CRIME: 25% of all prison inmates are there for drug related crimes. 16.4% are in prison for committing crimes to get money for drugs. 47% of crimes were committed while a person was on drugs or alcohol.

SEX: A lot of the sex outside of marriage wouldn’t happen if it weren’t for alcohol or drugs being used to try to drown out guilt and fear (which are nature’s feedback to try to stop us from doing something against its perfect order). And nature does other harsh things to try to stop sex outside of marriage. USA Today reported that shockingly, 1/2 of everyone under 25 years old in the United States has had an STD (Sexually Transmitted Disease). The U.S. Dept. of Health reports that there are 1.1 million current cases of AIDS/HIV in the United States. (So obviously, it needs to be recognized that nature is hostile towards sex outside of a monogamous, heterosexual marriage, which is the only sexual setting that nature doesn’t try to stop via harsh consequences). 80 percent of unmarried teen mothers end up on welfare, costing this country $7 billion annually. And a University of Georgia study reports that of those individuals who experienced unwanted sexual intercourse in the last year, 92.1% had been under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

ACCIDENTS: Alcohol is involved in 50% of all driving fatalities. In the United States, every 30 minutes someone is killed in an alcohol or alcoholism related traffic accident. That amounted to 17,488 people last year alone.

MENTAL ILLNESS: Fifty percent of the mentally ill population has a substance abuse problem. In fact, 22 million Americans suffer from substance dependence or abuse due to drugs, alcohol or both, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

EMOTIONAL HEALTH: The general emotional health of the public is very poor, as is evidenced by the high divorce rate and a teen suicide rate that is higher than the other 26 industrialized nations combined. Other indicators of the general state of the heart of America come from its entertainment industries: the shocking and harsh experiences in the movies, the rampant dysfunction on television, and the high percent of bad feelings (and the big void of good feelings) that come out of the music industry.

Now that’s the bad news. The good news is that there is a solution to all of this. That solution starts with understanding what the basic problem is. The basic problem behind alcoholism and drug abuse is that people aren’t finding happiness and fulfillment naturally. So then they attempt to achieve happiness and fulfillment (or escape their unhappiness and emptiness) by using alcohol or drugs. But those bandaids usually end up leading to a lot more unhappiness, health problems, financial problems, relationship breakups, legal problems, etc. A lot of hidden damage is done while in a stolen euphoria. But obviously those risks aren’t enough to outweigh the problems in a person’s emotional state or the lacking in their life that cause them to overlook the risks and dangers of alcohol and drug use.

So then, WHY are people so unhappy or unfulfilled that they would make that choice? The answer is simple: they are not operating in harmony with the natural design of their being. It starts with the fact that if a person has his or her natural drives unsatisfied for more than a normal period of time while searching for satisfaction, over time the frustration and lack of hope from this can cause them to become more dulled and depressed and even sleepy and prone to drugs to try to make his or her self feel good and not feel bad.

But, the good news is that the continual unnaturalness that led to this bad state can be reversed. And the process that will awaken them, enliven them and make them even feel good and excited about their life. The reason is that they are given hope that there is a real solution for their problems…and then they actually get satisfaction by carrying out that solution.

Teaching a person how to be happy naturally and in harmony with the real design, meaning and purpose of their life is the key to how they get the strength, joy and deep fulfillment that is necessary for them to have no inclination for alcohol or drugs. But, that’s easier said than done, and can only happen within THE natural design of how we were made to be. That means first knowing what that design is. That can be a difficult thing to do in this world because there is a great amount of debate and disagreement as to what that design really is. But ‘the world’ in general, obviously has it wrong if there exists such a huge drug and alcohol problem and poor social statistics.

Having been in the top echelons of the music business as a former member of Sly & The Family Stone and The Elvin Bishop Group, I know alcohol and drug abuse well. But after experimenting with 22 approaches to lifestyle and personal growth, I became free from alcohol and drugs 24 years ago (after 18 years of use). I finally realized that fighting nature is not a battle that anyone can win and be happy. Therefore why even try?

