Alcoholism - a fault in Essence?

Gurdjieff describes the Essence as being "everything that we're born with". In contrast to Personality and False Personality, which are formed in childhood as a result of our interaction with our environment, Essence is the kernel of our Being and is already present in us at our birth.

Essence is born immature and needs educating, and normally this is the task of the Personality. We can see Essence in a very young child, who is spontaneous and innocent, yet in need of guidance and protection. In the Work, our Personality begins to feed our Esssence as we develop awareness and consciousness and see what needs to be done so that Essence may grow up and take its rightful place as the source of our behaviour.

But G said that Essence may be born with a fault that needs correcting. And I'm wondering whether this might be true of alcoholics - are we born with a fault in our Essence? Or is this terrible disease a result of environmental influences, and therefore part of Personality and False Personality only?

When I write of alcoholism, I'm including drug addiction as well. There are less immediately life-threatening addictions, too, such as gambling and codependence. But alcoholism (along with addiction to drugs) is the most immediately dangerous form of addiction. Without help, it will kill you. Millions of people die each year from the disease, and it takes enormous amounts of help as well as constant effort to overcome it.

Of course, we can argue, as Richard Rohr does in "Breathing Underwater", that we're all addicted to something. Some people are alcoholics, others may be workaholics or addicted to shopping. But while this may be broadly true, it's no help in trying to understand alcoholism, which is such an extreme form of addiction, involving a life-or-death struggle and requiring the help of a Higher Power in order to recover.  Alcoholism kills.  Not many people die from buying too many designer handbags.

But does this disease originate in the mind or in the body? And if in the mind, what part?

Brain scans and other investigations show clear differences between the brains of alcoholics and those of "normal"people. Different areas of the brain light up in response to stimuli; different chemicals are found in the blood; different patterns of behaviour are observable. 

But, just because we can see changes in the brain and its chemistry, this doesn't necessarily mean that alcoholism results from a purely physical defect. After all, such differences could be the end result of years of living in a depressed or addicted state, probably exposed to depression and addiction in the family of origin, since such diseases do run in families. An alcoholic parent raises his or her children very differently from the way a normal, non-addicted mother or father would behave. And this in itself might be enough to cause the different brain patterns and chemistry we can observe.

So which comes first?

One interesting and disquieting piece of research suggests that the brains of children as young as eight can show the beginning of unusual patterns that would indicate alcoholism in adults. But again, is this cause or effect? And what can we do with such findings? Even if they are found to be infallibly predictive of adult behaviour, would that give the State the right to ban alcohol and begin early therapy in such children?

Twin studies give more indication of the physical origins of alcoholism. Identical twins, sharing the same genes and separated at birth, will usually show similar behaviour in regard to drugs and alcohol later in life, even though their family environments have been very different.

The physical differences in the brains of alcoholics include the apparent lack, or the inability to process, endorphins that in normal people create a feeling of calm and wellbeing. Serotonin and dopamine are either present in much lower quantities, or the receptors that process them are defective or in short supply. The result, for the alcoholic, includes feelings of jumpiness, anxiety, depression, anger or chronic fear. This is why the alcoholic is sometimes spoken of as having "a skin too few". That's exactly what it feels like. And I talk from experience here, as a recovering alcoholic who will, please God, soon celebrate her 25th AA anniversary.

These differences account for the strong, ungovernable urge to drink to ease the pain. Drinking is a learned behaviour, a way of self-medicating. Alcoholics commonly report experiencing extreme euphoria after their first drink, at least in the early years of the disease, a form of relief from the mental stress that other drinkers don't experience, at least to that degree.

And the brain of the alcoholic then goes on to play a nasty trick: it loses the ability to discern when to stop drinking. Control goes, and it's not a problem of will-power. The brain simply doesn't recognize the need to stop drinking, as happens with normal, social drinkers.

