Read

November/December 2003 Living Now
There Must Be More Than This

by Judith Wright speaks to Miriam Knight

Imagine you could craft a new life for yourself from scratch. Judith Wright says the culprit that gets between us and our dreams, goals and potential is our "soft addictions." She is the author of  There Must Be More Than This: Finding More Life, Love and Meaning by Overcoming Your Soft Addictions (Broadway, 2003).

MK: Judith, why are "soft addictions" so bad for you?

JW: They rob us of our time, sap our energy, numb our feelings, mute our consciousness and actually keep us from having lives of greater meaning, adventure and satisfaction that we really deserve and desire.

MK: But it is so difficult to know what WE really desire.

JW: I think that is the big issue and why I wrote the book. Soft addictions are this huge filter on our own experience. Our consciousness is muted, we’re out of touch with our feelings, we’re not all there. How do you in that state go inside and try to listen to your soul? You know, what is it that you really hunger for? I think there is a huge cost because it keeps you from a life of meaning..

Our whole culture is about soft addictions, but you know, there is a big difference between our wants and our hungers. We know how to go about getting our wants addressed – buy this or that - but what we don’t know how to do is to really get the longings or hungers tended to. And that’s the only way we’re going to learn to have a satisfying life.

MK: We seem to be a nation that is looking for the easy way, the quick fix. Is your book easy enough for all of us to get into it or does it require the discipline and asceticism of a monk?

JW: It doesn’t require asceticism because it is not about doing without. It is about being awake and aware of what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. I believe in abundance. I think we’re supposed to have more in life, but more of the right stuff and for the right reasons. Everybody has these universal hungers, but when you want a quick fix, that lets us know that that’s addictive. That’s not learning to live life as a beautiful unfolding journey, which is where the real satisfaction lies.

MK: You talk about learning to live consciously. So what - are most of us unconscious?

JW: Yes, I think we all are, and I think it would be good for us to admit that. In a recent Harris Poll, 91% of Americans admitted to having soft addictions - you know, these mindless repetitive routines.

MK: And the other ones were lying…

JW: (laughs)…which is a soft addiction in itself. I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t have them. I do and I know I’m working on them. But no human being is 100% conscious all the time. The more interesting game of life is to increase our percentages of being more awake and aware.

MK: In your book you suggested that it was the intent or motivation behind an action that made the difference between a conscious or unconscious one. For example, one could watch TV to zone out or to get a window on the world.

JW: That’s the key right there. It’s how you go about what you’re doing. The average American watches TV four hours a day. By the time they’re 50, they’ve spent seven years watching television.

MK: You talk about making the "One Decision." Can you explain what you mean?

JW: The One Decision is really a decision to be or not to be. That really is the question. Am I going to have a life that counts, that matters, that I can feel and experience? Or am I going to numb myself. It’s like a contextual beacon that you can use to make the smaller choices and decisions of your life. I found it for myself extremely important. It was only when I made this one decision about the quality of my life that things really changed for me. The one decision, Miriam, is really deciding what kind of life you want or what your commitment is and then living from that. And it’s very different than just doing good things. It’s why you’re doing those good things in your life.

MK: Is this really attainable for most people?

JW: Absolutely! I think it’s our birthright. We don’t have models of it, we haven’t been trained for it, but it’s within our grasp if we’re willing to do what we need to do to make it happen.

MK: People want to be happy. Why do we stray so far from the path?

JW: I think we’re very confused about what "happy" is. It’s really all addicted states for most of us; it means getting high or buzzed or distracted. We think it’s the absence of pain, or having circumstances exactly right. I think it’s more important to be satisfied or fulfilled or to experience something fully. Aristotle defined happiness as the pursuit of excellence.

MK: Most people are happy if they can just get along, let alone achieve excellence. How would you advise them to go about setting their goals?

JW: Excellence doesn’t mean that you’re the absolute best at something; it can be just giving yourself to something fully and being the most YOU that you can be. Anyone can achieve that.

MK: As I was reading the book, I was having a sense of guilt that I could really be doing more with my life .

JW: Compassion and acceptance is really an important part of this whole journey, and also a sense of humor about ourselves. It’s so easy just to feel guilty, but you should be compassionate with yourself. At the same time the hunger to do more with your life, to make a difference, is a hunger that should be heeded.
You know, we all have these same yearnings in our heart. I call them spiritual hungers. We hunger to be affirmed, to love and be loved, to connect, to belong, to matter, to be seen, to be touched, to be heard, to make a difference, to be one with a greater unity. We can all design our lives to touch those hungers. This is the universal language that we all speak. That’s what it’s all about.

Go to Judith’s website, www.theremustbemore.com for information about support groups, a chat room and lot of other tools.