Article – Gabriel Mate – Addiction

This contains a great piece of insight: “It’s not what it is, it’s what it does.”

It’s not really that we like all that much whatever it is we crave.  What we really crave is the feeling that it gives us when we get it.  Pinpoint that and we’ve got the root of the craving / addiction.

The trouble of course is that we never end up getting enough, and so the vicious cycle goes on.  But once we know what it is we’re really after (the feeling that we’re trying to get from it, or even do get from it for a little while,) then we can think of other ways to get it that don’t carry unwanted side effects.

Here’s the link to the article:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandlifestyle/2018/nov/24/joanna-moorhead-gabriel-mate-trauma-addiction-treat