The Nerdist Way_ How to Reach the Next Level (In Real Life) - Chris Hardwick [37]
Addiction is a tough one. It tricks you. If I were to try to explain it to someone (people who don’t have the gene can’t fathom it), I would say that it’s like having thousands of hungry baby birds in your soul, chirping and begging to be fed on a molecular level. It’s hard to deny them and they can be very persuasive. If a dog begs and begs and begs at your table, sooner or later you might just give him a bit of steak to shut him up. It’s less painful in the moment than exerting all of the energy to retrain him, but that’s what you need to do—retrain your soul. To do this, you need a plan and you need support. Personally, AA never resonated with me. I’m not proud or ashamed about that. It just was what it was. For a while, I thought I was REALLY broken until another comic friend of mine said, “Yeah, I didn’t really like it either. I just kind of did my own thing.” Then a light went on and I felt OK. Now, many people from the Program will balk at this. I have a friend who occasionally will ask me, “You still not going to meetings?” to which I always say, “Naw, they’re not my cup o’ tea,” to which he’ll reply something along the lines of, “OK, Champ, good luck with that.” Well, I’ve been sober for eight years so my “luck” is holding pretty well. As alcoholics, we tend to be self-centered, so it’s difficult to imagine that something that worked for us might not work for another human.
BTW, I’m not bashing AA in the least. For some folks, it’s a lifesaver. They need that specific structure and that system. I only mention all of this because if you happen to be someone who didn’t click with it, I just want you to know that you’re not a loon or alone (that’s some snazzy wordplay there!). Having said all of that, I cannot express to you enough the importance of SOME kind of help. I had a therapist that I was crazy about, so that worked for me. An experienced friend can also be helpful. Or the AA route. Also, I haven’t used it, but I recently discovered a social network for those in recovery at IntheRooms.com that looked promising. They allow you to connect with similar folks at varying stages of recovery to give you support at any level of privacy you prefer. However you go about it, know that you just need some kind of wise, guiding force. You see, the substance isn’t the problem. Substances are things and, by Nature, innately neutral. They are an expression of an underlying emotional or chemical issue. You job in recovery is to try to dig that up and somehow sign an armistice treaty with it. I’ve seen so many people who quit doing whatever it is that they do, and think that’s going to solve their problem. Quitting only provides the clarity to discover and then start solving the problem. These can be troubling waters to navigate because several years of artificial coping may have stunted your emotional growth. I became INCREDIBLY emotional in the beginning because it had been so long since I had to just use my own brain to deal with things. It’s like that scene in The Matrix when Neo first gets rescued and he’s on the operating table looking like a pincushion, and he says to Morpheus, “Why do my eyes hurt?” “Because you’ve never used them.”
START WITH VANITY
Vanity should never in and of itself be a goal, but we all have it so we might as well use it. A lot of people ask me how I was able to quit drinking on October 8, 2003. (They don’t cite the date. I added that for dramatic effect.) The truth of the matter is, it started as vanity. I wasn’t working. I was fat and doughy. My skin was bad. I looked like death puked on a turd. The year prior to that (I believe), I was watching The Daily Show—as I was wont to do—and my old TV mate Jenny McCarthy was a guest. Near the end of the interview, Jon Stewart goes, “Oh, by the way, Chris Hardwick works here now.” “Really? Cool!” Jenny responded.