Becoming Addiction-Free (2017)
stevepavlina.com
stevepavlina.com
Is there any science to back that claim up? First time I've heard that and it very much sounds like pseudo-science made up by "war on drugs" people.
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EDIT: There seems to be a similar claim made in some review papers[0][1], though those primarily focus on hard drug abuse. Would be interesting to get the opinion of someone more qualified on the topic.
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Either way, interesting article and at least that interconnection of weak addictions is nothing I thought about like that before. I think I might even try out that advice, as I'm currently struggling with strong procrastination (hence me commenting here) while coincidentally my weak addictions recently all had a bit of an uptick.
That said, the overriding does make it harder to self-regulate. But only wrt each addiction rather than in general.
This is 100% true in my experience. In 2013 I gave up obvious sources of refined sugar and artificial sweetener due to an elevated triglycerides report. After two weeks all sweet cravings ended. Fruit started to taste amazing. Now I have dessert of any kind at most once per week and I probably haven’t had a soda of any kind in over five years.
Oh and my triglycerides went from 232 to 113.
To say fruit is flavored sugar with fiber when comparing it to candy is an oversimplification. Eating candy you can consume 1,000 calories with almost no effort. Good luck eating 15 cups of raspberries to get to that 1,000 calories. Who would do that? And the candy has no nutrition in it while raspberries have lots of vitamins, minerals and as you said fiber.
The bottom line is that our society eats too much sugar, fat and salt and we’d be better off eating less.
But if we look at the physiology social media sites and the such are triggering your brain in the same way. And if you cold turkey stop all of those things you are addicted to, you will have an adjustment period. And it could significantly affect you.
Sure, it won't kill you like someone withdrawing from a physical addiction to alcohol might, to make you feel like you are dying like an opiate withdrawal, but lets not kid ourselves, the online systems OP and you refer to are designed to be addictive.
For me, I’m on the side of “compulsive behaviours that have a negative effect on your life, and yet you continue to do them consistently” is the definition of “practical addiction” for me, and the “negative effect” part is critical, not the distinction between “chemical/physiological” and “psychological”.
Does the person who spends 6 hours/day refreshing HN have an addiction? Maybe, maybe not! Are they underperforming at work because they can’t stop themselves? Maybe it is a problem they should get help addressing. Does someone who must take an anti-depressant every day, lest they go into withdrawal, have an addiction? Probably not, even though they’re chemically dependent on it, it likely makes their life better not worse.
For me, the mechanism of action matters significantly less than the effects and outcomes when you define addiction.
The means someone achieves pleasure or long term happiness can in fact be the same. And I see see no reason to believe why a video gaming community (what he refers to as a shallow connection) can't provide both. Are you enjoying yourself presently? Great, that's pleasure. Is this a sustainable way to enjoy yourself? Great, you are on your way to long term happiness.
> We also expose the shallowness of connections that don’t really serve us. What does it say about a connection that isn’t as good without gaming or coffee? What does it say about the quality of a relationship if going orgasm-free for a while leaves you feeling hollow and empty instead of deeply in love and grateful? Addictions so often mask substantial weaknesses that we don’t feel ready to face.
We have a wide variety of needs, and it is unreasonable to think there is a magic bullet. Different social groups (or activities, hobbies) meet different needs. If you remove whatever was meeting your need, then you will naturally feel a sense of loss, whether the relationship was a healthy one (what he calls intimate) or an addictive one. I would imagine the loss of my dog or a loved one would leave me grieving for some time and I would enjoy parts of my life less. This doesn't mean those less enjoyable things were bad.
The day/s after drinking alcohol tend to be down days for me. I'm more depressed, sad, and have lots of anxiety. I'm currently experiencing one of those days and it is starting to seriously concern me.
I know It would be better for me to stop drinking alcohol completely. I've done it before and was able to be around alcohol without letting myself consume any.
But at the moment I've been struggling with self-control and haven't been able to keep myself from drinking.
So back to my original thought, I think the answer is yes.
This is all just conjecture on my part, but it does seem possible that there are ramifications to quitting addiction that medical science has not considered yet and which may have an important influence on peoples ability to quit.
That life would be very empty and boring.
> What if you never had another orgasm for the rest of your life?
I might as well be dead :)
> Of course we could live happy and fulfilling lives without these short-term pleasures. When we think otherwise, we’re confusing pleasure with happiness. It’s the nature of addiction to treat pleasure and happiness as one.
I'm addicted to a few things, but I don't consider them a source of happiness. You also can't really have happiness without short term pleasures, whatever they might be.
> You can’t have a relationship with the addiction. There is no moderation for an addict. The standard you aim to reach is being permanently alcohol-free.
