Russell Brand

The Number One Sunday Times Bestseller This is the age of addiction, a condition so epidemic, so all encompassing and ubiquitous that unless you are fortunate enough to be an extreme case, you probably don't know that you have it. What unhealthy habits and attachments are holding your life together? Are you unconsciously dependent on food? Bad relationships? A job that doesn't fulfill you? Numb, constant perusal of your phone, looking for what? My qualification for writing this book is not that I am better than you, it's that I am worse. I am an addict, addicted to drugs, alcohol, sex, money, love and fame. The program in Recovery has given Russell Brand freedom from all addictions and it will do the same for you. This system offers nothing less than liberation from self-centredness, a new perspective, freedom from the illusion of suffering for anyone who is willing to take the necessary steps.

Freedom From Our Addictions

Recovery

A guide to all kinds of addiction from a star who has struggled with heroin, alcohol, sex, fame, food and eBay, that will help addicts and their loved ones make the first steps into recovery “This manual for self-realization comes not from a mountain but from the mud...My qualification is not that I am better than you but I am worse.” —Russell Brand With a rare mix of honesty, humor, and compassion, comedian and movie star Russell Brand mines his own wild story and shares the advice and wisdom he has gained through his fourteen years of recovery. Brand speaks to those suffering along the full spectrum of addiction—from drugs, alcohol, caffeine, and sugar addictions to addictions to work, stress, bad relationships, digital media, and fame. Brand understands that addiction can take many shapes and sizes and how the process of staying clean, sane, and unhooked is a daily activity. He believes that the question is not “Why are you addicted?” but "What pain is your addiction masking? Why are you running—into the wrong job, the wrong life, the wrong person’s arms?" Russell has been in all the twelve-step fellowships going, he’s started his own men’s group, he’s a therapy regular and a practiced yogi—and while he’s worked on this material as part of his comedy and previous bestsellers, he’s never before shared the tools that really took him out of it, that keep him clean and clear. Here he provides not only a recovery plan, but an attempt to make sense of the ailing world.

Freedom from Our Addictions

Terry Benzie

DNF thus far. 

I am violating my general rule for not reviewing books that I haven't finished but I haven't been able to get through this. It started off strong enough that I actually suggested it to a friend who was struggling with addiction issues but the author (I'm listening to the audio version) keeps going on...and on...and on and I'm unsure that he's made a single, coherent point in the last three chapters. It's essentially the standard 12 step program, which he didn't find to work so he updated with profanity and personal anecdotes of things that he suddenly realized through the 12 step program, which he didn't find to work. I've never read nor listened to Brand before so perhaps he's an acquired taste and wraps things up nicely in the last few lines but I am doubtful. 

I finally shut it down to return it to Audible but thought that I would stop by here to see if anybody had a similar reaction and am surprised that few have. I will give it another go, perhaps working through from the beginning again if I do, and will update this if I change my mind. 

POST-SCRIPT - Apparently I can't return this book to Audible because I placed this order more than a year ago. I've tried to listen to it....probably ten times during that period - forgot that I wrote this review. It's the only book that I've given an effort to reading/listening and simply not been able to finish. I find myself disliking the author and life in general the more that I hear him drone on about how many drugs he is able to do but....I don't know what comes next. I assume that enough profanity and bad jokes reverses his hatred for his mother and gets him clean. However, I fear that I will hate life if I finish it. 

As I mentioned, I did suggest it to a friend who has had far more substance abuse problems than I fortunately have had to deal with. She thought it was a joke. Perhaps it would read better in book than in audiobook form and I would pick it up and flip through it if I were to find it in a bookstore but I don't believe that I would ever be able to finish listening.

Recovery Freedom From Our Addictions

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