Dr. Don WoodResolving Your Trauma-Based Challenges So You Can Unlock Peak Performance

The Truth About Addiction: Breaking Common Misconceptions

21 Feb 2025 · 1 min

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Dr. Don Wood challenges common misconceptions about addiction, arguing that people often use substances to relieve pain or distress rather than to pursue pleasure. He illustrates this with a vivid handshake-and-alcohol analogy showing that the immediate dopamine reward is a byproduct, not the primary motive for use.

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Addiction is really misunderstood. A lot of times people say, well, they're just going out to get high. They want a dopamine hit. So the way I explain it is, if I was standing in front of you right now, and I started to shake your hand, and I started squeezing harder and harder and harder, the pain was getting so great that you're actually down on one knee, it's hurting so bad. And then I just said to you, take a drink of this alcohol for me, and as soon as you do, I'm going to let go. What are you going to do? You're going to take a drink of the alcohol? What's going to happen when you take the drink of the alcohol and I release the pressure? You're going to get a dopamine hit. You're going to feel good. Right, because I let go. But is that why you took the drink? You didn't take the drink to get the dopamine hit. You took the drink to stop the pain. The dopamine hit was just a byproduct of what happened after I released. But the real reason you wanted to stop the pain was because you didn't want to be in pain, not because you wanted to get high.