Whatever we were inspired to have attraction for, we can only fuel that fire, or create new attraction by familiarity.

We are all dependent on familiarity. Anyone, from any walk of life, in any part of life only manages to maintain his/her tastes by familiarity. There is also about a 10% contribution of association (i.e. something is associated with a feeling you like or a good time you once had). When it comes to aversion, it will only remain undesirable as long as it is labeled in your mind as unfamiliar and unlike you.

Thus when we take on something like addiction, we must appreciate how important it is to gently or aggressively discipline our thoughts to make something unfamiliar and another thing familiar.

The result will be power over the addiction. The extension of this is that you get to change what you like and what you love and what you understand to those things that serve you!

No one is one thing. Every person can not only change, but be deleriously happy with the new version of him/her self. Sometimes we act like the only answer to addiction is to live in constant self denial. True, escape from addiction includes a little of that, but by and large it is about changing what you love and what is indulgence for you. You do not have to miss the old you or your old tastes or your old indulgences or your old lusts.

Since gaining this understanding, I lost some of the appreciation I have for people who just act like victims when presented with a different lifestyle that will serve them more. I hear people announce that they are this and they like that and do not like such and so.

I had an acquaintance tell me that he just really liked a good ice cream cone, so he could not possibly follow the dietary program I recommended. He later got arrested for sexual abuse. I wonder if he exercised the same victim-mentality when he first thought about that act: "Hmm, I just really like entertaining this thought, I think I will keep it around." It became familiar and then it became something he could do. Then he did it. Then he got arrested.

At first, he was incapable of such an act.

This is a health newsletter appendage and I suppose I should anchor myself to that end. Let me just say that there is no food so toxic that it is more harmful than addiction. Addiction is a heavy burden that takes all the luster out of life and makes even having a healthy body and a happy life completely unsatisfying (if not impossible).

No amount of cleansing will help diseases caused by addiction.

That is not to say cleansing and good diet will not help addiction. They will help because they will help you to let go of old patterns and increase in awareness. Soon, if you are willing, you can have the power to catch yourself doing what you are really doing. You can be completely aware of it. This power is unique to those who eat lots of live/raw plant food and who cleanse regularly.

Even so, that person who cleanses and eats a healthy diet will find that s/he still needs more help to overcome addiction. Sometimes the very obsession with health can be a way of self-medicating away the pains of addiction. This is where one announces to him/herself, "How great I am and how foolish others are for not following this wise plan. I must be okay." This helps offset the deep emptiness caused by addiction.

Addiction can be anything from a simple food addiction or addiction to negativity or gossip and can progress all the way to addictions that destroy families or that lead to criminal acts. There are some addictions that are grosser, but the actual process of addiction is exactly the same for whatever the addiction is.

Thus we have to stand strong and keep ourselves free of thoughts about anything that we ought not to be familiar with. If we have a weakness for bacon, then we should learn to gently guide our thoughts away from bacon when we find ourselves thinking of it. We should never allow ourselves to think of it. We should learn to tightly reign in our thoughts more than any other thing.

I shall speak of pride for a bit.

Sometimes the urge to spue out all our energy on a subject overtakes us. Often, this takes the form of an attack on someone, mentally or verbally; directly or to another person. This takes away our energy to manage that same kind of outburst in ourselves.

Thus only he who has no sins should cast the first stone, so to speak. If a person is totally incapable of any crime or unvirtuous act in an area, then that person can speak of another person doing that act with derison. Otherwise, the ability to protect one's self against similar acts is lost.

I am reminded of a warning from the Bible,

Agree with thine adversary quickly while thou art in the way with him, lest at any time he shall get thee and thou shalt be cast into prison.

I know of no such statement in Oriental philosophies, but I imagine that if such a statment existed they would change the wording just a bit,

Agree with your adversary quickly so that you do not give away to your adversary your power to protect yourself from evildoing.

With this insight we can often keep our energies to ourselves. When we notice wrongdoing, it is best to let that be a reminder to us to refocus ourselves.

Finally, it seems appropriate to encourage those who have a definite Higher Power that they worship or give allegiance to, to go full bore under the life of that Higher Power. If you do something only when it is cool or convenient or feels cool to you, what advantage in any religion or philosophy do you think you can gain?

The point is to change your life and put all your attachments, righteous agendas, worries and weaknesses at the feet of your chosen Master. You then take up only the one's that that discipline teaches you it is time to take up.

You conform in all things to the identity of your Master. For me, this Master is Jesus Christ. I do not divide you from me by announcing that, I only present to you that I can stand and say that He is my Master and still join arms with you because you also stand and announce that you have a Master and we are both working for a better world.

Often though, whether  you are Buddhist or Muslim or Christian or Jewish or Hindu or any other of many religions, the real issue is not that you lack something to make your life healthier, it is that you are simply not using what you have.

I cannot speak of addiction, such a consuming thing that it is, without speaking about the need to really get the identity of your Higher Power. Not so you can throw parties to talk about it, but so that you never have to talk about it because it is so obvious in your presence and your life. You have given yourself wholly to your Master and you have abandoned all those attachments common to ordinary people which keep them in bondage and out of the place of really benefitting from their Masters.

Thanks for reading,

Kal