The following extracts are taken from Demi Lovato’s recent public statement she gave at Instagram. The full statement is easily accessible online in many places. I have quoted specific words of hers here which I would like to comment on:
What I’ve learned is that this illness is not something that disappears or fades with time. It is something I must continue to overcome and have not done yet. … I want to thank God for keeping me alive and well. … I now need time to … focus on my sobriety … I look forward to the day where I can say I came out on the other side. … I will keep fighting.
Anybody who reads the mere titles of this artist’s songs immediately discerns that this is an incredibly emotional person. She’s obstinate, she’s guarded, she’s desperate, she’s needy, she’s battling, she’s anxious, she’s exhausted, she wants relief, she wishes she wasn’t so sensitive, she admires but lacks strength, she’s insecure, she’s an escapist, she dreams of paradise, she values but lacks self-discipline, she’s nostalgic, etc. Emotionally, she’s all over the map. Should it surprise us that such an individual would be interested in using drugs? Notice how she takes responsibility for giving up overcoming her susceptibility to drugs. She understands that she is prone to seeking methods of escape from harsh reality. She owns up to this. By implication, this also shows us she knows it takes a sober-minded decision to initially do drugs, come what may. She thanks God for sustaining her life, which is a biblical idea. I don’t know exactly which deity she is speaking of, but in the Bible God is said to be the one who provides every human being on the earth with breath, life, and all that they possess. It will certainly demand a maintained focus from Lovato if she wants to be the master of her own vessel; if she wants to be the conqueror in this war of her conflicting facets. She is hopeful, determined, and persevering.
The following excerpt is from my recent book The Responsibility of Jeffrey Dahmer. I think it is apropos here:
Dahmer claimed to have “tried to overcome the thoughts, but eventually gave in,” and this is true, but this is also where the root of his failure is located. He might’ve struggled against physical impulses, but his body wasn’t going to make any moves unless his mind authorized them; he wasn’t going to act without first deciding and planning to do so. His choice to act, and say, “Yes,” to his instincts was purely mental. A person may wake up with a spider-bite on his leg, and it might itch, but he still is presented with the mental choice to scratch it or resist. If he overcomes the very powerful itch, the strength of the itch will subside and eventually dissolve into nothing; if he chooses to scratch it, he might temporarily relieve his itch, but a few minutes later he will have to scratch again, and again, and again … Soon he’s got a little wildfire on his leg, in which he is slave to. It is not easy to conquer physical impulses, which taint our thinking, but they are most certainly worth fighting against. Dahmer began to practice, to act according to his instincts, and he got taken away by them. Like the heroin addict, he became chemically addicted at the brain to the satisfaction of his desires. He wasn’t replacing his immoral thoughts with better thoughts; he wasn’t controlling or subduing them. He would allow his mind to roam, to guide him unchecked. He was a puppet on the strings of instinct, like the animals. He fought, but he didn’t fight hard enough. Notice that he does not say he tried to overcome his thoughts but they overcame him; he says he allowed them to. Giving in is giving up. He stopped trying, and that’s when all hell broke loose. He was like someone holding a beach ball underwater, or like someone blocking a door against which men were pushing; at some point he decided to surrender. But the thing about pleasure is that it cannot fulfill. It can only satisfy in fleeting fashion. A person needs more and more of it to receive any excitement at all. They have to keep upping the level, and the type, of pleasure received. One sees, when they are considered chronologically, that the crimes of Jeffrey Dahmer grew gradually worse in their heinousness. He did not start out committing the same crimes he was performing in the end. His crimes changed in their character as time went on.
The Responsibility of Jeffrey Dahmer is now available through the Barnes & Noble website: