Dr. Gabor Maté
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
A slave has no choice.
Wow.
Yeah, and I've had my own addictive behaviors, and
um nothing like the patients that i worked with but in so far as i had them literally even though i was a well-paid middle-class successful doctor i was not exercising any free choice really or my behaviors no when did you what was the main uh addiction that you were you know tied to and when did you learn yeah how to break free of that well
So in my life, the main addictions have been to work.
To work.
Yeah.
Work hard, achieve, succeed.
More and more patience, more and more success, more and more.
More and more is the essence of addiction.
It's always more and more.
And there's a reason why I developed that addiction.
And that's the hardest one to give up.
Then I was addicted for a long time to shopping for classical compact discs.
And when I say addicted, I mean I would spend thousands of dollars a day.
On CDs?
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, really.
And I would lie to my wife about it and I would neglect my patients.