The Forgotten 6 th & 7 th Steps:

Transcription

1 Leadem Counseling & Consulting Services, P.C. 668 Commons Way, Bldg. I Toms River, NJ (732) The Forgotten 6 th & 7 th Steps: Restructuring the Relationship with Self Presented By: John & Elaine Leadem

2 The Steps that Were Forgotten The Forgotten 6 th & 7 th Steps Step 6 Were entirely ready for God to remove all these defects of character. Step 7 Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

3 Addiction & Recovery Are Both Progressive The Story of Relapse Prevention The story of relapse prevention begins with an understanding of the progressive nature of addiction. The progression of addiction reflects a deterioration process that is first spiritual, then emotional, and lastly physical.

4 Spiritual Health is a Journey The recovery process reverses the order and spiritual well-being is the last to develop. If the object of the addictive process is a symptom of a spiritual sickness, as we are told, then the addict s spiritual health is critical to relapse prevention.

5 is but a symptom. It is imperative that we help our clients understand that the object of their addiction is but a symptom of an underlying spiritual problem. The spiritual aspects of recovery are the last to develop because they represent the core of the addictive process.

6 Putting the Cork in the Jug is Only the Beginning Our liquor was but a symptom. When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically. We have a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Excerpts from pg. 64 in Alcoholics Anonymous, 1953

7 Addiction Will Make Every Problem Worse A Spiritual Malady Before addiction there is usually a life story that provides a fertile environment for the growth of our defects of character. When that life story is combined with the problems caused by our defects a spiritual sickness develops. The addict will try to medicate this pain in ways social users don't have the stomach for. The addict will seek relief to the point of jails, institutions and death.

8 One is the Loneliest Number The health of the addict s spiritual condition would appear to have much to do with the manner in which the challenges of life are handled and harmony with others is maintained.

9 Forgotten or Ignored? The 6 th and 7 th Steps will have the greatest impact on the addict s ability to cope with life and live in harmony with others if they are not forgotten or ignored. They continue the surrender process that began in the 1 st Step, and continued through the 3 rd & 5 th Steps.

10 Three Key Reasons 6 & 7 Are the Forgotten Steps The Forgotten or Ignored Steps 1. Many do not understand that the defects of character are a manifestation of the underlying spiritual condition that the addict seeks to medicate. 2. After completing Steps 3 & 5 the relief can fade into complacency when the client avoids the work of character change by explaining that they are not as bad as I used to be! 3. Many will view the 6 th Step as a reflective step rather than the process step that it is. The process Steps: 2, 4, 6, 8 are followed by action Steps 3, 5, 7, 9.

11 Defects of Character Begin as Adaptive Tools An Underlying Spiritual Condition Defects of character generally develop prior to the onset of an addictive disorder. 1. Defects begin as aids for coping with emotionally stressful life experiences and appear adaptive because they serve to reduce stress or to enhance the perceived quality of our life.

12 Role of Character Defects in Spiritual Sickness Defects of character generally develop prior to the onset of an addictive disorder. 2. These adaptive aids eventually appear to mutate into personality deficits when they fail to insulate us from the emotional challenges of life and begin to cause us problems that diminish the quality of our lives.

13 Defects of Character Fuel the Addictive Process The addictive substance or process does not cause defects of character it intensifies them. 1. In vino veritas: in wine [there is the] truth. 2. The belief that all the addict s behaviors could be tied to symptoms of an active addiction contributed to the fact that most addiction treatment professionals from the 70 s and 80 s failed to address co-morbid conditions in general and sex addiction in specific.

14 Denial Blocks Awareness Not Pain Why can t he see what he is doing to himself? 1. The addicted person s defects of character fuel the system of rationalizations and justifications that serve as the foundation of what Vernon E. Johnson called the Delusional System in his pioneering work in I ll Quit Tomorrow (1973). 2. Johnson believed that the addicted person s denial system would blind the addicted person from seeing what loved one s saw all too clearly.

15 Defects of Character: Obstacles to Emotional Sobriety Defects of character impair self-awareness and prevent the maturation needed to acquire healthy interpersonal coping skills that contribute to the vital task of Restructuring the Relationship with Self as described by Patrick Carnes in the Recovery Zone, Volume 1 (2009). True emotional sobriety will escape the recovering person who avoids undertaking the personality changes reflected in the 6 th and 7 th Steps.

