Addiction, as Gerald G. May describes it, reaches well past alcohol and drugs. The psychiatrist and contemplative writer examines how attachment takes hold of a life and where spiritual freedom from it might begin.

Readical Key Points

• First published in 1988 by Harper & Row; this HarperOne paperback edition was published in 2007
• Examines how addiction works in the mind and the body from the standpoint of contemplative spirituality, within the Christian tradition
• The addictions it considers include intimacy, responsibility, work, performance and sex as well as substances
• Content note: addresses substance abuse and compulsive behavior; a spiritual and psychological study, not a treatment program or a substitute for professional care
• Paperback, 240 pages, with bibliography and index

May, who worked as a physician and psychiatrist for twenty-five years, sets out what he calls the "processes of attachment" behind addiction and traces how addiction and spiritual awareness bear on each other. He argues that addiction amounts to an attempt to take complete control of one's own life, and he locates the way out in contemplative spirituality.

Readers drawn to where psychology meets faith, people in recovery among them, make up its audience, as do readers of May's other books, such as The Dark Night of the Soul. May writes as a doctor for whom attachment is a spiritual question as well as a medical one.

About the Author

Gerald G. May, M.D. (1940-2005), worked as a physician and psychiatrist for twenty-five years, then joined the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation in Bethesda, Maryland, as a senior fellow. His other books include Care of Mind/Care of Spirit, Will and Spirit, and The Dark Night of the Soul.

Condition: Brand New and Readical Ready.

Readical™ is an independent bookstore and reading-products brand built around a simple idea: books matter most when what we learn leaves the page and enters our lives.

Apply the Page. Get Readical™.