Addiction Recovery — An Awakening

Alcoholics Anonymous talks about a spiritual awakening as it describes recovery from alcoholism.  For some people, language that speaks of spiritual awakenings is off-putting. The book Alcoholics Anonymous was written in 30s when religious language was more common, even though agnostics in AA at the time warned of AA getting too religious. In 2019 this type of language appears dated to a lot of people, but it’s the principles behind the language that are important.

Those who dealt with alcoholism in the beginning, when it first became clear that alcoholism (addiction) was a disorder of mind and body, discovered that recovery was difficult and often seemingly impossible. Carl Jung, the famous psychiatrist in the era of Freud, remarked once to an alcoholic, who in desperation came to Jung, that in his, Jung’s, experience only those who had a deep psychic change could recover. What one calls this deep change/inspiration/awareness is irrelevant as long as it leads to recovery. In my experience, I’d have to say Jung was mostly right, although this deep change is different for everyone. Call it spiritual awakening, psychic change, awareness, clarity of thought, mystical experience, rebirth, rational realization, etc, it’s something powerful that generates change and inspires a person to continue in recovery even when it’s tough, and even when the person craves alcohol or some other drug.

The recovering addict, once they experience this deep change, almost always recovers purpose and meaning. If someone’s trying to quit drinking or using and they’re simply white-knuckling it, just trying to stay away from the drug, then they’ll probably wear down mentally and emotionally and return to the drug (remember, alcohol is a drug). But, when the person has a deep change and is pulled forward to something better in life, then positive energy is generated. This positive energy makes it easier to move toward this new life of purpose and meaning and good health. So, it’s a matter of moving toward something life enhancing, not just staying away from something bad.