Solving the Drug Problem

Hi to everyone.

“Don’t give me problems, give me solutions”

In one of my posts “Shooting blanks in the dark” I pointed out some of the problems we are facing as a society regarding drug abuse. This is a generalization of the problem and it goes much deeper than what I pointed out.

The solution to the problem is much more complicated than to declare war on drugs and drug dealers or to imprison people. That is not the enemy. The enemy lies in our society.

The enemy lies in how adults behave and treat their young. It is a fact of life that we learn from what we see. We learn more from the actions of our parents than from their words. Everything we say think or do instructs our children. Do you really think that they are not listening to what you are saying? Are you that naive

to think that they do not see what you are doing? Young people are like sponges; they are eager to learn about life, they observe closely. Young people don’t miss a thing. Do you really think you are kidding them?

I met with a young couple that was using Cat. They had a small daughter of 2 years old. They told me that they are not using in front of their daughter. The daughter was playing in her bedroom. Halfway through the interview the daughter came out of her room… holding a straw by her nose. The mother was horrified; the dad grabbed his head in disbelief. ‘Where did she learn how to do that?” they shouted, looking with embarrassment at each other. It was very difficult for me to keep my sarcasm to myself. Where in the hell do you think she learned that, I wanted to scream at them?

Fathers that think it is cute when they send their sons to get them their beer and even to get them to pour for them. “Just get mommies cigarettes in the bedroom.” Not please.  Later the mother wants to reprimand her child if the child doesn’t say please if they want something. When the children are teenagers, that same parents reprimand this children not to drink or to smoke or to use drugs. Do as I say, not as I do. How stupid can you be?

They see how you treat other people. They hear and see how you act on the road. They hear what you are saying about their teachers, and then we want to punish them if they treat their teachers with disrespect. They are like sponges. They observe you closely, and that is how they will do when they are adults. You are teaching them how to behave. Remember you are their hero, what you do must be how they should behave.

This goes even further, it also goes to abuse. It is no use spending millions of rand on abuse campaigns if fathers or mothers still abuse their wives/husbands and children.  Children learn from actions not words. Children mirror their parents.  They see fear. They see anger. They see hypocrisy and intolerance.  They see anxiety. They even know what you are thinking. They learn this from you, their parents.

Further, if you can now imagine that when this children become teenagers they start learning from their friends, which in turn learned different actions from their parents. They also learn from their teachers, which again were taught by their parents, and suddenly we are sitting in a situation where we are in now.

This problem started years ago, we are teaching our children what we were taught twenty and thirty years ago. I would like to challenge you to think back when we were young. Can you remember the acid wave in ’65, the duck-tails and the hippies and skinheads?

Our youth are mimicking what adults are doing. All people are imitating each other. We are just doing what we see others are doing.

So in conclusion I suggest that we start to guide our children through our own actions and behavior. That will be the only way to change the attitudes and behavior of our youth.

Thank you for reading this blog.

 Your comments are much appreciated.

The Prisons of the Mind

Hi to everybody

When we look at our lives, past to the present, and then into our future; all the hardships, all our struggles, all the pain we have gone through, our mundane routines of getting up going to work, getting home to sit in front of a TV, going to bed just to do it all over again, day in and day out then the question arises;

What is the difference then between a prison and your life?

The only difference is that people in prison don’t want to be in prison. We on the other hand want to be living our lives. That is when we start to realize how many prisons are in our world. Any place you don’t want to be is a prison for you. If you are in a marriage or relationship that you don’t want to be in, any work that you hate or if you are in a body that is sick and full of pain that is your prison. If you are around people that you don’t want to be around that is a prison for you. If you are addicted to something, then that will be your prison.  

So how do we escape from this prisons we are in. We don’t need to get rid of our partner or quit our jobs. We don’t need to leave the party and rather go home. All we need to do is to want to be there. As soon as we want to be in the relationship or job or at the party, as soon as you can change your attitude from, I don’t want to be here, to that of I want to be here, you escape the prison.

There are 4 well known prisons of the mind we could find ourselves to be in.

