caffeine addiction

[zenkarma]

i drink a box of about 80 tetleys british blend tea bags a week. Tea has an added extra, an amino acid called l-theanine that promotes alpha waves in the brain and has a calming effect on mood. If you have to have caffine, i would recommend getting your fix from tea rather than coffee.

[Lhug-Pa]

Then Bulletproof Black Tea is a great idea too.

In fact, I believe that Tibetan Yak-Butter Tea was the inspiration for Bulletproof Coffee; and, if I'm not mistaken, Yak-Butter Tea is made out of Black Tea (from Pemagul?).

[Jikan]

Coffee people are to speedy, impatient, and irritable for me. But, that being said, I understand there are some large good studies showing daily consumption increases one's lifespan.

Speedy? Yes, guilty as charged. I'm told I've become less impatient and much, much less irritable; perhaps Dharma practice does have observable effects on people?

thinking of this thread: viewtopic.php?f=39&t=10749&view=unread#unread

[Johnny Dangerous]

Yeah..I definitely feel tea is better for me, the pep has a different feel than coffee, and the 'high' is more controllable, less likely to cross the line into mild mania..

But man, I am nowhere near as addicted to tea lol. Sometimes at night I want to go sleep earlier so I can hurry up and wake up to have coffee.

[tomamundsen]

Relevant: Coffee beans in danger of extinction.

[Lhug-Pa]

You can consume tea which has much less caffeine, but it also has other beneficial compounds like theanine which is known to produce calming and relaxing effects, that tempers the already low caffeine content and anti-oxidants.

Tea—whether white, green, oolong, or black—like I'd written earlier in this thread, is usually more jittery for me than Yerba Maté or even Coffee. One thing I've noticed though is that green tea works wonders at the gym or even for body-weight workouts at home. Maybe it has to do with the theanine.

In any case what I'd like to do is cycle between tea, maté, and coffee (all 'bulletproof' & organically grown of course). Cycling is generally good with any type of herb or supplement.

Also, 'bulletproofing' tea by blending it with ghee & unfiltered coconut-oil or grassfed butter & unfiltered coconut-oil should make tea less jittery and more relaxed & even.

[Illuminaughty]

The strangest thing happens whenever I try to skip my energy drink or coffee for a few days. My blood pressure goes up. seems counter intuitive but I'm pretty sure it's a result of the lack of caffeine.

[Fa Dao]

I drink almost 2 pots a day of coffee and now science is backing up that its actually beneficial for preventing prostate cancer, type II diabetes, parkinsons disease, stroke, and alzheimers/dementia and a few other things. So tired of my beloved beverage being maligned. Check out the article:
http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/featu ... ealth-food

[Karma Gendun]

I dont recommend decaf, as they put lots of bad fats that make it tastier but very unhealthy. Home brewed yerba mate is good however. If you do drink coffee get organic and just one cup, do not drink much more. It has some good properti.es, but not in excess. Illuminaughty, you need to go of coffee slowly, your body is just used to the caffeine. Never drink energy drinks, it is like drinking 60 cups of coffee in terms of caffeine amount.

[Zealot]

What a terrible intoxicant this is. Open your eyes and kick the habit. Socially acceptable or not, you're still indulging in an addictive substance that doesn't further us along the path. I, too, however, am guilty in indulging in warm drinks that replace some other attachments of mine. Good luck, everyone. Addiction sucks!

[Johnny Dangerous]

What a terrible intoxicant this is. Open your eyes and kick the habit. Socially acceptable or not, you're still indulging in an addictive substance that doesn't further us along the path. I, too, however, am guilty in indulging in warm drinks that replace some other attachments of mine. Good luck, everyone. Addiction sucks!

Do you think it's really that bad?

I don't think caffeine itself is particularly harmful..in the right doses. In fact, there's ample evidence that for some things a bit of caffeine is beneficial. This may not be so for me personally, but surely a blanket answer here is jumping to conclusions isn't it? Caffeine is not alcohol by any stretch. I wonder if maybe the issue is living in a culture where over consumption of caffeine is the norm.

Guilty of engaging in 'warm drinks', oh you party animal.

[Zealot]

I don't think it's any worse than smoking cannabis However, in the same sense, it also gives rise to clinging and is a mind-altering substance.

