is a self-imposed, sealed fate. We find ourselves trapped in an endless rat race; the Wheel of Ixion, where we spin ceaselessly in a desolate landscape of nihilism.

As we grapple with addiction, it becomes the lifeline we cling to in this seemingly bleak world of perpetual anguish. It is the coping mechanism that provides a semblance of control and comfort in a reality that appears futile and unendingly miserable.

So, addiction is the proverbial straw we cling to in a world seemingly devoid of meaning.

I hope this doesn't make me look like a leftist and I'm usually not one to seek the problem out there, but this guy Mark Fisher puts forward a really profound and compelling sociological analysis on mental health and it kinda stuck with me:

 

Edited August 11, 2023 by Nilsi