- I've shown thousands and thousands of addicts
how to beat addiction in a very, very unconventional,
but incredibly effective way.
My name's Marisa Peer, and I would love to show you
that you can beat any addiction right now
in the comfort of your own home.
(inspiring music)
I've worked with thousands and thousands of addicts
with every kind of addiction,
from the ones you'd expect like drinking and drugs
and smoking and gambling,
to people who are addicted to shopping and sex,
people who are addicted to screen time.
We have so many new addictions now.
And addiction is classified as something
that takes you away from a bad feeling
and towards a good feeling.
So any addiction you can think of,
I've worked with people who are addicted to that.
And I found something very interesting
in every addict I worked with, bar none, and here it is.
Every addict I worked with had a belief, I'm not enough.
I'm not good enough.
I'm not interesting enough.
I'm not smart enough.
I'm not worthy enough.
I'm just not enough.
And guess what?
If you think you're not enough, guess what you need more?
If I'm not enough, I need more stuff.
I hoard 'cause I'm not enough.
I binge eat because I'm not enough.
I'm addicted to sugar or alcohol or drugs
or gambling or screen time.
I'm addicted to something that takes me away
from the emptiness I have here
because I think I'm not enough.
And when I treat addicts,
I treat the not enoughness before I treat the addiction.
And my programme is now going into many, many rehabs
who say, "You know, when we take people
"through the not enoughness,
"it has a powerful effect on our relapse rates."
If you're addicted to anything at all,
doesn't matter what it is,
I want you to take a minute now and think about that.
I worked with someone who's addicted
to the adrenaline high of extreme sports,
but he actually nearly died wakeboarding,
and his wife, "This has got to stop now.
"You have two children."
He said, "I can't stop.
"I'm addicted to adrenaline."
But he too had this feeling that he just wasn't enough.
So take a minute now.
Maybe even go into the comments
and share what your addiction is.
Of course you can do it anonymously.
What is your addiction?
And how would that link back
to you believing you are not enough?
And then to overcome addiction,
I want you to start by putting enoughness into your life.
Let's imagine you're addicted to food.
You're a binger.
And here's your reasoning.
I need more.
I've had one cake, but I need another one.
If a cake could make you better, why would you need more?
If one candy bar can't make you feel good, how could 10?
But here's your belief: I'm empty.
I need more food.
Maybe you're a shopaholic.
I work with many of these.
I buy stuff,
so much stuff to fill the emptiness inside.
Or I hoard.
I hoard so much stuff because I'm not enough.
But when I come home with armfuls, carrier bags of stuff,
when I have all this stuff in my house,
I convince myself for a moment if I've got all this stuff,
I must be enough.
So alcoholics I find who believe that they're alone
and their marriage hasn't worked
or their career has failed because they drink,
I find it's actually entirely the opposite.
Drinking allows them to fail.
I coulda, woulda, shoulda had a great wife, a great husband,
a great career, but, you know, the drinking got in the way,
and actually it's very often the opposite.
I feel like a failure.
I'm scared I'm not enough to have a great wife or husband.
I'm scared I'm not enough to have a career.
But as long as I drink, blame everything on that.
I could've done that, but I was an alcoholic.
I could've done that, but I was addicted to drugs.
So I want you to take a minute
and decide to say every day, "I am enough."
It may sound silly.
It may sound Pollyanna.
I promise you,
it is the common denominator behind addiction.
And just accept that if you think it's stupid,
silly, and bogus, just play with it.
Just say, "Okay, I don't believe this line.
"Okay, what have I got to lose?"
An addiction.
"Okay, so I'll have a go."
I want you to make all your passwords
on your computer say, "I'm enough."
Obviously some squiggles and dots and asterisks
'cause we don't wanna make a hacker's life easy.
I want you to write it on your mirror in eyeliner,
in lipstick, in marker pen.
I want you to set your phone alert
so twice a day they say, "I'm enough."
I want you to make it your screensaver.
I want you to write it, read it, speak it, say it every day.
When you say it,
it's rather like putting lotion on dry skin.
If you put lotion on dry skin,
it sinks in and it nourishes you.
When an addict begins to say, "I'm enough,"
it also sinks in and it nourishes you.
And when you begin to know you're enough,
to believe you're enough, to accept that you're enough,
the need for a filler for that emptiness,
whatever the filler is, drink, drugs, gambling, shopping,
will minimise, subside, and then it will go away.
So I invite you to go into the comment section right now
and name your addiction.
And then talk about how that maybe,
just maybe could link back
to you not believing you're enough.
Where did that come from?
Probably in your very early childhood.
That's where it normally comes from.
And then you can start to change.
I want you to wake up every day
and to repeat these statements.
I am enough.
I matter.
I'm significant.
I'm here for a reason.
I have something to contribute.
I have something to offer the world.
You probably think right now that isn't true,
but it is true.
