WHY ADDICTION IS NOT A CHOICE

Imagine holding a burning hot coal in your hand.

Your skin is burning. The pain is unbearable. You know exactly what’s causing it.

Yet you keep holding on.

Would you seriously conclude that the person simply wants to be burned?

Or would you become curious about what makes letting go so difficult?

This is where the idea that addiction is a choice becomes ridiculous.

People continue using substances despite losing their health, relationships, families, freedom and sometimes their lives.

They know the consequences. Many desperately want to stop. Some have tried hundreds of times.

And we still ask, “Why don’t they just choose differently?”

Perhaps the more intelligent question is:

What is happening in a human being that makes something so destructive feel so necessary?

You don’t need a complicated theory to begin asking that question.

Just a willingness to look beyond the behaviour.

Infinite Recovery Project