In fact, there, it is still a dominant religion and cultural focal point. Today, scholars recognize two primary forms of Buddhism, including Theravāda (“The School of the Elders” in the Pāli language) and Mahāyāna (Sanskrit for “The Great Vehicle”). However, certain people may be agnostic or even atheistic and refer to themselves as Buddhist. In these cases, Buddhism simply means they believe in and live by Buddhist philosophy. Much like a Higher Power can take many forms for various individuals in the 12 Steps, Buddhism can mean different things to different people. This keeps them stuck in their addiction and Brahn sees it as a self imposed prison of the mind, where the person could be free but on some level doesn’t want to be because they don’t feel good about themselves.
We can see what leads up to addictive behaviour in step by step detail if we practice mindfulness enough. This is why we believe the Buddhist perspective deserves more attention over some of the more traditional western perspectives on addiction, since is has the specific tools within it which can provide the self awareness needed to tackle addiction. The clear teaching of Buddhism is total abstinence from alcohol and drugs. However, like any religion, those who practice Buddhism are not immune from falling prey to substance abuse. Therefore, Buddhists need help to recover and return to a sober and rewarding life just as much as their fellow human beings who practice other religions or no religion. The principles in the 12 Steps can help anyone willing to take the first steps toward recovery.
- This judgement and suppression adds another layer of suffering to what is already there and can make things worse.
- All emotions flow in a certain sequence and thus we can use awareness to see if addictive tendencies flow from certain events or triggers, or certain moods.
- For addiction that can involve being in a certain place, around certain people, certain sounds, smells and so on.
- Let’s firstly examine the role of Buddhist philosophy in helping understand and deal with addiction, compare and contrast the two perspectives in much more detail below.
- To tackle strong addictions it will likely require many months and often over a year of regular meditation to truly overcome the addiction.
Our first perspective comes from Yuttadhammo Bhikkhu, a Buddhist monk who has done hundreds of videos on all topics as they relate to Mindfulness and Buddhism, including addiction. This is in contrast to Western tradition and philosophy which tends to be based on thinking alone and does not place much emphasis on meditation and inner observation. Let’s firstly examine the role of Buddhist philosophy in helping understand and deal with addiction, compare and contrast the two perspectives in much more detail below. Semantic Scholar is a free, AI-powered research tool for scientific literature, based at the Allen Institute for AI. If you’re currently traveling the path, your own road of recovery, I hope you have enjoyed this post outlining Buddhist wisdom.
If you have ever been in rehab, you have likely experienced group and one-on-one therapeutic approaches to treatment. Both are valuable and continuing to see a therapist in the later stages of recovery (or for any reason you may need family counseling) can be extremely beneficial. Group and direct therapy settings in the addiction treatment environment frequently utilize Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
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In this step of the path, pursuing sobriety becomes the most critical goal in your walk of life. Much as with concentration, sobriety through mindfulness and surrender does not come without great effort on the part of the person battling a SUD—something myself and others who have struggled with addiction know all too well. However, living out the steps while getting clean and working a program with a goal of long-term recovery is no walk in the park, either. To help, 12 Step programs like AA and NA incorporate the concept of a Higher Power as a way to develop an understanding of each step. People who do not formally follow the 12 Steps and for those that do may discover their own way of leaning on a defined Higher Power in their journey to recovery.
Feature papers represent the most advanced research with significant potential for high impact in the field. A FeaturePaper should be a substantial original Article that involves several techniques or approaches, provides an outlook forfuture research directions and describes possible research applications. You can come at it from the angle of observing outer phenomena (the five senses) or inner phenomena (patterns or the mind and emotions) and ideally when well enough developed mindfulness will allow you to see everything at once.
