Gambling Addiction? – How to Stop Running From Yourself and Face Your Gambling Addiction!

Gambling addiction has become an epidemic, particularly with the widespread accessibility of online gambling sites. Research reveals that 15 million adults in America are at risk of problem gambling and that there are approximately 5.5 million people who are pathological or problem gamblers.If you are one of the statistics, are you ready to do something to change your life around?Nobody can do it for you. Only YOU can decide to change your life because only YOU have chosen, consciously or by default, to take this slippery path downhill into gambling addiction. That is not to say you are to blame. You made the choice in order to comfort yourself in some way.It is human nature to seek out the quickest route to pleasure in life and try to avoid pain and that is understandable but, when pleasure comes at the expense of relinquishing family, friends, health, home and the precious things in life that are irreplaceable, then that may be a very high price to pay.You can make the choice now to take a different path.Firstly, the most important thing is to discover the underlying reasons for your gambling addiction. That is going to require willingness and courage on your part because you will need to really face yourself.You may have been avoiding this for a long time. The song “I’ve been to paradise” by Nancy Wilson, comes to mind as very relevant to many of us who run from ourselves into outer distractions and chase promises of fulfilment and short-lived pleasure, all the while missing the important things in life and especially, any deep connection with our inner being that would give our lives real meaning. We avoid ourselves at all costs, frightened that we may find emptiness inside. Why do we fear emptiness when it can be our friend? Sitting with emptiness is less painful than gambling your whole life away. I’ve been to emptiness and meaninglessness many times and have returned to tell the tale and so can you.If you feel that you do not have the courage then that is not true. If you can gamble, you have lots of courage and it just needs to be re-directed. You just need to be willing to take the first step.Secondly, you may find that you have been using your gambling addiction to cover up uncomfortable symptoms such as loneliness, boredom, anxiety or depression. Everyone goes through some of these states at some point in their lives. You are not alone here, nor are you mentally ill; you are merely human like the rest of us.Maybe you are running away from crises or difficulties that you feel you do not know how to deal with; there is no shame in that. We are not born with the skills to deal with everything in our lives; we merely learn them as we go along.Thirdly, once you are aware of the underlying need that your gambling addiction is trying to fill, then you can find a different way to meet this need.You have the power within yourself to turn your gambling addiction around if you want to. Are you ready to do so now?