the slippery nature of addiction

this is what i was actually thinking about when i got off on the tangent of deserving. 1) that addiction is inherently paradoxical and diametrically opposed to reality; and 2) that i must treat this challenge more as rehab and addiction therapy than as a "diet" or weight loss or anything physical.

addiction is a paradox. it takes one action and replaces it with something else. to the addict, it makes sense, sort of. to the addict, to me as the addict, "my bank account is overdrawn" = "eat a chocolate muffin." to the non-addict, "my bank account is overdrawn" would probably equal something more along the lines of "put some money in the bank," or "get on a budget!" chocolate muffins have nothing to do with reality in this situation, and are nothing more than a displacement activity.

it doesn't really matter that my addiction might seem to the World as a minor, laughable addiction. i've used that line for a long time to justify holding on to it. being addicted to junk food is nothing to our culture - the whole culture is addicted. and in denial about their addiction. i've already kicked 3 hard addictions: tobacco, alcohol, and caffeine. those are, in decreasing order, socially "accepted" addictions. tobacco is now vilified, but alcohol is still considered "fun" by my peer group, and caffeine is only disparaged by the few who can recognize its effects. so i've justified my cooked food addiction (and btw, when i say "junk food," i mean "cooked food." cooked food is junk. just like heroin.) by saying, "well, at least i'm not still drinking," or "at least i'm not hooked on pharma," or "my worst days are better than most people's best days!" and not one bit of that matters.

what does matter is that my worst days make me wonder why i'm on the planet. my worst days make me wonder why i don't just give it all up and go back to drinking and smoking because my life doesn't matter, because i don't matter. my worst days are as deep and as depressed now as they were before i was a vegan yoga teacher. in some ways, they are worse, because i don't have as many alleyways in which to hide from myself. and what really matters is that my worst days are far, far worse than my best days.

the difference between eating Raw and eating junk is more than the difference between day and night. it's more than the difference between being awake and asleep. any junkie can tell you about the waking nightmare of addiction, of needing a fix, and the mental state that accompanies it. the difference between eating Raw and eating junk is greater than the difference between being sober and being sauced. when i eat junk, i will live, but i will wonder why. when i eat Raw, i thrive, and i don't care why, because the "why" simply dissolves in the joy of being.

only something as dangerous and slippery and paradoxical as addiction could pull someone out of the joy of being and into the despair of "why me?"

and to anyone doubting the addictive nature of cooked food, who might be reading this and thinking i'm just nuts and a fool and an extremist, i invite you to try it. just try it. go raw for a day, for a week, for a month. join the 100-day challenge at www.rawfu.com. then maybe you'll understand where i'm coming from.