Like an Addict
There is an interesting connection between religion and addiction. Aside from what we think about religious hypocrisy, the correlation between spiritual belief and addiction is one of the most consistently replicated findings in the study of drug use. More notably, 12 Step groups like Alcoholics Anonymous more or less force their members to accept the existence of a higher power. Why is that?
Scientists think it’s because religion has what are called “prudential values.” In other words, they hold some authority over their believers, stepping in between them and their whims. The specific religious rules vary drastically across different faiths, yet there exists a common thread in the concept of belief that makes people less likely to abuse drugs. I think this connection is important and under-explored.
For example, when I sent out the first email in my Reading List, I had only one instruction: Don’t email me back to think aloud. What I got was just that. Rambling emails, people showing off how smart they are, almost no genuine questions. In fact, one person actually wrote THINKING ALOUD -just like that, unironically and in complete seriousness. What makes people do this?
I think these people are addicts. Or at least, wired similarly. They lack the ability to understand anything outside their own reality, that there is some ‘way’ to behave other than whatever they feel like. This is different than a malignant narcissist who manipulates others to to be like them, this almost a wide-eyed innocence, disbelief that other people don’t act like they do.
I think the reason religious people become addicts less often, or that recovering addicts liken their sobriety to a born-again spiritual awakening is because the two are rooted in humbleness. There is an implicit self-awareness that comes with accepting your place as somewhere other than at the center of the universe. You see with Penelope Trunk or awful bloggers an incredibly resilient refusal of this idea. They desperately lack prudential values – like self-restraint, or that maybe you just don’t say every single thought that pops into your head because it may be wrong, stupid or not in your best interest.
I don’t think you need to find this in religion. You can get it from many sources but you must have it. It’s critical to understand that you don’t always know what you’re doing, that learning requires deference and curiosity. There is certainly no way, as a young person, to coexist or succeed among older maturer adults, without it. Draw from a sense of shame or pragmatism or ancient wisdom or the fucking Bible – anything – so long as you can walk away with a sense of perspective that things matter other than you and that there are consequences when you behave otherwise.
Awesome post Ryan. I too felt the urge to sent back an email, but resisted because I really had nothing to say. I am just glad that there was not a ‘reply all’ option so my inbox did not get filled with inane responses as well.
Nietzsche found it’s way to the top of my own reading list yesterday, and I chuckled at the parallels between your writings and the will to power.
Good post.
One way to develop humility in a hurry is to get your ass kicked.
I get mine leveled four days a week at BJJ classes. The undeniable reality that there are people around me who are much, much better at something than I am forces me to confront the truth of my positioning in that particular world. Painfully so at times.
It’s not something that requires physical whuppings, but putting yourself out there against others – especially in public – should quickly result in enough feedback to change yourself for the better again and again.
That’s why I’m kind of wondering why you left the book club thing within e-mail. Is that public enough for feedback to actually get through?
I think religious people are less likely to abuse drugs because they have something to fill that empty void: their beliefs.
I know a lot of fundamentalist christians and I can tell you that there is no humility, and that they ARE the center of the universe because god put them there. They do believe that they know what they are doing at all times and regularly reject reality in favor of their beliefs. These people are incredibly unaware of the rest of the world.
Religion, like drugs, is nothing more than a way to cope. AA simply takes away one crutch (the booze) and provides another by forcing members to accept a higher power. I am all for people believing what they need to in order to get by, but to try to tie religion to humility or to suggest religion creates a more realistic perspective is nonsense.
Why can’t we have a sense of perspective simply from being a well adjusted member of society? Social pressures can have the effect you are looking for…and nothing can humble you like atheism.
Look, Kevin I’ll respect your opinion on this because I know some smart people who disagree with me on the issue. However, I think it’s pretty clear you’re not relying on much more than personal experience here and this is too complex for that.
The “disbelief that others dont’ act like they do” seems pretty natural, especially if you’re never done mind-altering drugs (and hence have an appreciation that your brain needn’t work the way it does), and is usually a pretty good heuristic (i.e. the golden rule).
For another example where this was wrong:
http://lesswrong.com/lw/dr/generalizing_from_one_example/
The tunnel vision way of seeing other people and new concepts that you write about is pervasive. But, maybe you are being hard on your readers. I read the first reading list email with the admonition not to think aloud in reply. Then, I thought that is exactly how we were taught in literature class to discuss written works. What would be more useful and appropriate instead?