16 6 th & 7 th Steps Help Build Character Bill W., AA co-founder, reflects in a 1958 Grapevine article, titled The Next Frontier-- Emotional Sobriety, that he hoped future AA s would learn: How to translate a right mental conviction into a right emotional result, and so into easy, happy and good living. Well, that's not only the neurotic's problem, it's the problem of life itself for all of us who have got to the point of real willingness to hew to right principles in all our affairs.

17 Surrendering Defects While Bill W. does not specifically reference defects of character he closes with direction and hope: If we examine every disturbance we have, great or small, we will find at the root of it some unhealthy dependence and its consequent demand. Let us, with God s help, continually surrender these hobbling demands. Then we can be set free to live and love: we may then be able to gain emotional sobriety. Grapevine, A.A., January 1958,Vol. 14 No. 8

18 Building Emotional Bonds It will become increasingly more difficult to develop the social and emotional bonds in recovery that are needed to replace the object of an addictive process if one s defects of character are left unchallenged because authentic relationships require honesty with self and others.

19 Defects of Character: Catalysts for Relapse Unbridled defects of character can eventually generate the depth and breadth of emotional discomfort that equals or exceeds the cost once levied by active addiction. 1. The person I was will relapse again. 2. My worse day of recovery is better than my best day in my addiction.

20 Pink Clouds Can Bring Storms A Daily Reprieve The freedom that follows the 3 rd and 5 th Steps can generate a sense of well-being that leaves the recovering person, who believes the work is over on a pink cloud. Alcoholics Anonymous suggests lasting benefits will be enjoyed from the 3 rd Step: As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of His presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow or the hereafter. Excerpts from pg. 63 in Alcoholics Anonymous, 1953

21 It does not get any better than this. The 5 th Step experience opens the door to a greatly enhanced spiritual life: Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing, we are delighted. We can look the world in the eye. We can be alone at perfect peace and ease. Our fears fall from us. We begin to feel the nearness of our Creator. We may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now we begin to have a spiritual experience. Excerpts from pg. 75 in Alcoholics Anonymous, 1953

22 Call to Action These rewards are heralded by scores of recovering addicts at 12 Step meetings all over the world. It is important to remember that both the 3 rd and 5 th Steps are followed by thundering calls to action in Steps 4 and 6.

23 Whew! I want to coast for a while. Potential for Complacency The progression through the first 5 Steps can be a difficult process that many people will want to recuperate from. For some the period of convalescence will become a permanent vacation from the Steps. The addict has a built in forgetter and can fail to heed the axiom that the program is the Steps and if you drop the Steps you have no program.

24 Time for Action Step 6 is a Process Step The Step s reference to having become willing suggests that there are lessons learned or tasks undertaken that brought us to the surrender to ask our Higher Power to remove our shortcomings. The 6 th Step is more than an awareness of our need to undertake personality changes. It has real value as an action step and little value as a meditative reflection about what we might need to change.

25 Believing Does Not Make it So Simply recognizing life would be better if we made deep changes will not do it. Patrick Carnes, Recovery Zone, Volume 1, 2009

26 The Cost of Addiction Revealed When the object of the addiction is removed you discover a greater truth about yourself and the role that your drug of choice played in your life. 1. If you want the addict to see what the addictive substance or addictive behavior is doing to him provide unlimited access to the drug of choice and eventually he will see what others have known.

27 Became willing Addictive substances or behaviors create mood altering experiences that are intended to change the way we feel and fill the void, for a time, that is left when our defects of character fail to do the job they once did. 1. If you want the addict to see what the addictive substance or addictive behavior is doing for him remove the drug of choice.

28 Tools for Relapse Prevention Potential Benefits Derived There are many potential benefits to completing the 6th Step that are explored in depth in a Gentle Path publication to be released later this year whose working title is The 6th Step Guide to Character Building: Restructuring the Relationship with Self, (Leadem, 2010). The prime benefit of undertaking this character building in Steps 6 and 7 is in the tools for relapse prevention.

29 Relapse ends with an event and begins with a process. The Relapse Process An Ounce of Prevention: A Course in Relapse Prevention describes 5 phases in a relapse process that can develop in reaction to a failure to address discomfort in an adaptive rather than maladaptive way. The addict s failure to develop healthy responses to emotional discomfort is directly tied to unchallenged defects of character.

