Meditation and Addiction

Part 2

This is basically the same problem that any cult will have. I think that Zen buddhisms way of moving the hierarchy with teacher to student via Dharma Transmission is actually designed to prevent this from happening, but as we all know, even this doesn't work many times - the burden of being seen as a guru is just too much for most of us to handle for years and years.

The problem with opiate addicts vs. alcoholics is just one of the dogmas that can't really hold water in critical studies. I have observed the same thing happening. Actually the saying "once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic" is also something that isn't just true. I have seen people get off the groups and maintaining moderate drinking for years. Of course groupers will then say that "they weren't real alcoholics in the beginning", but I suspect that isn't really the case. Actually I think that those kind of sayings are just self-fulfilling prophecies that are designed to keep people coming back - even though they might do as good or even better on their own..

There are good examples on this on the book I put the link of. You might want to taka a look of it..

Well, getting back to the topic - the book titled True Path by Roy Mathew of Duke University is about using meditation as a prescription, basically I think the author is exploring the idea of bliss and/or bliss consciousness in Zen/Raja Yoga contexts. Not quite sure he reaches the conclusion in this rather sprawling unfocussed work, but there is a lot of fodder.

12 step models aren't the only ones. The british government runs a phone service encouraging moderation and responsible drinking. Then there is Albert Ellis, too I think that is called REBT. It has a semi-Buddhist rational cognitive model. Kabat Zinn offers MBCT, "mindfulness based cognitive therapy", and that has been adapted by at least one Buddhist organization to treat alcoholism.

My criticism is that if one assumes that you are treating dependency disorder, then offering more dependency or substitute dependency, like most Buddhist and Christian organizations do, it won't work. Anyway only about 1 in 4 alcoholics or addicts kicks the habit before jails, institutions or death "intervenes" according to hearsay I get from professionals.

I have a variety of questions, related to this. So can we branch this out a bit?

In Kabat-Zinns "Stress Reaction" and "Stress Response" models alcohol, drugs, and food are listed a coping mechanisms at the bottom of the page with high blood pressure, hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, etc. listed as more directly at the top of the food chain, directly resulting from "fight or flight" - okay I am beginning to develop all these symptoms even though my meditation practice seems productive. I am not sure that I am getting the desire mind-body connection that meditation is supposed to bring. So in my case I am saying find the mind-body connection and you take away the desire for overeating, drinking, etc. ??

What else??
p e a c e
h a n s e n

So in using the Nikaya texts directly, for example guided meditations of Anapanasati, or Satipatanna sutta, FOR EXAMPLE, you would give about 50% attention to body (kaya) and feeling arising from the body (vedana) right? Is this similar to what Kabat Zinn has in mind I wonder. He talks a good talk, but when it comes down to it, only introductory mindfulness meditation is the cure-all which may or may not actually cure all.
h a n s e n

"I am not sure that I am getting the desire mind-body connection that meditation is supposed to bring."-han2sen

Hi Eric,

Kabat-Zinn's "mindfulness-based stress reduction" always reminds me of that Buddha story where the Buddha promised one of his monks all sorts of earthly delights (including women) if the monk would just do the practice and get enlightened. The monk, motivated by desire, did the practice, got enlightened, and promptly renounced worldly pleasures, thereby letting the Buddha off the hook for his specious promises.

Bottom line, it was a con. The Buddha rationalized it on the grounds that the end justifies the means.

Is "mindfulness meditation" a panacea? Almost everyone will agree that it does not cure those perennial bugaboos, "sickness, old age, and death." I don't know if Kabat-Zinn actually believes his rhetoric or if he is just trying to suck people into a practice that will benefit them in ways that are not easily marketed. In any case, a more reality-based assessment of the situation might be that meditation helps with some physical and emotional problems, especially in the short and long term. In the mid-term, meditation tends to exacerbate emotional and sometimes physical problems. Most people will agree that it is more than worth it in the end, but it's not fair to downplay the pain of the dark night phase, which can cycle in and out for years and decades. Meditation is, ideally, not a treatment modality at all. It's something much bigger, much deeper than that. It will cure the fundamental insanity that cannot be cured any other way. But it is not a panacea, and sometimes things get worse before they get better.

Kenneth

"Most people will agree that it is more than worth it in the end, but it's not fair to downplay the pain of the dark night phase, which can cycle in and out for years and decades."

I suppose ignorance (in the metaphysical sense that the Buddha spoke of) has just this one cure and no other. Alan Chapman and Duncan Barford, on their blog called "Open Enlightenment," were commenting recently on all the negatives that go along with being enlightened. So I asked them both if they could snap their fingers and have a free re-do, would they go through the pain of this practice all over again. Guess what they both said?

Sorry, this is off topic....

"In the mid-term, meditation tends to exacerbate emotional and sometimes physical problems. Most people will agree that it is more than worth it in the end, but it's not fair to downplay the pain of the dark night phase, which can cycle in and out for years and decades. Meditation is, ideally, not a treatment modality at all. It's something much bigger, much deeper than that. It will cure the fundamental insanity that cannot be cured any other way. But it is not a panacea, and sometimes things get worse before they get better.
"

This is quite important point here. Many times is seems to be the case that alcohol or aother addictive means are used to escape something. Perhaps some ghosts from the past or just plain anxiety. If meditation is prescribed as a drug, what easily happens is that the very things you originally were escaping from will become on the surface.

Can that person really tolerate it? Propably s/he will just stop meditating and gets quickly back to the safe place. So something other needs to me given too, something that helps to deal with the anxiety and fear. I think peers are pretty good help here - as well as some belief system like "higher power" or "boddhisattvas" or whatever. But of course there's then a danger that this substitute will be taken as the new addiction which then comes counterproductive..