Even if it has beneficial effects though, shouldn't we try only to use it when we need such benefits? Otherwise we might slip into the belief that we are continually sick and need coffee to even us out. Also, I try to take a simplistic view of things: eat food that nourishes us and abandon those that please us.

Even sipping my tea can lead me to more clinging: I drink my tea and then I crave a snack. I have a snack and then I want to sit down and enjoy it. I sit down and enjoy my snack and take out my phone. I take out my phone and send some useless texts. I wait for their reply and do nothing but idle in the meantime. And then I'm sloth

[Johnny Dangerous]

I don't think it's any worse than smoking cannabis However, in the same sense, it also gives rise to clinging and is a mind-altering substance.

Even if it has beneficial effects though, shouldn't we try only to use it when we need such benefits? Otherwise we might slip into the belief that we are continually sick and need coffee to even us out. Also, I try to take a simplistic view of things: eat food that nourishes us and abandon those that please us.

Even sipping my tea can lead me to more clinging: I drink my tea and then I crave a snack. I have a snack and then I want to sit down and enjoy it. I sit down and enjoy my snack and take out my phone. I take out my phone and send some useless texts. I wait for their reply and do nothing but idle in the meantime. And then I'm sloth

Don't even own a mobile (and don't plan to) so for me the problem is simply that I enjoy coffee too much, and have hard time with limits sometimes. Personally I don't think I will ever solve addictive behavior simply by aversion. It's been my experience that running away from things as fast as I can like that just brings me in a complete circle right back to them full throttle. Currently i've cut my coffee in half and that seems to be helping.

I don't think it's any worse than smoking cannabis However, in the same sense, it also gives rise to clinging and is a mind-altering substance.

Everything gives rise to clinging, including meditation and Buddhism. The clinging that makes that Thangka beautiful is no different than what you are talking about, is it? Arguably these are at least fully healthy things to cling to. It is indeed a mind altering substance, but then so are many things on the same level as caffeine, at where do you draw the line...should one not taking herbal supplements based on this reasoning too?

[PorkChop]

Don't even own a mobile (and don't plan to) so for me the problem is simply that I enjoy coffee too much, and have hard time with limits sometimes. Personally I don't think I will ever solve addictive behavior simply by aversion. It's been my experience that running away from things as fast as I can like that just brings me in a complete circle right back to them full throttle. Currently i've cut my coffee in half and that seems to be helping.

Meh, I wouldn't stress it.
Just take a couple days off every week, you'll be fine.
Maybe detox for a week or two if you feel yourself getting overly dependent.
I'm in the same boat as Lhug-Pa, tea makes me much more jittery than coffee.
Black coffee really just keeps me from getting drowsy at work.
I agree with you that swearing things off in a fit of aversion often leads right back to those behaviors.

I don't think it's any worse than smoking cannabis However, in the same sense, it also gives rise to clinging and is a mind-altering substance.

"Mind-altering substance" usually, in relation to the 5 precepts, implies intoxication leading to heedlessness, which leads to breaking other precepts.
Cannabis does not make you a better driver, for example, whereas coffee doesn't affect performance in a negative way.
I think you'd be hard pressed to say that coffee was on the same level of health risk as smoking cannabis.
Smoking anything has significant cancer risk.
Smoking cannabis + smoking cigarettes has a much higher risk than smoking either alone.

[Zealot]

Don't even own a mobile (and don't plan to) so for me the problem is simply that I enjoy coffee too much, and have hard time with limits sometimes. Personally I don't think I will ever solve addictive behavior simply by aversion. It's been my experience that running away from things as fast as I can like that just brings me in a complete circle right back to them full throttle. Currently i've cut my coffee in half and that seems to be helping.

Meh, I wouldn't stress it.
Just take a couple days off every week, you'll be fine.
Maybe detox for a week or two if you feel yourself getting overly dependent.
I'm in the same boat as Lhug-Pa, tea makes me much more jittery than coffee.
Black coffee really just keeps me from getting drowsy at work.
I agree with you that swearing things off in a fit of aversion often leads right back to those behaviors.

I don't think it's any worse than smoking cannabis However, in the same sense, it also gives rise to clinging and is a mind-altering substance.

