介绍:
Becoming Addiction-Free
By Steve Pavlina
How many addictions do you currently have? Are you addicted to smoking, caffeine, sugar, alcohol, any other drugs, the Internet, porn, masturbation, sex, orgasm, gambling, shopping, work, TV, movies, social media, video games, food, or anything else? What behaviors do you perform compulsively, even though they don’t really serve you in the long run?
The insidious thing about addictions is that all addictions weaken the prefrontal cortex, which is the part of your brain associated with self-discipline and willpower. The more addictions you have, the weaker your self-regulation abilities become, which increases your susceptibility to further addictions. One addiction tends to invite others, and pretty soon you find yourself with a half-dozen addictions, although you may only be consciously aware of one or two of them.
Addictions get conditioned when certain behaviors trigger a dopamine response. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that helps to solidify desired behaviors, such as eating and sex. Initially we experience a reward (a feeling of pleasure) to reinforce a new behavior, and as the pattern gets conditioned, the reward is gradually reduced. The behavior becomes automatic, even if the reward is stopped. If we want to feel the same level of pleasure we did when we first started, we have to keep increasing the dosage.
Unfortunately for us, our dopamine reward circuitry evolved during a much simpler time, when the triggers for addiction-prone behaviors were scarce. In a world of overabundant triggers, we see an overabundance of addictions. Our brains over-reward us, thereby over-conditioning short-term pleasures that often work against our long-term happiness and fulfillment. What’s even worse is that many companies deliberately target these neurological shortcomings to sell more products and services. Walk into a grocery store, and notice all the items on the shelves with added sugar, oil, or salt. One of the main reasons these items are added is because they make food more addictive than it would otherwise be.
These addictions have consequences for us. For instance, the latest Gallup polls report that 28.3% of adult Americans are now obese, an increase of 2.8 percentage points since 2008. That translates into more cancer, more heart attacks, more strokes, more diabetes, and a lot more money spent on healthcare (which is really sickcare).
