Up: [[Compulsion]] Created: 2022-11-27 Updated: 2024-08-27 > [!Orbit] Isabel Kliegman in *Tarot and the Tree of Life* > I define addiction as whatever we do, not for its own sake, but for the sake of altering consciousness rather than dealing with it….We don’t necessarily distract ourselves with something ingestible. We can do it with the telephone, movies, house cleaning, intellectual pursuits, charity work, or professional advancement. The particular choice of distraction isn’t important; what is relevant is that we are using one thing to keep from experiencing something else. (p. 100) I used to believe Kliegman’s definition. Under those terms, my massive addiction to work got replaced in retirement by addictions to sugar, organizing things, and maybe overspending on books, art supplies and online courses. But I’ve since realized that Kliegman’s definition is way too broad. Organizing things isn’t an addiction. Even overspending on books etc isn’t an addiction. Addiction is more than just intensity around something. An addiction is a state of possession. It is uncontrollable and much, much bigger than me. I like Woodman’s definition: > [!Orbit] [[Marion Woodman]] in *Conscious Femininity* > An addiction is anything we do to avoid hearing the messages that body and soul are trying to send us. For me, the 'master' addiction is to perfection, which I also often refer to as my all-or-nothing thinking.