I yield the floor to Nick Cave, whose 375th issue of responses to fan/reader mail, known as The Red Hand Files, addresses a reader’s woman’s struggle with her mother’s addiction:
My mom’s an addict, and her motto is “set your world on fire, seek those who fan the flames” and I think she struggles with banality. Sometimes I don’t blame her, we all just want to feel alive. And there’s no way cold plunges are gonna scratch that itch for her. How do you even get through to someone like that? Don’t we all occasionally have the urge to hurl ourselves towards self destruction to varying degrees, just to escape the narratives we built ourselves into? —HEIDI, LAFAYETTE, USA [message to Nick Cave, Issue #375,The Red Hand Files, August 2026]
The passionate and articulate leader of Australian rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds responds forthrightly that Heidi shouldn’t fall for her mother’s attempt to deceive herself and others into believing that addiction brings anything other than destruction:
The problem with your mother’s motto is that it is everyone else around her whose lives she is setting on fire, including yours, it seems, and the people who are fanning the flames are those desperately trying to put them out. The existential banality your mother is struggling with is entirely her own, for there is nothing more banal than addiction. The idea that addiction makes your mother more alive is the perverse logic reserved for the addict and those who enable them. If your mother is an addict, she is not occasionally hurling herself towards self-destruction, she is the very essence of destruction – of herself, but more importantly, of everyone else around her. I know, I was an addict too.
I’m sorry your mother is unable to build a more interesting and meaningful life with you – that must be difficult and hurtful. Maybe one day she’ll get her shit together and you’ll be able to have a better relationship with her. Until then, Heidi, be safe and look after yourself. You count for something. You matter. Don’t buy into your mother’s bullshit. It doesn’t help you or her one little bit. Let her know you love her, sure, and be kind to her, of course, but stand well back and let her fan her own flames.
Love, Nick [Cave, August 2026]
Addiction is the opposite of a glorious and defiant life. Addiction is surrender of self, subordination to something else, and ruin of the joyful loving narratives that we can build for ourselves only with clear eyes and hearts.