Well, i'll just say it then.

If i didn't have the experiences i have had/suffered from, i'd doubt i'd want to be anything creative at all.
But then again, if William S. Boroughs never got on the smack, he wouldn't be so famous. Same for De Quincy, same for fitzgerald in a way.(fitzgerald in reference to alcohol.) I just think, from looking at the majority of published poets and writers, they all appear to be addicted to something, in some way,

Whether that be love, crack, money, smack, drink, whatever have you. Just seems to be the general observation made. :)

Indie said:One of my best friends sometimes wonders why I'd want to be friends with her because she's not intelligent. That doesn't make her stupid, she's just not academic. In the time I've known her she's been a speed junkie and a stoner. I've also dated plenty of addicts in my time, being one myself, I think I'm unconsciously attracted to them. Sadly, the majority weren't what anyone would consider intelligent. Addicts tend to go to extremes in things, they're either all in or they're all out. I'm either completely obsessed with something or completely uninterested. I've had some people say all I've done is squander my life in ambitionless-ness, because I'm so flightly and can rarely stick at anything for long, because I get bored. I know plenty of driven people that aren't addicts at all, they can keep that pace and go after what they want without the rollercoaster road of being addicted to something, they just do what needs to be done without all the mental angst and emotional unstableness. Addiction is a way of not dealing with the world. It makes for an experience in suffering. To be a good artist you don't need to understand the deep suffering of addiction. Would I still be a writer if I wasn't an addict? Yes. Absolutely. I was a writer before I ever had the chance to become addicted to anything.

Well spoken, Indie...!
Especially the last phrases!!!

Mitochondrial said:Well, i'll just say it then.

If i didn't have the experiences i have had/suffered from, i'd doubt i'd want to be anything creative at all.
But then again, if William S. Boroughs never got on the smack, he wouldn't be so famous. Same for De Quincy, same for fitzgerald in a way.(fitzgerald in reference to alcohol.) I just think, from looking at the majority of published poets and writers, they all appear to be addicted to something, in some way,

Whether that be love, crack, money, smack, drink, whatever have you. Just seems to be the general observation made. :)

I think you might be misinterpreting causation. Yes... Burroughs could have lived his whole life, not famous, which is not intelligence btw. ( Although I doubt that assumption actually. The man was a Harvard graduate. ) but the dope didn't make him intelligent. He himself said on more than one occasion it diminished his intelligence.

Just wanna say, intelligence and creativity aren't the same thing either, in case people are misinterpreting it. You don't need to be intelligent to be creative, and you don't need to be creative to be intelligent. The two aren't mutually exclusive, they just sometimes happen to reside together.

Mitochondrial said:Well, i'll just say it then.

If i didn't have the experiences i have had/suffered from, i'd doubt i'd want to be anything creative at all.
But then again, if William S. Boroughs never got on the smack, he wouldn't be so famous. Same for De Quincy, same for fitzgerald in a way.(fitzgerald in reference to alcohol.) I just think, from looking at the majority of published poets and writers, they all appear to be addicted to something, in some way,

Whether that be love, crack, money, smack, drink, whatever have you. Just seems to be the general observation made. :)

The people you refer to arent remembered for their adictions but for their words

“The question is frequently asked: Why does a man become a drug addict?
The answer is that he usually does not intend to become an addict. You don’t wake up one morning and decide to be a drug addict. It takes at least three months’ shooting twice a day to get any habit at all. And you don’t really know what junk sickness is until you have had several habits. It took me almost six months to get my first habit, and then the withdrawal symptoms were mild. I think it no exaggeration to say it takes about a year and several hundred injections to make an addict.
The questions, of course, could be asked: Why did you ever try narcotics? Why did you continue using it long enough to become an addict? You become a narcotics addict because you do not have strong motivations in the other direction. Junk wins by default. I tried it as a matter of curiosity. I drifted along taking shots when I could score. I ended up hooked. Most addicts I have talked to report a similar experience. They did not start using drugs for any reason they can remember. They just drifted along until they got hooked. If you have never been addicted, you can have no clear idea what it means to need junk with the addict’s special need. You don’t decide to be an addict. One morning you wake up sick and you’re an addict. (Junky, Prologue, p. xxxviii)”
― William S. Burroughs, Junky


