Another Definition of Addiction (1 Nephi 11:21-23)

Speaking of the tree in Lehi’s dream, it is described as “the love of God…most desirable above all things…yea, and the most joyous to the soul.” (1 Nephi 11:21-23)

The times when I’m happiest, when I feel the most joy in my heart and soul, are when I know God loves me, when I know I am doing what He wants me to do. That joy fills my entire being. It is something I wish I could feel all the time.

I think everyone, on some level, recognizes this feeling and wants it. But we don’t always know how to get it. Our deep desire for this feeling, combined with our ignorance of how to get and keep it, is what leads to many addictions. Actually, I think it is the basis of all addictions.

Every addiction is based on the desire to feel the love of God. In the scarcity of that feeling, we seek to re-create it, to feel something like it, or to distract ourselves from the emptiness its absence creates.

The trouble with addiction is that the feeling of ‘joy’ it produces is counterfeit and fleeting. It also prevents us from finding the very thing we desperately seek.

Here’s a thought: what if those people who are most susceptible to addiction are those who feel most keenly their separation from God? What if addicts are not so much evil, but ignorant—wanting, but not knowing how to find, the love of God?

Addicts—seekers of God’s love.

That sort of makes us all addicts, doesn’t it? Or at least potential addicts.

When I am seeking, but not finding, the love of God, I head straight for food, my ‘drug’ of choice. Set adrift, I grasp for counterfeits. What I eat and how much I eat is in direct relation to my inability to make a connection with God. When I neglect my prayers or scripture study, or when I act contrary to what I know to be true, I lose that connection. That’s when I choose to feed my body instead of my spirit. That’s when I become an addict.

But it’s not enough. Having truly felt the love of God—the genuine article—counterfeits are no longer enough, never enough. And they never will be because they don’t even come close to the real thing.