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Perversely, some people follow a
path that they know will produce more costs than benefits,
because
following the path of greatest advantage sets up a conflict. On one
side there is the autonomous behavior that leads to immediate
gratification. Against this is pitted the person’s decision to
move in the direction of greatest advantage. The conflict plays out in
real time: choices are made, outcomes are experienced, and so the course of
one's life is defined.
Following the path of greatest advantage is not a trivial
task; one must over-ride two attributes of the psyche that favor
relapse despite good intentions:
- The Problem of Immediate Gratification [the PIG]: Motivation to
approach or avoid is much more sensitive to the immediacy than to the magnitude of the
payoff. The PIG causes people to choose a small now at the expense of a much a
larger but delayed reward. Likewise, some people avoid a small punishment now
and pay the price of a big punishment later.
- The Karma of Practice: The more well worn is a path the easier it
is to follow. Habit strengthens with exercise; performance requires progressively
less conscious guidance. With sufficient practice a behavioral sequence becomes
autonomous, and now requires conscious effort to over-ride.
The path of greatest advantage begins with the decision to over-ride the PIG and the
karma of bad habits . Note that the word: "decide" is derived from
the root "cide" as in sui-cide, homi-cide,
insecti-cide, and means: to
kill. When, for example, an alcoholic makes the decision to quit drinking it is
understood that [s]he means to kill, for once and for all, the option to drink alcohol,
and thereby lock out drinking in the future.
Nearby stimuli influence motivation much more than distant stimuli [see Myopia]:
bad mood or luck now can have a greater influence on behavior than a
commitment made last month. In some situations the alcoholic
wants to drink, in others s/he wants to quit drinking forever. Commitment is
required precisely because motivation is fluid, and changes with local conditions.
The decision to act marks the transition from fluid
motivation to frozen commitment. Incentive use will no longer be controlled by local
conditions, but by the commitment one makes at this moment of
decision.
A commitment is a promise to perform in a specified way at a future time. The ability
to deliver on this promise - despite the pull of local conditions - can be strengthened or
weakened. Making a commitment is like making a wager - a bet that you will do
what you committed to do. Winning the bet increases will power
- the power to adhere to future commitments. Failing to adhere to the
commitment loses the bet, and with it some amount of future will-power.1
Addiction is the consequence of losing this bet too many times.
Don't Be Reasonable!
When you make a commitment you are giving odds - one loss overcomes many victories. You
must do exactly what you committed to do. A well formed commitment is
developed with the no-exceptions requirement in mind, and so
requires a clear specification. It may be stated as an "I will"
intention, e.g., "I will remain clean and sober in all circumstances - no
exceptions." Note: coding the intention as a negative, e.g., "I
will not drink alcohol" is poor form [see The Imp of the
Perverse].
Motivation changes with local conditions. In the beginning, addicted individuals
are highly motivated to adhere to their decision to change. Naturally, they expect
to always feel this way [see The Soul Illusion], but they will
not.
As the crisis that motivated the commitment recedes into the past and one becomes
involved in the continuous stream of events that play out in real time, the
commitment decays. Local motivation becomes more a function of local circumstances
than the distant commitment. The PIG which at first supported the
commitment - when the addict wanted immediate gratification of the desire to be free of
the addition - must be over-ridden when the addict is faced with immediate
temptation. The motivation to maintain abstinence is greater during the
contrite state following an unfortunate drinking episode, than during a high risk
situation some months later.
Motivation is an abstract construct, but action changes
the world. Will s/he
drink or not drink during that high risk situation? Whatever happens at the moment
becomes part of the performer's biography. What had been merely a possibility is
promoted to a reality; the alternative options vanish into oblivion.2
Once performed, the behavior [either drinking or not drinking] becomes part of world
history, and can never be undone.
I am a psychologist, and people generally seek my services because they have relapsed -
regained the weight they lost, gone back to drinking or drug using, etc. During the
first session, I almost always ask the obvious questions: "What caused the
first lapse?" and "What was the sequence of events that led up to
it?" Oddly, they don’t know. They don't remember the details of
the the crucial early moments of the lapse. Recall of a sequence of events requires
that the sequences was originally coded into long term memory - a process that requires
attention. During the early phases of a lapse the addict does not seem to be
attending to the unfolding sequence of relapse - a sequence that we all know will be
viewed as a calamity in hindsight. Why are they blind at the crucial moment?
The decision to kill off a rewarding incentive sets up a
conflict. On one side there is the autonomous behavior that
leads to immediate gratification. Against this is pitted the
person’s rational decision to move in the direction of greatest advantage.
For more about this conflict:
If there are problems with Depression,
Anxiety, Anger, or other Mood Disorders, please visit the following pages:
- There are as many ways out of addiction as into it, and different models of the psyche
produce different treatment strategies. By far the most popular treatment
orientation is the 12-steps of Alcoholics Anonymous - for those interested a
comparison with the bio-psycho-social model presented here is available at, Models of Addiction.
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Footnotes:
1.
Ainslie, George, Specious reward: A behavioral theory
of impulsiveness and impulse control. Psychological Bulletin. 1975 Jul Vol 82(4) 463-496
2.
Frankl, Victor E. Basic concepts of logotherapy. Confinia
Psychiatrica. 1961 4 99-109
3. Tiffany, Stephen T. A cognitive model of drug urges and drug-use behavior:
Role of automatic and nonautomatic processes. Psychological Review. 1990 Apr Vol 97(2)
147-168
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We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a
journey that no one can take for us, nor spare us.
- Marcel Proust
Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one
elemental truth - the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that
the moment one definitely commits oneself, the Providence moves, too.
- Goethe
Integrity has no need of rules.
- A. Camus
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice,
there is.
- Jan van de Snepscheut
A path is only a path, and there is no affront, to
oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you. Look at every
path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask
yourself alone, one question. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good;
if it doesn't it is of no use.
- Carlos Castaneda
If we do not change our direction, we are likely to end up where we are headed.
- Chinese Proverb
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