 It also malfunctions in terms of memory; in an alcoholic blackout, the drinker can seem to be perfectly normal in speech and behaviour, and yet the brain is laying down no memories at all. Later, it's impossible for the alcoholic to recall what he or she did, and although this often seems like a cop-out to friends and family, it's literally true. The alcoholic will never be able to remember what they did, because the memory is simply not there. 

If alcoholism originates in the physical body, there should be indications of the disease in our DNA. And recent studies suggest that in fact there are. Different combinations of genes seem to be present in alcoholics and addicts, as compared to the DNA of those not addicted to these substances. Different physical reactions occur in relation to alcohol or opiates in individuals with these patterns.

So, although we can't say for certain whether the origin of the disease is physical or mental, I believe there are now enough indicators to say it is, most likely, a physical problem before it becomes evident as a psychological disease.

And if so, does this mean that alcoholism is a fault in Essence?

It would seem that it is. Perhaps it is the fault that we alcoholics have incarnated in order to overcome. Perhaps we took on this struggle willingly, seeing how dangerous the disease is and how it affects generations of families. Could it be that we chose to live life as an alcoholic, knowing the high risks, but knowing, too, that we could receive help from Conscious Humanity, our Higher Power, if only we remember to ask for it?

Or could it resemble the Sufi vision of life between incarnations - that as a soul begins its descent from the heavenly realms into its conception on Earth, it meets returning souls who ask it - perhaps implore it - to do battle with the very fault that the returning soul was unable to completely overcome? 

There's much to ponder here. I don't know the answers. But, if alcoholism is indeed a fault in Essence, the good news is that it can be alleviated and prevented from causing further damage, as long as the alcoholic remains aware of his or her spiritual needs and dependence on God.

Before the 20th Century, recovery from alcoholism was very, very difficult, perhaps impossible. Today, we have the Twelve Steps, AA, and NA, and it may be that we alcoholics incarnated now because at last real help would be available to us in our daily struggles.

Thank God for those Steps.

Passover: Freedom from the Slavery of Addiction

Recently, a spectacular Solar Eclipse followed by a red Blood Moon heralded the arrival of Easter and Passover. Many religious leaders have speculated about what these "signs in the sky" might mean. Some predict the imminent return of Jesus Christ, while others see grave danger to Israel and the Middle East, possibly signaled by a controversial "nuclear deal" proposed between the US and Iran.

 Leaving aside these possibilities - which obviously can't be verified yet - it's interesting that Passover and Easter often fall on the same date, even though they're calculated slightly differently. We know the Crucifixion took place at Passover, because the Last Supper was a Passover meal, or "seder".

The word "seder" means "order", and at every Passover Jewish families enjoy a special festive meal, which consists of a story-telling service and a celebration dinner. The story itself concerns the Jews' escape from slavery to freedom, when Moses led the Hebrew slaves out of Egypt, contrary to Pharaoh's commands. The escape had to be made in a great hurry, which meant that there was no time for bread dough to rise, so the Jews took with them bundles of crispbreads, known as matzoh.

To this day, the Passover meal is celebrated with matzoh and includes a roast dinner, usually chicken or lamb; bitter herbs; a sweet paste, called haroset, which recalls the paste used by the slaves to make bricks in Egypt; a roasted egg; salt water; and a lamb shankbone. These items are arranged on a specially decorated seder plate, and the story tells of the escape to freedom, and the role that each object plays in that tale. Special prayers, songs and time-honoured rituals make this meal memorable. If you're ever lucky enough to be invited to take part, do go; it's enlightening and beautiful.

The word "Passover" comes from the commandment of Yahweh, who told the Israelites to daub their doorposts with the blood of a lamb. Because Pharaoh would not let the Jews go, the Angel of Death was to visit all the Egyptians' first-born sons, but would spare the children of the Israelites; the Angel would know who they were because of the blood of the lamb on their doorways.

Clearly, this story foreshadows the Crucifixion. Jesus is the new "lamb of God", whose blood is to redeem the Christians and spare them from eternal death. The Passover meal at which He washed the feet of the disciples and shared with them the bread and wine of the "new covenant" was a retelling of the familiar story, and the disciples would all have known every detail by heart.