30 Relapse is preventable. A relapse into active addiction is a preventable syndrome and not a predictable aspect of recovery. An excerpt from An Ounce of Prevention: A Course in Relapse Prevention Leadem, 2010

31 The Five Phases of a Relapse Acting Out Seems like a good thing to do at the time Uncomfortable Feeling We act out to change the way we feel Time Travel The person I was will drink again Our feelings never know what time it is Fragmentation Dry Drunk Broken mirrors distort reality Eliminating the Witnesses Someone needs to pay for this Loss of true self Gathering Justification This diagram is taken from An Ounce of Prevention: A Course in Relapse Prevention Leadem, 2010

32 It seemed like a good thing to do at the time. Uncomfortable Feelings: We relapse with a design on changing the way we feel. If we use our defects of character to alter our mood the work in progress becomes a work in regression.

33 Phase 1 Time Travel: When we don t address our discomfort, feeling memories from the past can flood our current reality and make it difficult for us to maintain objectivity about what we are experiencing in the moment.

34 Phase 2 Fragmentation: Our insides do not match our outsides. The way we Think, Feel, Act, and Speak are not congruent and it makes it very difficult for others to know when we are in trouble or for them to get through our defenses.

35 Phase 3 Gathering Justification: Everyone who relapses must find a way to make it OK. The recovering person will develop a justification for a relapse. It may appear that there is no warning but that is only because the denial process can be intense.

36 Phase 4 Eliminating the Witnesses: The person on their way to a relapse will have to eliminate the witnesses to avoid seeing clearly what is going on and we cannot change what we cannot see.

37 Phase 5 Dry Drunk: "Dry drunk" episodes usually increase in frequency and intensity before a return to active addiction occurs.

38 The Names Don t Matter but the Behaviors Do Active Rather Than Reflective Model for Character Change 1. Naming the Defect: Give the defect of character a name or identify a phrase to describe the pattern of behaviors that you have developed for coping with uncomfortable emotions, situations, or people that you will ask to have removed by your Higher Power. Actions taken from: The 6th Step Guide to Character Building: Restructuring the Relationship with Self, (Leadem, 2010).

39 A Few Defects with Many Symptoms 2. Identifying the Common Symptoms (manifestations): Most of us will have but a handful of defects of character that present as somewhat different from each other, depending upon the situation in which they surface. Describe the common manifestations of the defect of character as it reveals itself in the various areas of your life e.g. romantic relationships, work relationships, 12 Step meetings, school, etc.

40 Review the Cost 3. Reviewing the Bill: List the problems (costs) in your life, both past and present, which the defect has caused or worsened. This task is not intended to be a repeat of your 4th Step, but rather an exercise to lay down an outline of what the defect has cost you so others can help to monitor your behavior. It is intended to answer the questions: what has the behavior associated with my defect of character cost me in the past? What costs am I still paying in the present? What are the costs that I can expect to pay in the future if I do not take action?

41 Doing the Same Things Over & Over 4. Assessing the Payoff: List the benefits you have derived, both past and present, from the defect under examination. Many of us are quick to say, There are no benefits... this defect is killing me. But the reality is there must be some way that you are benefitting from the behaviors associated with the defect or you would not continue to act in that way.

42 and the wisdom to know the difference. 5. The Things We Must Change: Identify the behaviors that you can eliminate that are related to the defect under examination. This task is intended to prepare a offering to the God of your understanding in the 7 th Step when you humbly ask for the shortcomings you have identified to be removed. It is not enough to say, I am just not going to do it anymore, as most of us have tried that numerous times in the past without relief. This task will help you identify the behaviors that will have to be eliminated if you are to resist the lure of the defect of character.

43 Filling the Hole in the Donut 6. Replacement Behaviors: The behaviors that have been marked for elimination must be replaced with actions that will promote emotional health and spiritual well-being. This task will help you to identify the behaviors you will need to introduce into your recovery plan in order to fill the holes created by those you are ready to give up to the God of your understanding.

44 Therapist s Role: A Guide Through Steps 6 & 7 The Therapeutic Process 1. The therapeutic relationship will be able to help the client identify the nature of the client s defects of character. 2. The therapeutic relationship can play a critical role in supporting the client as he works to overcome the obstacles to completing the 6 th Step. 3. The therapeutic relationship will have gathered a great deal of information about the client s intrapersonal and interpersonal coping strategies and will be of immense value in developing healthy replacement behaviors.

45 Poem By: The Guy in the Glass Peter "Dale" Winbrow Sr