Drugs, Addiction and Initiation: The Modern Search for Ritual

Luigi Zoja argues that the pervasive abuse of drugs in our society can in large part be ascribed to a resurgence of the collective need for initiation and initiatory structures: a longing for something sacred underlies our culture's manic drive toward excessive consumption. In a society without ritual, the drug addict seeks not so much the thrill of a high as the satisfaction of an inner need for a participation mystique in the dominant religion of our times: consumerism.

• Witness to the Fire: Creativity and the Veil of Addiction
• In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction
• War of the Gods in Addiction
• The Thirst for Wholeness: Attachment, Addiction, and the Spiritual Path
• Many Roads One Journey: Moving Beyond the 12 Steps
• The Miracle Method: A Radically New Approach to Problem Drinking
• Lit: A Memoir (P.S.)
• Memoirs of an Addicted Brain: A Neuroscientist Examines his Former Life on Drugs
• The Addict: One Patient, One Doctor, One Year
• The Silent Cry: Mysticism and Resistance