•         The prison of Anger.
•     The prison of Fear.
•         The prison of Pain and Sadness.
•         The prison of Guilt.

Just as in a prison there are also different cells in these prisons.

In the prison of Anger there are Migraines, Peptic Ulcers, Back Pain, Hyper Tension and Obesity.

The prison of fear consists of Phobias and Anxiety.

The prison of Pain and Sadness consists of Asthma, Depression, Addiction and excessive smoking.

In the prison of Guilt are cells like Impotency, Frigidity, Skin Decease, Obesity and Suicide.

So if we have these prisons there are obviously crimes that are committed, there must be a sentence and then also we need prisoners.

The crimes committed.

·        I am here.

·        I am a boy/girl.

·        I am angry.

·        I am afraid.

·        I hurt.

·        I love.

·        I am curious.

The sentence that is given.

·        You must never feel angry

·        You are not lovable – you are bad

·        You must not succeed

·        You must be afraid

·        You must not love – not even yourself

·        You must not think.

The Prisoners

·        Psychosomatic disorders

·        Decease of addiction

·        Emotional disorders.

The most amazing aspect of this model is that these prisons do not have guards or bars or doors. You can walk out whenever you feel like it, but we choose to stay in these prisons our entire lives.

The only way to get out of these prisons is to go back to the crime scene, to understand where/who passed the sentence. Only then can we walk out of our prison.

Lesson number one:

·        Never believe a prediction that doesn’t empower you. How many predictions have been thrown at you your whole life? If you believe every prediction that is thrown at you, you will wither and die. You will physically or your spirit will die as you walk around like a carcass, a corpse, walking around just following the masses. You will be given a lot of titles in your life, you will be told so many things. You must only listen to that that empowers you. I do have a belief that served me well in my life and that is that everyone is rooting for me to win, even those that doesn’t know it. I am not here to tell you that I had adversity in my life and therefor I know what you are going through. I do not have a clue. I did not grow up in your neighborhood, I did not have your set of parents nor do I live in your body. I did not have the events that you had to go through. I am only an expert in one thing and that is how to be me. 

The second lesson is that you are not your condition. That is why I am teaching people in addiction that they are not addicts. You must rise above this condition. The only addiction is the refusal to adapt and to stay in that prison of the mind, to act like addicts. You have to adapt to any environment you are in, even if it is addiction. You must stop pitying yourself. The biggest addiction is self-pity. You are not your condition. How does adaption looks like? I think it looks like celebration. If you are around people that celebrate life you want to be around them, you want to learn from them, you want to do business with them. If you want to get out of that prison you need to change your attitude, you must believe in yourself you must start trusting yourself that you can bring value to the human race. If I believe I am an addict I will wither up, I will be shy, I will be insecure, I will be afraid, I will act as if I need your help and the rest of humanity will be okay with that. I choose something else. I choose to be strong; I choose to be a leader. I know why I was put on earth. I have been put on earth to rid humanity from their insecurities. When a human being is insecure they do stupid stuff. When we feel that we are not enough we chase external validation to tell us that we are enough. You are enough. I made a pledge as a therapist to love all people, it doesn’t matter what they did wrong. I found that it doesn’t matter what people did, all people just want to be loved. They don’t want to only be loved by their moms or dads or partners, they want to be able to love themselves.

Lesson three.

Stop bullying yourself. You cannot pity yourself, stop believing the predictions other people lay on you. I am not good enough, I am a wash out an addict I am no good for society. Stop bullying yourself.

Last lesson.

The real prison is not surrounded by barbed wire, fences and bars. It is in your mind. It doesn’t matter if you are in a real prison or live in a mansion. I know of people that lives in mansions but they are still in prison, the prison of their own mind. We all got it. We all have a mind that chatters, on and on, never stopping.

Do you know where your salvation is? It is when you drop out of that chattering mind of yours into your heart, into your soul. There where love comes from. When you love yourself, when you stop believing predictions, when you stop bullying yourself, when you stop pitying yourself, when you learn to master your emotions then and only then you are free. 

