As mentioned in previous podcasts, the Earth School environment and the paradigm of fear that currently manipulates human behavior within the "first world" have made the "modern" human experience rife with addictions ready to suck an individual into enslavement. Once the human vehicle's nervous system has been introduced to a pleasurable stimulus it is forever seeking to recreate or, worse, top that initial "high." Why we of the Monadic Kingdom decided to program that feedback loop into the emotion-based human experience I am unsure. I can only surmise that it was to further deepen the "test" that the human experience can provide.
I, Drew Fisher, have been just as conditioned by this environment, by this paradigm, and have been just as susceptible to coming under the power of addictions as the next American. I will remind you that for my first 20 years I walked the planet in a virtual fog of ignorance and naiveté--the malleable, fear-motivated automaton that Big Brother would have me be. I was also born into a fairly typical family in which addictions--some of which are even deemed socially 'acceptable'--had wormed their way into the behavioral and genetic fabric.
American way of life in general is full of addictions--many of which we are completely unaware and might not even consider addictive in their effect. At this point it might be appropriate to share with you my personal definition of the word "addiction." I define an addiction as the obsessive attraction to or perceived need for a substance, activity or stimulus whose perceived need for the individual's attention begins to erode the attentiveness and effectiveness of that individual's relationships with other people, normal duties and responsibilities as well as that individual's functioning in terms of healthy self-care, including 'proper' nutrition and sanitation. According to my definition, Americans are addicted to clothing, easy-access food, processed foods, consumerism, over-sanitation, easy transportation, telecommunications, a perceived 'need' for privacy, competition, and more--all of which arise from the Grand Illusions of Duality that We created expressly for the decision-making tests or challenges that they provoke.
I will remind you that human beings can and have survived without clothing, without air conditioning, without supermarkets, without computers, televisions, iPods and telephones, without throw-away consumables, without cars, in communities that practice mutual assistance instead of insulating, competitive behaviors for periods of history far, far longer than the period we have been in for the past two or three hundred years. Such have been the effects of our conditioning, the brainwashing that has occurred in order to get us to be involved, and get us to condone and endorse the Age of super-Leisure and ultra-Comfort, mega-Productivity and manic-Efficiency.
And so, as Drew Fisher, Journeyman Paul set himself up in full knowledge that there would be several addictions strapped on to weight down, slow down, challenge, and distract his Soul from focusing on the work order he had created for this incarnation in the Earth School. I have, I think, been fortunate to have had the wherewithal (that is, a well-thought out Soul Plan) to learn from the actions and (decidedly negative and unattractive) consequences that addictions had on friends and characters from media and fiction. Thus, I have made choices to avoid experimenting with many addictive substances and behaviors. There are other addictive substances and behaviors that I tried that I was able to learn through first-hand experience the negative and distractive aspects of their effects on me that I was then able to opt to discontinue and avoid repetition of those choices. And then there are those addictions that have been more deeply ingrained in me because they were modeled to me by things that I was in contact with almost every day of my life during my "impressionable" and "formative" years--like the people around me (family and friends) or the media (television and school). Being, as they say, "hard-wired" into my "tapestry" of neural patterning as "habits" by persistent and often insidious repetition, these addictions and addictive tendencies have provided me with challenging obstacles throughout my lifetime. When I find that they are distracting me from A) maintaining successful and open relationships with my family, friends, clientele and society in general or B) from continuing with my "soul work," then I get more introspective as to the real "need" that I feel towards these substances or activities and then I usually get more serious in my attempts to "deal" with or diminish the power that I allow them to have over me. Each "flare up" of a particular addictive tendency is invariably met or followed with a self-questioning period of guilt and remorse (which are both, I realize, wastes of time and energy but which signal the self-reflective "police" to the site of the "crime.")
(You may be wondering: If I believe, as I say I do, that there is no right or wrong, no better or worse, etc., etc., then why should I even care about struggling with things like addictions and guilt and remorse and self-reflection? Why not just let them be?
Because, dear listener, the time, attention, and energy spent in dealing with these behaviors take time, attention and energy away from other activities and pursuits that Journeyman Paul may have prioritized in the Soul Plan that he and his Team put in play when they made the commitment to the Drew Fisher adventure.
