“Addiction, The Escape”
There are very few cases where an addict is born being addicted. Most of the time it is a person's choice to be an addict. People use many different tools for addiction, whether it be drugs, alcohol, food, etc… the most dangerous of course being drugs and alcohol.
Drug or alcohol addiction starts off as a curiosity or to add spice to a moment or to get rid of an unwanted condition (for example emotional or physical pain). After you’ve had your fun and you realize the pleasure you can get from the substances, you begin to use it for other things.
You may hear someone say “No, I’m not running from anything, I just like to get high.” This is the biggest justification a person could come up with in order for them to continue their life style and be comfortable with it. No matter which way you try to look at it, the bottom line is a person uses drugs to escape from some sort of stress or problem or situation they are continuously running into. Instead of confronting the problem and looking at it for what it is, they feel they need to throw up a wall of some sort to help deal with it.
Yet, not everyone needs drugs to help them with life. The sober individual can find comfort and purpose in healthy alternatives like hobbies, exercise or other activities. We walk a path in life and problems come at us from different directions. The tools to deal with these problems are sometimes, by our own choosing stripped from us and replaced with a substance. We all have a cycle with which we operate in.
This cycle can either be constructive or destructive. Take a school teacher for instance; he/she wakes up every morning, makes breakfast, has a cup of coffee and gets ready for work. Once they get to work, he/she does everything their job entails them too; constantly bettering themselves, their students and helping anyone that may need it.
After work, they go home to make dinner for the family, relax, then sleep and wake up and do it all over again. This is an example of a constructive cycle. Now, on the other hand, an addict also has a cycle. They are constantly swayed by how they are going to get their hands on the substance that helps them get through the day.
This can be an expensive habit and eat away a substantial portion of funds on a monthly basis. So, in order to keep the habit, they pick up tendencies like lying, stealing, manipulating. Happiness can be measured by pleasure alone, however, if you are burning people on your way to that pleasure, how can you be truly happy? Escaping from problems with drug use can only lead you down a dark road and will continuously drain you.
People need to concentrate handling life without receiving some sort of mental band aide or using a mask and throwing up walls. This will get you nowhere and lead you into a downward spiral. We have the power to do great things but if we dull ourselves with substances to fix problems, then how can we ever truly be alive?
Written by Zechariah L.