Thank you for reading this post. 

Feel free to leave a comment. It is appreciated.

Letting go of Fear

Hi to everybody.

When I was a little boy my friends dad bought him a bicycle. It was a brand new Raleigh bike with straight handles and a three speed gear setup.

I could not ride bike at that time, so I asked him if he could teach me. That same afternoon, after school, we were standing next to the pavement with Chris holding the bike. Me, one leg over the crossbar and my foot on the pedal, nervous, scared and very excited, all at the same time. Chris then pushed the bike without warning and shouted that I should pedal.

Needless to say, I traveled  about ten yards before I lost my balance and crashed, with my friends brand new bike. We tried another three times that afternoon, to no avail. By now I was so scared, holding the handles that my knuckles showed white. I was so rigid and stiff out of fear that it was impossible to hold my balance.

The next day after school, Chris told me something that I would never forget in my life. He said to me to relax. "Just relax, then you will be able to hold your balance" he said. It worked and I could ride the bicycle.

We are so fearful of what might happen to us, that we are holding the handles to tight. That is why we are suffering from all kinds of sickness, related to stress and anxiety.

We fear mainly two things in life. We fear death. We fear the future.

 

Fear is a huge problem in our modern world, and instead of letting go of fear we are creating fear. We are looking at horror movies, vampire movies, scary movies; we are listening to people who find it sadistically pleasurable to tell us the most horrific stories. The world is going to end on exactly that date and hour. That is their prophecy, and amazingly thousands of people actually believe them. You should not eat this or that, they say, because it causes cancer. 

Television is a good example of how big industry motivates us in buying their products. The biggest motivator is fear. Think about the insurance industry. They scare us into buying their products, just in case something goes wrong. Have you seen how high the crime rate is they say. Just be careful that you do not become a victim, without our products. And you pay and pay. The most amazing scary stories  gets around, from death, germs or losing your belongings. We are victims of fear. 

Winnie the Pooh and Piglet walked home one Saturday afternoon, after visiting Rabbit.

 On their way home a vicious thunderstorm broke out. It was a terrible storm. Thunder, lightning and a howling wind. Trees was uprooted or hit by lightning, and little Piglet was scared, very scared. He shouted on the top of his lungs, "What if a tree falls on us?" For a moment Winnie hesitated, because Winnie was also scared. But then sanity prevailed. Winnie stopped and waited for Piglet to catch up. "And what if a tree doesn't fall on us?"he asked Piglet. That calmed Piglet down and they reached their home safely.
                                                      

What will happen if… followed by something negative, something terrible that might happen to us in the future? There is a possibility but in most cases very unlikely. The anecdote for fear is, what will happen …followed by something positive. Negative thoughts have a tendency to create a negative outcome, and a positive thought creates a positive outcome. The lack of fear creates positive outcomes.

I understand when people go into a relationship with fear. Fear that their partner might cheat on them, fear that their partner might leave them, fear that their partner might abuse them. Whenever such a person is so afraid, it creates such a terrible lack of trust. When there is a lack of trust there cannot be a good relationship. Many of us are in relationships with a lack of trust, and a lack of trust means there is a lot of fear. So because there is a lack of trust, because of the fear we cause the relationship to crash. That is the negative loop we are into. What we fear will most probably happen. This fear stops us from enjoying life. Nobody wants to be in a relationship with a fearful person. There are so many rules that need to be obeyed, just because of our fears. When we are fearful we are tense, and when we are tense we fall off our bicycles. We need to learn to relax. Fear causes all kind of sickness.

This question always comes to my mind. Why do we have to fear God? That is the kind of fear we are taught from childhood, from when we are small. God loves us but we must fear God. Why is that? We are taught to love our partners but we must also fear them. 

If there is no fear that means you can relax, and when we relax you can start enjoying life. That is why you are on earth. Our biggest fear is fear itself.

So the best way of overcoming fear is to have a positive attitude. We must stop falling into the trap of having all this contingency plans. If this plan doesn’t work, at least I still have plan b or c.

