Alcoholism is not genetic in the sense that you have a gene that causes alcoholism. Alcoholism is a complex mix of nature and nurture. The reasons why people can "hold" their alcohol or not are just as complex, having to do with fat metabolim, insulin and a host of other factors. It cannot be prayed away either.

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Hope
Alcoholism is not genetic in the sense that you have a gene that causes alcoholism. Alcoholism is a complex mix of nature and nurture. The reasons why people can "hold" their alcohol or not are just as complex, having to do with fat metabolim, insulin and a host of other factors. It cannot be prayed away either.

It is genetic.

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May 26, 2004 -- A new study links a gene to alcohol addiction -- backing up a long-recognized pattern showing that alcoholism runs in families.

The finding also provides evidence that an inborn high level of anxiety is part of this picture. The study appears in this week's issue of the Journal of Neuroscience.

From WebMD
[www.webmd.com]

I think Hope is trying to say that genetics isn't the whole picture.

There definitely seems to be a genetic predisposition towards alcoholism, as well as other harmful effects from alcohol use, among certain racial groups and certain families.

But most researchers believe that cultural and family dynamics play an equally important role in developing the disease.

i just want to add my agreement to the 'hyper-religiosiy" term and description...to add myself to the hr list and to add carlos castaneda's books/ teachings to the long list of teachers/ groups who encourage hallucinations..or "lucid dreaming"...or "dreaming awake,"as it is called in the castaneda material..

i like your analogy of the stars being present during the day...

in my experience, when that surprisingly thin boundary between waking and dreaming was worn down, what began in me is what a good psychiatrist later correctly called a series of psychotic breaks. i guess, like many others here, i had a strange "hyper-religious" compulsive drive to wear those boundaries down and away in the 1st place. the terror i experienced and the years it has taken to put the mind back together, is just one more sad story to add to all the others in this forum.i like the way you write about this, brainstormer...nice name btw...

in retrospect, i am wanting to find out about the ways in which it serves destructive teachers and groups to make the line between waking and dreaming so very permeable....my hunch is that in those of us who find this stuff interesting to begin with, that link is already pretty permeable...hence the hyper-religiosity???? and what relationship does this bear to being a person who might be more ''suggestible" to hypnotic suggestion/ mind control? i certainly know that i was--or still am??? and i have to take very good care of my mind because it just picks stuff up like a sponge...

Hi Starter

I am interested in what you have to share about the dreaming stuff as related to by Carlos Castaneda.

A false guru used this on my girlfriend, and I would like to know about the psychotic breaks you talk about. How did this 'lucid dreaming' make them happen?

What were the symptoms of these psychotic breaks? How did the 'lucid dreaming' leave you feeling? What was the psychiatrist's explanation of what the 'lucid dreaming' was really doing?

I look forward to your answers.

Thanks,
Brad

dear brad,
wow.
thank you for your questions...unfortunately, to large extent, they are the same questions i have myself...i grapple with them with my good therapist and we both wonder together what the answers are...he has at least one psych degree to guide him and he sincerely seems to have nearly as many questions as i do about how this stuff goes down...he is NOT a specialist in cults...a cult specialist might be able to help you and your girlfriend find answers to these questions...
but i will try to answer just from experience. i did not have a name for what happened to me..i remember seeing sky...blue clear sky...i wasn't hallucinating, i was actually looking out a window on a sparkly clear bright day..the sky was so blue--i will never forget it--and my mind was just blank. wide wide open--like the sky..and i just knew something was terribly wrong--even though i didn't feel particularly bad or afraid or ANYTHING anymore. it was sort of like something had snapped...i didn't know what to call it...i don't think this was necessarily the 1st psychotic break but it is the most memorable...from this point on i started experiencing even more anxiety than usual...i was still sort-of functional...or appeared to be..but inside i was now convinced that the cult leader was INSIDE my mind ALL the time...i had no privacy in my mind and i could not tell what was real from what was not real...i would see a book lying on a counter and believe that "they" had placed it there--the title or synopsis to convey to me a very special, personal and usually negative or threatening message. it was very nuts and i took way too long (years) due to fear, to get to a psychiatrist who said, very simply, 'you have had psychotic breaks--you are psychotic.' funny thing is, this was great news because i was very worried by then that i was schizophrenic and would not be able to recover. the doctor told me within 20 minutes of talking and questions--(i had no previous mental illness and was well past the age for schizophrenia onset) that i was not schizophrenic or bi-polar. phew....such a relief to get medication at that point...although it made me zombie-like sleepy ALL the time...it did the trick like a good chiropractic...popped my mind back into alignment or something like it anyway. :) okay...sorry this is so long...

how i got that way...the group i was involved with, from the very beginning, "taught" by indirect means..they told 'stories' 'parables.' they were very smart and i felt i was very smart and a very good student because i could always follow them and pull out the metaphors and apply them properly..there were lots of special meanings for different words, phrases, concepts and stories (sometimes biblical etc) that had special relevance to the group and their ideals...an apparantly simple passing remark about a full cup of water about to fall off a table ledge--would clearly mean an ego-filled student about to be slammed back down to earth...etc..(note: besides the spiritual traditions these people are monkeying around with, they also have at least some knowledge of milton erickson hypnotic techniques and nlp etc..in short--brainwashing/ mind control.)i remember once my teacher telling me that although i knew that everything he said had double meanings--i STILL wasn't advanced enough to realize that everything he said had three, four or even five different layers of meaning! wow--i was so impressed! i was always digging--trying to get all those meanings!!! as time passed and the stress intensified, and baffling and terrifying events started to occur over a period of several years (and i was pretty isolated, of course) my great skill at reading correct meanings out of so many intentionally ambiguous messages--went haywire...EVERYTHING became messages from 'them' whether they were present or not--and it was all about ME....i wasn't measuring up...i was a failure. i was going to be thrown out...three crows sitting on a telephone wire--oh no, what does THAT mean??? (lol)

anyway--this is how it seems to me like dreaming...the symbolic takes over when the rational mind (i.e. the good healthy ego we need to be sane) has been broken down and is no longer around to mediate for the subconscious--the dreaming brain overfunctions during waking and the waking (literal) brain thinks its weird imaginings MUST BE real--but they're not. it is essentially 'a waking dream'--or 'psychotic' or 'delusional.' ..my eyes are open--i am walking around the world, but everything has a very heightened and metaphoric feel...i did not specifically hallucinate or 'hear' voices, but i was VERY SURE that my teacher and or others from the group were shapeshifting into different people and coming into my work many times a day just to further mess with my head....and it was very painful because no one believed me when i told them this was happening!!! :)

i don't feel like i've answered you very fully but i have already gone on way too long....will private message you more, if you like, when i have the requisite 10 posts to be able to...let me know more of your story if you feel like it...i wish you and your girlfriend all the best in the world...recovery is so hard but it is the most rewarding thing i have ever done...

practices of lucid dreaming and obe induction are probably valuable real techniques for spiritual growth within real spiritual traditions...i sadly have had no experience of such things except with charlatans...

What was the name of the group you were involved with?

It would be beneficial for others to hear your story as well as your PM's to Brad.

Good luck in your recovering.

brad private messaged me just to notify me that he had posted to this thread...i couldn't private message him back because i didn't have 10 posts yet....this is the whole thing so far...

the groups i was involved with...i trace the most traumatic parts directly back to e.j. gold, a self-proclaimed crazy-wisdom teacher (i.e. whatever loopy ends justified by whatever intentionally devious or destructive means.)

more later...