Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.) Quotes

“although I had experienced my fair share of suffering because of the conditions I was born into, I had also piled a whole lot more suffering into my life through the choices I had made.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“By recovery, we mean finding a path away from the trouble caused by our addictive tendencies. We see this as more than merely stopping the addictive behavior – hard as that can be. It is untangling the compulsive drives of our addiction to discover a richer and more fulfilling way of living.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“activity, even though it is causing us harm.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“Many of us who have been dominated by addiction became addicted while trying to recover from a painful experience. We found that self-medicating took the sting out of the pain.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“However desperate you become, accept your pain as it is, because it is in fact trying to hand you a precious gift: the chance of discovering, through spiritual practice, what lies behind sorrow.2”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“Addiction happens when an activity is used as a means to escape from the distress of experiencing oneself.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“The point is not that any of these behaviors are in themselves necessarily addictive, but that it is our relationship to them that defines the addiction.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction

“The challenge for human beings is not how to avoid suffering, but how to face the pain that is inherent in our lives, and how not to create more suffering by our desperate attempt to avoid pain.”
― Valerie Mason-John, Eight Step Recovery (Revised Ed.): Using the Buddha's Teachings to Overcome Addiction