We like and dislike simplicity and complexity. We wish matters were more simplistic in contexts than we find them, and we are suspicious of what appears to us in complex explanations. At the same time we wonder about the explanations we receive, but feel the scholarly and thoughtful persons have the better explanations, especially in relationship to the fields of their expertise. During my adult life few persons doubted the complex explanations of Einstein. Most persons have no idea what he said or believed although they might readily recognize E=mc2. It makes some persons feel intellectual. Writers struggle with sentence structure – to use simple declarative sentences or not to use simple declarative sentences. Hemingway made a lot of money and a great career by coming down in favor of the simple statement. Some Hemingway worshippers believe anything more is affectation. You really don’t need much to be an old man on a fishing venture in a vast sea. Some writers reverse the pattern, and the evaluation of it – so to write dense prose for dense problems. The point needs to be made that the writer should use what is needed to make his or her point, sometimes simple and sometimes complex.
For years I have held that some human problems are very complex, but that we try to manage them in overly simplistic ways. The results become unattractive, extend the problems, and divide cultures and societies. If we are to understand them we need to give some time to their review, and find ways to clarify the problems and solutions. I am finding the emergence of some thoughtful approaches to serious problems – personal and social. The public will need some sophistication, self-control, open-mindedness, and understanding of reality if we are to find the truth of things and the best application to freedom in the conflict between personal and social freedom and freedoms. We see the problem in various fields as in addictions like alcoholism and drugs, in relationships like heterosexual and homosexual lifestyles, even in religious differences like Christianity and Islam. These are not easily settled issues. They challenge us.
If the issue is one relating to addiction, how do we handle it? We are not doing well with addiction in that we may make an improvement in one habit area (tobacco usage) while failing in another (various drugs). Counselors (psychiatrists and others) know they are not doing well in alleviating addicts, or helping persons caught in contexts. The success/failure rates for counselors relate closely to the severity of the addiction – the addiction itself dictates the severity for this person and the lesser force in the other person. The strength of the addiction relates to the strength of the person taken with it. Differences are explained in many ways: the health, attitude, brain waves, nurture, depravity, availability – and the list is long. Addiction is not a simple declarative sentence for the suffering individual. I was lifted with a bit of hope when I caught the article by Dan Cain: Addiction is complex; so is treatment. . . . Addiction isn’t biological, psychological, social or spiritual. It is all of the above. It may take a combination of medication, social and personal counseling, spiritual context consideration, support from friends and family, transitional living quarters, and the subdivisions of these factors – to overcome destructive addictions. The medical approach is chemistry fighting chemistry; the counseling is the appeal of truth thinking to false and emotional response; the spiritual context introduces concepts of right and wrong as relates to righteous (right/correct) belief and conduct related to values; and, the total approach is carried through in relationships, hopefully with family, but also with others who may have made the journey from addiction to freedom – and perhaps to God. Seldom will the addicted person emerge without some application of all, or nearly all the factors listed here. Humanists tend to accent the physical factors: Christians the spiritual. Troubled persons may need a team approach to gain meaning, and what may or can happen. The humanist accents the offerings of nature: the Christian the offerings of God. The humanist identifies illness; the Christian, not denying the illness, may accent the problem as sin (distortion). To give understanding, the person needs to understand that sin (addiction, or any wrong) is anything that violates God’s nature. Persons recognizing both physical and spiritual natures as related are best able to gain healthy holistic life. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020