World Series Baseball, Pain Medication, Addiction Falsehoods, And Existential Questions…

A story appearing in AOL’s World Series baseball coverage about a popular Rangers player titled Aching Addict: Josh Hamilton cautious with pills, injections, opens thusly:

If you’re an addict, you probably understand how there is so much more history behind the needle that might slide into Josh Hamilton’s injured groin muscle, or the pills he might gulp down to ward off the pain.

If you have an addict in your life, you probably cringe when you hear about these needles or these pills, because you know that behind such history lurks a murky world that doesn’t much care if the addict sleeps under a bridge or brings nightly joy to millions of fans who happen to be in awe of sports’ redemptive powers.

Sports journalist Lisa Olson paints quite the dramatic picture here, her narrative being that there’s palpable danger for Mr Hamilton in taking any pain medication (the above quote also passes along the falsehood that addiction is “an equal opportunity disease, but that’s another topic for another day, yet it’s important to note because she uses it to subtly set up her next falsehood: that human beings, regardless of their stature and any evidence of their personal ability aside, cannot control their own behavior). She continues:

More than other athletes immersed in physical rehab, an addict must straddle a line most of us don’t know exists. Is this the one painkiller that will put him back on that tortured path?

The question is, as I see it – should Hamilton be led to believe that using a drug for legitimate medical purposes will subsequently cause him to use drugs and alcohol for round the clock amusement as he once did? Clearly, there are drastically different motivations between taking a drug to quell a painful injury, and his former behavior – which Olson so colorfully recounts:

 Sidelined for a month, Hamilton’s abundance of free time led to his first sip of alcohol, and soon he was daily guzzling a 750-ml bottle of Crown Royal. Next came enough cocaine to stop a gorilla’s heart, and then came the failed drug test, the suspension by MLB, drug rehab and more failed tests and more suspensions and lots more rehab, his entire $4 million signing bonus gone, the years from 2003 to the summer of 2006 a blur of tattoo needles and crack dens.

Our addiction and recovery culture sees people as mere billiard balls locked into a universe of cause and effect, helpless but to move in the direction determined by any cue which strikes us (i.e, that the human mind cannot be a cause in and of itself, but only has the potential to be effected in a specific finite way). This culture (the mainstream movement towards deterministic philosophy) reduces human behavior to that of inanimate objects, denies the power of the mind, and denies the existence of free will. The purveyors of this view deny the power of ideas and personal motivation, thus it appears to them that when a drug enters the bloodstream we will be helplessly caused to behave a certain way as a result – in this case, the assumption is that a painkiller will cause excessive recreational substance use.

The beautiful truth is, that a painkiller cannot cause excessive recreational substance use – nothing other than the contents of an individual’s mind (their thoughts and beliefs) determines such behavior.

This is how a narcotic pain reliever works:

When narcotics, also called opioids, dissolve in the bloodstream, they attach to the proteins that take pain signals to the brain. This disrupts the pain cycle. Narcotics also enter the brain, and change the way pain is felt. In other words, they do not take pain away, they simply allow the brain to interpret pain differently.

Narcotics effect some physical workings of the brain for a short time. They do not effect the mind (brain and mind are not one in the same). Narcotic substances do not determine thoughts and beliefs. They do not implant the idea or form the judgment that “taking lots of drugs and alcohol is the most enjoyable way for me to spend my time” – nor can they implant the belief that we are helpless billiard balls, and that a mere drug will cause a complex pattern of behavior – only a person is capable of reaching such ridiculous conclusions. These ideas can only exist within our minds when we choose to create them, reach them by default as a result of habitual irrationality, or else unquestioningly accept them on someone else’s authority. But we have every ability to arrive at different conclusions – should we choose to be more rigorous in our thinking.

It takes true and blatant irrationality to simultaneously hold these two premises in one’s mind:

• That the human mind is efficacious enough to identify a problem of pain, dream that a solution can be found for it, investigate the biological workings of the body, and choose to gather the products of nature, distill them to their essence, and reformulate them into a mass produced and distributed pill which relieves pain by the physical process described above.
• That the human mind is not efficacious at all – that it is powerless to choose its own course of action/behavior.

That is what’s going on here with the idea that a pain relieving drug will set off an automatic pattern of behavior. The beholders of such a belief acknowledge the existence of a product which was created by man’s volition, while simultaneously denying that man has the power of volition (free will/the ability to choose our thoughts, goals, and actions).

Now why should I pick on and make an example of this particular writer on this particular day? Most likely, she has innocently accepted these premises out of trust in the addiction experts of our time, and was merely looking for a juicy angle upon which to write a sports story. So, I hold nothing against her personally (although it’s possible that she may be intimately involved with “addiction and recovery” in her life, and has failed to take the responsibility of considering the topic rigorously, which would not make her innocent, but rather guilty of defaulting on the use of reason where it matters most). Well, my reasons are twofold: for one, to give an example of where such falsehoods are passed along in our culture ever so casually, and how they permeate everything; and two, to show how you can be exposed to these ideas and absorb them without rationally choosing them as your own.

I believe that most everyone has the ability to arrive at truthful, logical conclusions about “addiction” if they try. But I don’t think most people try. Instead, we can easily get into the habit of blindly accepting the ideas that are in fashion; that if we hear certain things enough times, we often simply accept them as truth. This is fine when the ideas don’t matter too much to you personally. If one can make a living by say, being a personal trainer, then they needn’t examine the processes of agriculture, the biological process by which a vaccine protects them from disease, or the inner workings of a television set – they need only defer to the experts in these matters, and really only need to care that the experts follow their passions and keep delivering fresh edible food, effective vaccines, and quality electronics. But if increasing physical fitness is their job, then they should care deeply about the workings of the human body and the dynamics of human motivation. What I’m describing is the beauty of living in a division of labor society – it allows us to narrow our focus, and thus we defer the effort of thinking about certain subjects because someone else is doing the thinking – it’s why we trust the experts.