Stop been so controlling. It is the control freaks that cause us so much fear. They want us to fit in with their plans and if we don’t we become fearful of what they might do. That comes from very painful experiences they had in their past, when they suffered a lot. Because they suffered a lot they think that the only way to protect themselves is to control more. So they are such fearful people, they always plan, figuring something out. Just in case they might get hurt again. They go into relationships with all their plans ready, they go to work with plans, and they even have plans for their children.

People don’t need to be like that, they create problems not only for themselves but for the people around them as well.

We do not know what might happen in the future. Why then, do we ask people to promise us that they will do something correct. We don’t know what will happen next. Why can’t we just adapt to life as it unfolds around us.

I have learned that the only way to overcome fear is to be kind. Just be kind at your job interview, or have to give a speech or whatever. Be kind to your children, even if they do something that doesn’t fit into your plans. Not only to be kind, but also try to put some fun into whatever you are fearful to do. 

Lastly stop all this worrying. Worrying comes from fear.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Don't be scared to leave a comment. It would be highly appreciated. 

A story about Cathy

Hi to all my friends

I found this letter which I would like to share with you.
It was written by a bouncer and because of the length of this profound letter to all parents, I would rather prefer to write a post about this next time.

The letter is called "Cathy" Enjoy.

 I had worked at various night clubs in Durban and surrounds since 1993. When I joined the Police the “work” was frowned on so I dropped it off, only working the odd job when money was tight. Well, let’s say money is always tight.

One of the main reason I was often hired to “work the door” was not just the size and intimidation factor, other guys had plenty of that, I tended to be mature and calm and knew when to draw the discipline line without resorting to injury. I saw and learned a lot about human beings in those years. My “bullshit” detector became highly tuned. I learned a lot about the proliferation of drugs and alcohol abuse, and I learned a lot about parenting.

The main thing I learned is that many parents talk big about how much they care about their little china cups and more often than not, when their priceless Ming vase messes up, it is everyone else’s fault except mommy, daddy or the work of art’s.

Many, many times I became a surrogate father to a goofed up teen lying in a gutter. A couple times I was even the “next of kin” to an unknown girl taken away in an ambulance who literally drank herself into a coma. (They will never know my name. Perhaps if they did, they might have got hold of me via the hospital documents and said thank you.) And here I come to the parents.

See, little Lisa certainly does not have a drinking problem. Someone MUST have spiked her drink. Now yes, I do know about Rohypnol and other drugs and the effects they have. But doing a little on site investigation helps me draw some more sensible answers. Little Lisa’s vomit is pure liquid meaning she has not eaten anything solid for at least 12 hours. Scratching around for some identity, I was almost guaranteed to find “Thins” in her handbag. (Back when they could be bought.) So our innocent darling has had no food, been fed nothing but ephedrine all day, arrived in time for the “happy hour” and collapsed after a mixture of red wine, tequila and a host of various shooters.

So we fly forward a decade to the photo posted above. I was asked a favour to help chaperone an end-of-year under 18 party. 99% of the reason myself and some other adults were there was to ensure that alcohol was not consumed. This, we attempted to achieve mainly by searching the bags of kids coming in. I was amazed mommies dropped off Pete and Suzie (both aged 15) at an under 18 party, but each of them is carrying a backpack weighing 20 kg and has a crust of frozen condensation on the outside. “It’s my makeup bag,” simpered one kiddie with big blue eyes and an innocent smile.

Next operation was to keep tabs on liquor “coming over the fence”. With a colleague we spent four hours walking the dark corners, boundaries and back doors, confiscating everything from beer, cider, vodka, and a good selection of other consumables. The more we took away, the more the partiers were on the phone calling in more drops in ever more creative methods. Kids 14-16 years old were determined to drink. And seemingly, the adults dropping them off either didn’t check or didn’t give a hoot. You should see the looks when we found a wire-thin 15 year old straining under the weight of two cases of Hunters cider coming through a hedge. The load was bigger than him.

Humour aside we were simply maintaining order ensuring no harm came to innocents. One of the chief rules of protection is: be invisible until you need to be visible. We weren’t there to spoil the fun. Then we came across our dear Cathy (Name changed) pictured above.

