Connection as the opposite of addiction

Reflections of a formerly sober person

I used to have a resentment against Gabor Maté.

That may seem absurd but it’s true. Him and other thinkers like Johann Hari who have argued that opposite of addiction is not sobriety but connection were super threatening to me.

I thought this kind of talk was dangerous, because I believed whole heartedly that my life was absolutely dependent upon staying sober and I worried that such talk would worm its way into my mind and convince me that I didn’t actually need sobriety — I just needed connection.

And while I think both Gabor Maté and Johann Hari would probably say that some people absolutely do need to be sober, and are not offering connection as a substitute for sobriety, I have now become a formerly sober person. Something I never thought I would say, unless in the throes of a chaotic and awful relapse.