Canada Drug Rehab

By Geoff Thompson - MA, CCC
Program Director
Sunshine Coast Health Center

Recently, I had a discussion with the clients at our residential treatment center about work. Some fellows said they were at work only because it gave them a paycheque. They didn’t like the job, but they had kids to put through school and a mortgage to pay. Others said that they were near retirement and were just counting down the years: “I’ve got seven years left to retirement, so I just have to suck it up and hang in for a few years more.” Others said they were unhappy at their jobs and so just quit.

Many of the clients who spoke seemed to think they were doomed, victims of their jobs. Many seemed resigned to the “fact” that they just had to suck it up and survive. But making sense of work like this is not very helpful in recovery—or in life, for that matter. There are ways to make work more interesting and satisfying, if you decide to take action.

Sunshine Coast Health Center is sponsoring a major international conference this month in Vancouver on finding meaning in the workplace. The official title of the conference is “Creating a Psychologically Healthy Workplace: Meaning, Spirituality and Engagement in the 21st Century” (visit www.meaning.ca for more information). What this means is that we now have very good research on how to turn a dull job into an interesting one.

Some of the world’s foremost experts will be letting us in on the secrets of transforming your working life, and, if you are a manager, how to create a workplace that will inspire your employees. It’s especially important right now because many people are simply surviving at work. There seems to be a general feeling that we are just hanging in because of layoffs and the downturn in the economy. And lots of our alumni tell us that they are working at jobs simply because of the paycheque and not because they are excited about work.

At Sunshine Coast Health Center, we stress the importance of working at a fulfilling job or of doing something that will allow our clients to reach this job, such as getting training. Each of us spends an enormous amount of time at work, so it’s important that it be a major source of fulfillment and significance.

Why all this is important for your recovery is obvious. Alcoholics Anonymous says that a key to recovery is “To thine own self be true.” And Viktor Frankl, the guru of leading a meaningful life, said that addiction is one response for those whose lives are unfulfilling and unsatisfying, including their working lives.

In this article we’ll take a look at some of the ways to make work more meaningful. As always, remember that you are the author of your life, so finding meaning at work is your job.

Part One - The Job as Meaningful vs Intense

Some clients tell us that they love their job. They go to work everyday, happy to be there. But when we talk to these clients, we discover some very interesting things about this job they love.

A common example is a job that is filled with pressure, such as managing a multimillion dollar project. Or perhaps it is in the financial world, where the client invests millions of dollars each day. Or perhaps it’s a job in at some remote industrial plant where the client has to do some welding while tethered to a safety harness 100 meters above the ground. Or perhaps it’s a job that changes every day and has no real routine.

When we ask our clients what the appeal of the job is, they often tell us, “It’s a rush.” Exciting. Risky. High stakes. Or, as we phrase it at Sunshine Coast, it’s filled with intensity. And addicts love intensity. Counsellors find it interesting that the job itself is often not that appealing—it’s the rush, not the job itself, the client likes. As one client said, who flies around the world first-class on business trips and gets invited to all the best parties, “I could care less whether I’m doing what I do now or whether I’m selling eggs. As long as I get to be a rock star!”

If you recall from previous articles, I talk a lot about the appeal of intensity for addicts. Our main point is that addicts substitute living intensely for living meaningfully. This is one of the most important dynamics to understand addiction. But the key to recovery is to live a life that fills you up, that matches what you truly want out of life. The intense jobs don’t seem to accomplish this goal; but they are intense.

Psychologist Mike Csikszentmihalyi studied people who thrived at work and discovered that the key factor was they loved the work itself (not the paycheque or perks, but the work). This was true of artists and scientists and business people. Pursuing a job because one loves the job itself is a key to finding fulfillment in work. Many artists are content holding down a minimum-wage job so as to ensure they have enough time to work on their craft. Many people donate time in the community to help out organizations or to help their company become a good corporate citizen.

Part Two - The Job as Part of Life, Not the Whole

A few years back, ABC News featured a documentary on the addicted actor Daniel Baldwin. This is the one where ABC News follows Baldwin during his stay at a residential treatment center in California.

In one segment, his psychologist suggests that being a Hollywood actor may not be the best job for Baldwin because it is a life through which Baldwin has used drugs regularly. The ABC interviewer asks Baldwin if he would be willing to change careers, and he replied, without hesitating, that he would never even entertain the idea.