So, yes, there are rehabs and clinics
and meetings you can go to.
And one of the reasons that meetings like AA
and NA and CA work is that you go to a meeting
and someone puts their hand up and says,
"You know, I sold my children's toys to buy drink or drugs."
They go, "So did I. "I thought I was the only one.
"I feel a bit better now,
"and so I don't have to judge myself."
So it may sound too simple, too unrealistic
to believe that you can overcome
and beat addictions by investing in,
telling yourself every day that you're enough,
but it absolutely works.
For addictions that have less of a side effect,
like an addiction to sugar,
an addiction to extreme sport,
an addiction to buying things and hoarding things,
an addiction to screen time,
these will be cured very easily by I'm enough.
Of course, if your addiction is to hard drugs and alcohol,
you may need the support of a programme.
You're going to have to face up to some side effects.
I've worked with many, many alcoholics
and serious drug addicts who changed like that
and hardcore alcoholics.
I worked with somebody not long ago,
a man who just could not stop drinking.
And when I talked to him,
he told me that he never saw his father.
His father left when he was a baby.
And when he was 17, the father told him,
he said, "You're a man now.
"I'm gonna take you to the pub."
And he took him to the pub with all of his friends
and got him drunk.
And he formed an interesting belief at just 17.
Oh, alcohol connects you.
If you drink, you get connection.
My dad is now connected to me through alcohol.
I worked with someone else who told me
that her father frequently hit her mother.
She was just a little girl,
and the mother would say to her, she'd lay on the floor,
"Get me my cigarettes."
Her mother would smoke, get herself together, and get up.
One day she said, "Have a cigarette with me.
"By then I was 15, and I smoked with my mum.
"My mum is now dead, and I realised I smoke
"to keep that memory of her alive.
"We connected through me getting the cigarettes.
"That was a time we bonded.
"That was a time that she needed me."
Some people are addicted to drama.
Some people are addicted to crisis
'cause it makes them feel useful.
So please don't believe
that just because your addiction is something serious
and something chemical that you can't beat it,
change it, fix it by investing in I am enoughness.
And let me end by telling you this.
When you think you're not enough,
you will always need more, more of something.
And when you know you are enough, you don't need more.
You can go, "Well, all that stuff's great,
"but I don't need it."
After all, look around your home if you're a hoarder.
Look at all the stuff you have.
If that made you feel enough, why do you need more?
If you're a drinker, look at the fact that
if alcohol could make you feel better,
why do you need more?
If drugs can make you feel better, why do you need more?
When you know you're enough,
you don't need more of anything.
You're not needy.
You're not addicted to praise because you're enough.
And when you're not enough,
there isn't enough food, alcohol, cookies, sugar,
or stuff you could but in the world
that's gonna fill that emptiness.
You can fill it right now today and every day
by telling yourself you're enough.
So, again, go into the comments
and just write, "I am enough."
A schoolteacher just wrote to me and said,
"I made all the children in my class
"who are bullies say that, and they started to cry.
"I don't even know why I'm crying.
"Why am I crying?"
'Cause it did something to move them.
It changed them.
It touched them.
And it will move and change and touch you
and the tribe that are in the comment section.
So go in there now and just write, "I'm enough."
There are so many ways
you can put "I'm enough" into your life.
You can ice cookies with it.
You can print it on your toast.
You can write it in sand.
You can plant seeds in your garden.
You can do anything.
You can stamp it onto a T-shirt.
You can tattoo it onto your arm.
You can write it onto yourself.
You can write it on cushions.
You can write it on a chalkboard.
I have it all over my house.
It's on my fridge in fridge magnets.
It's on my mirrors.
It's on this bracelet and this bracelet and this bracelet.
One of my clients said,
"I had that stamped on my kids' pillows
"so the first and last thing they see is I'm enough,
"and then I thought, well,
"I might as well stamp it on my pillow."
Write it on your pillow.
What a great idea.
The last thing you read,
the first thing you read is, "I am enough."
So write it all over your house.
Share it.
And share the very many ways you're gonna do it.
What are you gonna do first?
You gonna ice cakes with it?
Maybe not.
Are you gonna write it in marker on your wall?
Are you gonna stencil it somewhere?
Are you gonna put it on fridge magnets?
Are you gonna write it in the dust of cars
as you walk down the street?
You gonna write it in the windows
in the mist or in the rain?
Share a new way of putting I'm enough into your life
and everyone else's life too.
And also remember that this isn't just for you.
If you have children, godchildren, brothers, sisters,
other people in your life,
there isn't a person who can't benefit from I'm enough.
So when you do it for yourself,
you're doing it for other people too.
So start today.
Write it in the dust of a dirty van.
Trace it out in the sand.
Trace it out anywhere you like.
Make it part of who you are.
First it's what you do.
Then what's wonderful is it becomes who you are.
And when it becomes who you are, that will be who you are,
and you won't be an addict.