Addiction, Spirituality, and Culture

Addiction is a complex obsessive, compulsive, and possessive disease of a total human biopsychosociotechno-spiritual nature. Whatever addiction touches, it destroys. Addiction is all around us as anyone, irrespective of the race, culture, religion, social status, economic status, and intelligence, can be addicted to anything or anyone. We are all vulnerable to the plague of addiction. Yet not everyone will be addicted to the same thing no matter the strength of its addictive nature. Hence, the fundamental questions raced in the field of addiction studies: Why are some people addicted to a substance or behavior and some others are not? Is addiction about the substance or about the person? Why are all children of a person with alcoholism not suffering from alcoholism? Why is it that many persons who receive treatment relapse and some who never receive any clinical treatment were able to stop drinking or using? Is addiction a disease, a lack of will, a moral failure, or disconnection from God? All these point to the complexity of addiction. This book is a study manual and a helpful resource, written to help students in addiction studies understand the dynamics and complexity of addiction and addiction treatment. It is to help them have a hand on information on the holistic view of addiction from a biopsychosociotechno-spirituality. That is, addiction is not only a disease of the brain which can only be treated with medication, but also a spiritual and socio-cultural problem which needs spiritual and socio-cultural intervention. It is to draw the attention of the students and the addiction professionals to tapping into all areas of life of the person with addiction which the addictive behavior has taunted. This book is the result of many lectures, discussions, and personal experiences on the subject. It is my hope that it will be a resource for the students, a handbook for the addiction professionals, a source of knowledge for families of the persons struggling with addiction, those who wish to know more about addiction, and a bibliotherapy - a healing tool - for the persons with addiction