“Why can’t we have a sense of perspective simply from being a well adjusted member of society?”
Not all people can be a well-adjusted member of society. At least in the terms we are putting it. A portion of the population will always have a special trait that makes them different and the ones that are very strong in that trait will tend to be assertive about how they are correct in that area. The people that think they are perfect or god-like are a necessary part of society and that is why they still remain.
Think how different the world would be without the belief that western culture or religion is in some way superior to all else. Sure, there were people that saw the values and pros about other ways of life, but you won’t find that in any history texts. When it comes down to it, I think people that act in this way are just acting like a king and hoping to be treated like one.
It’s not just my personal experience. If you really dug into the research, you will discover some really interesting statistics. People who identify themselves as religious are over represented in prisons. Religious people tend to have higher rates of obesity and are more likely to commit adultery than people who are non religious.
I’m not railing against the hypocrisy of religion, I just don’t see the research supporting your position that belief contributes to self-restraint. Does belief in a higher power help with addiction? Probably, but the virtues of belief stop there.
Ah yes, the “fucking Bible.”
If you’re gonna be hip, baby, ya gotta refer to the Bible with at least a little disrespect, or else you won’t get any respect from your paying customers.
Kevin you’re really confusing correlation with causation. People in a lower socioeconomic status make up the majority of the religious followers. Unsurprisingly people of lower socioeconomic status also are more likely to be obese, more likely to be in jail, and at least for women are more likely to be adulterous.
Also, desperate people are more likely to compromise their belief systems no matter how strongly held they are. Like most accusations against religion there are a lot of other causes responsible, yet most people blame or hold it unquestioningly sacred, as they usually have strong beliefs one way or the other.
As an un-related side note: The reading list book descriptions/synopses was some of the most emotionally powerful writing I’ve read from you, Ryan. Great job.
“The correlation between spiritual/religious involvement and lower risk is one of the more consistent (although seldom taught) findings of the addiction field.” William Miller “Researching the spiritual dimensions of alcohol and other drug problems.” Addiction, 1998
Kevin, those statistics are interesting but irrelevant to the point I am making. There is a reason that the narrative of most addiction stories involves some sort of ‘break.’ It is a point of submission or an acknowledgment that their INSTINCTS are broken or misaligned. That they shouldn’t always defer to what they feel or what comes naturally might be the wrong thing. This is one of the most consistent facts of recovery and one I think non-addicts can learn from.
Also, Casey you sound like a tool.
“Casey you sound like a tool.”
Why not “stupid assed ancient wisdom”?
A significant slice of the world’s population consider the Bible to be God’s gift to man. The word “fucking”, used as an adjective, adds nothing of significence to any sentence, but only creates an aura of sneering disrespect.
Take away the “fucking” and you will have a sentence which validates several path to proper perspective – the Bible equal among the others.
I’m just sayin’.
Interesting take on religion and addiction. And I don’t think that addiction or spirituality have anything to do with the off-track emails you got.
What most likely happened was an unintended consequence of the power of suggestion. Yes, hypnosis.
See, when you said “I had only one instruction: Don’t email me back to think aloud.” what you really suggested was everything but the Don’t part. It’s like me asking you to not think of blue. You can’t help but think of blue.
The part that got stuck in their head was “email me back to think out loud” and more than likely got stuck in their subconscious.
I know it sounds hippy dippy and new agey. But the next time you want your readers to follow only one rule, use the desired outcome instead of the reverse negative. So your re-written rule would be “Send me only thoughtful questions or well thought out complete ideas.”
I agree with most of what you have to say Ryan, but I just wanted to add that religion could also add a social hierarchy to the “prudential values”. In a culture where we tell children constantly that they can be anything that they want to be (regardless of it’s true or not) as well as a balancing of power between the sexes, the social hierarchy that has probably been around since we were more like chimps has shifted and been thrown into a shambles. Until we adapt, and perhaps until we establish a new social hierarchy that tells people exactly where they belong, we may not see the prudential values come back into common occurance.
Being raised Catholic myself, I believe if nothing else, the Sunday school teachings gave the ground rules of what’s right and what’s wrong. It also gave you a social hierarchy to follow. (God at the top, the lay people at the bottom) The Church itself may be crumbling due to a lack of changing with the times and poor decisions on behalf of those in power, but the message remains the same as well as the social stability.
