Addictions
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	I have found that as I tune in to problems in the world and wish to do something to make a difference that I keep coming back to the necessity of working on myself.  The less I have my act together the less likely it is that I can be effective.        I have also found that a functional way to think about many of these issues of getting my act together is to think in terms of addictions.  I owe a sincere debt of gratitude for the formulation of these ideas to Ken Keys, author of The Handbook to Higher Consciousness, a book I strongly recommend.  Many of the ideas in the Handbook have their origin in Tibetan Buddhism.  Key's genius has been to take these ideas and express them in everyday language without reference to religion or God.  Not that God or spirituality is excluded from these ideas, just that no particular religious dogma is required to understand and apply them.   An addiction can be defined as anything which I (or you or anyone) want and which if I don't get it I suffer.  Addictions come in a million shapes and sizes.      The idea   is to upgrade addictions to preferences.  It is perfectly all right to prefer something above something else.  The important point with a preference, however, is that if you don't get what you prefer you don't suffer.  After all, it was just a preference.               There are the obvious adictions such as drugs, alcohol and smoking.  Actually we all have many addictions.       A very practical reason to minimize addictions in your life is because people with addictions are easier to manipulate.       The Handbook contains a number of ways to upgrade addictions to preferences.       You can identify addictions by tuning in to when your emotions are triggered.  Not that emotions are bad, mind you, just that they are not reliable guides for running our lives.