"Mind-altering substance" usually, in relation to the 5 precepts, implies intoxication leading to heedlessness, which leads to breaking other precepts.
Cannabis does not make you a better driver, for example, whereas coffee doesn't affect performance in a negative way.
I think you'd be hard pressed to say that coffee was on the same level of health risk as smoking cannabis.
Smoking anything has significant cancer risk.
Smoking cannabis + smoking cigarettes has a much higher risk than smoking either alone.

At the risk of angering the greg, I will answer this now off topic post about cannabis:
I'd like to see studies that show cannabis use causes a higher rater of accidents. http://norml.org/library/item/marijuana ... c-evidence
I'd also like to see the correlation between smoking cannabis and cancer. http://norml.org/component/zoo/category ... g-the-risk
Honestly, I think coffee can be much more dangerous than cannabis. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_coffee
It seems like there's as many detrimental effects as positive. Plus there's the physical addiction.

If you're suffering from drowsiness, perhaps you should change the way to sit to a more erect posture or you could be sleep deprived.

As far as breaking the habit goes; Getting away from the coffee and the friends who drink it may give you a clear head. Up at the sangha I'm currently living at, there's no smoking allowed, so it has been great to clear my head and let me see my cannabis habit from a different perspective. Unfortunately, everyone here drinks tea, so for me it's just like replacing one habit with another. But it's also FRICKEN COLD up here with all the wind, so a warm drink always seems particularly appealing.

But if you put yourself in a situation where you physically can't have what you're addicted to, I think the cravings will subside a lot easier than when there's a can of coffee in the cabinet and your coffee machine sitting on the counter. Those are a constant tug at you to just give in. Of course, with such widespread acceptance, a coffee shop on every corner and coffee in nearly every store, you pretty much have to be a hermit to avoid it completely.

Perhaps vowing to uphold the fifth precept for a week or even a day or two a week for a month will help you ween yourself away from it and towards the Dharma. You have a precious human life, what a shame it would be to waste it the throws of caffeine addiction.

[Johnny Dangerous]

Coffee can be more dangerous than pot?

Seriously..inhaling smoke of any kind has a correlation with cancer. It takes a heavy smoker if only pot is involved to significantly up cancer risk i'm sure, going by what little has even been studied, but it's pretty common sense that inhaling smoke is carcinogenic.

Don't hang out with friends who drink coffee..are you pulling my leg or are these supposed to be real suggestions?

You are the first person I have heard in a while to adamantly argue the fifth precept relates to caffeine, frankly it fits with your name I find the claim questionable...the point of the fifth precept is as Pork Chop said to avoid intoxicants that cause heedlessness and can make you break the other precepts. If you include coffee and tea you are not far from also including stuff like Ginseng. So in fact I do keep the fifth precept, years of having a hard time giving up alcohol and pot are over.

Perhaps vowing to uphold the fifth precept for a week or even a day or two a week for a month will help you ween yourself away from it and towards the Dharma. You have a precious human life, what a shame it would be to waste it the throws of caffeine addiction.

Ugh..dude, please don't talk to me like that..that is not the way to spread or talk about the Dharma, if that's what you are trying to do.

[CrawfordHollow]

Zealot,

You are blessed to be staying at the Garchen Institute, which is home to some of the most wise and compassionate teachers out there, but...
You are still very new to the Dharma, and I'm afraid that if you feel that it is necessary to "abandon those that please us" you may be setting yourself up for some serious obstacles. Coffee drinking actually does not relate to the 5th precept. It is very wrong to suggest to someone that their coffee intake is in any way an obstacle to their Dharma practice. I have met and served many lamas over the years, and a lot of them LOVE coffee. In fact, I can think of a high level teacher at the Garchen Institute who always had this big creamy, coffee drink every afternoon.

Do you think that these lamas, who all spent many years in retreat, were somehow wasting their precious human lives because they ENJOYED coffee and tea? And I can assure you that although these highly enlightened, wonderful beings did drink coffee (gasp), not a single one would approve of or partake in the use of marijuana. If you feel strongly about this, I suggest you ask Garchen Rinpoche or Gape Lama about it next time you are permitted an interview. Make sure to inform them how dangerous their caffeine habit is. Maybe you guys can talk about over a bowl of some sick herb.

