As I said before, my dad used to smoke opium when he was in Laos in his youth. He quit just fine and never looked back.
What about coffee addiction?
I find that those who can’t do without coffee are addicted to the stimulant.
In my opinion, any kind of addiction is bad. As a test of will-power, I’ve told some friends to do without coffee… but they can’t even do that.
It seems like human/animal nature is very prone to addiction.[/quote]
Brian, everyone who tries opiates does not become addicted to them. In fact, the great majority of patients who are prescribed opiates, including morphine, for medical conditions have no problems stopping the medication when the condition resolves. There have been an exhaustive number of studies performed that bear this out.
This doesn’t mean that your dad did not enjoy smoking opium. I’m sure the reason he went back several times was because it’s enjoyable. However, like many humans, he did not become addicted to it.
Addiction is an incredibly complex phenomenon, with both physical and psychological components inextricably bound. Like any disease or disorder, it won’t necessarily affect afflicted patients in the same way.
As for coffee, your friends (at least some of them) may experience some fairly significant headaches or other unpleasant physical symptoms when they don’t mainline coffee every day. Because they have to go to work or school or have other obligations, they do what gets them through the day. Coffee is a readily available, legal commodity, and it is socially endorsed. So where’s the incentive to give it up?
You know when willpower kicks in? When someone knows, without a doubt, that what they’re drinking/eating/ shooting up is going to kill them. Not much of a chance of that happening with coffee. So I’m recommending that you lay off them with regard to your “willpower” experiments, or they might kill you for getting between them and their Starbucks.
