First, on t he descending arc of alcoholism, there is diminishment of creative

thinking, an abnegation mentally of previous responsibilities, and a developing mental

isolation.

At emotional levels, there is increasing shallowness of affect, a loss of feeling for

cultural meaning and family bonds. Energies which previously were directed into
many drives are now being focussed on one — the satisfaction of the outward show of
thirst for what has been lost inwardly. There are swings of mood --highs and lows.

When the etheric level is reached even these energies are dispersed. The vitality is
diminished. Periods of complete exhaustion feature regularly. The subject is likened to
a creature stunned. Finally, physical degradation begins. The features bloat, redden and
hang and the face is "like a devil's, sick of sin."

Then, at the rock bottom of degradation, all alcoholics agree about the occurrence of
one supreme common experience . - that of an overwhelming and nameless fear that
besets them. The fear is so intense, so groundless that some have described it as a
"fear of fear." And only when this trough is reached, in which the most hellish
experiences occur, with or without delirium tremens, that the process of the
descending arc can reverse itself and the hard upward struggle toward rehabilitation
begin.

If therapists could understand the nature of this fear and its causes the whole method
of treating the alcoholic could be revolutionised and given a better chance of success.

The suicide rate of alcoholics is extremely high and the astral world has a high
percentage of its population made up of discarnate alcoholics. Their numbers are
excessive because unlike other discarnate groups, their worldly desires are, in most
instances unrequited. Suicide, accidental death and death from some acute
condition, like an overwhelming infection, does not bring an end to the desire
nature— far from it! The earthly desires, after a short period of quiescence, reassert
themselves in the astral body after death and the urge for drink, or to return to
gluttony or to sexual excesses surface once more into the consciousness of the
recently dead.

These effects were spectacularly described by the clairvoyant C. W. Leadbeater, who

on many occasions personally witnessed the crowding of astral entities, previously
alcoholics around bars, taverns and inns where alcohol was being consumed. It was as
if something of the fumes, if not the actual liquid could be drawn into their astral
bodies at these sites.

140