Understanding and flowing with the natural order is how to make inner, outer and social life work at their best. But like I said, that is a task that is easier said than done, given that the mainstream culture in general is not in harmony with the natural order and is tolerant of a lot of dysfunction. Therefore, if a person wants to be free from a weakness for alcohol or drugs, they will have to go through a re-orientation of how the mind, heart and body are designed to function, and they will have to know how to have the strength and vision to transform into that design. My self-help Addiction Free Forever program shows how to do all of those things.

]]> http://www.hrpk.com/the-root-cause-and-permanent-solution-for-an-alcohol-or-drug-addiction.html/feed 0 http://www.hrpk.com/drug-addiction-chemical-dependency.html http://www.hrpk.com/drug-addiction-chemical-dependency.html#comments Wed, 16 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0000 admin http://www.hrpk.com/?p=1366 Drug addiction or chemical dependency involves regular taking of psychoactive drugs to the point where the user does not have any effective choice with him. The addictive nature of drugs varies from substance to substance and from individual to individual. Often drugs like codeine and alcohol typically require more exposures to addict their users than drugs like heroin and cocaine, which create fast addiction.

Types of drugs

Drugs are something that affects your brain and behavior. Often people start taking drugs out of sheer curiosity but this proves to be dangerous.

Following are the types of drugs available in the market:

]]> http://www.hrpk.com/drug-addiction-chemical-dependency.html/feed 0 http://www.hrpk.com/how-to-feed-the-hungry-heart.html http://www.hrpk.com/how-to-feed-the-hungry-heart.html#comments Sun, 28 Feb 2010 00:00:00 +0000 admin http://www.hrpk.com/?p=3741 Most of us live our lives hungry, hungry for love, attention, praise, success. But no matter how much we take in, it’s hard to be satisfied and feel full. We may get what we need momentarily, but then before long we’re craving more. It is easy to spend each day waiting for tomorrow when we will get what we dream of. Most think that tomorrow they will arrive arrive at their goal, find a new job, have good weather, or finally, magically, meet the love of their life.

But when tomorrow comes it’s another day, just like this one. Unless we know what this day is, and how to live it fully and truly, the fulfillment we dream of never comes. In Zen this is called being a hungry ghost- someone at a banquet who eats and eats, but is still unable to taste the food, feel full or be nourished by it.

The good news is that we can learn to eat, digest and be nourished by all that comes to us. Zen practice is about stopping the merry go round of our minds and heart.

We take our attention off the prizes we think are waiting for us, off being good enough someday, and realize we’re good enough now. At this very moment we are that which we seek so fervently.

How To Take The First Step

Stop For A Moment

Practice is about stopping. We stop our usual way of running,moving, chasing, fixing, thinking, doing and take a breath. Just a simple breath, just like one we take every moment of our lives, but pay no attention to. The first step is to take charge of our focus and pay attention to what’s going on now,right here, under our eyes, to this very breath.

Without this precious breath and the one that follows it, we would not be anywhere. Strange, isn’t it, how we take this breath for granted. What else do we take for granted? It’s worthwhile to look and see.

Exercise: Paying Attention

Consider for a moment what you pay attention to all day long. What seems important to you, what do you take for granted and hardly attend to at all? Write it down. Do not judge your answers. Be honest and simple. As you keep track all week long, you’ll be amazed at what claims your attention, what you give your life force to.

Most of us spend our lives paying attention to the dreams created by our racing, scheming minds. We allow this Monkey Mind to rule us. The monkey mind is the mind that hops from person to person, job to job, desire to desire, thought to thought. It always wants more, never feels good and doesn’t now how to say thank you.

It chatters endlessly and is an expert in spoiling, judging and criticizing everything. Sometimes it is very loud in our lives. Other times it settles down. This monkey mind pursues that which has no value and doesn’t know how to find that which it is yearning for.

In order to fill our hungry hearts, we must learn how to recognize and dissolve this monkey mind, to take our attention away from it, to turn our focus to what counts.

