One more thing I wanted to say is what has always helped me to stay away from the addictive stuff people take is just the awareness that something is really unhealthy, very detrimental, so why be my own enemy, even if some friend would try and pester me to have one more drink when I knew I already drank my share I would usually write him off in my head as someone who's against me in the war against the world. The more somebody tried to get me to drink or smoke, the bigger a personal enemy of mine he'd be considered. I thank God for the grace in the first place.
Nicotine addiction
- Thread starter Tippy
- Start date
I think the problem is the addict loses sense that such stuff is unhealthy or starts to think the benefits outweigh the health concerns.
With alcohol is was this sense that one was in touch with ones true self only when drunk. That this was almost spiritual in a way. That modern life grinds one's soul to such a extreme that detachment in the form of alcohol induced highs was not a vice but a necessary survival mechanism.
There certainly is a brotherhood of alcohol drinker feeling that is much harder to attain sober. I never thought such fellow drinkers were scheming my downfall and still don't. Many just feel more connected when drunk and perhaps it's the only time they do, hence the encouragement
With nicotine it was more just a stimulant but even then I had similar thoughts that if life is just empty and spiking dopamine one way or another. I had zero interest in the self improvement treadmill (ultimately just another 'drug') so I may as well just get my dopamine spike through nicotine. Life sucks anyway so who cares if I get my cheap relief?
Thoughts like that really but I never thought 'but it's unhealthy!' was a strong deterrent. I never found being a walking talking vegetable very fulfilling.
Name checks out.
Iakobos
Orthodox
IME people who bond with others primarily through drinking, don't actually care that much who they're drinking with.
^ I would say the same for hard drugs as well. It seems like hard drug users have a tendency to look for people to "party" with and aren't too picky. These people want "dope buddies" even when they have nothing in common likely because the bond that they are partaking in some sort of forbidden vice is enough of a bond and a way to mark themselves off as different from regular people.
I've lost more than one set of friends when I was young because I wasn't a druggie and tried to get them to calm down on it, they cast me out for it. A few grew out of it but most are just living completely shit lives now, they didn't do anything in their youth but mess around so they are paying the price for it now. When I run into them once in a great while without fail they start waxing all poetic about the past trying to be my best friend again because the past is all they have left and I represent when life wasn't shit to them, they are walking disasters.
Doesn't even have to be hard drugs, weed in high school, drinkers later in life and each group progressed to worse drugs before the wheels fell off.
I'm no saint I like to have my fun and I have had my fun but once you make that stuff your identity it's pretty much over. The guy ripping lines in his Wall Street office living it up with the world on a string is one in a million if that, I've met some of those guys even they crash out eventually I've seen it first hand.
Doesn't even have to be hard drugs, weed in high school, drinkers later in life and each group progressed to worse drugs before the wheels fell off.
I'm no saint I like to have my fun and I have had my fun but once you make that stuff your identity it's pretty much over. The guy ripping lines in his Wall Street office living it up with the world on a string is one in a million if that, I've met some of those guys even they crash out eventually I've seen it first hand.