How facing our emotions helps us fight addiction
As human beings, the deepest, most core conflict we face
is whether or not to feel. Do we seek vitality, love, passion, compassion and
the unpredictable roller coaster that comes with being engaged in life and
emotion? Or do we engage in behaviour that detaches us from the inherent pain
of the human condition? When we choose the latter, anything that cuts us off
can seem appealing, from cell phones to social media, pain killers to
pornography, Coca Cola to cocaine.
Edgar Allen Poe said, “I have absolutely no pleasure in
the stimulants in which I sometimes so madly indulge. It has not been in the
pursuit of pleasure that I have periled life and reputation and reason. It has
been the desperate attempt to escape from torturing memories, from a sense of
insupportable loneliness and a dread of some strange impending doom.”
Addictive behaviour is the result of a primal desire to
self-sooth. Anything can operate as an addiction if done habitually and for the
purpose of fulfilling a need to be tolerably numb. We turn to addiction to
escape pain, but the escape itself perpetuates our pain, and thus begins a
dangerous spiral. In reality, when we attempt to kill off our pain, we often
engage in other self-destructive behaviour. We forget that psychological pain
has a purpose and is actually an adaptive function warning us that something’s
wrong.
Working through our emotions helps us to learn, grow
and develop. It increases our resilience and makes us more alive to our
experience. Conversely, our attempts to cut off may render us emotionally
immature and often, far less functional. Moreover, we cannot selectively numb
pain without also numbing joy. Turning to addiction can leave us feeling frozen
or numbed to all our feelings. In this state, we risk losing a sense of our true
identity. We disconnect from our real selves.
Because we are torn between feeling and not feeling, we
are all divided between our real self, the part of us that wants to live,
pursue goals and experience life and what my father Dr. Robert Firestone calls
the “anti-self,” which seeks to isolate us, cut us off from feeling and even
obliterate or destroy us. Our anti-self aims to protect us from the natural
pain or fear that comes from caring about or investing in life, but it winds up
limiting and hurting us in countless ways, for instance, by steering us
toward addiction.
When we indulge the notion that we can’t tolerate our
pain, we are actually siding with our anti-self. We are listening to the advice
of a destructive inner coach, a thought process known as the “critical inner
voice.” This “voice” can be the fuel for addictive behaviour, first encouraging
us to use or indulge, then punishing us for our behaviour. “Just have a drink,”
it beckons, “You deserve a good time. You work so hard. You need to let go and
relax.” Then, once we’ve indulged, it screams, “You failure! How could you mess
up again? You’ll always be a loser.” This luring, then punishing voice
perpetuates the addiction, a subject I’ll be diving into in the Webinar,
“Fighting Addiction: The Sneaky Role of the Critical Inner Voice.”!
Voice Therapy, developed by my father, is helpful in the
treatment of addiction, as it allows us to become conscious of this destructive
thought process and face the underlying emotion behind it. Through the steps of
Voice Therapy, we can start to understand where our critical inner voice comes
from and how it operates. We can start to feel for ourselves and how we’re
affected by this voice. We can then stand up to the voice as an external enemy
rather than accepting it as our real point of view.
As we come to know this inner critic, we become smarter
about how we react to it. We can see how it tries to sneakily influence our
actions, then, we can consciously choose to act differently. If nothing else,
the critical inner voice is tricky. It can creep into our thoughts so smoothly
we may see it more as a live-in roommate as opposed to the hostile intruder it
really is. By making the unconscious conscious, we can stand up to our
“anti-self” and, by no exaggeration, take power over our lives. There are certain
things we can do to help ourselves challenge this inner voice, strengthen our
real self and get ahold of addictive behaviour.
1. Adopt strategies for increasing our tolerance for our
emotions - When we break an addiction, the painful emotions we’ve been trying
to repress are likely to surface. It’s incredibly important to have a healthy
and adaptive alternative way of dealing with these feelings. Cultivating
self-compassion and mindfulness is of great help in this process. Adopting an
attitude of self-compassion allows us to accept that our suffering is a part of
being human. It teaches us to exercise self-kindness, patience and acceptance
in our journey to grow and change. Additionally, practicing mindfulness can
help us learn to sit with our thoughts and feelings without allowing them to
overpower us and drive our behaviour.
2. Get to know your triggers – It’s important to notice
what events, people or circumstances trigger our critical inner voices. What
situations set us up or prime us to want to cut off? Does a stressful work day
ignite our inner critic to tell us to indulge? Does a heated interaction with
our partner stir up old feelings of fear and rejection? Where do we then go to
seek comfort? We also need to beware of those people in our lives who
side with and support the seductive voices to indulge. These individuals
support the seemingly soothing part of our anti-self. When we start to know our
triggers, we can make better choices about who we spend time with, what
activities we engage in and how we handle the stresses that are likely to
arise. We can do this while maintaining our self-compassion, being considerate
of what we need in order to make better choices.
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