Exercise: Stop The Monkey Mind

Spend some time getting to know how the Monkey Mind is operating in your life. Much of our misery is caused by IT. The first step is becoming aware. We need not hate, reject or try to get rid of it, just to recognize what’s going on. This recognition takes its power away. As we learn to make friends with this part of ourselves we help it to settle down and take its proper place. As you pay attention and stay in the present, little by little you will be returning to your original self. This is the part of yourself which knows the truth, is kind and filled with clarity. As this part of you grows, everyday life and the struggles it brings, will become transformed. Life will become fresh and new possibilities will come to you all by themselves.

Cc/author/2007

Now don’t get me wrong these things can all be useful. They prepare you for the “final revelation” which will help rid you forever of your addiction.
You do deals with yourself. “If I don’t have (insert your personal addiction here) today, then I will be able to have one tomorrow” or “I am useless because I can’t control this”. “I feel so bad today I need my little helper”. Maybe, your inner voice tells you no-one understands how hard it is, or you are just more sensitive than others, or it makes you interesting, or my friends wouldn’t like me any other way or or or….

We can run in these circles for years, swapping addiction for addiction. Blaming everyone for our problems. “I was an unloved child” “My father was an alcoholic” “I have issues with commitment”. Sound familiar? Now please, don’t get me wrong. Being the child of an alcoholic is no small thing! I am not belittling it, just as I would not dream of belittling anything that someone believed was the cause of there addiction.

But, and here is the problem. If you “believe” something external caused you to set off on the road to oblivion, then you are going to need an equally powerful external tool to make you change that path. Well, it’s not going to happen! There is nothing external to you that will alter your course. Sorry, but thats the truth.
You can justify, lie, blame others and spend a fortune on self-help guru’s, until you realise one simple truth and that is this.

The secret to stopping your addiction is to Stop. Yes Stop! and the point is you won’t until you realise the answer to your difficulty lies inside you.
Fear is stopping you contacting the part of you that can help. Whatever it is you do to allay that fear, “your addiction,” stops you hearing that clever part of you.
The trick is to recognise the fear for what it is.

Understand it is standing in the way of you hearing your inner voice.
You have been tricked into believing that the fear is as deep as you can go. The fear is shallow. Make the decision to Stop, Stick with it and move on. Once the thing you are doing “your addiction” is no longer ruling you then you have a chance to work out how you got into this mess, That’s if you feel you need to? Maybe just getting on with your life is an option too?
Remember! The answer to the question is you! The secret of stopping, is to stop!

1. I can’t handle my pain.
2. I am unworthy and unlovable.
3. Others are my source of love.
4. I can have control over how others feel about me and treat me.

Part 2 was about the first of these beliefs learning how to handle pain. Part 3 addressed the second and third beliefs “I am unworthy and unlovable” and “Others are my source of love.” This section, Part 4, explores the fourth belief, “I can have control over how others feel about me and treat me.”

If I had to choose one false belief that causes the most pain for most people, it would be the belief that we can control how important people in our lives feel, think and behave.

In my work with individuals and couples dealing with addictive behavior, I encounter this belief and the many ramifications of it over and over. It seems very difficult for most people to accept the truth about their lack of control over others. The pain, frustration, loneliness and aloneness that result from not accepting your lack of control may be the underlying cause of your addictions.

Take a moment right now to reflect about what you think and do that is a direct result of this belief.

Do you judge/shame yourself to try to get yourself to act “right” so that others will like you? If you do, you are operating from the false belief that you can control how others feel about you by how you act. You are also operating from the false belief that self-judgment will work to control your own behavior. Judging and shaming yourself can lead to addictive behavior to avoid the resulting pain.

Do you act “loving” to others with the hope that others will act loving to you? If you do, you are operating from the false belief that your behavior controls others’ behavior. It is wonderful to be loving to others because you feel good when you are loving, but when you have an agenda attached of being loved back, then your “loving” is manipulative you are giving to get. The hurt you feel when others don’t love you back can lead to addictive behavior.

