Legal Pot: Celebration & Concern

      I love marijuana. And I’m very glad that now, finally, I live in a country where using it is legal, where I’ll never again have to sneak, hide, or deal with people I don’t really want to deal with in order to get it.

     But I’m also a marijuana addict, and I know how much it can fuck up a life. So while I applaud legalization, I’m also concerned. I know that, just as some people insist that marijuana has no positive qualities, there are others who mistakenly imagine that no harm can come of it. And I know better.

     I started using marijuana occasionally when I entered university. The summer after my freshman year, I began to use it regularly. And within another couple of years, I began to realize that I had a bit of a problem.

     My roommate and I began our use of marijuana at about the same time, and we enjoyed it together. I’ll still argue with anyone that marijuana enhances creativity, the perception of beauty, can promote a mental agility and flexibility. And, perhaps best of all, it can substantially enhance the ability to synthesize information, to view things from novel perspectives and to transcend an habitual attitude or viewpoint. Being progressive rather than conservative in outlook, I see these as very good things.

     Marijuana was also very helpful to me in that it helped me to overcome a shyness, a reticence, a limiting self-consciousness in social or intimate situations. It helped me to open up, to express myself, and to connect with others. It empowered me to take reasonable risks and to make bolder explorations. I consider it an amazingly useful and transformational substance.

But I became dependent. I began to turn to marijuana for an everyday boost, as a kind of ‘cure’ for what I perceived as my shortcomings. So my addiction was underway.

     I didn’t see, at the time, that I was using herb as…medicine, shall I say? And by over-using it, I was cancelling out its most beneficial traits. Every high has its low, and daily use of herb had the side effect of reducing my 'sober' hours to a duller, foggier and more lethargic state. Getting high was then necessary to gain back a spark that felt more life-like. I knew that 'Yo Highness',  kept me from being bored, not realizing then that boredom, like every kind of natural pain, was a powerful and useful signal about my situation, circumstances or state of being. And in this case, the boredom was substantially a sign of withdrawal, a direct by-product of the, by now, faint and foggy highs that were the most that my abuse permitted. But that’s getting ahead of myself.

     The way I learned that I had an issue was through the mirror of my roommate, and others. We’d go in on an ounce together and a week later I’d be all out, and his lid would seem almost intact. I began to see that while lots of friends got high on the weekend, I was continuing to indulge all through the week. Despite the rhetoric that weed was not addictive, it became very clear to me that it was very addictive to me.

     The fact that I’m an addict in no way changes my notion about the supremely positive characteristics of marijuana. Most users I’ve known over the years use it, enjoy it, put it aside and show no ill effects that I’m aware of. But there’s that small minority that I’ve seen use it to the point of disabling themselves, and most of them don’t recognize or acknowledge it.

     Yes, the pothead who loses all motivation or ambition exists. And the one who becomes so muddle-headed as to be unable to tackle any complexity. And the one who loses all sense of responsibility, or of accountability, or punctuality, or even of reality. Then, there are those whose disability never becomes quite so apparent. They still go to work, have relationships, manage their households. But some of them have reduced their … what shall I call it … their Life Force, their Vitality, their Clarity to the point where they are substantially dimmed, diminished, lessened – dialed down to 75 or 50 percent – and they may not even know it.

     I was one of these. After years and years of almost daily pot smoking, I was a dull knife indeed. And it was very clear to me that if I continued on my course, I was committing a kind of suicide. I literally felt that I had to give it up in order to save my life. And I finally did. With the help of a 12 step program, I gave it up and didn’t use for many years. Fourteen, in fact. And there’s no question that giving it up grounded me, brought a kind of clarity and solidity to my life that I hadn’t known was missing.

     At some point – because I still remembered the glories of weed – I told myself that if I made it to 10 years of sobriety, I’d allow myself to try it again if the opportunity arose, and if I felt inclined. And when I did smoke again, I knew instantly that I was still an addict. Because immediately, I wanted to smoke more, I wanted to smoke it every day.

     Long story short, I ultimately found a good balance. Once a month works for me. I allow myself to indulge once every few weeks, for a day or two. Because I’m coming to it from sobriety, the quantity I consume is very little. A single joint will often suffice. It’s amazing to me how much I can get from that periodic indulgence. It’s so wrong, this notion that the brilliant ideas one gets while high evaporate into nothingness when the high is gone.  The insights that come have helped me powerfully in my writing, in my people work, in my personal life. They have often helped me to see things in a holistic way that previously eluded me, bringing together and making sense of experiences and challenges I hadn’t even seen as related.

     But I remain an addict. Sometimes, the indulgence is so good, I want to continue it. So it stretches to three days, four days. By which time, a bit of fog has descended, the world has become a bit less solid, and it becomes harder to put my mother drug away. I have occasionally gotten caught up in that haze again for two or three weeks. It can remain a very sweet trap for that long and longer. So, I’ve learned how important it is – if you’re an addict like me – not to let the indulgence stretch out.

     One of the things I think most pot heads don’t even realize is that, when they use all the time, they rarely if ever experience the glorious high that first committed them to weed. Instead, they may experience a soft, tingly and insulated stasis, like I did. It's often a numb but safe space, full of trivial but reliable comforts, and so easy to get to. A grander, deeper and richer high, in my own experience, demands at least occassional society. Sobriety of the intentional sort, which is not the same as what one experiences when unable to connect with their dealer for a couple of days.

     On top of that, overuse denies us potheads the opportunity to experience the wonderful solidity and clarity of total sobriety. I know, I know…this sobriety can feel extremely oppressive, boring and empty when one is in the grip of the herb addiction. But that emptiness is a symptom of the addiction, not of sobriety. And besides, it doesn’t last.

     So, my worry about legalization is simply that, with the persistence of the myths, that marijuana cannot be addictive, and that there’s nothing to lose, there will be more people falling into the pot haze trap. This is not a call for prohibition or restriction. I think herb is a wonderful gift, and that anyone ought to be able to use it as they see fit , except that I believe it’s a bad idea for kids. And while it will only ever be addictive to a minority, it can be devastating to we few.

     I try to see marijuana as a kind of sacrament, as a precious substance to be used sparingly and with great respect. I try to use it purposefully, and when I'm in a positive frame of mind, never to boost myself out of a bad mood. It is amazing when doing things creative or enjoying art. But I no longer toke up just so the explosions will be cooler when I'm zoning out watching Netflix. If I'm going to experience a temporary, rhapsodic shift in consciousness, I want it to be meaningful. A sacrament is not to be wasted or taken for granted. 

     I hope this legalization goes well, that it brings to any who use it the positive blessings it had brought me. And I hope those, like me, who are prone to addiction, will realize this and never let it take over or reduce their lives, as it did mine for too many years.