Cathy’s buddies scattered like stabbed rats when we came up to them, except for one faithful young blonde who appeared sincerely concerned for her friend. We picked up Cathy and took her to a lit area to asses her. She was puking properly and started weeping her sorrows. Her friend admitted Cathy had downed the better part of a bottle of Russian Bear. We established she was FOURTEEN years old and managed to find a phone number and get a parent to come get her.

Mommy arrived. And now I start quoting:

“Oh, ja. I gave her the Vodka. Sometimes she does drink too much but…..”

That was about the time I started having images involving fish hooks, pliers and a blowtorch.

This is your modern parent, dear readers. Cathy was ONE example of dozens every weekend in this suburb and others around the country. A hell of a lot of modern “parenting” involves dropping the “Cathy’s” of the world off somewhere and forgetting about them for a while.

Tell me, who would mommy have blamed if Cathy had ended up unconscious in some dirty corner with her jeans around her knees?

Who would mommy have blamed if Cathy was listed as missing and found a day later in a government hospital with God knows what disease swimming through her veins?

Who would mommy have blamed if we found Cathy a few minutes too late and she had drowned silently on her own vomit?

People better start waking up. This is not a joke. But my intuition is that I will receive a lot of “not my child” and “I know exactly where my daughter goes” but I don’t know if all the “Cathy’s” mommies will let the message sink in.

I feel sorry for Cathy. In her 14 years she has not had the time to gain enough life experience. Her only reference for morals and ethics is letting her down. I wonder how many nights like that one she has already seen. And how many more until something really goes wrong.

There are PLENTY of Cathy’s out there. I’ve seen them for decades. I still see them today staggering around shopping malls with jeans shorts pulled so high a gynecological exam is possible at 10 meters. And I see them giggling uncontrollably, reeking of liquor, on the passenger seat next to some 18 year old boy who just learned to drive.

Stop blaming the world, the government, the police and society as a whole. Look at yourself and see what example YOU set for YOUR child. And then you might also know how your child is going to turn out too.

This was posted by a bouncer in 2014 and I feel every parent today needs to read this.

Shooting blanks in the Dark

Hi to everyone,

Surely, after 100 years or more of fighting drugs somebody should have realized that something is wrong. Surely after spending billions of Rands, imprisoning thousands upon thousands of people, somebody should have realized that society is bumping their heads against a brick wall. Apparently not, the drug abuse statistics are climbing higher and higher. Nobody it seems, are prepared to think that maybe, there might be a different problem.

This week there was another march against drugs.  Banners #DRUGSMUSTFALL  and SAY NO TO DRUGS,  long angry faces singing Christian hymns down the street. Front of this procession walks the pastors and next to them the politicians. Behind them walk the clever addiction counselors, then the mothers and a few fathers and behind them a few dancing youngsters, clearly not to interested.  

Now what is wrong with that, you might ask?

As an addiction counselor (not only drugs) I am working with people from all walks of life, from kids to young adults, teachers, parents, lawyers and people in old age homes. My oldest client was 73 years old. This people were mentally, physically, and sexually abused by their own families, in some cases by teachers and even by their own children.

I do not see any marches against abuse, placards shouting #ABUSEMUSTFALL. The same mothers that are marching against drugs are the ones that throw their children out in the street, to sleep in gutters and under highway bridges. They are the mothers that had children when they themselves were still children. They are the mothers that gave their children to granny or aunt to look after. They are the mothers that did not want their children and now that the children are grown up they want to control them. Then there are the drunken fathers, abusing their wives in front of the children, abusing their children in the name of discipline, refusing to take responsibility and pastors allowing drug dealers storage in their churches because they are paid good money. That is just a short version of what is really happening in our society.