It is interesting that he refused to spend even five seconds thinking about it a career change. Why? The documentary makes it clear that Daniel Baldwin may have no life without his acting. Perhaps the reason Baldwin cannot conceive of having another career is that any sense of who he is hinges on the career. He talks in that segment that he could be a lawyer or real estate agent if he wanted to (which is very true), but it seems obvious that these jobs would be far too dull for him. No limelight. No excitement. No showing up at the Academy Awards. Being successful according to his own standards of wealth and fame is how he judges a job. He does not talk about being a lawyer because he loves the law and wants to help people. He does not talk about being a real estate agent because the job has intrinsic meaning. He is only interested in winning cases or in making money.

One wonders what would happen to Baldwin if he suffered the same fate as the actor Christopher Reeve, who had to give up acting after breaking his spine. Could Baldwin gain success as Reeve did? Who is Baldwin if he were not famous or wealthy or the life of the party? Perhaps it is the job that allows him to survive, that provides him with his identity, with a sense of who he is as a person. Not a very balanced life.

Part Three - Changing Jobs

According to some research, most heart attacks happen on Monday morning, right after the days off and just before going back to the grind. This should give you some idea of how important work is for your health.

O, Oprah’s magazine, often contains articles on how people transformed their lives by changing jobs. Of course changing jobs is not realistic for everyone. But the articles in Oprah’s magazine are about those who are capable of changing jobs. The only think that prevented them was fear.

One woman wrote about her experience of overcoming fear. She and her husband made six-figure salaries, and both were regarded at work and in their communities as very successful. But what they truly wanted to do was to get out of the business world, buy a sailboat, and sail around the world. No more worries about appointments and the high pace.

But to do this obviously meant quitting their jobs. It meant selling their house to pay for a sailboat. It meant giving up their upper middle-class lifestyle. Their neighbors and colleagues at work thought they were a bit nuts. But sailing around the world was what they truly wanted.

The woman said that it was scary, but she said it was the best thing they had ever done. They realized they didn’t need six-figure salaries to be happy. They didn’t need a big, expensive house to be happy. All they needed to be happy was to be true to themselves (and realistic, of course).

Their willingness to act in spite of fear is a good lesson for those in recovery. Remember that Bill W. and AA tell you, “To thine own self be true.” And, of course, Viktor Frankl would not be the least bit surprised to learn that the couple were much happier sailing about the world.

Part Four — Examples of Meaningful Work

In this article we’ve been examining the ideas of finding meaningful (not intense) work, not allowing work to become your identity, and facing fear of changing careers. Eric Clapton’s autobiography provides a good example of someone who transformed his work into something that provided meaning and purpose. He didn’t change jobs, but he did transform his job into something personally meaningful.

As you know, Clapton suffered from addiction. In active addiction, he became a famous and highly respected musician. He describes this time of his life in his book. There was the joy of music, but equally there was the distraction of drugs, party girls, soap opera life, photographs and television, audiences of screaming fans, hanging out with other famous rock stars, money, and so on. And he describes it as a rather narrow life and also that despite the fact that he was surrounded by people, he didn’t feel all that close to others.

Then, after two stays at a residential treatment center, he found recovery. He now has his work in perspective. It is there, but his family and friends are equally important. What is really remarkable is the way he describes his work (music). Now, clean and sober, he describes the power of his music is to heal those who are suffering. This is a long way from the rock musician in active addiction.

Bill W. offers an example of a different route. He did change jobs. In active addiction, he was a business man. In recovery, he spent his time getting AA on its feet. He was the coach, guru, diplomat, and promoter of AA. He turned from a self-centered alcoholic businessman to a man who followed his passion to help other suffering alcoholics and their families.

In both cases, there are several common factors. Each had to take action. Each had to be creative. Each had to follow his bliss, that is, be true to himself. Each had to look at work as something of substance, rather than as simply a way to money (or in Clapton’s case, fame).

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses the nature of suffering and how to make sense of bad things happening to good people.

By Geoff Thompson - MA, CCC
Program Director
Sunshine Coast Health Center

One of the beneficial things to do in recovery is occasionally to pause and reflect on how your life is going. Many in recovery are busy, doing this and that, and never take time to think about their progress, how far they have come from where they were.

With this in mind, this article will pause and reflect on the second anniversary that Sunshine Coast has been offering the online support program for its alumni. We’ve mentioned dozens of recovery topics from relapse prevention techniques to dealing with family members to discovering spirituality.

With more than 100 topics covered, what are the major themes that the online program has pursued? What are the most important, according to our alumni and research? Which topics seem to have the greatest impact?  

To be honest, we don’t know for sure. But pooling all the information, here are four. We’re not sure if these are the top four, but they’re close. 