Oh yes you can. The important question is that whether this relationship is disruptive, neutral or positive (like being addicted to training). Drinking isn't inherently bad, but the author thinks so. My impression is that there are equal number of studies on pro/contra moderate alcohol consumption.
Not sure if it's part of the 'official' definition of addiction and forgot what the source of it was, but I always liked the explanation that if there's no negative (emotional) feedback loop, it's not really an addiction, but just a habit.
Being addiction-free doesn't mean that you can't enjoy the occasional cup of coffee or alcoholic drink. As long as you're not addicted, some amount of short-term pleasure is perfectly fine.
> Someone who is alcohol-dependent may persist in drinking, despite harmful consequences. They will also give alcohol a higher priority than other activities and obligations.
It's this element of continuing to do something even though it's causing harm that is one of the markers of addiction.
Wrong! Once you are addiction-free, you are much more sensitive to stimuli, making life much more interesting. But the problem with addictions is that the addict can't possibly imagine that this is true. If you are addicted, find a forum on the internet and read stories of people who have recovered. They will tell you without exception that their lives are much more interesting now.
Maybe we shoud distinguish and not conflate some things.
1. Addiction (self-reinforing habit with negative outcomes) 2. Addictive activity (self-reinforcing habit) 3. Engauging in an activity known to become addictive selectively. (Aka; adults drinking)
We use all 3 interchangably, when the dangers, and outcomes, are very different.
I think the author just, somewhat, arbitrarily chose alcohol as the example for the all-or-nothing mindset for overcoming an addiction, and in that mindset "drinking is bad" is the thought in the addicts head using that approach, not the authors decree. Alcohol could be substituted for "internet" in the regulation example, in which you'd get moderate alcohol consumption. Though the tools available to pull that off with alcohol addiction might not be enough for some.
either you're addicted or you're free, no middle ground, no gray areas, no better days in which is easy to overcome one's compulsions and no worse days in which it's much harder.
simplistic "all or nothing" ideas which diminish nunace are also dopamine inducing, this is why memes are so popular. they are the refined sugar of information and understanding.
I think there is a lot of useful advice in here but it needs to be filtered against the cognitive biases of the author, who comes off as extremely obsessive and judgmental. These are useful traits to someone laser focused on controlling their own impulsive behavior but possibly not generally applicable to others in such an extreme sense.
I think him even hinting at it being bad triggered the rationalization behavior in you that he talked about in the article.
Hence why you just rationalized why you didn't need to listen to certain advice given in the article...
Coffee and orgasming is arguably not bad (there are health benefits to both). No one would dispute that the author’s kleptomania _is_ deviant behavior though. So I disagree that the goal should be to purge _all_ addictions, the goal should be to live a good life and eliminate addictions that obstruct this. The article still has good advice when viewed through this lens.
Anything that meets the old diagnostic criteria for addiction or the current ones for even mild substance use disorder is bad, or at least on a very clear road to badness, yes.
Lots of people use the term “addiction” for any habitual pleasure seeking activity, which is both wrong and, yes, includes lots of things that are not bad.
I drink coffee non-compulsively once or twice a week, without bad effects.
do you pass up on opportunities because of it? e.g. would you pass up a chance to engage in some activity because you know there won't be any coffee?
It seems plausible that it could work, but it's suspicious that the site doesn't address the most obvious question: Wouldn't I just stop shocking myself? Curious if any HNers have tried this thing.
This creates an aversion, similar to getting so sick from drinking a type of alcohol that you don't want to do it again.
If you decide to not use it, of course it can't work. However, the vast majority of users who complete the 5 day protocol register no desire or craving for the old habit, even a year later. You can read some more studies on our device specifically, and aversion in general, at pavlok.com/science.
[citation needed]
> In 2016, 3702 caffeine related exposure were reported to Poison Control Centers in the United States, of which 846 required an hospitalization and 16 with a major outcome, and several caffeine-related deaths are reported in case studies. The LD50 of caffeine in humans is dependent on individual sensitivity, but is estimated to be 150–200 milligrams per kilogram (2.2 lb) of body mass (75–100 cups of coffee for a 70 kg (150 lb) adult). There are cases where doses as low as 57 milligrams per kilogram have been fatal. A number of fatalities have been caused by overdoses of readily available powdered caffeine supplements, for which the estimated lethal amount is less than a tablespoon. The lethal dose is lower in individuals whose ability to metabolize caffeine is impaired due to genetics or chronic liver disease. A death was reported in a man with liver cirrhosis who overdosed on caffeinated mints.
My take on this revolves around the part where you’ll supposedly forge deeper connections etc. I just don’t see it. I suspect our connections are what they are. They’re all we have, but also in most cases not that strong really. And it’s just part of life.
