Fake Identities

These wise words of Christina Grof from her book "The Thirst for Wholeness – Attachment, Addiction and the Spiritual Path" emphasise the loss of the authentic self associated with addiction. In the end we believe our own Press Releases, what our head tells us. Fairy tales become truth and judging by the PR lies spun to us from Governments, Corporations and inevitably the Media, truth is as becoming as the whereabouts of Lord Lucan.

 

Richard John Bingham, the future 7th Earl of Lucan was born 18th December 1934. He went to Eton where he discovered the great passion of his life – gambling. In 1953 he joined the Coldstream Guards, where he spent much of his off-duty time playing poker or visiting casinos. After leaving the army he joined a Merchant Bank, but by now, gambling was his first priority. One night, after a substantial win at chem-de-fer he decided to quit his job and become a professional gambler. His gambling nickname was " Lucky".

All addicts think they are lucky in the beginning. They think they will get away with it.

 

Bankruptcy forces one to be authentic very quickly – luckily I was 18 months into recovery when I faced the music of my £38,000 Personal Debt that was instrumental to my fake identities ( about £120,000 in today’s money ). In 1984 I stood in the dock in the Law Courts in The Strand to agree with the judge that I had led an extravagant lifestyle on other peoples money and that I had lied to obtain 5 bank Accounts and 15 credit cards. However due to my surrender wake up call in 1982 I contacted all my creditors, told them the truth about my addictions and began monthly repayments to all. Consequently no creditors turned up for my hearing and Harrods sent a personal letter to the Court declaring that they wished to be removed from the Creditors list as " I had behaved like a Gentlemen ". Because of this and having taken swift personal responsibility around debt the Judge wrote the whole lot off, leaving me with no credit anywhere for 5 years. I didn’t get away with it, for the toxic shame lasted for years.

 

Without throwing dice I had in fact gambled as openly as Lord Lucan at the tables, robbing Peter to pay Paul every month when it came to flying by my pants in order to keep up appearances. I soon learnt that the GUCCI Belt I had bought at Bal Harbor in Maimi, months before I stopped using, only held my trousers up, nothing more, even though the bag and the wrapping it came in offered great promise to my fake identity of success. I regularly read Andy Warhol’s INTERVIEW Magazine along with the fashion glossies convinced I was somebody who mattered, when what really happened was that I was living in a flat later deemed by the Environmental Health Department " unfit for human habitation ". Denial was not the word.