Hi! I'm Valery. Giving a tribute to the tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) I should say with some sort of irony “I’m an alcoholic” After the long period of high-functioning alcoholic life , I was drunk for the last time over 10 years ago. Besides, I’m a professional philosopher. For almost all my life I’ve been studying such an exotic for general audience thing as the history of Belarusian national philosophy. My formal CV can be found by most inquisitive visitors following this link.
A philosopher is a person always in doubt. I’ve written the previous paragraph and began to think whether I shall believe I’m still an alcoholic after 10 years of sober life. I am not sure, but surely I think rather no then ye. The idea of AA is that soberness requires constant external support. A person having lost control of the amount of alcohol he/she consumes needs external support to prevent him/her from following the bad habit. Alas, it isn’t for me, I was raised as a Soviet atheist and long ago took Cartesian's principle De omnibus dubitandum (All is to be doubted) as my credo. Therefore, I am looking for other reasons of my breaking with the addiction. Like in many other issues, the explanations for addictive behavior should be at the same place where the addiction born. This place is my brain. My substantial argument is that a person by himself or herself shall find own personal executive long-term control system to regulate own distorted mind, his or her cognitive sphere and the imperfect behavior.
In my case the thing called in AA tradition a power greater than ourselves can be replaced with another addiction. For me, natural curiosity about the whys and wherefores of the world and person ( Someone described philosophy in this way) became the kernel of such system. Incessant searching is a necessary for any research achievements. This work can be planned for years and decades. It requires daily attention and submits every aspect of my life to itself by its charm. It is another addiction, a conditionally harmless. Sometimes this striving may be stronger than the desire to be drunk. For me as a scholar the choice was evident. In my past alcoholic life, the strife to create and the desire to drink fought each other. And it’s a rare case when alcohol addiction retreated. During these ten years I’ve written some books some dozens of articles, visited over 20 new countries. The biggest achievement for me was winning the Fullbright scholarship, which helped me to spend unforgettable four months in Washington, DC, where, in the atmosphere of the Library of Congress and the National Medical Library the idea of rethinking of alcohol was born.
Nevertheless, I can’t finish here the introduction of myself under the sounds of triumph. Abstaining from alcohol and even gradual confidence that no relapse is to be expected isn’t a success as such, it’s just a beginning of new struggle. Reading hundreds books and articles on alcoholic addiction I sometimes find phrases like “I don’t want such a life; I didn’t expect it at all”. I shall probably say a very trivial thing. The problems a person covered with alcohol, those debts (financial and moral ones) that accumulated during the years of addiction don’t disappear, but due to the particularities of a retired drinker’s mind they are felt much more terrible than in a mind of sound and decent peoples.
They say time heals all wounds. Going back to the beginning of this story I dare say I can’t call myself an alcoholic. Thinking about the Book, meditating over materials I study I can say that now there’s no place for alcohol in my life, I’m not afraid of a relapse, I almost never think about the influence of this past to my present existence. For some years I don’t count days of sober life. No, I’m not free from anxiety, from repeating attacks of depression. For many years after some unlucky or difficult days I woke up with a feeling like abstinence symptoms (today I know that it’s called protracted abstinence). However, in this case I don’t think about alcohol as a remedy for so many years. How do I view the story of my addiction? Rather than a number of incidents form my past, recent, but past experiences. Just unnoticeably passed away bouts of nostalgia about this time. Indeed, instead of shame and repentance, this absurd – from the viewpoint of a sound person – feeling used to embrace me sometimes. Life is going on and this project is a witness to it, although according to the addiction logic I should have been dead for a long time. Among few indisputable points I lay to the foundation of this book, there’s a thought of an unconditional value of life, so even the fact I’m alive and won’t die according to the strict laws of alcoholism is a victory in itself.
A philosopher is a person always in doubt. I’ve written the previous paragraph and began to think whether I shall believe I’m still an alcoholic after 10 years of sober life. I am not sure, but surely I think rather no then ye. The idea of AA is that soberness requires constant external support. A person having lost control of the amount of alcohol he/she consumes needs external support to prevent him/her from following the bad habit. Alas, it isn’t for me, I was raised as a Soviet atheist and long ago took Cartesian's principle De omnibus dubitandum (All is to be doubted) as my credo. Therefore, I am looking for other reasons of my breaking with the addiction. Like in many other issues, the explanations for addictive behavior should be at the same place where the addiction born. This place is my brain. My substantial argument is that a person by himself or herself shall find own personal executive long-term control system to regulate own distorted mind, his or her cognitive sphere and the imperfect behavior.
In my case the thing called in AA tradition a power greater than ourselves can be replaced with another addiction. For me, natural curiosity about the whys and wherefores of the world and person ( Someone described philosophy in this way) became the kernel of such system. Incessant searching is a necessary for any research achievements. This work can be planned for years and decades. It requires daily attention and submits every aspect of my life to itself by its charm. It is another addiction, a conditionally harmless. Sometimes this striving may be stronger than the desire to be drunk. For me as a scholar the choice was evident. In my past alcoholic life, the strife to create and the desire to drink fought each other. And it’s a rare case when alcohol addiction retreated. During these ten years I’ve written some books some dozens of articles, visited over 20 new countries. The biggest achievement for me was winning the Fullbright scholarship, which helped me to spend unforgettable four months in Washington, DC, where, in the atmosphere of the Library of Congress and the National Medical Library the idea of rethinking of alcohol was born.
Nevertheless, I can’t finish here the introduction of myself under the sounds of triumph. Abstaining from alcohol and even gradual confidence that no relapse is to be expected isn’t a success as such, it’s just a beginning of new struggle. Reading hundreds books and articles on alcoholic addiction I sometimes find phrases like “I don’t want such a life; I didn’t expect it at all”. I shall probably say a very trivial thing. The problems a person covered with alcohol, those debts (financial and moral ones) that accumulated during the years of addiction don’t disappear, but due to the particularities of a retired drinker’s mind they are felt much more terrible than in a mind of sound and decent peoples.
They say time heals all wounds. Going back to the beginning of this story I dare say I can’t call myself an alcoholic. Thinking about the Book, meditating over materials I study I can say that now there’s no place for alcohol in my life, I’m not afraid of a relapse, I almost never think about the influence of this past to my present existence. For some years I don’t count days of sober life. No, I’m not free from anxiety, from repeating attacks of depression. For many years after some unlucky or difficult days I woke up with a feeling like abstinence symptoms (today I know that it’s called protracted abstinence). However, in this case I don’t think about alcohol as a remedy for so many years. How do I view the story of my addiction? Rather than a number of incidents form my past, recent, but past experiences. Just unnoticeably passed away bouts of nostalgia about this time. Indeed, instead of shame and repentance, this absurd – from the viewpoint of a sound person – feeling used to embrace me sometimes. Life is going on and this project is a witness to it, although according to the addiction logic I should have been dead for a long time. Among few indisputable points I lay to the foundation of this book, there’s a thought of an unconditional value of life, so even the fact I’m alive and won’t die according to the strict laws of alcoholism is a victory in itself.