Yogananda's Crazy-Low Addiction Threshold

Back in the day, everyone interested in spiritual seeking would read Paramahansa Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi, the story of his experiences with self- and God-realization. I'm sure I internalized a lot of it, but only one thing really stuck with me, a story I keep returning to in my mind as I consider my attempts at living life well.

It seems that when Yogananda was out on one of his speaking tours, each night when he returned to his room, he would have a ginger ale. One night, when it wasn't there, he thought to himself, "Where is my ginger ale?" And in this moment he realized he had lapsed into an unenlightened state of attachment and, yes, addiction. Dang! Okay, the logic is unassailable. If you live in need and expectation you limit the range of possible experience and exempt yourself from the beauty of the here and now. I get that.

But the way this all works for a lot of us non-yogi types is that when we develop some kind of non-sustainable addiction we nudge ourselves back into a reasonably healthy way of life by substituting a bunch of more workable addictions. You know: meetings, the gym, God, sex, sweets, Netflix, work, golf, playing the market, traveling, and so on. Oh, yeah, and drinking way too much ginger ale. Yep, when all I'm pining for is that evening soda pop, or, as is more frequently the case, some cookies, I know I'm on some sort of righteous path.