"But," you may then ask, "How, then, do you know that working with addictions and other weighty time and energy suckers wasn't part of the very Soul Plan that Journeyman Paul and his Team set before the Drew Fisher Ego/Personality?"
And the answer is: I do not know. I have, actually, assumed that dealing with addictions and time- and energy-sucking emotional behaviors are very much a part of Journeyman Paul's task list for me, Drew Fisher--that he intended for me to have to learn from dealing with these 'obstacles' in my life with great seriousness and enthusiasm.)
And so I do. I struggle with addictions. I give them a lot of attention (which may in fact be giving them more power than they warrant or deserve). Over time I've learned that if I give these addictions less time and attention, that is, if I accept them as just part of who I am and who I am going to be for this lifetime, that they end up taking less time and provoking less 'need' for attention--which then opens up more time for relationships with other people, activities, and pursuits in my life. The more energy I put into fighting them, feeling guilty or trying to solve the puzzle of why they are present in my life, the more I take away from opportunities to be creative and loving, the more time I lose in realizing the tremendous Beauty, Truth, and Joy I have access to while in this Drew Fisher body in the Earth School.
I just had a thought! Perhaps 'Addictions' is just another course or set of courses in the Earth School curriculum! We opt into them for the challenge, for the excitement, for the potential learning: "Can I manage, overcome, and defeat the addictions that come my way, or will they end up taking over my life, distracting me from achieving the goals set forth in my Soul Plan?"
Such are the mysteries of the Earth School: What are the intentions behind the existence of addictions; how are they useful to Monads and the Spirit World? These are some of the questions of an as-yet unfinished student of the Earth School curriculum. In the meantime, I continue my study, continue my struggles, continue living life as I know how.
You'll hear some people say, "Who cares if a person has addictions so long as it's not affecting (or 'hurting') anyone else?" I've heard this old dismissive used often enough. It makes some sense until one remembers that, in reality, All Is One; everything is part of one singular, fluidly fluctuating energy field; everything is connected. Like the proverbial butterfly fluttering its wings in Brazil to set in motion a typhoon in Japan. Also, I am especially sensitive to the underlying, 'hidden' effects that addictions can have on intimate relationships because of the dynamic effects I felt and learned from the addictions within my own family of origin. No one escapes the rippling effect of the addict in their lives. The rest of us are at least co-dependents caught up in the addict's web. This is where detachment comes in handy. And taking back one's power by not giving it away to another--not even to an addiction.
I have an argument that I use to express my distaste for the domestication of animals for the purpose of keeping them as house pets. I believe that this argument can be applicable to addictions: I believe that the time and energy a person devotes to giving care and attention to a house pet is time that could have been spent giving time and energy (love) to a relationship with another human, such as a loved one, a less fortunate, or even to one's own self. I believe that this same 'advice' could be applied equally sagaciously to one's addictions: The time and energy one devotes to the care and attendance of an addiction or obsessional behavior is time that could have been spent giving time and energy (love) to a relationship with another human, with a loved one, with one's self. But, then again, who's to say that the time and energy giving love and attention to one's pet (and, one's addiction) isn't a positive flow of love and energy? I mean, there is no right or wrong, right? And all flow of energy (and time) is but a flow of Love, n'est-ce pas? So, my argument may be out of line and obsolete. So, disregard this paragraph, if you wish.
There is a saying I've heard several times in my spiritual studies that goes: "What you resist persists." This seems to corroborate my argument above with regards to the time and energy you put into fighting one's addictions. This also seems to follow the principles of the Law of Attraction as well as the postulate that Alice Bailey gave to us, "Energy follows thought." That is, what you give attention to, creates more energy, attracts more energy and attention, giving it more power and a greater presence in one's life. So, then, it would seem that a tactic of nonresistance, of acceptance, of going with the flow, of even finding other things to give one's attention and energy to, instead, would be good medicine for the treatment of addictions. If, that is, one chooses to work against the so-called addiction--if one chooses to want to try to direct the energy and attention that one exerts in addiction toward other things.
Can we look at one's addiction(s) as one's lover? One's life work? One's vocation, one's "major thesis"? I'm not sure I'm ready for that, but, as I keep reminding you (and myself): Energy follows thought! If you can imagine it then it can, of course, be true--and is, most certainly, possible. So, my final words of bumbling wisdom are: Love your addictions! The lessons will follow!
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