Do you get angry, judgmental and critical of others? If you do, then you are operating from the false belief that anger and judgment will have control over how others feel about you and treat you. You can certainly intimidate others into complying with your demands as long as they are willing to do so, but you cannot control how they feel about you. And they will comply only as long as they do. At some point they might leave, so ultimately you have no control over them. Your resulting stress may lead to addictive behavior.

Do you give yourself up, going along with what another wants of you, such as making love when you don’t want to, or spending time in ways that you don’t want to? If you do, then you are operating from the false belief that giving yourself up will have control over how another feels about you and treats you. A loss of a sense of self can lead to addictive behavior.

Do you withdraw from another or resist another’s requests? If you do, you are operating from the false belief that you can change/control another’s behavior toward you by punishing them through withholding love. The deadness of withdrawal can lead to addictive behavior.

In important relationships, most people do some or all of the above behaviors, resulting from the false belief that you can control how others feel, think and act.

If you really accepted the truth of your lack of control over others, what would you do differently? If you deeply, totally, completely accepted the truth of your lack of control over others feelings and behavior, you would be left with what you CAN control yourself.

I have seen over and over that people finally take loving care of themselves only when they fully accept the truth of their lack of control over others. It is truly amazing the rapid progress the people I work with make when they finally accept this truth.

Shifting out of this one false belief and into the truth will go a long way toward healing your addictions.

– Your boss ends your Monday with a stack of papers and instructions that you must submit this report in the next 48 hours or else…

– Your significant other doesn’t answer your calls when you need to get a hold of them the most

– Your mother sends you Guilt-Tripping messages that you don’t come and visit enough

– Your landlord Completely ignores you when you tell her that part of the ceiling is leaking in your apartment

– Your credit card bill is getting HUGE and is taking over in your dreams

At this point your probably starting to feel a throbbing pain in your temples like your head is about to explode.

EASY does it.

You certainly don’t want that to happen now do you?

Sit down and take a deep breath, close your eyes, relax and unravel your inner thoughts.

Sometimes, when taking control over a chaotic life, a stressful situation, a physical ailment or an emotional dilemma, it will usually start within you – your mind, and specifically, your “Subconscious”.

Communicating with your subconscious doesn’t have to be seen as being difficult.

Negotiating with your own self(Yes, I know it sounds kind of crazy, but hear me out) can be ‘achieved’ through a form of mind control called “Self-Hypnosis”.

Some of you reading this article right now may of heard of this practice and know How To do it, but for those of you who don’t here’s a sample of this basic procedure in 7 easy to follow steps.

Step #1. Find a venue conducive for relaxation.

Find a quite room, with a comfortable temperature and set the lights just right (not too dim, not too bright).

Then… light a candle and incense if you desire.

Step #2. Surround yourself with sound pleasant to your ears.

Play some relaxing music. Bring in a portable fountain. Hang some chimes where the breeze blows.

WHY?

Because the sound of music is soothing.

Step #3. Find a comfortable position.

Surround yourself with the things that make you feel the most comfortable. For example, your pillows, blankets, your favorite pair if joggers, whatever you like.

A caring, healing sensation always eases stress.

Step #4. Tell yourself this.

I am light, I am comfortable, I am at ease with myself.

All my tensions, worries and anxieties are gone.

I am light, I am comfortable, I am at ease with myself.

(Repeat many times while breathing deeply and with your eyes closed.)

Step #5. Picture what you want your life to be.

Visualize every detail, every situation that you want to happen.

Imagine it So… as if it is really happening at this moment.

Step #6. Repeat step #4.

Breathe in, breathe out. Now… imagine yourself being surrounded by a bright, luminous light starting from your forehead until it fills the whole room.

Step #7. Wake Up!

Simply wake up when you’re ready and feel refreshed.

Repeat this procedure regularly as needed.

This exercise simply helps you clear your thoughts.

It may also lead you to Self-Revelations that will help you assess the situation on How you want to live your dreams.

