This program is important because it concerns problems common to a large number of people in our culture. Not just drug addicts but most people are habituated or addicted to one or more substances. Drug detoxification involves two main processes changing our abusive habits and releasing the drugs from our lives.

Drug use is a huge problem; we are a drug culture, and literally thousands of substances are used extensively. Western medicine is likewise a drug-oriented system. We consume billions of pills yearly and spend many billions of dollars on them. These figures do not even include the everyday use of caffeine, alcohol, and nicotine.

Some preliminary concepts can help us prepare for drug detoxification. Most important is the relationship between states of being, symptoms, and our use of drugs. If we are slow or hyper, we may stimulate or sedate ourselves chemically. If we view a symptom as a problem, we may want to correct it with a drug. Although for immediate relief this may seem very practical, it is theoretically ludicrous and shows a complete misunderstanding of the design of the human body. Drug use and drug therapy rarely fix anything. Our symptoms are a warning sign of something wrong for which we must work to determine the cause. Symptoms are not the real problem, but results of deeper processes and causes. They are not an error on the part of our body; our body rarely errs. It responds to how we treat it. We must correct our internal imbalance by listening to our body and avoiding dietary and lifestyle abuses, which means limiting drug use.

It is very important not to devitalize our body if we can possibly avoid it. The first step for many people is to learn again to care for and love themselves and reinforce their desire to live. Much of drug use, at least the habitual type, is part of a syndrome of self-destruction. Pharmaceutical prescriptions and most over-the-counter (OTC) drugs are designed to help us feel better, yet often they are used for problems resulting from abusive or misguided habits.

Addiction is a tremendous personal, social, and economic problem in our culture. It both supports and drains our total economy. Our society and advertising world promote addiction. It begins with sugar, caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, and many foods, such as milk products. Our behavior regarding foods, particularly sweet ones, is conditioned very early and is very difficult to change.

Later, the coffee break becomes a reward, a refueling and rest stop in the intense workday. The caffeine and sugar stimulants are the prime mind/nerve provocateurs to continue to work more. Nervousness and hyperactivity are often associated with productivity, though they are really not comparable to steady, healthful energy; trying to perpetuate that artificially stimulated productivity eventually leads to reduced capacity, time lost from work, wasted money, and increased illness.