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In this meeting of the minds discussion, we’re joined by three of the world’s leading experts on addiction: Dr. Gabor Maté, Dr. Richard Schwartz, and Professor Marc Lewis.

Although their backgrounds vary widely, with Gabor initially training as a medical doctor, Richard as a family therapist, and Marc as a developmental psychologist and neuroscientist, all three of them have reached similar conclusions in their understanding of, and approach to treating addiction.

In a lively and wide-ranging discussion, we explore:

— Why do we need to approach problems with addiction not by asking: "what's wrong with it?", but instead by asking, “what's right with it?"

— Why both the ‘self-indulgent’ and ‘disease’ models of addiction are both fundamentally flawed and harmful (from a scientific point of view)

— The root causes

— How the internal family systems (IFS) model can improve our understanding of the mechanisms underlying addiction

— How Gabor Maté’s Compassionate Inquiry approach can help heal addictions by simply asking the right questions from a place of compassion and genuine curiosity

— Why IFS therapy may be one of the most effective approaches out there for working with addictions.

And more..

You can learn more about each speaker’s work via the selected links from this episode.

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Dr Gabor Maté is a retired physician and worked for over a decade in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side with patients challenged by drug addiction and mental illness after 20 years of family practice and palliative care experience. The bestselling author of four books published in over twenty-five languages, including the award-winning titled "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction". Gabor is an internationally renowned speaker highly sought after for his expertise on addiction, trauma, childhood development, and the relationship between stress and illness. For his groundbreaking medical work and writing, he has been awarded the Order of Canada, his country’s highest civilian distinction, and the Civic Merit Award from his hometown, Vancouver. To learn more, join his e-news list at www.drgabormate.com.

Dr Richard Schwartz, PhD., began his career as a systemic family therapist and an academic. Grounded in systems thinking, Dr. Schwartz developed Internal Family Systems (IFS) in response to clients’ descriptions of various parts within themselves. He focused on the relationships among these parts and noticed that there were systemic patterns to the way they were organized across clients. He also found that when the clients’ parts felt safe and were allowed to relax, the client would experience spontaneously the qualities of confidence, openness, and compassion that Dr. Schwartz came to call the Self. He found that when in that state of Self, clients would know how to heal their parts. A featured speaker for national professional organizations, Dr. Schwartz has published many books and over fifty articles about IFS. Learn more at: https://ifs-institute.com/

Dr Marc Lewis is a neuroscientist, professor, bestselling author, and one of the world’s leading experts on the neuroscience of addiction. In his academic work, he has authored or co-authored more than fifty journal articles, and for many years was a professor of developmental psychology at the University of Toronto before retiring. In recent years, he has focused on making his work more accessible to a wider audience through public talks and interviews. He is the author of two bestselling books on addiction: “Memoirs of an Addicted Brain” and “The Biology of Desire”, a book which Dr Gabor Mate argues “effectively refutes the disease model of addiction.” You can learn more about Marc’s work on his website: https://memoirsofanaddictedbrain.com.

Links:

— Marc’s website: https://memoirsofanaddictedbrain.com

— Marc’s blog post series on using IFS to treat addiction:
https://www.memoirsofanaddictedbrain....

— Memoirs of an Addicted Brain - Prof Marc Lewis: https://amzn.to/2ZGBjy5

— The Biology of Desire - Prof Marc Lewis: https://amzn.to/3aBhVsB

— Gabor’s Compassionate Inquiry Training: https://compassionateinquiry.com/onli...

— In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts - Dr. Gabor Maté: https://amzn.to/3ajx3JV

— The Wisdom of Trauma Documentary: https://wisdomoftrauma.com/

— Gabor’s website: www.drgabormate.com

— IFS Institute Website: https://ifs-institute.com/

— IFS Institute Online Circle: https://bit.ly/ifs-online-circle

— IFS Annual Conference: https://ifs-institute.com/annual-conf...

— Greater than the Sum of Our Parts - Dr. Richard Schwartz: https://amzn.to/3lnJNFJ

— The Body Keeps the Score - Bessel van der Kolk: https://amzn.to/3oGf20Z

— What Happened to You - Oprah Winfrey & Dr. Bruce Perry: https://amzn.to/2YwcNSC

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