By the way, I’m really interested in trying to get Seabrook’s book. I’ll be doing a search for it when I’m stateside (Oh attending school in a nearly 3rd world country! I miss bookstores!) Any suggestions on where to find them? I’m gonna try my favorite local one before trying Borders.
“You see with Penelope Trunk or awful bloggers an incredibly resilient refusal of this idea. They desperately lack prudential values – like self-restraint, or that maybe you just don’t say every single thought that pops into your head because it may be wrong, stupid or not in your best interest.”
There’s much that can be said about Penelope Trunk, but it most certainly not true that her policy of saying everything that pops into her head is not in her best interest. Quite the opposite. She earns $15,000 per lecture, and the more outrageous she is, the higher the demand for her on the speaking circuit. She has a very carefully constructed business model that is based on traffic at her blog — speaking engagements, product endorsements, columns in print publications. The more traffic, the bigger her revenue stream. If you think her outrageous posts (day before yesterday’s: how she was raped by her father as a child) drive traffic away, you’re mistaken. You’re not witnessing an absence of self-restraint: what you’re seeing is the result of very smart calculation.
Kevin: addicts don’t take drugs to fill a void, they take drugs to create a void. Addictive behavior is all about turning off unpleasant feelings. Recovery is about learning how to survive your feelings.
“religious people become addicts less often”: is this a statement of fact? I’d like to see a footnote for this.
“learning requires … curiosity.” Indeed. I think you just described THINKING OUT LOUD.
“They lack the ability to understand anything outside their own reality, that there is some ‘way’ to behave other than whatever they feel like. This is different than a malignant narcissist who manipulates others to to be like them, this almost a wide-eyed innocence, disbelief that other people don’t act like they do.”
There’s no question that addicts behave with extraordinary selfishness, but I’d argue (and, believe me, I didn’t start out thinking this way) that that’s a symptom of addiction, not the cause. It’s difficult for healthy people to appreciate the degree to which pain — emotional or otherwise — causes people to turn inward and ignore others. Pain is the great focus-er. Other people either stand in the way of your lessening your pain, or become tools you use to lessen your pain. Addicts don’t steal from their children because they don’t understand the “consequences;” they do so because they’re carefully weighing the consequences of hurting other people against the reality of their pain. Lessening their own pain will always win. Calling that “selfish” is missing the point.
There’s also the plain fact that drugs change your brain chemistry. What starts as a “choice” quickly becomes behavior your brain won’t let you stop. 12 Step program don’t substitute religion for your drug of choice, and they don’t teach “humbleness.” What they do is two things: they substitute a wide range of healthy behaviors as a distraction from addictive behavior in order to give the brain time to undo the effects of drugs on its chemistry — this is literally what “sobering up” means; and they teach methods for surviving the feelings that the addict thinks will kill her. Humbleness is a derivative of the change — it comes from feeling grateful — not the cause.
If this sounds like it’s based more on hope than on science, you’re right. The Betty Ford Clinic reports 5 year success rates of only 35%. The big complaint of critics who oppose AA’s method is that substituting one out-of-control feeling (a higher power) for another (I hate these feelings which are controlling me) teaches addicts exactly the wrong idea. The right idea is: you don’t have to let your feelings control you, you can survive your feelings and flourish despite them; good outcomes and good feelings can come from healthy behavior and healthy relationships.
Last, I think your readers are excited by the opportunity to share ideas with you about the books you’re reading, Ryan. You seem to have some rules about the content of that sharing and the form you want it to take. Be a better teacher: be clear about what you want (“don’t think aloud” is hardly clear) as well as what you don’t want, give an example, and encourage learning. Comparing readers who didn’t understand your vague admonitions to drug addicts makes you sound like a petulant tool.
I’ll refrain from thinking out loud about this post or most of the comments, but Ryan I know from experience that this quote is on the money:
“Kevin, those statistics are interesting but irrelevant to the point I am making. There is a reason that the narrative of most addiction stories involves some sort of ‘break.’ It is a point of submission or an acknowledgment that their INSTINCTS are broken or misaligned. That they shouldn’t always defer to what they feel or what comes naturally might be the wrong thing”
As a former and still kinda self-absorbed prick, I can say with certainty that the quickest way to pierce the veil of narcissism (or whatever term you’d prefer to describe a pathologically self-centered worldview) is to be confronted with overwhelming evidence that you are, in fact, capable of being wrong.
