Amber Hollingsworth (Put the Shovel Down channel) explains that "addictive personality" is not a formal psychiatric diagnosis but is a popularly used label for people who pursue things excessively. She links many such traits to attention/ADHD-like patterns, describes these tendencies as a potential "gift" or "superpower" when harnessed, and offers practical advice: manage environmental influences and intentionally redirect intense focus toward productive goals.
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In this video, we're going to cover the topic of the addictive personality. We're going to talk about what it is, what it means, how to overcome it, what the heck to do if you have it. And best of all, I think you're going to be pleasantly surprised by some of the information I give you about addictive personality. For those of you who are new here, welcome to Put the Shovel Down. I'm Amber Hollingsworth, and this is YouTube channel is designed to help you understand the science and psychology of addiction so that you're always five steps ahead of addiction and you can get your life and your family back on track. Get back to living the life that you want to live. Okay, back to our topic of addictive personality. The first thing I want to tell you about that is that's not a real, like, psychiatric diagnosis. There's no such thing as addictive personality disorder, but we've all heard that term, so there must be a little something to it right now. In doing research for this video, I watched a couple of the other videos about addictive personality, and people were talking about the personality traits involved with someone who's more likely to be addicted. And a lot of them said things like, you know, decreased impulse control, more anxiety, more depression. And I thought, well, I guess I could see that if you had those things, it would make you more likely to develop an addiction. But to be honest, I wasn't really connecting to that because what I'm usually thinking of is the type of person who usually does everything, like, excessively. And I guess that's the thing about using a term that's not a real term. We all have these different ideas about what that means. And so when we say it, we're thinking different things or we're trying to convey a different thing. For me, when I've heard the term and used the term, I've typically used it around dealing, trying to describe a situation where someone's just always excessive about everything they take on. Sometimes I'll be listening to clients and. Or their families especially, and they'll say, oh, my gosh, since they were three, they have this addictive personality. Like, they did everything excessively. If they ate McDonald's, they had to eat a McDonald's cheeseburger every single day. And if they didn't, they lost it. You know, things like that, where it's just this obsessive or compulsive trait about someone. Now, like I said, because it's not a real term, I can't give you any real data on It. But my guess is, is if you are the type of person or your loved one is the type of person who has adhd, you might have a lot of these characteristics that we call addictive personality. Because I like to say adhd. I really wish they wouldn't call it Attention Deficit disorder or Attention Hyperactivity deficit Disorder. I wish they'd call it attention. Attention Inconsistency Disorder. It should be like AID instead of add. Because when you have this, it's not so much that you can't focus on anything, it's just that your focus is inconsistent. And I find that people that have ADHD focus on some things to a degree that no one else could possibly keep up with, and then other things, they can't focus on them at all. And I can speak a little bit to this because I'm one of those people, and I would definitely consider myself a kind of person that has this addictive personality trait. I can definitely get excessive with pretty much almost anything. So if this is you, if you're relating to this, or this is your loved one, and you're relating to this because of your loved one, I want you to maybe think about this a little bit different. Instead of thinking about this trait, this quality, this part of your personality as being a defect or a bad part, I personally think of it as a gift. It is in some ways a biological advantage. Your brain is wired up to cause you to think obsessively about certain things. And a lot of times when people have this, they can become workaholics, they can become drug addicts or alcoholics, but it's. It's. In some ways, it's a superpower. And the way I like to talk to my clients about it is I say, listen, it's a superpower. We just need to help you learn how to use your superpowers. Reign them in, harness them and use them for the good, and maybe stop using them for the bad. Because think about it. If you have a superpower, you're probably either a villain or a hero, right? And so maybe your superpowers have been going over here in this not so great direction. But if you've got that quality about you, you can learn to steer that and harness that into a good direction. Because you have something that other people don't have. You have the ability to think about something and focus and keep trying something over and over again until you figure it out and until you harness it. The most successful people on the planet have this quality. These are these people that just won't Give up on something that just won't quit studying something that just won't quit scientifically trying something until they absolutely figure it out. And if you're one of these people who have this addictive personality, you probably have this very same quality. The key if you have this is to be really, really intentional about the influence that you put into your life. So it's about managing the people you surround yourself with, the music that you listen to, the books that you put in your life, the TV shows that you watch. Because all of these things can easily spark thought processes that you can grab a hold of and, you know, take to an extreme. I know you know what I'm talking about. But if you'll manage the influence that you're putting in your brain all the time, and you'll control these things that are sort of sparking that process in you, that is the way that you can harness these powers for the good. Now, the bad news is you're probably not going to be a very balanced individual. But I personally think balance can be a little overrated. I know that's a little different and weird, especially to hear a counselor type person say, but you know what? No one ever did anything great while being balanced. Now, I do think it's somewhat important to, you know, like, control your superpower. You got to harness it in. Think about all the Spider man movies. When Spider man first gets his powers and they're sort of out of control and doesn't know how to use them well, and it's a big mess. You don't want to be like that. You want to learn how to manage it and harness it so that you can sort of turn it on and turn it off when you need to. But if you can start to accept this thing about yourself and even understand that it may be a gift or an advantage, then you can do some very, very meaningful work in your life. If you can put all that energy into doing something that you feel is productive that helps you, that helps other people, you're going to walk away from that liking who you are as a person. You're going to be proud of yourself. The people around you are going to be proud of you. And yeah, okay, I know you might not be the most balanced person, but at least you're doing something that makes you feel good about where you're putting your time, energy and efforts, and not somewhere that you feel bad, shameful, and regretful about where you're putting your time, energy and efforts. So if you're one of those people that has addictive personality. Please realize that you have a gift, and you can choose exactly how you want to use that. But of course, the first step is to not be wasting your gift on these counterproductive addictions. So, up next, here's another video on exactly how to beat those addictions so you can get back to using your superpowers for the good.
