Instructor Irene Schwonek on the longing beneath every addiction
What if every addiction — to YouTube, coffee, alcohol, even the past — is really a longing for something else? In this conversation, Instructor Irene Schwonek shares why addiction is rarely about the substance itself, and why the way back to ourselves is gentler than we think.
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What is addiction, really?
The conversation begins with a question many of us recognize. We notice ourselves returning, again and again, to the same place — a video stream, a glass, a screen. At first it brings something that feels like joy. Then, one day, it doesn’t.
Schwonek’s response is unhurried. Addiction, she says, is rarely about the thing itself. It’s about a quieter hunger underneath — for love, for peace, for the simple feeling of returning home.
"Addiction is they can’t find love. That’s the real problem. It’s not the alcohol or binge watching. The problem is they have pain because of lack of love."
When we cover that pain with substances or scrolling, we’re not failing. We’re searching. And when we begin to nourish ourselves with our own love, the substitutes quietly lose their grip.
The memories we carry from childhood
The conversation turns to something Irene Taira recognizes in herself — small habits she still carries from a childhood of financial worry. Walking into a supermarket, her eyes still find the discount rack first.
"I don’t say that’s bad. But I realize how much I’m still living in that situation."
Schwonek listens, then offers a familiar Ho’oponopono framing: we are grown now, and the experiences we have today are made of memories or of inspiration. The way through isn’t to analyze the memory or chase its origin. It’s something simpler.
"You are responsible for your experiences now."
Beneath every emotion
When something catches us — a small ache walking through a familiar place — there’s almost always an emotion underneath. Schwonek asks us to name it. *What is it?*
For Taira, the answer is sadness. A quiet sadness that visits in supermarkets and other unexpected moments.
"It’s in your system, in your Unihipili. And you don’t know why. It could be from your childhood, or it could be sadness from your grandfather, your great-grandmother, some other ancestor."
The sadness isn’t a problem to solve. It’s a memory asking to be released.
Detect, and set yourself free
Schwonek’s invitation is simple, and it’s the practice itself.
"The best is, when it comes up, to detect it. To say, ‘Oh, I feel this emotion of sadness.’ Or to talk to your Unihipili. There’s this sadness again. Look, we have the sadness again — but we can let it go."
There’s no need to find the cause. Sometimes we will never know what happened.
"When you set yourself free from this emotion, then you set everyone free, even your parents, because they are connected. We are all connected."
She closes with a quiet gratitude that lands like a blessing:
"This is why we have been given this gift. We can set free."
— Irene Schwonek
(Interviewer: Irene Taira)
Peace of I