Kenneth: Okay I will take that to mean Kabat Zinn might be full of BS but hansen might not have too bad of an idea with applying the suttas' instructions to applying "sati" to the body and its subsequent sensations directly. Anyway "sati" doesn't exactly mean "mindfulness" anyway. The Pali term actually corresponds better to the english word "remember" - but not past tense, like "memory" but present tense like "remember the breathing" - "remember what you are doing" etc.

Alcoholism and addiction are just attachment. In the case of severe alcoholism, make sure the person kicking the habit is hospitalized, unlike heroin, cold turkey can actually prove t be fatal.

The 12 Step template can be extended to cover a wide range of attachments. Certain reactions like being in denial, having reservations, etc. are just as true with attachment as they are with addiction.

p e a c e

h a n s e n

"Alcoholism and addiction are just attachment."

Hi, han2sen.

I'd like to urge caution on the terminology front. I think most real addictions are based in biology and are thus not "attachments" in the sense that we Buddhists speak of such things. Fort example, I can be attached to my computer and want to use it a lot, which I do. But I would actually be addicted to nicotine, or heroin, or alcohol. I'm offering this up because it's easy to over-reach with Buddhism and present it as a panacea to *everything*, which I don't believe it is or was ever meant to be.

I would defer to the doctor in the house on this, of course.... David?

"
"Alcoholism and addiction are just attachment."

Hi, han2sen.

I'd like to urge caution on the terminology front. I think most real addictions are based in biology and are thus not "attachments" in the sense that we Buddhists speak of such things. Fort example, I can be attached to my computer and want to use it a lot, which I do. But I would actually be addicted to nicotine, or heroin, or alcohol. I'm offering this up because it's easy to over-reach with Buddhism and present it as a panacea to *everything*, which I don't believe it is or was ever meant to be.

I would defer to the doctor in the house on this, of course.... David?

"

I think that's quite commen way of seeing addictions nowadays - and lot of it comes from the 12 step educated rehab business. However, currently there seems to be a movement towards seeing addictions more holistically as something that hasn't got so much to do with physics that has been thought. Actually there are studies that show how people that are supposed to be physically addicted to some substances tolerate the very same substances very well without a relapse - if the attitude was such that it wasn't a case of a relapse but instead a necessary medical medicine or such like.

So, to understand addictions as something that is purely physical and so something you just can't control anymore as you have became addicted is actually a self fulfilling prophecy. In reality the physical part is really small and quite easily overcome by anyone. The attitude that you have lost your control over something is much bigger problem to deal with. I think that this is well understood thing f.ex. by tobacco industry and actually taken advantage of. Belief systems that support the physical addictions are actually creating that "physical" addiction.

So I'd say addictions are "just" attachment. And attachments are very powerful thing.

"So I'd say addictions are "just" attachment. And attachments are very powerful thing." -Kundun

Hi Kundun,

Interesting discussion. Like all nature/nurture debates, I think this one is a false dichotomy. It always turns out that biology and socialization work together. Chris's point that alcohol withdrawal can lead to death is well taken (and well documented):

emedicine.medscape.com/article/166032-overview

This kind of extreme physical reaction is, in my opinion, unlikely to be related to the attitude of the patient.

At the same, time, I find your own point both relevant and empowering; our attitudes and belief systems profoundly influence our physiology, within limits (e.g., I can enhance my immune system using my mind, but I can't grow a third arm or a new liver). This understanding gives us powerful tools for recovery that wouldn't otherwise be available. And the fact that some alcoholics are able to return to a life that includes moderate drinking overturns the notion, propagated by AA, that abstinence is the only effective treatment. Eye opening article (at least it was for me, Kundun, although I think you are already familiar with the research):

www.medhelp.org/health_pages/Addiction/I...way-/show/278?cid=76

At the ultimate level, all phenomena are just thoughts and sensations arising and passing away within awareness. So, it's always possible to see that this moment is perfect, even in the midst of the most extreme physical pain and emotional distress. Nonetheless, down here in meat space, where we spend so much of our time, biology must be respected. Nature and nurture are inseparable.

Kenneth

I'm all for meditation and its use in the treatment of all kinds of ailments. But it's not going to cure an earache. I just want to be realistic about what meditation can and cannot do. In the end I agree with Kenneth's formulation. We can't separate biology and the psyche, and with the caveat that Kenneth states - the biological disease is far less likely to be cured by meditation than by the appropriate medicine or surgery.

"Interesting discussion. Like all nature/nurture debates, I think this one is a false dichotomy. It always turns out that biology and socialization work together. Chris's point that alcohol withdrawal can lead to death is well taken (and well documented): "

I agree with that fully. Actually other subject that has been research is that these so called "habitual addictions" produce endorphins and other hormones that are actually the same that will be produced with some addictive substances like coffeine. So as far as brains are concerned, it doesn't matter whether it is some substance we are using or just some habitual addiction we are performing (jogging, gambling, sex, shopping, etc).

I think that makes it even more obvious that the degree of addiction can be as higher or even higher with some functional addictions as it iis with some addictions to substance. I'm not an idealist - I don't think matter has become from idea. Neither am I a materialist - I don't think consciousness arises from matter. I think that mahayana buddhist observation "form is emptiness, emptiness is form" or put in another way "matter is idea, idea is matter" comes closest to the answer. It's an interdependent process where everything arises together from everything - and at the same time from nothing, as there isn't anything that is separated from anything. Addiction is great example of this dichotomy in the practice of our lives.

"Eye opening article (at least it was for me, Kundun, although I think you are already familiar with the research):

www.medhelp.org/health_pages/Addiction/I...way-/show/278?cid=76 "

That was a very good article - without bad attitude that sometimes can be found from this kind of articles. I was familiar with the things that were referred there, but it was very straight and compact article that included all the most important points. Thank's for this link!