Learning to Face Life and Triggers without Flinching
Part II of the Series “Is Relapse Really Inevitable?”
In the first article in this series, we looked at how a person in recovery can overcome the cravings that make one’s attempts to stay sober so difficult—and often miserable as well. We also described the exercises on the Narconon drug rehab program that gradually enable each person to leave the painful, traumatic past behind and move into a bright new future.
We’ll now look at the other barriers to lasting sobriety that need to be addressed to prevent relapse.
Insufficient Ability to Confront
Let’s face it, life has its challenging moments. Someone cuts you off in traffic, takes your parking place, fires you from a job when you were trying your hardest or breaks your heart. When the frustrations get too intense, a person in recovery may simply stop thinking and reach out for that old consolation, his (or her) drug of choice. It can be so automatic that he can have the drug in hand before he even knows what happened.
Preventing relapse from this cause requires a much stronger ability to confront what’s going on in one’s life. If an individual feels incapable of successfully dealing with challenges or communicating with an angry or upset person, he may be badly knocked about by life.
The skill he needs is taught in the first section of the Objectives, described in Part One of this series. At the beginning of this step, each person learns the theory of effective communication and discovers how this skill all by itself can enable a person to overcome this type of challenge. Then the theory is put to work in a series of practical exercises that strengthen each person. Not only does the person become better at using communication in daily life, he also gains an improved ability to confront changes, difficulties and adversity. This ability protects his lasting sobriety.
Susceptibility to Environmental Triggers
Anyone working in rehab knows that triggers are a major challenge for each person in recovery. There are all kinds of techniques for proofing oneself against triggers or working out how to avoid them completely. It’s far better when a person is strong enough to see the trigger and not need to hide from it. Then he then is less able to be surprised or blindsided by a sudden encounter.
This is another time the fundamental ability to confront comes in to play. Those improved communication skills give each person more resistance to triggers as well as a greater ability to deal with all kinds of communication, friendly and unfriendly.
What follows the training in communication is a series of exercises designed to bring a person’s attention out of the past and into the world around him. Trauma, pain, grief, anger, guilt—these are all rooted in the past. As these exercises are completed, the chains that bind a person to past difficulties are loosened. Each person’s attention is freed from the past and they are able to focus on the present and start thinking about the future. With each step forward, triggers have less power over an individual because he is simply more objective about his life.
In the next part of this series, we will talk about the specific Life Skills a person needs to maintain sobriety. We’ll also reveal how the Narconon program develops these skills in each person. Continue reading to gain an understanding of how relapse can be prevented.