We know that addicts suffer horribly because their do things in their lives that do not match what they truly value and what they truly believe. What has been controlling them is the substance. And we often find that those in early recovery are still being controlled by outside forces: family, financial crises, and so on. The secret to this dilemma is written on the AA chip: “To thine own self be true.”

Of course, being true to yourself doesn’t mean that you get to do anything that you feel like doing. You live in a world over which you have little control. This is our second topic: How do you take control of your life in a world that dictates everything from how fast you can drive your car to the fact that you will die. No matter how much you may want to play basketball in the NBA, if you’re 5’2” it’s not going to happen. That’s just the way the world is.

Our third topic reminds you that the key to happiness is to live a personally meaningful life. If you are living a personally meaningful life, then the byproduct will be that you are happy. You don’t even have to work at being happy; it just comes naturally.

The fourth topic is about suffering. Sadly, many people think that living the good life means not suffering. All those advertisements telling you that suffering is not necessary and can be avoided are wrong. If happiness depended on lack of suffering, then no one would be happy. Everybody suffers. So what’s the trick to dealing with suffering?

The fifth topic is on putting it all together.

Theme One—You are the author of your life

You are the author of your life. This is also backed up by research on recovery. In fact, it is likely the most important factor in your recovery, although in psychology we use terms such as “intrinsic motivation” or “internal locus of control.” Basically, being the author of your life means that it’s your job to figure out how to live your life.

You have one life to live, so how do you want to live it? That’s the bottom-line question that faces every human being. There will be no thunder-bolts coming down from the heavens to save you; you have to make choices.

You have lots of options. You can, for instance, become one of the crowd. There’s great benefit in this. You’ll be accepted, and you’ll have less conflict in life. But, of course, you likely won’t feel very good. In previous articles, we talked about the great psychologist, Rollo May, who said being one of the crowd was the single greatest reason why people suffered in the 20th century. People agreed to be part of the “herd” because they had such a desperate need to feel ‘part of’ that they were willing to give up what they valued and believed. Eugene O’Neill called them the “spiritual middle-class: how petty their dreams must have been.”

Similarly, you can live your life by avoiding things that make you uncomfortable. If you’re worried about being hurt by someone close to you, then you don’t have to get close to anyone. If you’re filled with worries about finances, you can choose to stay at your job even if you really don’t like it. If being around family makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to deal with them.

Another option: You can choose to be a victim of life. ‘If only I hadn’t had such a lousy upbringing….’ Or ‘My family should stop treating me as a kid’. Or ‘It’s unfair that I got this disease….’

The choice is yours.

Theme Two: Ask Life what it demands of you

Viktor Frankl told us that unhappy people go about the universe demanding that others or things be a certain way. ‘My parents should be fully supportive of me in my recovery’. ‘My life would be so much better if my boss weren’t such a jerk’. ‘I’d fall in love if only I could meet a rich supermodel who would adore me’. ‘I’d be happy if only I had a million dollars’. And so on…

The problem with this approach is that people and things just do what they do, regardless of what you want. The only thing that gets accomplished by demanding things from life is that you get isolated and miserable. Studies of people with cancer, for instance, have shown that those who do not accept the reality of their illness will suffer more than those who do. As strange as this may seem to you, many people who have learned they are HIV+ have said that the diagnosis shocked them into realizing how precious life is.

Bill W. said that a key to recovery was to “Live life on life’s terms.” Frankl’s version of this was “Ask life what it demands of you.” This is the opposite of demanding that others or things be a certain way.

Here’s just one small example:Many clients at Sunshine Coast tell us they have problems making decisions because they don’t want to lose out. “I’ll have a couple of lovers around; that way, if one dumps me, I have a backup.” “I don’t know what to do because I’m afraid of making a bad choice.” People who operate like this have not yet figured out reality. It’s simply part of the rules of life that whatever choice you make, you will lose out. If you choose one lover over another, you lose one. If you choose school over work, you lose the paycheque. If you work on Saturdays, you may miss your son’s soccer game. This is reality.

(BTW, not making a choice is a choice. When you don’t take control and choose, reality eventually steps in and makes the choice for you.)

Theme Three: Happiness means living a personally meaningful life

This is, of course, Viktor Frankl’s theory of human happiness. As we mentioned last month, psychology is torn between whether the key is to live a hedonistic life (do what makes you feel good) or to live a meaningful life. At Sunshine Coast, we go with Frankl.

