Addiction and compulsion—Mindfulness to the rescue

The highest form of human intelligence is to observe yourself without judgement.
J. Krishnamurti

The other day someone complained that she was completely addicted to her mobile phone. Well, good for her that she openly admits her compulsive habit and wants to do something about it, but aren’t we all? When I look at the folks in the subway how they scroll down picture after picture on some Instagram, Twitter, or whatever the latest and greatest social media outlet is these days, it really looks like the Matrix has sucked us all in. Same with the endless video games that they our boys and their friends are playing. Of course, addiction and compulsive behaviors have been around for the longest time wether it is drugs, eating disorders, sex, smoking and alcohol, but it really seems like we are all collectively wiring ourselves into addiction at an ever faster rate. Our monkey mind needs to be occupied all the time and the trigger finger needs to double click otherwise something is simply off.

Compulsive behavior has a clear message for us. We have trapped ourselves into an activity that we think aids us psychologically when it will become pretty clear one day that it pulls us down. When we have finally accepted that we want to overcome the habit, we spend our time fighting it mentally. Soon we learn though that whatever plan we come up with, by the time the desire arises, our mind and actions are simply on auto-pilot. Here is J. Krishnamurti's simple advice: wake from your trance by observing your compulsive behavior in action (he gives the smoking example, but you can substitute any compulsive behavior instead, even getting sucked into uplifting FB memes)

"Habit is a dead thing, it is an action which has become automatic, and the more one fights it the more strength one gives to it. But if the person who smokes becomes conscious of his habit, if he becomes aware of putting his hand into his pocket, bringing out the cigarette, tapping it, putting it in his mouth, lighting it and taking the first puff - if each time he goes through this routine he simply watches it without condemnation, without saying how terrible it is to smoke, then he is not giving new vitality to that particular habit. But really to drop something which has become a habit, you have to investigate it much more, which means going into the whole problem of why the mind cultivates the habit - that is, why the mind is inattentive."

I have a prediction for you, an ever increasing number of people will open up to spirituality. It’s these moments when you want to break a compulsive habit when you start looking for a more serene and happier energy, when you learn that a lot has to change in your life to make it an ongoing reality. A new mindset, new friends, sometimes even a new profession and a new life philosophy. Louise Hay in "You Can Heal Yourself" had an interesting insight. She claimed that once we are in the process of tackling your addiction, we should watch what other side effects this change brings with it. The former smoker who gets fat as he stops smoking, or the writer who loses her creativity as she stops drinking. Louise Hay’s point is that the compulsive habit is in fact compensating for an issue that we are not aware of, but once other side effects show up, we are given new clues what the underlying issue really is. It might be the lack of love or confidence; maybe we are even searching for God without realizing it.

That’s exactly how a spiritual journey starts, a complete revamp of everything that we believe in and that gives us meaning. Who knows where the journey will take you once you start knocking on a new door. The bottom line of fighting any compulsive habit is mindfulness. Look up from your screen, go into the forest for a few hours or just hang out with a good friend in an old-fashioned coffee shop without WiFi. Once we start looking for a new way, that’s always when the Way shows up.