Life Process Program Blog

While other mass media hosts rose, fell, retired, and fizzled, one modest woman pursued a successful career for a half century while raising a family despite her “illness”.   Jane Pauley has several life stories. She was a monument...

An LPP client asked a question about something that he has been pondering:  “Society seems to acknowledge the danger of prolonged depression and the link to addictive behavior. But what about this word dysphoria? Is it something at the...

Last week, a podcast listener emailed us with such an interesting question that we wanted to share the question and our answer with you. Listen to our answer in this video, or read our exchange below. Question: I feel...

The idea of addiction as inevitably a lifetime burden is a myth. In fact, most people resolve addictions over time and most do so without professional or support-group help.  We know this because the American government’s own data tells...

AA may be among the victims of the modern plague. At least if musician Laurie Wright is any example. For Wright, “AA meetings were my saving grace, by going to them every day.” And now? “We do the meetings...

Stanton Peele: Author of Resisting 12-Step Coercion: How to Fight Forced Participation in AA and NA. One of the country’s foremost experts on addiction joins Jim Breslo (Hidden Truth Podcast) to explain that we focus too much on the...

Dear Dr. Peele, I went through a somewhat nasty divorce in 1990, along with getting laid off from my job. I realized that I had a drinking problem, and I attempted to moderate my drinking. I was somewhat successful,...

IF MOTIVATION is the force that drives you to act, then rewards are what you gain from that activity. People quit their addictions when they begin to get more rewards for living without the addiction than they got from...

THE GROWTH OF ADDICTION TREATMENT in the United States, predicated on the idea that alcoholism and addictions of all kinds are diseases, is a public-relations triumph, and not a triumph of reason or science. The idea that modern addiction...

The disease model of addiction does more harm than good because it does not give people enough credit for their resilience and capacity to change. It underestimates people’s ability to figure out what is good for them and to...

This program points out many actual stories of recovered addicts, virtually all of whom did it on their own. These cases come from all walks of life, and from all of my many activities. That is, some are based...

We frequently hear from people who say: “I drink too much sometimes, but I don’t think I’m an alcoholic. And I don’t want to stand up and talk about myself in front of a group. Is there any other...

In spite of what the government and treatment programs tell us, we all know that many people escape addictions without treatment. How do we know? Because so many of us, our friends, and our loved ones have quit addictions,...

Because they can’t draw unfavorable inferences about life in poor ghettos or poor rural communities (to which they have little exposure), liberals are drawn to the belief that drugs cause addiction. I couldn’t disagree more. But as a card-carrying...

Disease Theory of Addiction The disease theory of addiction underpins punitive and abhorrent drug policies—but in fact, its negative impact is evenworse than this. Recently, two notables on an addiction theory list to which I used to belong debated...

We are recognizing that addiction is a regular part of life, and it scares the hell out of us. When I published Love and Addiction with Archie Brodsky in 1975, we received catcalls from my fellow faculty members at...

This is a wide-ranging talk about addiction and today’s youth and teens. Dr. Horvath, SMART’s President, interviews Dr. Stanton Peele on what is needed in society, in public policy, for parents, and for those in the caring and justice...

When I first started looking seriously at addiction in the late 60s, people would ask why I was interested in it. “We already know everything about addiction,” one student told me. My answer to him was that I wanted...

  In the United States today, our goal is to shunt the troubled/addicted individual out of the home and into treatment. By itself, that doesn’t work. What is the purpose of an intervention? In the United States, members of...

At a time when diagnoses are set to increase, I’m working to establish online addiction treatment. Some doubt the value of Internet programs, but their reach is unparalleled and evidence suggests they can work. We are about to witness...

Drug addiction is not caused by the effects of drugs alone. After decades of growing acceptance, the concept that addiction is a medical disease (more exactly, a chronic brain disease) is suddenly being linked to the drug war—and being...

It was with great pleasure that I read Meghan Ralston, of the Drug Policy Alliance’s, piece in the Huffington Post, entitled, “I’m Breaking Up with the Word Addict,” in which she wrote: When we do feel the need to...

The Truth About Addiction and Recovery Why It Doesn’t Make Sense To Call Addiction A “Disease” We frequently hear from people who say: “I drink too much sometimes, but I don’t think I’m an alcoholic. And I don’t want...

Writing to SMART Recovery counselors and group leaders, Stanton reminds them that recovery is a natural process, one assisted by counselors and support groups, or reinstated when a person goes in the wrong direction. When presenting this view, Stanton...

22-year-old struggling with leaving AA Can I argue against AA in my philosophy debate? Where do I go for help now that I am out of AA? I grew out of AA Is my son an alcoholic? Did my...

Gambling Addiction DSM 5’s announcement that the psychiatric diagnostic manual will, for the first time, call something addictive that doesn’t involve substance abuse — gambling — has opened the floodgates. It is intriguing to consider how gambling was placed in this...

Dear Dr. Peele: My name is , and recently I had the great fortune of stumbling across your web-page. Wow! What a life-changing event that has turned out to be! I will not bore you with a comprehensive...

On June 12, the A&E Television Network ran one of its investigative reports entitled, “Inside Alcoholics Anonymous.” Although promoed as including “leading national health authorities and the organization’s outspoken critics. . . answer questions never before asked,” it was...

Psychology Today, September/October 1996, pp. 35-43, 68-70 (material added not present in original article)  American attitudes toward alcohol are paradoxical: we focus almost exclusively on abstinence, yet we frequently drink to excess. Every year $2 billion is spent advertising...

What is the future of addiction and the Internet — will more people be locked in rooms alone communicating wholly electronically, increasingly with entities that may not actually be human? A European group has created an international effort to...

More people quit addictions than maintain them, and they do so on their own. That’s not to say it happens overnight. People succeed when they recognize that the addiction interferes with something they value—and when they develop the confidence...

Stanton reviews a new medical tome on sexual addiction, by psychoanalyst Aviel Goodman. Yes, people become addicted to sex; no, it is not a medical disease best treated by the 12 steps. Contemporary Psychology, 44:154-156, 1999 Review of Sexual Addiction:...

Heroin overdose is almost nonexistent. Rather, heroin users who concurrently take tranquilizers, alcohol, and cocaine are those at risk for sudden death. But the promotion of the idea of heroin overdose (seen most recently in the well-off Texas suburb...

Private treatment for alcoholism and drug abuse expanded greatly beginning in the late 1970s. Between 1978 and 1984, the number of beds in private alcoholism treatment centers more than quadrupled. In the ’80s, hospitalization of adolescents in private psychiatric...