During the Israelites' forty years of wandering the desert before they reached the promised land, God gave them the Ten Commandments. The lengthy period of dwelling in the wilderness allowed a whole generation to be formed by the ethics of these commandments, the like of which had never before been seen. Other nations had laws, but the Ten Commandments go much further.

If we follow these Commandments, as Jews and Christians are all supposed to do, they shape our way of life into that of the Good Householder. They form the basis of community living, and they appeal to our Real Conscience. There must be no wanton taking of life, no theft, no lying, no adultery and no idolatry. Family life is sacred, and the worship of the monotheistic, ethical God is mandatory.

Considering that the tribes of Canaan and other regions where the Jews were to settle were worshiping a horrible, destructive deity who demanded that their babies be thrown alive into a fire, these Commandments separated the Israelites from their neighbours, and gave them a loftier moral and ethical code by which to live. It was vitally important that they keep these Commandments rather than conforming to the evil ways of the surrounding tribes. God was to shape this ramshackle group of runaway slaves into a people who would give rise to the Messiah.

Jesus, when he instituted the "new covenant", did not annul any of the Ten Commandments. They still form the basis of civilized life in the West, as far as we can lay claim to any form of civilization today. He took them even further, telling His disciples that obedience must involve the head and the heart, as well as the body; all three centres, in a Work sense, must take part if we truly wish to follow Him.

Behind the story of the Exodus lurks the memory of the years of slavery in Egypt. Even today, at Passover meals each participant is commanded to take the story personally, as though he or she has been individually saved from slavery.

Those of us in recovery have no problem with that, because the Exodus is the story of every alcoholic or addict in the entire world, and everyone who's been rescued from any form of addiction.

All of us in recovery have been slaves in "Egypt". Whether we've been drinking ourselves into a stupor, dulling our brains with drugs, taking on unnecessary suffering in the form of codependence, gambling, or workaholism, any of the myriad forms of slavery which constitute addiction have held us captive for many years. Addiction is a cruel Pharaoh who doesn't want to let us go.

But we could not come into recovery before we were ready. And here, it's interesting to note that before Passover may be celebrated, Jewish households must conduct a thorough search of their home for any leftover "hametz", or yeast, which could contaminate the Passover festival.

In this context, the Rabbis teach that "hametz" means sin, and specifically the sin of pride. "Hametz" is that which puffs us up, makes us swell with our own vanity and conceit, and prevents us from seeking help. Unless we can lay aside our pride, we will never be able to take the steps which will lead to recovery.

We have to bow our hearts and minds before God, acknowledging that we have made a complete mess of our lives and that only He can rescue us. The God of our understanding doesn't have to be Yahweh or Jesus. It can be the AA programme as a whole, or the individual AA group, if the practicing alcoholic or addict simply can't recognize the God of religion. But it must be a God in some form who can offer real help, real love and friendship, and firm guidelines which - in the form of the Twelve Steps - can show us a way out of slavery and into the promised land of recovery.

Pride is the worst sin of all, because it keeps us from seeing ourselves as we are, and it's the one which every alcoholic and every addict suffers from, above all. Alcoholics have been called "people who look down on others from their place in the gutter". And it's true. All of us alcoholics have thought we knew it all and were somehow above the laws which everyone else had to follow. We disregarded other people's warnings and followed our own self-will, which nearly killed us. As the song says, we did it our way. Until, that is, we saw the pit of hell to which our way was leading us.

As the saying goes, "You can always tell an alcoholic, but you can't tell them much"! We alcoholics and addicts have to be brought to our knees, to our rock-bottom, before we can envisage turning our will and our lives over to anyone else, even to God.

But once the "hametz" - the pride, vanity, and illusion of self-sufficiency - has been cleared out of our lives, we're ready for the great escape to freedom.

This Easter, as we saw, Passover again coincides with the Christian festival. And I, as a grateful, recovering alcoholic, am celebrating both!