4 things your anxiety maybe here to ask of you
On the science & purpose of addiction, worry and stress
Six months ago when I was living on the farm, with very little predictability in life, and no ability to see the magic that is unfolding now, I started smoking cannabis pretty intensely. It felt like my 23 year old self was back with a vengeance.
I beat myself up.
“You fucking pot-smoking loser” is a sampler of the hors-d'oeuvres I served myself when the smoking was getting out of hand again.
The result? More pain (now self-inflicted…)
And what is my old coping mechanism for relieving pain and discomfort? Smoking pot.
Alas. Welcome back to the vicious circle of stress, pain, addiction and low self-worth.
The Science of Stress & Addiction from a Neuroendocrine Perspective:
Stress and anxiety increase cortisol, demanding juicy external dopamine (such as what we get from substances/instagram/or even exercise) to regulate that yucky cortisol feeling, which then relieves stress in the ultra-short term, only to cause the stress response to rise back up sharply.
That is due to the depletion of dopmaine from addictive beahviors, and stress coming back to take control, this time unhinged with no more inner resources to regulate it. It becomes unbearable, unless we bring me more external dopamine.
And so forth, forever.
I knew that during the summer. As a matter of fact I was deep into my research of the science of stress, while I smoked my anxiety away with my favorite addiction.
I also knew a lot of that in medical school when I started smoking cannabis for the first time.
Most of us (dare I say - ALL of us) know that too much of anything is bad for us.
However, addictions of all sorts are at an all time high, and so many of us quit cold-turkey, priding ourselves on being “clean”- only for these old coping mechanisms to come back stronger and overpower us.
I see that with clients all the time.
And it happened to me last year.
I needed to dig deeper this time.
I had to get to the root.
The Psychology of Anxiety & Addiction
I reached out to my coach and the person who taught me Internal Family Systems (the method that I practice now in my health coaching), and asked him for a session to work on this.
“I can’t stop smoking these days, and I feel terrible about it.” I told him. “I feel so faded and out of control.”
He guided me by first asking the part of me that judges me for smoking to take a step back, and then we got to understand what it was that the “pot-smoker” in me was really looking for. I started answering the questions that I now know by heart, and know when and how to ask them to my clients, but still need someone else to ask them to me!
I invite you to ask your anxious or addictive part these ones as well:
What do you want me to know about yourself?
What are you afraid would happen if you did not work so hard?
Ten minutes into the visualization exercise, I had this image come up:
A part of me was in that bus that I lived on in the farm, and it was creating a cloud of cannabis smoke around a little child inside of me that was so scared of the future.
Even though I was putting up a brave face, and my friends commended me about how I approached these extremely hard financial circumstances with “grace”, a part of me inside was simply scared shitless. It wanted to ask “What the fuck are you doing, dude?”… “How are we going to make money?”… “Where are we going to live?”… “Will you ever be able to make this work?” ..etc.
Turns out, the “potsmoker” was not at all interested in pot itself!
It was fully invested in protecting my inner baby boy from being overwhelmed. It had developed that skill more than a decade ago during my medical internship, when I was depressed, overwhelmed, and…you guessed it…had very little predictability about the future!
Ahh..the circle of stress. It is the wheel of anxiety.
Some of us fall by the wayside
And some of us soar to the stars
And some of us sail through our troubles
And some have to live with the scars
There's far too much to take in here
More to find than can ever be foundThe circle of life - The Lion King
So that is when it hit me.
I was smoking cannabis again because that was my way of creating predictability in a very turbulent foggy time.
The more there anxiety was, the harder things got, and the less control and predictability I had.
So what is a sure way to increase control and predictability?
Ingesting substances of course! I know exactly what will happen when I smoke a joint…I will get high! It doesn’t even matter to that part whether I feel better or not, but it just feels a bit more sane.
And just underneath that realization was the answer
The question was not how can I quit?
The question became: How can I bring more predictability into my housing situation?
That made me realize that I simply have gone too far and stretched myself beyond my stretch zone, and into my panic zone.
It was time to adjust my own expectations.
The months to come involved a deep negotiation with the pot-smoker inside of me who was protecting that scared child, and I bartered an interim cease-fire: “I will get you a boat, if you stop smoking joints.”
“Ok but I need a whole year of knowing where I will live. 2 months on a boat won’t cut it.”
I could only find a 2 month deal at that point.
“Ok, how about we cut out the tobacco, and you only eat edibles until we find a hope?”
“Mmmm…ok no joints, only vapes.”
“Fine deal. But only until we find a 12 month home for us all.”
“Deal.”
And so it was. I have not smoked since then, but it was not because I quit…
I have smoked zero joints since then, and gradually weaned off the vapes with edibles, and now that I am in a home for 12 months, I am only smoking when I really want to relax, and it is no longer that hard to not smoke all day.
My business is flourishing, my cognitive abilities are returning, my sleep has improved, my ability to go to the gym and workout is back, and overall I feel balanced.
In other words: The addiction was my friend, and it was warning me that I had gone too far. By understanding its needs, I allowed it to transform me.
It doesn’t have to be a dramatic change.
It was not a disease that I needed more drugs to treat.
This isn’t the end of my story with cannabis, but it is certainly a major milestone and I hope that inspires you today to take a more understanding approach towards your own addictions.
Now it is your turn: What rewards does your addiction or anxiety give you?
In other terms: What role does your addiction play in your life? What is it hoping to get for you.
When we develop addictive or anxious parts that look angry or “harmful” on the outside they are usually trying to get us one of the following proven things:
1- Control
2- Predictability (fear + uncertainty = anxiety)
3- Social support (the lower the social capital, the more the anxiety)
4- Outlets of Frustration
Which one of these rewards do you notice recurring the most when you map your anxiety loops?
Let me know in the comments!
And if you are looking for direct support…
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We can work on a focus area of your choice in the areas of exercise, stress, addiction, sleep, nutrition, or relationships. Check out my reviews here. Happy to offer you more references as well.
If you are struggling with worry or work-related stress, just reply by “interested” and I will set you up with an intro call and free assessment.