We often ask questions to Sunshine Coast clients to help them begin the process of figuring out what is meaningful to them. Why would you bother going through the irritation of cleaning up? What is it about your life that you are willing to fight for it? What makes you want to get up in the morning with energy and passion? Of course, most clients struggle with these questions, but they are fundamental to recovery.

As we’ve mentioned many times to our clients, happiness is what recovery is really about — which means that living a meaningful life is what recovery is all about. So many people run into trouble because they believe that the goal of recovery is abstinence or going to three AA meetings each week or eating right, and so on. These goals hardly equal living a meaningful life. You have to keep your eye on what makes you feel fulfilled, contented, alive. The big picture in your life. 

Theme Four: The problem of suffering

Suffering is one of those things that people have been trying to make sense of for millennia, and we’ve touched on this idea in several online programs. At Sunshine Coast, we help clients find ways to eliminate unnecessary suffering due to their addictions, but we also try to help them make sense of their suffering in a new way.

Shifting how you look at suffering is important for recovery. Modern research is showing that your life will improve if you can find meaning in suffering. It is through suffering that people often transform and discover how to live a fulfilling and vital life. In fact, it is usually because of suffering that we change how we live.

The first part of transforming suffering is to accept it. One of those truisms in life is that sh*t happens. Remember that old saying (about 2100 years old, actually): It’s not about what happens to you, it’s about how you deal with it. For the rest of your life, there will be lots of things happening to you that are not so pleasant or unexpected and really irritating. You may be hurt by a lover, find yourself in a ridiculous lawsuit because of a disgruntled person, be the victim of a scam, break your leg while skiing, find that someone has broken a promise to you, realize that someone lied to you, and on and on.

The second part of transforming suffering is to rise above it. Psychologist Paul Wong who developed the therapy model we use at Sunshine Coast, and who is suffering from cancer, told us last summer: “I’m thankful that I’ve suffered so much in my life.” Suffering had taught him to stick to his values regardless of outside pressure. It taught him how beautiful life could be. It taught him that he could be a role model for others who suffered but who did not know how to handle suffering. And so on. Paul has not avoided suffering—he’s risen above it.

Theme Five—Living the good life

Here’s just one of all the fellows who went through Sunshine Coast: After his fourth time hitting bottom, Harry (not his real name) decided that he had to do something with his life. In his first time at Sunshine Coast (third treatment center), Harry, a senior citizen whose wife passed away recently, was in rough physical shape. He learned how not to live his life. After treatment, he went to AA but found it boring and had no feeling that he really belonged there. He lived along and didn’t have much contact with his kids. The only real contact was with his alcoholic neighbor. Six months later, he relapsed.

When he came back to Sunshine Coast for his second time, he figured out that he needed a reason not to quit drinking. So he put together an impressive plan for how to live a full life, in spite of his physical ailments, age, and loss of his wife. We hear from Harry every once in a while—he now has a couple of years of sobriety and tells us that he is doing well.

What had happened? I would suggest that Harry finally realized that if he wanted any sort of life, he’d have to make it happen for himself. He had to fight for his life, which meant that he had to believe that he was worth fighting for. He used his creative intelligence to figure out how he could live in a way that made him feel satisfied, and he put all the pieces together. He returned to AA, but this time found a home group where he felt he fit in. He started to volunteer at a place that he felt he could contribute his talents. He made a schedule to meet with his kids. 

Not that everything was easy or worked out for Harry. When he screwed up, he learned from it. He fought through the cravings, knowing that he was quite capable of this. He didn’t say ‘F-it’ and give up when he was having a bad day. He didn’t blame others or his health or for his misery. He had a mission to live a better life.

By Geoff Thompson - MA, CCC
Program Director
Sunshine Coast Health Center

If you are in early recovery, you may be familiar with the social pressure that comes along whenever we see others drinking or partying. This could be at a wedding, during the Grey Cup or Super Bowl, or the Christmas season. Sadly, some people in recovery talk themselves into joining the party. They seem to forget what they learned in treatment or at a 12-step program.

But we know from psychology it’s not really a matter of forgetting or ‘being an addict’ or ‘stinkin’ thinkin’’. In psychology we call this “confirmation bias.” A few years back, there was a shift in psychology known as the “cognitive revolution.” What this meant was that we began to get quite good at figuring out how individuals process information—how your brain works. One of the things that we discovered is that the brain is not like a computer.

Information goes into your brain and gets processed. That’s true. But we learned that the brain is not particularly logical. You have a natural tendency to pay more attention to and overvalue things that confirm how you make sense of the world, and you tend to dismiss or undervalue those things that contradict it. This is ‘confirmation bias’.