This is just a theory, but I think that the reason so many folks on the internet are incapable of looking beyond themselves is that their delusional bubble hasn’t been popped by contact with reality. If you’ve been shuttled through life by your parents or whoever, and you’ve never actually experienced real hardship and compromise (or in my case, getting into some hairy situations solely due to my own stupidity), there’s a good chance you’ll be the type to think that someone you’ve never met would care to hear your stream-of-consciousness ramblings.
As a recovering addicts I can tell you that when you come in your told that you better find God. Now. I struggle with the concept of God, just as I did when my faith in Santa Claus began to fade, but your point is well made. Addicts need to find a place in the world, a place in which they give instead of take. If we don’t find something to fill the void left by drugs we’re doomed. So to make it as simple as possible, anytime we do something selfless, our spirit moves closer to harmony, which is a higher power. I do hate when people push God down Newcomer’s throats. If it happened to me in the beginning I would have bounced.
For what it’s worth, the process of religious conversion is just about identical to the process of joining a terrorist cell:
burning bright
In my flu-induced delerium I have read this post twice, once with the Marlon Brandon voice from “Apocalypse Now” and once with the Dennis Hopper voice.
Its worked out pretty well on this post. Made it deeper and more meaningful. From now on I’m reading all your posts this way!
Now where is that cough-medicine…?
“If you’ve been shuttled through life by your parents or whoever, and you’ve never actually experienced real hardship and compromise (or in my case, getting into some hairy situations solely due to my own stupidity), there’s a good chance you’ll be the type to think that someone you’ve never met would care to hear your stream-of-consciousness ramblings.”
Jimmy Johnson: the reason people on the internet think someone they’ve never met would care to hear their stream-of-consciousness ramblings is because at the bottom of every post is a button labeled “COMMENT.” It’s an invitation to comment. The fact that people “on the internet” (let’s include you too, shall we?) feel comfortable sharing their opinion with strangers is a function of the fact that they are invited to do so, not that they have been shuttled through life by parents or have never experienced hardship. If the button said, “Submit your master’s thesis here,” you’d get a higher level of commentary. But as it is — no filter, no rules — you get a little of everything, which is exactly what is being asked for.
Let’s cut the crap Dan. The comment you posted before was one of the most pompous and least informed on this site to date.
Now I’ve won the prize for both best comment and most pompous/least informed. You’re not getting any less petulant, Ryan. Bring the level of discourse up.
Dan: My comment certainly wasn’t in response to yours, so I’m not sure if I touched a chord via a misunderstanding or if you simply disagree with what I said that vehemently.
You’re right, a blog is an invitation to comment. But, and perhaps I failed to convey this point above, it doesn’t mean you should hammer out every thought that pops into your head and expect for your opinion to be thoughtfully considered. It’s no travesty to post a half-assed comment, but it’s certainly a waste of time for both parties.
Jimmy: I disagree that vehemently.
First of all, the idea that comments one doesn’t like, or think are poorly written, written while high, missing the point, or not meeting someone’s criteria for excellence somehow reflect on the writer’s upbringing or character is a pernicious attitude. Some people express themselves well, others don’t. You agree with some people’s opinions and disagree with others. Your taste in their comment doesn’t bear any relationship to their character.
Second, your argument wasn’t that idiots shouldn’t expect their opinions to be thoughtfully considered. It was that people who write stream-of-conscious comments that you feel waste your time have been coddled by their parents or haven’t experienced hardship in life, and therefore think their opinion matters more than it really does. The COMMENT button is an invitation to everyone, and it doesn’t offer anything in return, including thoughtful consideration.
Third, I mean what I said: the button says COMMENT, not GOOD COMMENTS ONLY or ONLY COMMENTS I AGREE WITH or ONLY WELL-WRITTEN COMMENTS. We’re free to write anything we want, which means we can throw the rules of civility out the window as easily as we can engage in a thoughtful discussion. I think telling someone whose writing you don’t like that they haven’t suffered hardship is, at the very least, un-civil.