“The junk merchant doesn't sell his product to the consumer, he sells the consumer to his product. He does not improve and simplify his merchandise. He degrades and simplifies the client.”
― William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch

“Junk turns the user into a plant. Plants do not feel pain since pain has no function in a stationary organism. Junk is a pain killer. A plant has no libido in the human or animal sense. Junk replaces the sex drive. Seeding is the sex of the plant and the function of opium is to delay seeding.
Perhaps the intense discomfort of withdrawal is the transition from plant back to animal, from a painless, sexless, timeless state back to sex and pain and time, from death back to life.”
― William S. Burroughs, Junky

and that is just some of what he had to say about being a Junky

Yes.

Not to mention there are many different kinds of intelligence.
I think everything going on in your mind influences how you act.

I left Las Vegas last year to quit heroin at a Buddhist monastery in Thailand and ended up staying here as a Buddhist monk.

I needed to learn about me to actually treat my addiction. Everyone is different - but I think addiction stems from a lack of self-awareness and mindfulness, which messes with your reasoning, eventually leading to addiction.

I used to think addiction was more of a medical issue.
It turns out, I never had a clue what i didn't know about.

Addiction has nothing to do with self awareness or lack of it. There are plenty of addicts that are well aware of their addictions and the consequences of it. They continue to use for many reasons... escape from pain, escape from reality, fear of reality, fear of themselves, lack of self esteem, etc etc. It's true some addicts have no self awareness, but you don't need to be an addict to not have a clue. Plenty of clueless, unaware people aren't addicts. Like everything else, addiction doesn't discriminate. Getting well has more to do with caring about yourself more than you do about your particular addiction.

of course Not

~ couldn't figger how to delete my 'opinion', so i 'modified it by erasing it, & was 'told' that was an error, & i needed to 'go back'
& write something.

hmmm, i'magine that

dkzksaxxas_DanielX said:i worked 10yrs in 'recovery' cousenling...am myself 25yrs clean/sober...former sig-other of 5yrs was an addiction physician....

i'll guarantee that addiction/alcoholic selfDestruction pretty evenly covers the entire span human 'measurable', so'called 'intelligence' -

AND i bet that all ponderings, & ever knowledgeable 'research' only leads to more wasted time & erroneous 'conclusions'.....

let's perhaps practice staying 'in the moment' & cultivate an unconditional compassion for each other, rather than look for more reasons & methods 'sizing' each other up.
well said.

whoops....to late to dis'opine!

thank ye, dear

Completely off topic...

ne·cro·sis

noun
death of a circumscribed portion of animal or plant tissue.
Origin:
1655–65;  < Neo-Latin  < Greek nékrōsis  mortification, state of death.

Related forms
ne·crot·ic, adjective.
post·ne·crot·ic, adjective.

I'm going to refrain from making a joke...

& b-sides,

If you are REALLY a real POET, y'll shut yr mouth of all opinion on anything & let your
Pootery
do All yr talking---

confuse th'shits out of anyone who Dares to read:

"Creating mental confusion is the poets primary porpoise in life & is poetry's saving grace for all mankind....Our only plausible 'salvation' so speak....drunk,sober,junkie matters not"
----Elwin Mubassa Shistinsky, 1939

dkzksaxxas_DanielX said:& b-sides,

If you are REALLY a real POET, y'll shut yr mouth of all opinion on anything & let your
Pootery
do All yr talking---

confuse th'shits out of anyone who Dares to read:

"Creating mental confusion is the poets primary porpoise in life & is poetry's saving grace for all mankind....Our only plausible 'salvation' so speak....drunk,sober,junkie matters not"
----Elwin Mubassa Shistinsky, 1939

interesting opinion

Indie said:Completely off topic...

ne·cro·sis

noun
death of a circumscribed portion of animal or plant tissue.
Origin:
1655–65;  < Neo-Latin  < Greek nékrōsis  mortification, state of death.


isn't there a 'Necrophiliac Vegan' out there in our DUP land? should his/her opinion be solicited?