Here are two examples of confirmation bias that might affect you. Maybe a family member picked up on one single thing you did—such as miss an AA meeting or have a slip—and then let you know that your recovery is all a sham. They see the single incident as confirming what they already think about how well you are doing. Another example: Perhaps in recovery you got angry at your family for an incident when you felt they were trying to control you, just as you thought they did when you were in active addiction. They may have treated you as the author of your life 50 times in a row, but you jumped all over that one incident because it seemed to confirm how you make sense of their attitude toward you.

Confirmation bias works both ways because all human beings do it. And it can lead us into all sorts of difficulties. One of the more public examples that psychologists have pointed out is the decision to invade Iraq after 9/11. Although it later became obvious that there was no evidence of weapons of mass destruction, because of confirmation bias many in the Bush Administration pursued information that seemed to confirm their preconceived ideas and discounted evidence that there were no weapons…

The real trick to deal with confirmation bias is to see it in yourself. That’s a lot tougher than seeing it in others. But since everyone has it—it’s a human thing—then you have it, too.

Confirmation bias is complicated, but two of its dynamics are known as ‘defensive motivation’ and ‘accuracy motivation’. Defensive motivation means that the person becomes very skeptical of information that contradicts his attitude, beliefs, or actions. This is usually because the information threatens him in some way. Let’s say that you are skeptical of information that says if you hang out in bars they you will likely be lured back into addiction. You might dismiss the idea of keeping out of a bar or away from a drinking party because you believe it’s the holidays and that’s where all the fun is; in fact, if you don’t go to the bar or drinking party, then you will miss out.

Accuracy motivation means that a person sees some value in the information. As one researcher described it, the person has a tendency to process information in an “objective, open-minded fashion that fosters uncovering the truth.” You may believe that the bar is a dangerous place, because you get caught up in the music, sexual interests, and camaraderie. If you believe this is dangerous for you, then you will pay more attention to information that tells you that you are right. You don’t need to drink to be in the festive spirit at a social gathering.

In this article we’ll look at confirmation bias and your recovery. With the wedding season and summer holidays coming, this topic is very important. So we’ll provide a few things you can do to deal with it.

Part One: Defensive motivation: Wrestling with your addiction

Cognitive psychology—the psychology of how we process information—has taught us that confirmation bias appears when we confront information that is threatening to us. We tend to take a defensive stand, becoming more skeptical. In psychology, we call this “defensive motivation.”

In a typical experiment, psychologists ask participants to write down what they are passionate about. A normal topic is capital punishment. Then the experimenters present studies for and against the idea that capital punishment deters criminal behavior. Inevitably, the participants are skeptical about the study that disagree with their stance but fully endorse the study that agrees with them.

Here’s an example of defensive motivation from the world of drug use. Although there are many reasons why those in early recovery wrestle with their recovery, a common reason is that they try to pin their addiction to their drug of choice. If you believe that it’s okay to have a couple of beers because your drug of choice was cocaine, then you will likely be skeptical of any information that says a drug is a drug is a drug. Or you will likely remember information about someone’s uncle who was an alcoholic but who now drinks with no ill effects on his life. If you are an alumni of Sunshine Coast, all that scientific information you learned at the Drugs & Your Brain workshop won’t make much of an impression on you, because of confirmation bias.

Logically, of course if you pin your addiction to your drug of choice, then you fly in the face of all those scientists. If you were being very logical, you’d have to say, ‘I’m right, and all those research scientists at Harvard and Johns Hopkins universities are wrong’. But people are not particularly logical, so they pretend the science doesn’t exist or, at least, doesn’t apply to them.

On the other hand, if you are firmly convinced that all drugs will hurt an addict, then you will likely pay more attention to articles and narratives that promote this; and you will likely shake your head and smile when someone says that it’s okay to drink because their drug of choice was cocaine.

Part Two: A solution to wrestling with your addiction

If you are debating with yourself on whether to join in the drinking festivities or be one of the sober ones, then here are some ideas that might help you choose the latter. These tactics are merely tricks to disrupt confirmation bias—the tendency to grasp hold of information that confirms your preconceived ideas.

Tip #1 - Get involved with a recovery support group - AA and NA have many activities throughout the year, particularly during the holiday season. In larger cities, they run meetings 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They usually provide Christmas dinners at the local Alano club or recovery center. Many groups have service activities that you can join, such as helping out those less fortunate. Most recovery centers have dances and music and other social events.

