How dealing with past trauma may be the key to breaking addiction

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Nov. 24, 2018 – Part of that price was addiction – whether to alcohol or drugs, gambling or sex, overwork or porn, extreme sports or gaming – but essential to understanding it, says Maté, is to realize that addiction is not in itself the problem but rather an attempt to solve a problem. “Our birthright as human beings is to be happy, and the addict just wants to be a human being.” And addictive behavior, though damaging in the medium or long term, can save you in the short term. “The primary drive is to regulate your situation to something more bearable.” So rather than some people having brains that are wired for addiction, Maté argues, we all have brains that are wired for happiness. And if our happiness is threatened at a deep level, by traumas in our past that we’ve not resolved, we resort to addictions to restore the happiness we truly crave.