If I claim that we’re addicted to comfort, convenience, flying, and disposable diapers, what’s the problem if we don’t realize it? If addiction isn’t that bad and ending it seems to make life worse, why not keep flying? Addiction leads to short-term thinking. We don’t think past the next hit when we expect one or past withdrawal if we don’t. We have trouble imagining a better life without those hits.[…] Keep reading →

We can’t create more time or energy. We get what we get. It doesn’t matter how much you want twenty-five hours in a day. You don’t get them. Not if you’re rich or connected either. Likewise with energy. There is only so much energy available. People can dream of unlimited energy, but they still have to eat and fill their car with gas because their energy runs out. Our culture[…] Keep reading →

How many times have you heard people describe a trip they took “the trip of a lifetime”? . . . or one they were considering? I hear it not daily but fairly often, including from the same people repeatedly, but a trip of a lifetime can’t happen more than once. It sounds to me like the concept common in addiction of tolerance, where the effect of what you are addicted[…] Keep reading →

This post is part 4 in a series including I’m continuing today the artistic representations of “What you fear losing when you stop an addiction is exactly what you’ll gain” or “You tell me what you fear losing when you stop polluting and I’ll tell you what you’ll gain” have simplified how I understand and express the emotional terrain people live in and have to navigate to act more sustainably.[…] Keep reading →

This post is part 3 in a series including “What you fear losing when you stop an addiction is exactly what you’ll gain” or “You tell me what you fear losing when you stop polluting and I’ll tell you what you’ll gain” have simplified how I understand and express the emotional terrain people live in and have to navigate to act more sustainably. I posted about how Martin Scorcese in[…] Keep reading →

Remember that when you depend on something to the point of addiction You tell me what you fear losing and I’ll tell you what you’ll gain. Suggest stopping gambling to gambling addict and they’ll fear losing winning. But outside rare jolts of winning, they mostly lose. Stopping gambling will bring them more winning and less losing. Social media addict fear losing connection, but social media isolates. Stopping social media will[…] Keep reading →

My friend brings addicts to rehab centers in California. He knows hotels where they hole up together doing heroin and such in modern-day equivalents of opium dens. They know him and that he doesn’t pressure them. He knocks on the door. They open it. He asks, “is anybody ready?” Usually they all pass, but sometimes one says, “I am,” and he drives them to rehab. He says that nearly every[…] Keep reading →