Just as sometimes we may temporarily fulfill our need for God by falling in love, so there are other ways we humans look outside the self for this experience of connectedness, of wholeness. One such way is in the use of substances, such as alcohol.

Bill Wilson, one of the co-founders of Alcoholics Anonymous and the author of the Big Book of that organization, after he had retired from his position as the figurehead of A.A., wrote a letter to Dr. Carl Jung, thanking him for his part in the founding of A.A. 

In the Big Book there is a story about a 'prominent businessman' (whom in the letter is referred to as Rowland H.) who, after having no luck finding sobriety with American doctors, had gone to Europe and placed himself in the care of Dr. Jung. After treatment, though he felt he'd learned everything there was to know about alcoholism, within a short time he once again found himself drunk. Returning to Dr. Jung he was told that his only hope was in having what Dr. Jung called a 'vital spiritual experience.' 

Bill Wilson wrote to Dr. Jung reminding him about Roland H. and completing the story in which Roland H., after his last session with Dr. Jung, became sober through a religious organization, the Oxford Group. He in turn helped a friend of Bill's, Edwin T., get sober, who in turn brought Bill into the Oxford Group, where he was able to quit drinking for the last time. After quitting drinking he, too, was able to have a 'spiritual experience' that relieved him of the obsession to drink. Bill W. goes on to describe the organization of A.A. that had grown up from that beginning, to thank Dr. Jung for his part in it and for his work (including the introduction he'd written for the I Ching, which had 'intrigued' some members of A.A.) and to report 'a great variety of psychic phenomena' that had occurred to members of the organization.

Dr. Jung wrote back immediately. Here is part of what he wrote:

His (Roland H.'s) craving for alcohol was the equivalent on a low level of the spiritual thirst of our being for wholeness, expressed in mediaeval language: the union with God. (A footnote at the end of this line references this Biblical quote: 'As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.' Psalm 42,1)

...You see, Alcohol in Latin is 'spirits' and you use the same word for the highest religious experience as well as for the most depraving poison. The helpful formula there is: spiritus contra spiritum.

Letter from Dr. Carl Jung to Bill Wilson, 

co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, 

January 30, 1961

Deep within, each of us longs for 'wholeness... the union with God,' regardless of what we may call it. There is an emptiness within that wants filling, and our world and society insist to us that this emptiness may be filled by things of the world, in spite of the fact that nothing in any amount from this world even can begin to fill it; and when we fail time and again to find happiness and fulfillment in the world, we are taught to believe there is something wrong with us. Sometimes a substance--a drink, a pill, a cookie, a joint--seems like the only thing that can touch the discomfort we feel. 

But why don't we simply turn to God?

An experience of God will not necessarily remove the discomfort right away. In fact the discomfort might be part of being alive that we have been avoiding, and our task may be to learn to have it without having to fix it. When we cover up our discomfort with a comfort substance, we are selling ourselves cheaply. We are choosing comfort over growth, a fix over a deeper connection with God. Sometimes we are meant, perhaps, to embrace the discomfort. Find out what would happen if we were simply to let it be.

There is a beautiful poem by Hafiz that says this so much better than I could hope to:

Don't

Surrender

Your loneliness so quickly.

Let it cut more

Deep.

Let it ferment and season you

As few human

Or even divine ingredients can.

Something missing in my heart tonight

Has made my eyes so soft,

My voice so

Tender,

My need of God

Absolutely

Clear

--Hafiz--

Today I will use my discomfort in the world to remind me I am here to know God.

Simbolo del Infinito by Diego Rivera, Ministry of Education, Mexico City, Mexico