GBR Podcast Beyond Addiction Ep-8GBR Podcast Beyond Addiction Ep-8
Beyond Addiction, Future of Addiction Treatment Today!
Barnett Gilmer and Danielle Ganag talk about why people often swap one addiction for another and relate this to deeper internal unrest and insecurity. Their discussion centres on finding peace from within so that substances and other habits no longer seem like the solution.
35:15•1 Dec 2025
Beyond Addiction: Why Substituting One Habit for Another Doesn’t Work
Episode Overview
- Stopping one substance without addressing inner unrest often leads to substituting another behaviour or addiction.
- Repeatedly telling yourself you won’t use tends to keep the focus on the substance, rather than on building a fuller life.
- Addiction is framed as an innocent attempt to feel better by looking outside yourself, not as a sign of being bad or broken.
- Recognising that peace and happiness arise from within reduces the urge to seek relief in drugs, alcohol or other habits.
- Learning to sit with temporary discomfort, rather than trying to numb it, is presented as a key part of sustainable recovery.
“We see addiction as innocently looking outside yourself to feel good.”
How do people manage the urge to swap one addiction for another? This conversation between Gulf Breeze Recovery CEO Barnett Gilmer and clinical director Danielle Ganag looks straight at that familiar pattern of “substitution” and asks why it happens in the first place. You’ll hear Barnett challenge the common “white-knuckling” approach of repeating, “I’m not going to use today,” comparing it to trying not to think of a pink elephant.
Instead, the focus shifts to understanding the roots of addiction – what Barnett calls “internal unrest” like anxiety, depression and deep insecurity – and the learned habit of looking outside ourselves for relief. Danielle shares both her professional experience and the impact of losing her mum to addiction. She describes addiction as “innocently looking outside yourself to feel good,” whether that’s drugs, alcohol, food, shopping, sex, video games or binge-watching TV.
She points out that many behaviours carry similar emotional drivers but different social judgments, and that people who use substances are often unfairly labelled as “bad” or “broken”. The episode breaks down a powerful plant analogy: the visible “plant” is addictive behaviour, the “roots” are internal unrest, and the “soil” is the misunderstanding that happiness comes from outside things.
Simply chopping off the plant – quitting a substance – without tending to the roots and soil often leads straight to another addiction. Rather than offering quick fixes, Barnett and Danielle talk about learning to tolerate discomfort, seeing feelings as temporary, and recognising an innate “health and wellness within us that we just don’t see”. As people begin to sense that peace and contentment arise from within, the urge to substitute one habit for another starts to lose its appeal.
If you’ve ever thought, “My problem is only with one substance, so I’ll just switch to something else,” this episode might prompt you to look at what’s really driving that urge and what a more peaceful alternative could be.
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