Tip #2 - Be grateful - If you were a client at Sunshine Coast during the past year, you will remember the power of being grateful. Psychology has confirmed that being grateful for what you have—your sobriety—will help you feel better. The 12-step program has a saying that those who are grateful do not relapse. The reason for this saying is that those who recover through AA or NA tend to think that their sobriety was a gift from their higher power.

Tip #3 - Make a decision to not drink for the holidays - This is a remarkably powerful tactic because it takes the pressure off.

Tip #4 - Remember the racehorse - This is psychologist Paul Wong’s saying: “Everyone has a racehorse and a donkey. If you don’t pay attention to the racehorse, you’re stuck with the donkey.” If you don’t pay attention to your goals and dreams, then the little things (immediate boredom, immediate loneliness) will take on a power that they don’t have in reality.

Part Three: Accuracy motivation: Remembering what you want

One of the interesting dynamics of confirmation bias is that people are more open to reality if they see some positive outcome in the information, even if it disagrees with them. During the holidays, it’s important to remember what you want in life.

Clients come to Sunshine Coast because the lives they have been living are not working out for them.

If you were a client in the new program, you learned that your suffering was due to the fact that your addiction did not allow you to be true to yourself, disconnected you from family and friends, and disconnected you from any sense of meaning and purpose. If you were a client under the old program, you discovered that the suffering from addiction came from the addict’s self-centeredness.

In either case, you were hardly living a live that was full and vital and satisfying. Your life was likely, as NA says, “meaningless, monotonous and boring.” In fact, people come into recovery because they begin questioning how they make sense of their lives.

So, they might be more willing to listen to Drugs & Your Brain, Medical Aspects, Relapse Prevention, and other workshops. They might be less skeptical when they hear that Viktor Frankl defines addiction as a response to living a life that has little personal meaning.

They might be willing to take Frankl’s advice that means “that being human is always directed, and pointing, to something or someone other than oneself: to a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter, a cause to serve or a person to love. Only to the extent that someone is living out this self-transcendence of human existence, is he truly human or does he become his true self.”

Part Four: Accuracy motivation: Overcoming barriers to the truth

Most people in early recovery have barriers that get in the way of allowing them to take an objective look at the facts. In 12-step programs, these barriers have been called “stinkin’ thinkin’” or “old behaviors” or “character defects” and so on. In psychology we assign them different names: “unhealthy coping skills” or “ego-driven life” and a bunch more.

It is fundamentally important for those in early recovery to deal with personal barriers to their recovery. We have lots of information from researchers and from those who have good recovery on what the individual has to do to recover. And we know that when a person is selective about what his recovery will demand, he usually runs into trouble. As we’ve remarked many times, one of the most common things we hear from alumni who have slipped is that they did not follow their aftercare plans. They decided, against all evidence, that they really didn’t need a support network or that they could go back to their old environment, and so on.

There are lots of barriers to being objective about information. Some examples: playing the victim of others (I can’t be the author of my life because my family won’t let me), living life lamenting the past (“what if” or “if only”), wallowing in self-pity (I don’t deserve a good life, so none of the scientific research applies to me), I can’t handle cravings (I have no self-control), I can still drink because cocaine was my drug of choice (neuroscience doesn’t apply to me), I can’t handle curveballs in life because that’s just who I am (even though the information tells me that this is a learned coping skill, in my case it’s my personality), and so on and so on.

Addiction physician Dr. Donald Hedges believes that fear is the primary motivator of addictive behavior and the greatest barrier in recovery. Many agree with him: fear of financial insecurity, fear of success, fear of responsibility, and so on. At Sunshine Coast we would say that the greatest fear of someone in early recovery is the fear of change. If you are motivated by fear, then you will likely be skeptical of information that might truly help you.

Conclusion

Confirmation bias, confirming preconceived ideas and discounting accurate information that goes against those beliefs, is powerful. This is because change is difficult. And, if you are a Sunshine Coast alumni, you learned that changing the way you make sense of yourself and how you fit in the world around you is very difficult. But recovery demands change.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health, talks about “P.I.L.T.” or the “Purpose in Life Test” and why finding your prupose in life is a very personal decision.

Goeff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses psychologist Dr. Paul Wong’s belief that happiness is a result of positive relationships with others.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses one of the keys to spirituality being a sense of hope which goes hand in hand with the importance of hope in addiction recovery.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses having courage when facing your own fears, and why this may result in a happier life.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses why it is important to identify what is meaningful to you and then act in a way that allows you to pursue those things you value, rather than acting against them.