Trauma and PTSD is prevalent in 95% of all the clients. The use of drugs (narcotics) is to alleviate pain. This pain is the mental pain that is caused in early childhood. This pain comes from when you know or feel that you are not wanted. This pain comes from when you feel you are not good enough or that you cannot live up to the expectations of your parents. This pain comes from not been taught how to be independent and therefor your mother will look after you, will imprison you in her house, look after you as long as she lives. That gives her the chance to complain about you, for using drugs. Then she can cry to her friends about her addict son or daughter, getting their pity. That helps her in her addiction of self-pity.   That makes her feel good.

To scare youngsters about what drugs does to them, to imprison them for using narcotics that alleviate their pain is criminal. To kick them out of school (from government) or house (parents) into the street is criminal.  This is the people that should be jailed. The victims are imprisoned and walking the streets. The victims are the future drug dealers, the drug dealers that the culprits want to kill. The culprits are organizing marches against drugs, boosting their own egos and feeling sorry for themselves.

To tell me that you are a drug addiction counselor because you understand what drugs do to a human is as far fetched as a man in the moon. No wonder the success rate of rehabilitation centers are so low. If you do not understand abuse, trauma or PTSD or how to treat it you are shooting blanks in the dark. Everybody hears the shots, applauding you for fighting drugs; however the addiction statistics is climbing. Society is busy fighting the wrong enemy; for years they are missing the target.  Sorry my friend, you are not a hero, you are a fool. You were only trained to administer treatment for something you don’t even know exists. You, just as the rest of society have been brainwashed.

Drug abuse is the consequence of trauma and pain in childhood.  Drugs are used as a painkiller for deep rooted pain and abuse, that society wants to sweep under the carpet.

Am I the only one that sees this?

Thank you for reading this post. Please leave your comments.

The Hole you Fell into

Greetings to you

And now, now that you have fell into this dark stinking hole of addiction, suffocating, drowning in your own misery, not knowing how to get out, I would like to offer you a solution.

Only you understand how dark it is, only you know how helpless you feel.

Your family walk past you, judging you, blaming you, telling you that they told you not to do it. They say that they did warn you and that you are now on your own. They had enough of your bullshit.
Your friends walks past you, laughing at you, they don't give a hoot about your well being. They are still all right. Why should they care?
The pastor or priest walks past you, promising you that he will pray for you. Only God can save you.

In the meantime you are lying in the mud, suffocating in your misery.

"Help me... Please somebody help me" you yell. Everybody hears you, but nobody knows how to help you. All they know is to judge and blame you, laugh or pray for you.
If only somebody can only help me you think, in desperation, but to no avail.

Then, one day somebody walks past, somebody that knows how to get you out. He understands why you are in this hell hole, he does not judge or blame you, he doesn't laugh at you or pray for you. Without hesitation he jumps into this hole, he takes your hand, slowly he guides you out. He knows the road out. He leads you out of this darkness.

Now, again you can feel the sun on your skin, you can hear the birds and smell the flowers. You can breath again. You can start a new life. You were taught not to step into that hole again. Wonderful.

This is possible, there is hope.

Please leave your comments. It is highly appreciated.

Why is it so hard to be kind ?

Why is it so easy for us to be inpatient, neglecting, rude or maybe even cruel to those that we love? Why is it so hard to be kind to them? We can sometimes tell in a marriage or close relationship how long people have been in the relationship by how they talk to each other. When people just get married or start in a relationship they do have some wonderful speech, but after a while it deteriorates and ends up into bickering and sniping at each other, been intolerant, inpatient and even rude. This is not only with our spouse but with our children, our bosses or even with our parents. This causes huge problems in our life.

This is a huge problem and today we will look at possible solutions.

I still have the habit of sometimes bad speech but I try to be mindful of this. What is the cause of this bickering, impatience, intolerance and arguing with one another? We all know how unpleasant it is to be living with someone and you keep on fighting with each other.

The first step in solving this problem is to realize where it comes from. It comes from delusional stupidity, not seeing it clearly. One of the things we don’t see clearly is our idea about ourselves, our ego, and our sense of conceit. The core idea is to lose your ego, yourself, so that it becomes not a matter of who is right and who is wrong, who’s the best or who’s the worst.