People may be able to abstain for a while but then they often relapse, binging out on what they had tried to avoid and probably sometimes deepening the addictive pathways in their brain. In general terms, he does not advocate avoiding or pushing away addictive behaviours or substances in an obvious sense like some perspectives do, particularly Western ones. So of all the major religious views then, the Buddhist teaching and practice is the one most suited to observing and learning how the mind works. Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. Yuttadhammo is more in favour of allowing the addiction in, but being mindful about it when you act it out, really picking it apart from the level of the five senses so you can see there is nothing intrinsically good or beneficial about it. He recommends addicts try to give their habit up just for a short time to begin with, just to see what happens and how they cope with it.
Responses to Addiction in Established Buddhist Cultures
Addiction, compulsion, dependence, obsession, craving, infatuation—whatever you want to call it, you know it when you’re in it. Thoughts can be addicting, just like eating, drinking, shopping, or gambling, a fact the Buddha understood well. Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how you look at it), people haven’t changed much in 2,000 years. The teachings aetna drug rehab of the eightfold path are still useful, dependable lessons, available to help the ordinary person step out of the cycle of samsara and addiction. In this month’s online retreat, join Vimalasara (Valerie Mason-John), chair of the Triratna Vancouver Buddhist Centre, as she shows how the Buddhist teachings can relieve you of your own addictions.
Right Livelihood
The Sanctuary Foundation helps people of all faiths and religions regain the confidence to live a sober and fulfilling life. In the context of addiction recovery, the Buddhist tenet of having the right intention means to commit to a new sober life. This must occur for yourself, your loved ones, and because you know it is a “right” thing to do. However, it might be said that before you can get honest, you have to understand what you are being honest about. The Buddhist principle of right understanding helps you to understand your addiction, which—for those in recovery—might be a combination of scientific, medical, emotional, or introspective understanding. This is an interesting variation from Yuttadhammo, who on one level expresses almost the opposite viewpoint, that we should not push away addictions because by doing so we don’t understand them.
This is a refreshing take on addiction, as conventional wisdom often dictates avoidance and elimination of any cues and triggers as a first step to dealing with addiction. Get rid of all alcohol out the house, delete all pornography on your computer, throw all your cigarettes away and so on. This is also actually an interesting point of difference with the second viewpoint we will detail later. His has produced a couple of videos on the topic of addiction, two of which we have embedded below. His take on the subject is particularly refreshing if you find yourself constantly fretting and getting upset about your addiction itself as well as other things that happen in life. This judgement and suppression adds another layer of suffering to what is already there and can make things worse.
The Buddhist Recovery Network promotes the use of Buddhist teachings and practices to help people recover from the suffering caused by addictive behaviors and is open to people of all backgrounds, and respectful of all recovery paths. Whichever way you approach it, mindfulness meditation is an important tool for self awareness, and it is fair to say that addiction can’t come about unless there is some lack of self awareness. Therefore anything that helps to improve self knowledge will in time have a beneficial impact on addictions. When we do this, we begin to see how our addiction is formed and acted out in terms of patterns in the mind. All emotions flow in a certain sequence and thus we can use awareness to see if addictive tendencies flow from certain events or triggers, or certain moods.
Nevertheless, even Buddhist thinkers themselves will have different takes on certain subjects and addiction is no different. There are many different perspectives on addiction from both the secular and religious worldviews, and each of them has a different take on the subject. As a nonprofit, we depend on readers like you to keep Buddhist teachings and practices widely available.
The aim is to provide a snapshot of some of themost exciting work published in the various research areas of the journal. Click here for our Mindfulness Resources page which books, videos and links which can https://soberhome.net/ get you started on mindfulness and meditation. His Sirimangalo video page has at the time of writing more than 750 videos where he addresses the Buddhist perspective on many different issues and problems.
Whilst this “cold turkey” elimination approach can work for some people, the problem with this approach is that it can represent avoidance and suppression; we are desperately trying to keep the source of our addiction at arm’s length. And if we don’t understand it, it can be much harder to truly let it go. Consistent and determined practice of mindfulness will most definitely allow one to see the patterns and flows of their mind better, and therefore understand their addiction and where it comes from. Buddhism’s focus on mindfulness and awareness is actually tailor made for understanding and handling addiction.