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I am addicted. I believe we all are addicted to something. I wonder if us humans could function without an addiction of sorts. Especially in the hell that we have created for ourselves. Whether it's a natural state of humans is a moot point given hardly anything about humans is in it's natural state anymore. And yes I am assuming there is a natural state for humans, and no, it doesn't mean climbing trees. [edit: scratch that, we should be climbing trees.]
But back to the topic, we are actually addicted to a few things, caffeine, a screen, social media, cigarettes, weed, most of them which keep us going on a regular basis. I do not think one should abstain from these altogether, hell, it's probably healthy. It is healthier than watching the news, That's for sure. But it is healthy to abstain, too. Maybe that's why many religions have some form of abstinence period. In Christianity it is the 40 days before easter, in Islam it's ramadan, and the Hindus have ekadasi. I think it teaches us something about ourselves. If we have a part of our being constantly muted, we are not fully aware of ourselves, and thus of reality. We go through motions that we don't even notice, in order to accomodate ourselves to still that nagging itch, to alleviate some physical feeling that keeps recurring. There is a physiological process which is not allowed to complete, and that something can often cause us illness. They all seem to do, they undermine our health in some way, and we stick to them despite not even really enjoying them. That is what makes an addiction an addiction. So why do we do it?
We need to abstain, in order to peek into what is going there. It is a very uncomfortable process in which there is major upheaval in ourselves, in our emotional makeup and even in our thought processes; it is something unfamiliar, with which we are not used to dealing. We face ourselves, we are thrown in the unknown, in our own undiscovered depths. Only then can we get to know ourselves a little better, and avoid deterioration which is, after all, what makes us decay and become old.
Abstaining from our addictions, for brief periods, is a good and healthy habit to make, and, like medicine, it is a bitter experience. We are filled with power, forever, and with knowledge about ourselves, and with experience, and even experiences, out, in the world, that can transform our reality and our worldview. Addiction is a kind of darkness, which does not allow us to see, but that darkness can briefly dissipate, and give us a glimpse that can say much about how we might accomplish our goals and dreams, or even change them a little.
We can do this with many things, not all at once, of course, but alternatively, it would probably be a good and interesting exercise. It is too easy to get overconfident, and stop many things at once, only to crash spectacularly. It is always wise to take things one step at a time, and of course, not to blame oneself when one goes back to the habit. We should aim to keep ourselves as aloof from that bad habit as we can for as long as we can hold it, and try again whenever we relapse. There are processes that have to unfold, and with introspection we can help those processes reach their completion in proportion to the work we put into them.
That's it, there's more to say but this is about enough for now.