It may or may not work, your goal may or may not be achieved – the universe has reasons humans may not fathom.

The important thing here is this: “Self-Hypnosis” will help you become a better, calmer person that’s More attuned to themselves, and more willing to help others.

With ALL your tensions and worries away, who knows what you may accomplish in the coming Days, Weeks, Months and Years that lie ahead.

1. I can’t handle my pain.
2. I am unworthy and unlovable.
3. Others are my source of love.
4. I can have control over how others feel about me and treat me.

Part 2 was about the first of these beliefs learning how to handle pain. This article addresses the second and third beliefs “I am unworthy and unlovable” and “Others are my source of love.”

As small children, most of us decided that it was our fault when we didn’t get the love we needed. We decided that there must be something basically and intrinsically wrong with us that caused our parents or other caregivers to not love us or to abuse us. Since we were too small to give ourselves the love and attention we needed, we were naturally dependent upon others for our survival. Deciding it was our fault that we were not being loved gave us the feeling of control: we could change ourselves and become the “right” way in order to get the love we needed. We put aside our wonderful essence and developed our ego/wounded self to try to have control over getting love and avoiding pain. We went about trying to get the love we needed from others.

The problem is we became addicted to trying to get love from others and never learned that we can, as adults, access love directly from our Source.

Are you operating from the false belief that you can’t do this for yourself that you can’t access the love you need directly from your Source? Do you believe that you are somehow defective and that the Source of love that is God will not come to fill you with love, peace and joy? Do you believe that you were born flawed and are therefore undeserving of receiving love from your Source? If you are operating from any of these false beliefs, then it is likely that you are still looking outside yourself for a dependable source of love.

If you could see love, you would see that we live in a universe of love that it is all around you as well as within you. Your feeling self your inner child needs that love to survive and thrive. It is everywhere, yet your Child may be starving for love.

When you don’t know how to access the love that is always available to you, and you believe that it won’t be there for you anyway because you don’t deserve it, it is likely that you will turn to outside sources. You might use food as a substitute for love, or alcohol or drugs. You might use things toys, clothes, objects as substitutes for love. Or, you might think that another person needs to be your dependable source of love that you need sex or attention or approval to fill the empty place within that needs love. You might sense that love exists within that other person, and you might believe that he or she has more ability to access love and bring it to you than you have. Many of the people I work with tell me that they cannot love themselves as well as someone else can, so they keep trying to get someone else to take responsibility for their feelings and needs. They keep trying to hand over their inner child to someone else, thus creating inner abandonment.

The inner abandonment that comes from using substances, things, activities or people as your source of love is the real source of your pain. As long as you are making something or someone outside yourself your dependable source of love, you will be creating – through your self-abandonment – the very pain you are trying so hard to avoid.

As children, our parents were supposed to bring us love from our Source. As adults, we are supposed to be doing this for ourselves. But when our parents didn’t show us how to do it for ourselves because they were not doing it for themselves or for us, we never learned how access our true Source of love. Without this access, you will remain stuck in your addictions, trying to fill the inner emptiness that can only be filled with love from your Source.

In the next section of this series, I will explore the ways you might be attempting to get others to fill you coming from the false belief, “I can have control over how others feel about me and treat me,” and in the final section, I will show you how to access love from your Source.

Imagine how convenient it will be to read a quick email from your therapist that can give you just the insight you were looking for to move beyond your failed relationship or that obsession with chocolate that was left in the wake of a bad break-up. This could be the very addiction that is causing you to buy larger sized clothes all of the sudden.

Think about the worried mother who doesn’t quite know what to do about her child’s out-of-character or unusual behavior. Or even worse, the distraught parent trying to cope with his teenager’s drug or alcohol addiction. And of course there are other intense problems, such as teen pregnancy, death of a loved one or terminal illness in the family.

These can be tough problems to tackle in an already stressed environment that is the world we live in. But when do you find the time to go to your therapy session? This is especially the case when your therapist is not available during the day, over weekends or at some other time when it is convenient to you?

