Defects of Character

[MajestyJo]

What are your thoughts on "Behavioral Addictions", are they
addictions, or bad habits that we enjoy?

Please share your thoughts.....

A good question! My first thought was they were behaviors that developed as a result of my addiction(s). My love for attention, for validation and approval, my people pleasing, my looking for someone to love me and willing to go to any length to receive that love. A lot stemmed from my need to get comfort or a high and what I needed to do to attain it and maintain it.

Behaviors can be changed. Behaviors can be modified. Behaviors can no longer stand me in good stead and have to be revised to fit my life in today. Behaviors are often as a result of my action to others, which becomes my issue not theirs.

Again, when I see the contol word, I think "if I have to control it, it is out of control." For me, the only way it can be controld is by surrendering it and asking my Higher Power for help. Control for me is an illusion. An example of this is me buying myself a treat. I tell myself I will have it a piece at a time. I have it a piece at a time but the problem is, it generally ends up being two pieces. As much as I give myself a talking to and tell myself I shouldn't eat it all at once or I shouldn't buy it at all, it ends up in my fridge. Until I find the willingness, to turn it completely over and ask my HP to take away the craving and the need, it isn't going to happen if I am truly honest with myself. I am telling tales on myself so perhaps, this will be the beginning of the first step on this matter.

I went today to check my Lottario ticket, I thought it was last night and it told me results were not available. The ticket is for tonight. A woman came to stand beside my and said, "I like those, I spend $20, sometimes I win but most times I lose." She was referring to Nevada Tickets. I told her that I allowed myself $3. and if I win I win, if I don't I don't. She said, "Lucky you!" There really isn't a difference, no matter what we spend, we still have the desire to buy. My $3. is a result of asking my Higher Power for help because they were out of control. I no longer buy every day and there are days that I can walk by them and not buy any, that in itself is a miracle from where I was before.

I choose not to spend any more than I can afford to lose.

Is it an addiction, a bad habit, a behaviour pattern, or all of the above?

Again, it isn't the substance that is the problem. An addiction is a mental obsession and an allergy to the body, mind and spirit, we do not metabolize or think the way, most people do. The chemical imbalance is different between different people, but it isn't the substance that causes it, I firmly believe a lot of it is in our genes and we are more often than not, products of our environment. We don't have to take on other people's stuff, but we often do without realizing it. Just another aspect of our dis-ease.

Originally posted on another site on 2010.

I was told that anything that I put between me, and who my God would have me be in today. Anything that will take me out of a space I don't want to be in. What I use to shut down and shut off. It may start as "just this time" and yet, when I start thinking more, I see it as part of my dis-ease. My addiction is the thinking behind the substance. What is my motive and intent. I had to learn to give myself permission to have a nap when my body needed it. In the past, my bed was my place of escape for life and what was around me. I didn't want to eat, even though I was hungry. I was thinking fat, so would pick up a cigarette. I would want to go to a certain event, but kept telling myself it was alright to run away from home. The only problem is that wherever I go, I take me with me.