Why do creative people use drugs

At Narconon Ojai, we offer this same recovery path to our artists and creatives so we can continue to enjoy their creations for decades to come. Sue has worked in the addiction field with the Narconon network for three decades. She has developed and administered drug prevention programs worldwide and worked with numerous drug rehabilitation centers over the years. Sue is also a fine artist and painter, who enjoys traveling the world which continues to provide unlimited inspiration for her work.

You can follow Sue on Twitter, or connect with her on LinkedIn. Somehow a lot of artists think they have to be high or drunk to access a higher level of creativity. But it became very clear to me drugs and alcohol take it away. People who lose everything to addiction are not always scruffy, poorly-dressed individuals living on the margins of society. Wealthy, high profile individuals may also fall to this problem.

Ron Hubbard Meet Our Staff. Sue Birkenshaw in Drug Abuse July 26, Sue Birkenshaw Sue has worked in the addiction field with the Narconon network for three decades. A group from Leiden University Institute of Psychology in the Netherlands examined the effects of cannabis on divergent thinking to be able to objectively measure the effect of the drug on creativity.

They tested creativity by administering divergent Alternate Uses Task and convergent Remote Associates Task tests to the participants. They found that the lower dose and placebo groups did not experience any impact on their level of creativity or divergent thinking , while the high-dose group experienced a decrease in divergent thinking.

Lysergic acid diethylamide LSD is also commonly linked with creativity. The drug produces what is described as a psychedelic state, which is associated with a change in perception of surroundings and altered integration of sensory stimuli. There are a number of possible explanations for why psychedelics have been linked with creativity. These drugs are used and abused by many people, few of whom have produced any creative innovations.

When someone who generates exceptionally creative products reports using any substance, the substance is assumed to be the cause of the original creation. The vast majority of the population, who are neither exceptionally creative nor drug users, may hypothesize a possible connection.

Another explanation is that creative individuals possess their exceptional abilities despite, not because of, drug use. The process of creating music, art, or literature, could be so cognitively demanding that artists may seek to dissociate from reality as a way to release stress, not as a tool for their art. Some suggest that creative people link drugs and alcohol to their creativity.

Others say that any supposed link is not real; it is just a crutch to be leaned on when those in the arts world realise they have a problem that cannot be overcome. History is replete with individuals involved in the arts who used alcohol and drugs. However, things took a decidedly different turn in the s, thanks to research conducted by psychologist and author Timothy Leary.

It was Leary who brought psychedelic drugs into the mainstream under the guise of potential physical and psychological benefits. Of course, the drug dose does not produce the transcendent experience. It merely acts as a chemical key — it opens the mind, frees the nervous system of its ordinary patterns and structures.

The nature of the experience depends almost entirely on set and setting. The point Leary was making here is that psychoactive drugs free the mind from the normal constraints that guard its activity. In so doing, Leary asserted that there were other states of consciousness that could only be achieved through drug use.

It was his revolutionary ideas that opened the door to socially acceptable drug use in the s and 70s. The world has not looked back since.