I have to admit, Ryan comparing people who wrote him poorly-thought-out e-mails about his reading list to drug addicts and narcissists pisses me off, especially since he gave such vague guidance to begin with. The guy who wrote THINKING ALOUD definitely wasn’t paying attention, but now he’s The Man With the Golden Arm? That’s just childish, even it you can manage to shoehorn it into some larger theory about addiction and religious belief. But it’s Ryan’s blog, he makes the rules, and he puts the COMMENT button on the bottom of the post. That’s a two-way street, for him and for me. He doesn’t like to be criticized, so I know what I’m in for when I do it.
By the way, this statement of yours in a comment above: “…that they shouldn’t always defer to what they feel or what comes naturally might be the wrong thing” is one I agree with strongly. This is what Buddhism certainly teaches and is common to lots of religious systems, whether you choose to substitute “God’s will” or “a higher power” or something else for your own feelings or for what comes naturally. Addiction is about zeroing out unpleasant feelings; healthy living is about feeling your feelings fully.
Dan, it seems that we’re talking around each other. You’re reading too much into my comment; I wasn’t trying to imply that a shoddily crafted craft comment on a blog is somehow a window into someone’s fundamental personality. I’ve been guilty of that plenty of times.
My point, which itself was hastily jotted down, was that people who have gone through life being handled by kiddy gloves are likely to lack a sense of perspective and realism when it comes to the “merit” of their opinions. If you’ve never been told explicitly, or never found out through experience, that the world doesn’t revolve around you, and that you’re not qualified to offer an informed opinion on certain subjects, then you’re likely to run your mouth when you really don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.
It’s not always a bad thing (I’ve learned a lot of hard lessons by running my mouth when I shouldn’t have), it’s not indicative of some deep character flaw, but it can be annoying when Billy Badass the 20-year-old college student presents himself as an authority on, well, anything.
For everyone following along, the problem is that Dan is one of the people who sent me an email and even though it was totally fine, he’s freaking out thinking I was referring to him.
Well, at the least, he has a point there about you totally shitting on people who disagree with you once in a while.
I am the “THINKING OUT LOUD” emailer.
We are all assholes, however, Ryan provides what we seek.
Perfect example for this post:
“Choose not to be harmed and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed and you haven’t been.”
-Marcus Aurelius
Thank you Ryan for your insight. Still a fan.
AA is a free program that allows anybody to go whenever they want. That being said, anybody who wants to form an opinion about it really should go. There is no barrier to learning about it. I had to go when I got a Minor in Possession (aka, caught drinking underage) to avoid the misdemeanor. Later I went back for a few sessions to write a paper about AA for a class. I’d highly recommend it if anything just to learn.
Now, from my anecdotal evidence (remember though, the plural of anecdote is not data) it isn’t about replacing alcohol with religion, though there is definitely religious backing throughout the program. Most of the people I met in AA were there for the companionship. I once went to a group where everybody was at least 5 years sober, yet they went religiously (no pun intended) to be with their friends. When they told me their story, and they are all dying to tell you their stories, the common theme was that alcohol was a universal band-aid. Once they had others to talk to in their AA group, they didn’t need alcohol to cope with life’s troubles. These people replaced addiction not for religion but for companionship. Robert Sapolsky makes this case in his book “Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers” and accompanying lectures on iTunes; regardless of all the study into the science of stresses, the single greatest stress reducer is social companionship. Alcoholism, TV, exercise,etc are all ways to deal with common stress, but companionship is the single greatest indicator of an individual’s ability to cope with stress.
In relation to your main theme, it would seem that the “naive commenters” turn here simply because there is nobody else to challenge their beliefs. There are not a lot of groups in high school (or in general) that voluntarily read books solely to talk about them (Yes, I know book clubs exist, but I have yet to find one worth joining). If there were more ways to intelligently discuss reading, nobody would be signing up to an email list to do it.
Wow. Read GOD IS NOT GREAT and listen to Christoper Hitchens make this point better than anyone.
“Religion is the opium of the masses”. Faith is the antithesis of logic, therefore many people struggle internally with this concept.
Filling the void is a lonely and painful place to be and if it allows people to get back on their feet- that is fine. Hut don’t “shove it down someone’s throat”.
Good subject matter though as this is at the root of almost all of our international policies as well…
It boils down to the discussion of religion as prejudice or religion as trascendental experience.
@Aaron
After you read God is Not Great, read On Being a Christian, Does God Exist?, and The Beginning of All Things by Hans Kung.
Ryan, have you read any Hans Kung? I recommend highly.
Very interesting post, describes me amusingly well