Sugar addiction: the Stephen Fry paradox

Did you know that for most of his childhood, writer and actor Stephen Fry suffered from sugar addiction? He describes this in vivid detail in his autobiography. The Chronicles of Fry. It led to lies, robberies, and repeated expulsions from various schools.

Stephen Fry? But it is a national treasure.

And that is the point. He is more than a good example of someone who, despite having an extremely addictive personality, has managed to succeed and help others (he has used his bipolar disorder to raise a lot of awareness about mental illness). It is a role model for all who have a dependency, showing us the importance of dealing with low self-esteem and the self-destructive tendencies that accompany addiction.

Part of dismantling the control sugar has over your life involves accepting responsibility for the behavior that triggers this addictive substance. Accept responsibility for your self-loathing. Blaming the door for what are, after all, inanimate white granules prevents you from taking control.

Have you ever heard the saying that with great power comes great responsibilityand? Usually this only applies to the political arena. It is repeated so often that it has become a cliché. However, something very interesting happens when you reverse the logic of this statement:

With great responsibility comes great power

Taking responsibility for the damage you have done to yourself through the tool of your addiction is, in fact, a very difficult thing to do. The upside is that it gives you the power to transform your life, an empowered life that is liberating beyond description.

Confronting the person you have become is likely to unleash intensely uncomfortable feelings such as denial that you have been living on subsidies. You may interpret this as self-loathing, but the strange irony is that it can actually allow you to start liking yourself, just as much as Fry would like if you met him.

This is Stephen Fry’s paradox: coming out of denial can be like bathing in self-hatred, when in reality you are opening the door to accept and please yourself.

If you read The Chronicles of FryIt is initially quite shocking to hear the author talk about his self-disgust, so nice is he. After a while, we assimilate this new information to our view of him, and we admire him even more for his honesty and awareness.

The reason it is so difficult for addicts to extend the same understanding to themselves is that they have yet to come out of denial, that “I blame-my-addiction-I-can’t-help-me” attitude. same”.

Letting go of the crutch of denial is not remotely easy. Many people are aware that they live in denial, but fear that taking responsibility for their addiction is too difficult. However, a more important and useful question is this:

Has living with a sugar addiction been easy in your life?

The constant cravings. The behavior you know is below your standards. Not being able to focus on a conversation at parties, because you can’t stop thinking about the food there. The casual theft of other people’s food.

There is a way out. And it’s open to all sugar addicts, not just national treasures.

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