If you lose your ego it brings the amount of arguments down. Most arguments are about who is right and who is wrong. That doesn’t make sense to me. It is more important to be kind and loving to your loved ones. The more people can start to understand that, the fewer arguments will happen, the fewer wars will take place between nations, countries, races and religion.

 Here is a question to you. Do you always want to be right or do you want to win in a situation?

A great example of this is the story of the chicken and duck.

A young couple took a stroll next to a dam. The sun was just setting, his arm around her shoulders, they were in love.

Suddenly, as they were walking, a duck quacked behind them. “O” said the lady, “Listen darling that is a chicken” He looked at her in bemusement. “No darling that is a duck.” “No darling, “she said,” that is definitely a chicken” “Darling” he said taking his arm of her shoulder. He was losing his cool. Just then the duck quacked again. “That is a duck. D.U.C.K. duck.” She was adament. “No I am sure it is a chicken.” The man, now visibly upset said. “Chickens goes cookel,doodle,do and ducks goes quack… quack.”  She started to cry, “but…but” she sniffled,” that is definitely a chicken.”

At this point the man did something we all should learn to do. He squeezed her hand and said. “Maybe you are right my darling, it could be a chicken.”  

Who care if it is a chicken or a duck?

We sometimes could be thinking we are right. It could have been a genetically modified duck.

They carried on walking, his arm around her shoulder, and had a lovely evening together.

This comes from how we are brought up. If you are doing something stupid you get punished for been wrong. That is why we always want to be right. So that nobody can punish us. There is nothing wrong to make mistakes, we are not perfect. Even the people that want to punish you are making mistakes.

The fool that admits he did a stupid thing is not stupid, he is wise. Why? Because he admits he made a mistake and doesn’t want to argue his innocents. He wants to win a situation. The argument stops. How many terrible situations can be avoided if you can admit that you have made a mistake? Sorry I was wrong. I admit that I am human and I can also make mistakes, and then move on. 

When you admit you made a mistake and your partner carry on about how stupid or how terrible you are…please value honesty. Because sometimes we do not want to admit we made a mistake, we think that our honesty will not be valued. If your partner came up to you and admit their fault, how would you treat him/her? Would you criticize them, would you put them down or ridicule them? Then you do not value honesty. So if you accept the fact that they were honest about their mistake, if you can acknowledge with them the mistake, you can move forward together, so that they don’t make the same mistake again. We don’t admit to our mistakes, usually out of fear of what the other person might say or do. How can you be in such a relationship? Then it will also happen that you will keep on hiding your mistakes. You will start to lie. So been right or be wrong, be perfect or imperfect, is not the point.

How many of us can say they are in a relationship like that, where you can admit you made a stupid mistake and that your partner accepts that you made a mistake and forgive you? You must admit, very few of us. Where you are allowed to make mistakes because you are human and still be respected for admitting you made a mistake. We must respect honesty.  It all comes from fear. We are afraid to admit that we were wrong. We are afraid what other people might think of us or even what they might do to us. That is why we always need to be right even if we are wrong.

 It’s a wonderful feeling to admit your mistakes and then, people around you to accept it. That ability not to have such a strong ego, a strong sense of self, that you don’t have to admit your mistakes, you don’t have to be right, is an important part of a relationship, where we can rather be kind to one another. Then we don’t have to be trying to defend ourselves all the time.

The other problem is that we are taught from young to compete. You must be better than somebody else. We are not taught cooperation. If we understand cooperation, working with other people, together, we don’t have to prove that we are better than somebody else. Sometimes competition is important but cooperation in your relationships is much more important. When we get into a relationship we keep on competing and that brings all our misery and heartache. We have to be right all the time. We must be better than our partner.  Who is right or who is wrong?

That brings us to conceit (Excessive pride in oneself… arrogance) I have learned there are 3 types of conceit. I am better than you; I am worse than you; I am the same as you. That is measuring you against another person. How can you do that, or why do you want to do that. That is the stupid delusion I was talking about earlier. We are all different, we are all unique. You must be respected for who you are. You must respect another person for who they are. We don’t have to compare people or religion or race to one another, because comparing is conceit. If you do not compare, you do not conceit. Then you can work or associate with different people. You can talk to people of  different religions or cultures. We are not better, worse or the same than anybody else, we are different.