By Geoff Thompson
Program Director
Sunshine Coast Health Center

Spirituality is a hot topic today. Bookstores are filled with works on ‘Mindfulness’, ‘Purpose-driven life’, Ekert Tolle’s and Wayne Dyer’s bestsellers, and so on. In this blog article, we’ll examine a little more in depth the nature of spirituality.

There is good reason to spend some time thinking about spirituality. If you are involved in the 12-step program, then you know that Bill Wilson considered alcoholism a “spiritual” disorder, which required a “spiritual” solution. If you are a fan of psychology, then you know that cutting-edge research has concluded that good recovery is linked with ‘spirituality’—and poor recovery with a lack of ‘spirituality’.

So, everyone agrees that ‘spirituality’ is very important to live a great life in recovery. The problem is that nobody seems to be able to tell us what exactly this ‘spirituality’ thing is.

In a previous article, we looked at two ideas that seem to have something to do with ‘spirituality’. Alumni talked about their experiences with coincidences that seemed to be more than just accidental (synchronicity), and Joseph Campbell said that when you live the life that is true to you, then you will feel as if “hidden hands” are helping you along. We also chose three common things about ‘spirituality’ that just about everyone agrees with: spirituality is a good thing, it inspires hope for the future, it is a way of living.

In this article, we’ll look at the idea that the power of spirituality is that it allows people to live a personally meaningful life. This won’t surprise alumni who were at Sunshine Coast when we put the new program in place, which emphasizes the importance of meaning and purpose in life.

The new treatment model is called ‘meaning-centered therapy’, developed by Dr. Paul Wong. Wong believes that spirituality can provide a way to live meaningfully. And he’s not alone. As one example, the Association of American Medical Colleges Consensus Conference for Spirituality and Health defined spirituality as “every person’s inherent search for ultimate meaning and purpose in life.” So even the medical doctors are on board with this.

Here’s the basic idea: There is ‘something’ going on in the world beyond what you and I see in everyday life, some sort of benevolent force that provides order to life. If you discover this ‘something’, then you realize very quickly that there is a lot more to life than the limited, narrow-minded view many have in active addiction. By joining with this Force, we find a sense of belonging. We realize that life is valuable and worthwhile. Being spiritual means that we join with the Force.

Suffering as Part of Spirituality

If spirituality is acceptance that there is something ‘bigger’ happening in life, then even the suffering in life must have some sort of meaning. There must be some sort of logic in the experience of suffering.

Psychologist Ken Hart has just completed a very interesting research project on addiction and spirituality. Part of the study was to test Viktor Frankl’s idea that happiness depends on finding meaning in suffering. And Hart’s research data indicated that Frankl was right. Those who found meaning in their drug-induced suffering had a better quality of life than did those who dismissed their suffering as merely a place of pain and misery—that is, suffering was of no value and had no purpose.

Last year, we asked alumni at Sunshine Coast Health Center to tell us their thoughts on their personal experience of hitting bottom. The answers were remarkable. Those who avoided thinking about their suffering or who dismissed the drug days were all struggling in their recovery. But those who told us that they realized that hitting bottom was a necessary step on their journey to happiness were all doing well.

Knowing this, Sunshine Coast counsellors are concerned when they hear a client say: ‘I don’t want to think about the old days; I’m starting a new life’. We worry because psychology tells us that their lives will actually improve if they reflect on their old way of life and make some sense of it.

Here are three ways our alumni have made sense of the old days in active addiction. Some see it as a gift: “I would never have known how amazing life could be if I didn’t hit bottom.” This is the idea that you have to go to Hell to find Heaven. Some see it as part of a meaningful life: “I should have been dead a hundred times; there must be some reason why I’m still on this Earth.” Some see it as a necessary step to wake up to life: “When I hit bottom, I realized that I’d better get on with living.”

At Sunshine Coast, we remind clients that this was what happened to actor Christopher Reeve when he broke his spine, to Viktor Frankl at Auschwitz concentration camp, to many people when they were diagnosed with cancer or HIV, and so on. These people were not victims of their biology or circumstances because they “tapped into their spiritual core,” as Frankl put it.

Those people who have no ‘bigger’ picture of their lives believe that suffering is 100 percent pain. Self-proclaimed spiritual people, such as Frankl, are able to find meaning in suffering—in other words, because of spirituality, suffering is much more than just pain.

Spirituality is Attitude, Experience, Creativity

Frankl helped us understand some of the concrete, daily activities that are part of ‘spirituality’. If it’s true that the essential component of spirituality is that it provides meaning in life, then there are specific things you can do to achieve this. According to Frankl, you need three things: develop a positive attitude, experience what life has to offer, make the world a little better place to live. 