Since that is so unsatisfying, it makes sense to find it unacceptable and fixate on removing some contaminant, something that’s in the way of the real thing.
P.S. To be clear, I am not a hater. I've learned about Steve when he was a game developer, having developed one marginally successful shareware game. That was more than ten years ago. He then decided to teach others how to become successful game developers and launched game publishing business. Which went nowhere. He blogged all along. Then Steve got interested in personal development, polyamory, polyphase sleep, etc. becoming 'an expert' in these topics, just like he has in successful game development and game publishing.
This is a guy who believes in spirit guides (yes, really) - https://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2020/05/better-than-spirit... and for a low price of $299 can teach you that your reality is subjective - https://www.stevepavlina.com/submersion/
Steve used to get a lot of 'hate blogging', there were a bunch of blogs devoted specifically to his personality (ex. https://www.sitepoint.com/community/t/seriously-sick-of-stev... or http://bigwig-bigwig.blogspot.com/2011/03/8-top-reasons-why-... or https://stevepavlinalies.wordpress.com/2011/04/02/exposing-s...). I would have never imagined that I'd find Steve's post on HN.
Might have to do more with interests etc in this case, because 2008 is over a decade later than my first steps on the internet :)
Anyway: I completely get your point now. Yet, and this is a typical problem especially in psychic and other circles: despite the insane stuff which has come out of his pen, this article isn't all that insane. Not that I comletely endorse it, some of his solutions are too simplistic and/or might work for him but not for others, but there's also not a whole lot of nonsense in it. Point being: even though people might be completely wrong on one topic, doesn't necessarily mean they are on another topic. Just requires extra skeptisicm when reading them as precaution perhaps.
What makes him stand out in my mind is that he actually does the challenges as opposed to so many other people writing blogspam articles or whole books without the work. It got me into self-experimentation - not with any dogmas in particular, but seeing people actually doing rather crazy long experiments gave me some courage. Also he introduced me to a lot of interesting concepts.
I haven't really seen other people actually do this. The biphasic sleep experiment, and the water fast experiment were especially tough, and no one without serious discipline could do that in my mind. This was years before "fasting" became a thing.
He was also an early adopter of both the diet and sleep experimentation (that didn't really take of), lucid dreaming and all kinds of other fads i have seen become mainstream later on. So i don't think he has "no authority" or whatever, even though he maybe a freak, but i generally like freaks who are on the fringes if they do the work and can write about it.
So i thank him for for introducing me to these concepts that i have been practicing for years now, ie. fasting, having an interest in dreams and general worldview, and experimenting seriously with diet (though i eat completely differently than him).
So all in all he is very much a self-hacker - he tries stuff even though it's weird, very tough and obscure - that's a lot of points in my book. (never bought anything from him though or read any of his books).
Small off-topic rant about "science":
Also yeah when people really take a deep dive into meditation / lucid dreaming stuff just "gets weird" - so he is not that different from a lot of highly educated meditation teachers i have run across, you just gotta say "whatever" if it's not your cup of tea. Another example is Daniel Ingram who i respect but is also doing weird psychedelic stuff or have "crazy" worldviews (many more than most people think in my experience especially in the math/physics sphere).
After diving into this stuff myself i would say to my old self: reality is way, way weirder than i thought when i was young - especially when you begin to really go deep (no drugs here). I personally went from a "science is some isolated emergent property of history", to science is an extremely vague subset or evolution of certain historical developments that are all still completely traceable to weird esoteric, fuzzy, diffuse lineages or worldviews that are much more philosophical/religious in nature.
A good starting point is "The Secret History of Western Esotericism Podcast" - for a very academic and rigorous introduction to why the current science-history historiographical paradigm is very wrong. Then afterwards go to a few retreats, meditate 1+ hours a day, practice Koans on science, math and philosophy and slowly see your reductionistic perspective vanish, while you actually get better at doing science and "normal everyday work".
Note that I tried the polyphasic sleep for a week or so and I suspect SP romanticized the things a bit in his blog posts. Like down putting the bad aspects, hyping the good ones in order to market the thing (thus himself). It was an interesting series, but this kind of material should be contextualized and display along with warnings.
Finally, once you get a few key ideas (mainly that you need to do things to get results), spending time reading personal development stuff is wasting time. Every blog, post, book just retold a few identical ideas.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biphasic_and_polyphasic_slee...
P.S. I am glad I stopped reading Steve ten years ago, I've just browsed through his website and I think he became more woo-woo. At least that's my impression after reading his recent article about how you are supposed to 'energetically clean money' that you received as payment for your work - https://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2020/05/how-to-clean-your-...