Risk Addiction: Part 3 of 5 from my recent FEAT speech…
With risk, comes fear, and when conquered, there is a high. Similar to addictive drugs, this risk/fear process releases a flood of dopamine into the brain. I know from experience that this temporary riding high can become very addicting. However, as the body adapts to the risk, you’ll have to take a bigger one next time to get the same dopamine and endorphin rush, etc etc.
Along with this temporary high, our conquering of risky adventure brings peer praise and attention; this validates and perpetuates the behavior on a human to human level, we begin to crave the attention.
Risk also can free us from our relentless and often cruel internal dialogues. Without conscious awareness training, this addiction will eventually lead to burnout and injury, short-changing the transformational potential of sport.
Do these types of behaviors qualify as a healthy relationship to sport? Is your engagement in these choices contributing to your ability to serve in the other facets of your life? It is often these other lifestyle patterns and challenges that contribute to the health of our connection with sport.
Next Topic: Inner Wisdom
If you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing it!