You need a positive attitude. Silly as it may sound, we need to see the cup half-full, not half-empty. We ask our alumni to think back to their time at Sunshine Coast. They may remember all the remarkable people they met, or they may still cringe at all the irritating stuff such as people not doing chores, showing up late, pushing their buttons, and so on. There is no scientific reason why we should choose the good over the bad, but Frankl says that remembering the good stuff is necessary for happiness.

Secondly, we need to experience life. In active addiction, we find that our clients often wandered through the universe with blinders on. The things they paid attention to revolved around the drug: how to get it, how to avoid feeling guilty about using, how keep out of trouble at work and home over the drug use, and so on. It’s really quite a pathetic life when you think about it.

According to Frankl, you have to start taking things from the world. Watching a child smile, going to a football game, listening to their favorite songs, watching a good movie, watching a sunset, etc, are all ways of taking something from the world. We are not the child smiling or the one playing professional football or the musician or the movie director or the sunset. But our lives are enriched by paying attention to these blessings.

Thirdly, we have to give something to the world. If we find a cure for cancer, that’s great. But for most of us this means being a good father, friend, employer/employee, lover, neighbor, citizen, member of a congregation, etc. These are what Frankl called acts of creativity.

If we can put these three things together in a way that is personal, then, according to Frankl, we will be living a personally meaningful life. And the byproduct of this life is happiness. Perhaps attitude, experience, and creativity are three components of what it means to be ‘spiritual’.

Spirituality is Living for more than Yourself

Spirituality is often interpreted as recognizing that all of us are in this thing called ‘life’ together. If we believe in a religious God, then we recognize that everyone is created in His image. In 12-step programs, a common saying is, “God doesn’t make mistakes.” If spirituality is based on some idea of Nature, then we may recognize that we are part of nature. In other words, spirituality offers a sense of belonging to a greater whole. 

If we recognize that we belong to a greater reality, then we might follow psychologist Paul Wong’s advice and “not live life just for ourselves.” Dr. Wong believes that happiness is a result of positive relationships with others. He’s a great believer that happiness depends on living life not only for yourself but for others.

Here’s an example we hear from Sunshine Coast alumni. Those who are thriving in their recovery have figured out how to live for more then themselves. Some are now little-league coaches, some have used their jobs as an opportunity to help their community by setting up Eco projects, some have volunteered at the SPCA or seniors’ home, some have become involved in 12-step volunteer activities, and so on.

A warning. Some alumni seem to have lived their lives only for others. This is also not a good idea. We talk to our alumni who tell us that they are craving drugs again because their family is on their case. Attempting to control the family, they choose their words careful so as not to “give my wife an excuse” to criticize, they go to meetings to “keep the family off my back,” etc. In other words, they give up being true to themselves to appease others. This is definitely not what Dr. Wong means when he says to live life beyond yourself.

Most alumni who are struggling in recovery are usually living life only for themselves. They have pursued a job because it would give them lots of money. Others sit in the house hoping that the phone will ring, others are so wrapped up in a blanket of their own depression or anger that they have little interaction with others, others are too afraid to take risks of setting boundaries or take risks even to challenge their fears.

Spirituality is Making Sense of Life

Aaron Antonovsky recognized that some people are much better able to cope with stress and challenges better than others. Those who did not seem to be resilient often fell ill to disease and suffering. But those who had resilience had fewer health problems and more happiness in life. So he studied what it was about people that made them better able to cope with life’s problems.

He concluded that the key was ‘meaning’. They were able to make sense of their lives in a way that worked for them. Those who were not able to make sense of their lives fell victim to stress and challenge. He called this a Sense of Coherence or SOC. If someone believes his life is predictable, manageable, and worth emotional investment, then Antonovsky says the person has a high SOC. On the other hand, if he finds his life confusing, unpredictable, unmanageable, and not really worth an effort to save it, then Antonovsky says he has a low SOC.

He even developed a test to measure SOC. Interestingly, researchers discovered that SOC and spirituality were closely related. Those who scored high on SOC tests also scored high on spirituality. Those who scored low on SOC tests also scored low on spirituality.

Based on this research it seems reasonable to say that someone who is ‘spiritual’ also makes sense of his life in a way that leads to happiness. He finds life predictable, manageable, and worth living and fighting for.

It should be no surprise that the SOC test has been used extensively in recovery, and research has shown that those who score high on SOC also do well in recovery. Go figure, eh…