Stopping an unhealthy addiction follows the four main phases associated with the learning process.

• The first phase is building your awareness as to why you need to learn something new; for example, wanting to end the destructive cycle of an addictive lifestyle.

• The second phase is investing time to learn the ways/methods to accomplish what you want to do, i.e., by attending a treatment facility to learn how to live an addiction-free life.

• The third phase is taking your new knowledge and skills and practicing what you learned in a “live”, diverse  social environment - an environment outside of a residential treatment center.

• The fourth and final phase is developing your new mindset and skills into efficient habits so they are carried out effortlessly and routinely. Take a closer look into the phases of learning in APPENDIX 1F.​

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A recovery center can be likened to a dress rehearsal for a play. Think about the practice that goes into the production. Think about the growing tension as you move from the final dress rehearsal to the opening night performance. “Break a leg or good luck” is nice to hear before you go on stage, but will a well-wish really impact your reality on opening night? (“Luck” happens when preparedness meets opportunity.) Opening night jitters are replaced with boldness as you confidently manage your emotions while you perform your role as designed. Look at rehearsals as the controlled environment, much like a residential rehab center, under which you learn and practice the performance standards necessary to resemble the character you are assigned to play - i.e., yourself without an addiction.

 

When opening night arrives, you replace fear with courage as you perform what you learned in front of a live audience. The temporary tension you feel as you learn to manage your emotions while performing your part in the play starts to dissipate the more repeat performances you do. You'll continue to get feedback on your performance from both your director and the audience but you use it to fine-tune your upcoming live performances. When you receive positive reinforcement for performing what you learned, you are more likely to repeat and maintain that behavior, solidifying your desired skills. (As opposed to hecklers in the audience that may think your "performance" isn't up to their standards.)

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The transition between graduating from a recovery center and establishing your new normal lifestyle- life without addiction in a diverse social setting - is a similar process and should be looked at by you as just another phase involved in your recovery. In the recovery center, you focused on the psychological components of overcoming an unhealthy addiction, amid a like-minded social group. Your goal now is to take the private success you’ve experienced in this environment and make it a public success too. While you learned the rehabilitation how to’s in this rehearsal setting, once the live performances begin, you need to perform these new skills in front of a diverse audience while still performing the standards of what you learned, despite the feedback you receive from the crowd. As you do, and with positive reinforcement and repeat performances, you become more confident and efficient so that these new skills become deeply engrained habits that make up part of your new normal routine.

 

A "live performance" or the social aspect of living, is too often overlooked in the recovery process. The social aspect of your addiction recovery can't be taken for granted. Deciding how to act in public is a psychological and social balancing act that requires a humble yet confident faith. Everyone experiences “opening night jitters”. It comes from a natural transition between the first two and the last two phases in the learning process. Tension, the nervous energy generated from change, can motivate performance if and when you let it. Learning to channel this energy productively is the difference between performance tension and anxiety (read more about cognitive consistency and dissonance in "The Art of Self-Mastery)". When passion collides with purpose, direction is given to that energy and channels it into confident action. Recovering successfully from an unhealthy addiction needs faith to fuel hope - uniting passion and purpose! ​