I'm sorry if I sound overly critical and sarcastic, I am just being honest. As we all know, I have my own addiction issues that I have been dealing with for years. You may not smoke at the moment, but from the way you talk it sounds like you are still very much addicted, or at least obsessed over it. I would also be careful about preaching to others, especially when it comes to their dedication to the Dharma and how they spend their lives. A little humility goes a long way. Lets not forget that we are all begginners, you most of all.

Take care, my friend
Troy

[CrawfordHollow]

In case anyone is wondering, as if it had any relevance at all, I am not a coffee drinker. Snap.

[Zealot]

Crawfordhollow,
My tone is somewhat serious and somewhat joking. If someone is addicted to a substance, even caffeine, then I would consider it intoxicating. Yes, things can be enjoyed without being addicted to them, but the topic here is caffeine addiction, not caffeine enjoyment. I think it's wrong of you to assume that coffee drinking can't relate to the fifth precept.

Along the Path, any thought, word, or deed that doesn't further the progress of the Aspirant is a distraction, an intoxicant.
When there is no Path, there is no distraction, no intoxicants. None are necessary, and none will distract.

Attachment and grasping comes in many subtle forms.

Johhny Dangerous,
If you seriously feel that your caffeine addiction is detracting from your quality of life, then yes, they are real suggestions. I thought this topic was about addiction, which is a serious, harmful thing. Yes, the point of the fifth precept is to refrain from activities that cause heedlessness, and I certainly feel that coffee can cause that like the slippery slope in my last post. Sorry I didn't mean to offend you by my encompassing views; I am new to the Dharma, and as with every aspect of my life, people tell me I have a unique view. It's great that you uphold the fifth precept in relation to those substances, and I hope that I will feel the strength able to take that vow and uphold it some day. If you view caffeine as an addiction, I don't see why you wouldn't see it as an intoxicant.

Also, from your post previous to this one; Yes, I do see herbal supplements in the realm of food and beverage that should be avoided unless necessary. If Buddha survived on a grain of rice a day (yes I know, the extremes of asceticism), then we, too, should limit our luxuries when we see ourselves over indulgent. Clearly, neither extreme is the answer and we all have to find that middle ground that is so hard to tread.

If one just enjoys coffee and tea like other aspects of the household life, then I'd say it's fine. Clearly the correlation I see with smoking cannabis and drinking coffee is of no value here, so I will quit discussing it.

I'm very sorry if I've offended anyone. It was my intention to introduce a new and hopefully helpful view. Loving regards to all of you!

-Zealot

[CrawfordHollow]

Zealot,

After reading my post again, I realize that perhaps I was a little too harsh. All I'm trying to say is that you should try not to preach to people. For all you know, Johnny D. could have over thirty years of meditation experience, so I would be careful about giving people meditation advice when you have just begun to practice yourself. I am only saying this because I have been guilty of it too, so I know how much of an ass you can make of yourself when you start preaching to people. I'm not saying your an ass, but you know what I mean...

I think that while you are staying at the Garchen Institute, you should take advantage of your situation and talk to one of the lamas about your views regarding marijuana. Ask what they consider an intoxicant is and about their views regarding pot. Ask Garchen Rinpoche if possible. I say this because you seem to be stubbornly holding on to the view that because pot is considered to be a mind-altering substance and an intoxicant, everything must be a mind-altering substance and an intoxicant. Thus you preach to people about the dangers of coffee and how their precious life is being wasted because they drink it. I am not going to argue or debate this point, I am just telling you what I observe. Since you feel strongly about it, you should bring it to one of the lamas, don't feel that any topic is taboo and shouldn't be discussed with the teachers, that is what they are there for.

I don't want to downplay or disregard the signifigance of your abstinence from smoking. I know that this was a huge step for you and I give you much respect because of it, just be careful about how you talk to others. Nobody likes being preached to. OK, now that I am done preaching, I'll leave it at that. I seem to have caught the flu and I am running to the bathroom every five minutes. Not fun. Anyway, I urge you to talk to one of the lamas about this, and let me know how it goes.

Take care,
Troy