The word addiction is bandied about a great deal these days, but what does it really mean?

By definition, addiction is ‘the condition of being abnormally dependent on some habit, especially a compulsive dependency on narcotic substances’.

Less officially, it’s an urge to do certain stuff, repeatedly.

Whichever way one perceives it, this compulsive behaviour invariably comes with negative connotations. For you see without the inherent detriment, addiction would have to be downgraded to merely, passion.

I’ve always believed that addiction is not so much a mental issue as it is the simple act of loving something too much – which, yes, admittedly, does often result in my detriment.

The point remains: some people have an excessive love of eating; these people are considered food addicts. Others are besotted with the rush of gambling or/and the grandiose effect of alcohol; some have their love affair with cigarettes or/and other drugs.

Addiction is a filthy word. It carries a stigma rivalled only by peoples’ general feeling for politicians. Here’s the thing though, addiction is not always bad. There are good, honest folk out there addicted to good, honest pastimes. Sure, perhaps they do it so much that it isolates them from their wonderfully balanced contemporaries, but that’s not detrimental, that’s their choice.

Take a diligent man who is so passionate about his career that he makes his work his life. By definition, this man is now addicted to work. Some might prefer the hackneyed colloquialism, workaholic, but no. If you want to mix alcoholism with work, that’s your call.

Workaholic, chocoholic; fitness freak, health freak… In the 21st century the aforementioned categories are said to denote addictions of sorts, but do they really? Can an undying passion for chocolate really be considered an addiction? I think more just a weakness of spirit. What about fitness? Addiction – or desire to be the best you can be?

That’s the thing: distinguishing addiction in its truest sense from merely enjoying, or loving something too much.

I am blessed with an addictive personality. This means that if I do something once and like it, odds are I’ll do it again and again and again and again until someone forces me to stop. Then when they’re not looking I’ll likely do it another couple of times.

I stop short of referring to these part time passions as addictions – suffice to say I am easily consumed. Smoking, drinking; gambling and kleptomania are but a few of the demons that have reared their compelling heads in the past fifteen years. In fact, I find myself in a constant battle to avoid the intoxicating allure of life’s vices. Substitution is my cavalry.

Nefarious Addictions for Innocuous Distractions.

It’s not perceived as a weakness to be a fitness fanatic but it is to be a smoker; therefore I cancel out one with the other. Then coming as nothing short of oxymoronic, my passion for healthy living makes up for my love of Scotch whisky; my compulsion to be prudent with money negated by a love of betting on greyhounds. Kleptomania’s an odd one, but my overwhelming desire to scrawl page upon page of rhymes long ago took care of all my accumulated pens.

That’s a lot of addictions for one man to harbour.

Get this. Our addictions are in our heads. Primarily; purely. They can be beaten down by the same part of our brains that elevated them in the first place…

Alternatively we could choose to die with our so-called addictions.

Would that be so bad?

 

 

Article by Mit Reklaw

Edited by Kim Pulson

Photography by Mia Dixon