However, if you are touched by “addiction”, you should know that the so-called treatments for it are ineffective, and that the “experts” have failed. You cannot trust them. Nor can you trust the philosophical premises upon which these experts base their opinions. If the truth about addiction matters to you, either because you’re personally having a problem, or a loved one is having a problem, and you’re looking for an effective solution, then it’s time for you to stop trusting the conventional wisdom of the experts. It’s time for you to rigorously consider the issues involved and exercise your own judgment in order to reach the truth. The first question to consider is “do substance users freely choose their behavior?” Both a yes or no answer will lead to drastically different paths towards changing one’s pattern of substance use (one may not lead you to the change you’re looking for at all) – and this fundamental question will effect your conclusions about every other issue revolving around substance use – so please consider it carefully.

What happens if you’re wrong about the answer to this key question? Well, you might “sober up” anyways – as Josh Hamilton, the subject of the article above apparently has. However, it may not last, or you may not achieve the quality of life that most people are looking for when they decide to change their substance use habits. Holding such a fundamental contradiction leads to less than ideal living standards, as Ms Olson describes here:

Now 30 and covered with more regrettable art than a subway wall, Hamilton works his sobriety like a preacher tending his flock. Rarely does he carry more than $10 in his wallet; never does he go out with teammates to eat or wind down after games. The line he attempts to follow is straight and simple: Home. Ballpark. Home. Ballpark. Narron, the coach hired by the Rangers to watch over Hamilton, stays in the adjoining room when the team is on the road, judiciously distributing Hamilton’s $92.50 per diem and leading him in Bible study when everyone else is out cavorting or shopping.

Every third day Hamilton uncomplainingly urinates into a cup for a lab technician at the ballpark. “As long as they ask, I’m happy to comply,” he has said. “A lot of people—especially my wife and my family and the people who allowed me to come back and play baseball—deserve to know that things are good with me now.”

The result of believing the tripe he’s been fed is that Hamilton has restricted his own freedom, and relies on others to control him. He fears having money in his pocket, thus gives control of his earnings over to a personal “coach” – he fears that he’ll be triggered by the behavior of others, thus he stays home with no social life – and he fears himself, thus he allows someone to babysit him around the clock. Accepting that he’s not in control of a basic behavior such as substance use, is what has now opened the door for him to voluntarily relinquish nearly all control of every other aspect of his life to others, so that they may control his life for him.

Does he allow himself to use man’s wonderful technology to relieve the pain of his injuries? I don’t know:

And so they asked him in St. Louis this week and they will ask again this weekend in Texas, and always Hamilton politely declines to color in the dots. “I plead the fifth,” he said when someone wanted to know what he was taking to soften the barks from a groin injury that, had it occurred any other time, would limit him to shuffles between the couch and the bed.

I suspect (at least I hope) from this answer that perhaps he does allow himself this modern miracle, although his answer provides no definitive answer. I’m certainly not a baseball aficionado, or even a fan, but from all accounts he’s a true sports hero of great accomplishment, thus I suspect there’s a glimmer rationality of, which despite the garbage he’s been fed, burns deeply, telling him that it just doesn’t make sense to tolerate such pain when there is a decent solution available. But notice his answer “I plead the fifth.” He’s unsure whether it will “trigger” him or not, or else he’s afraid of contradicting the “wisdom” of the recovery culture he most likely follows, and which tells him and millions others that they mustn’t use pain medications where they would clearly be effective, because it will send them into a “relapse.”.  The contradictions of the recovery culture which he’s accepted have destroyed his ability to give a public answer on this question which he can proudly stand behind – that is, although his judgment of the issue may differ with conventional wisdom, he doesn’t have enough faith in his own conclusions to fully commit to them.

Most people will not answer the question of free will, nor even ponder it – they’ll think that free will exists in some respects, but not in others – thus living with a self-contradictory mindset. Do you see how this one simple contradiction poisons every other aspect of one’s life?

The truth is, plenty of people can and will change their behavior while holding these contradictions, but plenty more will live a life of constant struggle with confused and troubling personal behavior, and still, many will see their way out of the contradiction. But each path brings a different set of consequences with it. From what I’ve seen, those who proudly claim their free will go on to improve functioning in all areas of life, they increase their personal freedom, adapting to change expertly, and truly creating a vibrant existence for themselves. Those who reject free will, either wholly or partially, decrease their personal freedom – allowing themselves to be knocked around predictably like so many billiard balls – ending up in some hole they never consciously chose to be in (yet indirectly chose for themselves).

What do you want?  To be free to live your life to its maximum potential, or to be controlled and confused?  Your judgment on the question of free will may just make the difference.

Note: to those who who aren’t entirely familiar with my views, this site, or the most important debate in addiction theory, I should explain that my purpose with this essay is not to personally attack Ms Olson or Mr Hamilton. My purpose is to fight against the core teachings of the addictions treatment industry, 12-step groups, and most other so-called experts on addiction (what I refer to collectively as “the recovery culture”) – namely, that addiction is a disease, and that an “addict” is powerless of drugs and alcohol, i.e., that they can’t choose to stop using substances in a problematic way. I feel that these bogus theories are harmful, and my purpose is to help people see that they must question them, and abandon them – so that they may find a real effective way to change their substance use: by choosing new thoughts and behaviors.

For those with interest in a choice based approach to substance use problems, click here to learn more about the groundbreaking program I currently teach.

Sources:

Aching Addict Josh Hamilton Cautious with Pills, Injections

How Does Pain Medication Work