Goodreads Doesn't Have It, Data Migration: The Turning Point
Apparently the entire book was written by dictaphone and typed up by his wife, and it sort of gives you a sense that it was spoken without being reread in a way you don't get the impression about from a directly written book.
This is a book about someone with drug use that wasn't making decisions in their interest getting out of drug use by giving up the sense of control using the support of Christianity.
He uses "addict" a lot, and there's a lot of covert Christian hatred where they call him in just to "hear from a previous addict" about his addiction, and he's nothing more than that which is just soulsucking to hear about. He also isn't very committal with his first ministry job in a way that just makes him seem kind of floozy. Same thing with finally marrying his wife after engagement. I don't think that's his addiction. My ex husband was about as addicted and it was a relatively straight shot. But when they don't give up control and accept the addiction is bigger than them, where Christianity, Christ and God really helped Vincent Guerra to do that, there's really no hope for them. You'll be argued with all day; while they can't accept it's completely bested them, you are wasting your time and need to get out until they can accept it's way bigger than them and they need the help of God, of something way bigger than them like the addiction is right back. You can't be a huge narcissist and beat addiction. You have to accept the addiction is bigger than you. But it shows you how it affects every sector of your life how he constantly struggled with several different key parts of his life, even after he recovered. It really changed his wiring for a long time.
It backs up the science on impulse control when he talks about how it's the same circuit that caused him to do shoplifting, both for the high and to make money for drugs. It was interesting to hear how there was a ton of money in gay clubs back in the day, and they had assigned "straight" partners when the cops came, but then switched off to their gay couples and that he didn't like it but there was lots of money in it. I thought that part was interesting.
But otherwise he is really upfront about what he got out of drug use, how he got into it, and how constant heartbreak in the scene drove him out of it. Ex partner was constantly saying he hated being referred to as an "addict" as opposed to someone with a SUD, but he was pretty fragile more so than I could stomach, so I doubt it wouldn't be triggering but it seems like somewhere to start.
Honestly he doesn't seem too inspired at the end, but he does talk about how he really changed some people's lives. I think the critical part is he shows how you can't get out of this without accepting your brain doesn't work really anymore and you need a crutch to lean on and to give your control away to really get out of it. Christianity was his crutch during recovery, but everyone needs one to recover, Christian or not. I think that was the critical point. I also think believing in God can really help with giving up control when it is absolutely, 100% bigger than you like addiction is. There's no getting out of that while retaining narcissistic ego. There's just not. It's like accepting disability. You will continue to do damage until you full accept your scope of limitations with a disability. A SUD is considered on the range of disability.
I also think his stories about people coming off and him coming off were really interesting and helpful, the differences between successful coming off stories and ones that weren't successful in the long run, like ones that didn't have a core, foundational motive and construct change that still enabled irresponsibility, vanity and narcissism from the drug use and the narcissistic Christmas tree of the dopamine system in the user didn't last but those that had a foundational construct change that uprooted core narcissism that the addiction was incentivizing did last.
Drug use seems like living outside in the winter. You do it because you're living day to day in some way. Seems socioeconomic fundamentally, and sometimes relational patterns are so broken down it's like you're living in the winter. It's really funny because this book from the Canadian border says all the Russians in the area say one thing and it's "you can't survive without vodka in the Russian cold. It warms you up. It's medicine." It serves a purpose. From the book, oftentimes that purpose is to distract from what feels a meaningless life socioeconomically. These things are not all on the user, they're not in a vacuum. I appreciate that it takes a social determinants of health perspective.
However, they really put forward how he bullies teachers in a really nasty way and he says that was on his irresponsibility and that the irresponsibility was before and also informed why it was so hard to kick the addiction. I think that's true. The people that quit have a "can do", "it's my fault that I'm addicted", "it's easy to quit if I take responsibility" attitude. The people that don't still are being bested by their narcissism and irresponsibility. At a certain point, there's endless cannon fodder for being responsible and irresponsible for this kind of thing, there starts to be endless evidence in either direction. At a certain point you just have to absurdly decide to take responsibility for it, and that's like 90% of successful recovery from the science it looks like. The rest is accepting it's bigger than you and you need something way bigger than you to fight it back, like a church community.
It's like the person who knows chocolate makes them fat and says "get this away from me" when their coworker brings in the chocolate cake. They know the chocolate cake addiction is bigger than them, so even though they don't really have control--they know they will lose control around the chocolate cake--they still have control by having control over where they are around and in terms of it.
He makes that point saying even though he wanted to, he knew he couldn't be a good minister to all current users. He knew he was super vulnerable to their thinking and lifestyle so he turned down that ministry repeatedly. That is a HUGE part of why he successfully recovered. He knew his limits and he knew when and where he would lose control, he didn't say, "Oh, I'll be able to control it". He knew when and where he would lose control and staid away from it.
There's no better cure for narcissism than actually find a meaning for God you truly believe in and can get behind. Same with believing in Christ. It's not a half bad solution. I'm being tongue in cheek, tThere's no "pragmatic true belief". There's just not.