Think about the time it takes to travel back and forth for a therapy session even when you do manage to schedule one. There is the ever increasing cost of gasoline to contend with too, adding to the stress that might lead you to seek counseling in the first place!

Then there are some problems that you might not want to talk to someone face-to-face with, especially someone who lives in your home town. Wouldn’t it be much easier to sign up for email counselling sessions with someone in a far away city? You could even open an anonymous email account with yahoo or some other email provider that doesn’t necessarily need your real name, and use that to offer near total anonymity.

This seems like a good idea, it can provide you the kind of nurturing environment needed to really pour your heart out to the therapist and get a professional response via email. The therapist doesn’t have to know anything about your identity and can still treat you professionally. And this could mean no embarrassing record that could be subpoenaed in a court of law.

A good online counseling plan might include unlimited emails for a certain amount of time. Giving you the kind of access to a therapist that you might not get in a once-a-week appointment. Not without paying extra, that is.

Yes, there are a number of benefits to seeking online therapy. Anonymity, access, time and money savings. No one needs to know you are in therapy and they won’t ever see you “go” to an appointment. Yet, while you are sitting at your computer, an email may pop up with just the timely advice or encouragement you were looking for, the kind of support that can be hard to come by in today’s crazy, mixed up world.

Now it occurs to me that I generally motivate myself to quit in the following manner:

(i) Make a demand to myself to quit.
(ii) Fail to quit.
(iii) Punish myself for continuing to smoke by nagging myself about it (I call it “worry”).
(iv) Make an offer to myself I will stop the nagging, but only as a reward for quitting smoking.
(v) Fail to quit again.
(vi) Go back to Step (i) and repeat….

It’s been an unconscious process up until recently, because I’ve been nagging myself for so long that it’s become second nature to me. My operative motivation, then, for quitting smoking is to relieve myself from the nagging that I impose upon myself. It’s actually designed to work like this:

1. Punish myself for continuing to smoke by nagging myself about it.
2. Make an offer to stop the nagging as a reward for quitting smoking.
3. Quit smoking in order to collect the reward.
4. Bestow the reward (stop nagging at myself).

But hey, since I’m offering myself only the cessation of something (nagging) that I don’t have to do in the first place, why not just skip Step 3 and go directly to Step 4? And that’s always what ends up happening after a few go-rounds of (i) through (vi).

The cessation of self-imposed nagging is what’s called an “imaginary motivation”. It’s a game I can’t win, and deep down inside I know it. And when an imaginary motivation fails to produce real results, I judge and blame myself for failing to be motivated by it, thus starting the whole cycle all over again.

Roses are red
Violates are blue
I’m schizophrenic…

And so am I

There’s GOT to be a better way…

According to the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse that was conducted in 2001, it is estimated that 83 million Americans have tried marijuana. It is also estimated that 5.6 million of these users reporting having problems with illicit drug use and more than 2 million of these users feel dependant on smoking marijuana.

There are effective treatments and supplements that you can take to control the urge to smoke marijuana, however not everyone can afford to go to a rehab clinic or fork out hundreds of dollars for craving supplements that may or may not work.

This is where Emotional Freedom Technique (or EFT) comes into place. It is free, quick, easy and very effective at stopping cravings of all kinds including craving to smoke marijuana joints.

So what is EFT?

EFT is in simple terms, a method to break habits. By applying pressure on certain areas of your body whilst thinking about your craving you can reverse this craving for whatever it is you do not want. The technique is also used to send positive affirmations to your subconscious mind. The technique looks very strange but it is very simple to do and very effective. I would recommend everyone try this technique as it is so simple to achieve results.

What you will be doing is tapping with our fingertips on certain key points of the body. Just before tapping and during tapping you should concentrate on your craving. For example, if you wanted to smoke a joint, you would think about smoking a joint and imagine yourself already smoking a joint.

It’s very simple stuff and can be performed by anyone. Results are instant and the whole process should not take you more than 3 minutes to complete.

Sign up to the Cannabis Addicts newsletter to recieve a free EFT guide.