In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction

by Gabor Maté

Levi quotes Jean Améry, a Jewish-Austrian philosopher and resistance fighter who fell into the grasp of the Gestapo. “Anyone who was tortured remains tortured.… Anyone who has suffered torture never again will be able to be at ease in the world.… Faith in humanity, already cracked by the first slap in the face, then demolished by torture, is never acquired again.”

But if the differences between my behaviors and the self-annihilating life patterns of my clients are obvious, the similarities are illuminating—and humbling. I have come to see addiction not as a discrete, solid entity—a case of “Either you got it or you don’t got it”—but as a subtle and extensive continuum. Its central, defining qualities are active in all addicts, from the honored workaholic at the apex of society to the impoverished and criminalized crack fiend who haunts skid row. Somewhere along that continuum I locate myself.

More importantly, research now strongly suggests that the existence of relatively few dopamine receptors to begin with may be one of the biological bases of addictive behaviors.

Babies are highly sensitive to such cues—as are aphasiac adults (people who, usually due to a stroke, have lost the ability to understand spoken language). Because they pay heed to physical and emotional rather than verbal messages, young children and aphasiacs have a much better sense of when they are being lied to than most of us have.

ADDiction: the inability to concentrate on one bad habit for any length of time.

We cannot help people when we put ourselves in a position of judgment.

We teach what we most need to learn—and sometimes give what we most need to receive.

The purpose is not to justify or rationalize but to understand. Justification is another form of judgment every bit as debilitating as condemnation. When we justify, we hope to win the judge’s favor or to hoodwink her. Justification connives to absolve the self of responsibility; understanding helps us assume responsibility.