We must treat people with respect. So instead of thinking why did I marry this man/women, I was such a stupid person to have married this fool. I must have been drunk, instead of that, to treat your partner with respect.  If you respect somebody you have a sense of harmony with that person. They know they are respected by you and they will eventually give you the same respect. Instead of acting more superior, more clever or critical they will start treating you in the same manner.

So as you lessen your sense of ego, if you don’t compete with the other person or be critical towards them, if you start cooperating with them, learning the skills of cooperation and stop judging other people it will be so much easier to speak kind words to them.

The Connection between Religion and Addiction

Greetings to everybody,

It is with great excitement that I am writing this blog today.

In January I asked a very relevant question. What was the connection between religion and illegal drugs? My question was why, when I say drug addiction, addiction counselors, clergy and the greater population of society, call on God. It would have been more acceptable, I think, if they could also call on religion when I was talking about the other 230 different addictions, but they don't.

I have asked if someone could please offer me an educated answer in trying to understand this. Unfortunately to no avail.

Then, two days ago I stumbled across an educated answer which actually made total sense. I thought about this statement carefully, and then the answer I was looking for jumped out at me.

Blaming Satan for our bullshit means
that we do not have to take responsibility for our actions.

Therefor, we now can conveniently use God to fight Satan for us.

Now I understand why churches are so involved in fighting drugs and drug abuse. It creates more patrons and therefor also more money. It also now gives them the opportunity to rule through fear, judgment and blame.


I hope that you would read this with an open mind. It is not my aim to discredit any religion.
This blog is purely to help changing societies perception about addiction.

Thank you for reading and feel free to leave any comment.

                                                       

The Biggest Addiction of them All

Greetings everyone.

On the last count there were more than 230 different addictions known to humanity , and counting. Just that fact in itself might sound impossible to us but it is very true.

Working with, and understanding addiction for close to 20 years, I went through the list of different addictions and came to an astonishing realization.

The biggest addiction on earth does not even feature on the list.
To illustrate what I am talking about I would like to tell you a very interesting story.

I was chairing a support group for parents who's children are on drugs.

There was 20 odd people, predominantly mothers, with understandably sad faces. Even a few with very angry faces. Interestingly only 1 or 2 fathers.

After opening the session we normally ask that someone would stand and share their story. This is where I normally sit back to listen what their kids have done while they were "high". The one horror story after another. From stealing to aggressive behavior, not coming home or coming home as high as kites.

That evening, in the front row sat a mother, well dressed, sobbing her eyes out. She was supported by two other mothers, also close to tears. a Pitiful site to say the least.

I stopped proceedings giving her a chance to tell her story. The tears stopped and she told the group her sad story.

"My son", she said, "is on drugs."

That was it.

"What kind of drugs?" I asked her.

She looked puzzled, did not know, and sat down.

She got her fix for the evening. Everybody felt so sorry for her, poor women.

That made her feel so much better, till the next time somebody asks her how she was. Then she would cry and say "my son is on drugs". And she would feel so much better again and again.

                                                                                    

It turned out that a friend told her that they saw her son smoking, with people that they think are smoking weed.                                                          Her son is 25 years old.

What would happen if her son stopped smoking weed or never smoked weed in the first place? What would she then use to make herself feel better? See, she would like her son to stay an addict for as long as possible.

The biggest addiction on earth is self pity.

I would like for you to sit back a moment and think about it.

How many times have you played the self pity card?

Your spouse did this or that, you might tell your friends, and they feel so sorry for you.The government did this or the boss did that and the children does not listen to you or are using drugs. Shame, poor you.

It really made you feel so much better, does it not. Especially if your friends agree that you have such a tough life.

Self pity, the biggest addiction on earth and there is no cure, no rehabilitation center.

Hope that you to read this with an open mind, My aim is not to judge or blame, but rather to change societies perception of how they see addiction.

Please leave a comment.