This post is about addiction recovery approaches that are realistic and make a lot of common sense.

This is a guest post by Patrick of the Spiritual River, a website about overcoming drug and alcohol addiction. When I said “yes” to Patrick’s idea for a guest post I had no idea it would be such a meaningful addition to Aim for Awesome. I really enjoyed this - you will too. Read on!

Now most of you reading this are probably not addicted to drugs and alcohol. So what does recovery have to do with you and your life? A lot, if you are willing to take a look at a few simple concepts and apply them to your own growth and development.

So let’s take a look at how the principles of recovery can potentially help anyone, including you:

Recovery Demands Creation

Most people probably believe that overcoming addiction is about putting down the drugs and the alcohol. They believe it is primarily an act of elimination, thinking that success is driven by leaving the chemicals alone.

This is not the case. Recovery is creation.

The recovering addict or alcoholic is literally creating a new life for themselves. Because they have been using drugs and alcohol for so long, their default state of being is to abuse chemicals. So if they are not actively engaged in creation, they will revert back to their former life. This is called relapse.

Recovery from drugs and alcohol is the continuous reinvention of oneself. Regardless of what recovery program a person might follow, they are involved with creation. This will generally involve holding a vision for one’s life and then striving to meet that vision. The whole key to a new life is through purposeful creation and passionate living. Without this, the addict will simply revert back to their old ways.

How you can apply this: Anyone can use creation in their life. Anyone who is just floating through life without any real goals or purpose should consider the idea of creation as a means to help them live with more passion and meaning in their life.

Perhaps you are in a dead-end job or you are stuck in a relationship that is going nowhere. Whatever your situation is, you are ultimately responsible to create a new life for yourself. No one is going to come along and hand you a brand new life. You have to create it for yourself.

If you have a goal or vision for how you want your life to be then start moving towards that goal with positive action.

Mandatory for Overcoming Addiction - You Must Aim for Awesome

Everyone who tries to overcome an addiction fails on their first try. This is true nearly 100 percent of the time. This is because nearly everyone underestimates what it will take to beat their addiction.

With most things in our life, a modest effort gets us modest results. Not true with recovery, as it is strictly a pass/fail proposition. If the addict takes just one drink or drug, it’s all over. Back to square one. So a modest effort in recovery almost always results in a huge failure. Our mistakes are amplified due to the nature of addiction.

The key then, is to use the principle of overwhelming force. If you want to beat addiction then you have to aim for awesome. Whatever you think it is going to take to keep you clean and sober, triple that effort and add 10. Now you are in the neighborhood of the kind of effort it really takes to beat an addiction. This is one of the “secrets” of beating addiction - that it is a lot of hard work and you have to take action and make a supreme effort.

How you can apply this: If you have an ultimate goal or vision for your life then clearly outline it and then attack it with overwhelming force. Don’t settle. Use unlimited time and energy with which to pursue your highest goal. Don’t just aim to meet your goal… completely dominate it with overwhelming force. This is how the big stuff in life gets accomplished and that goes for beating an addiction as well. Use the idea to tackle your own goals.

Overcoming Addiction Requires Raising Your Awareness

Success in recovery demands a higher awareness. Why is this the case? Because addicts used drugs for so long that getting high became an automatic response to everything. You can’t walk through the minefield of recovery with this same level of consciousness and expect to be successful. Therefore, recovery demands that you raise your awareness.

This is why most recovery programs suggest techniques such as meditation and personal inventories. In active addiction, medicating ourselves with chemicals became a very barbaric activity, similar to an animal that devours food. In recovery, mindfulness reverses this trend and elevates us to a higher plane of existence.

How you can apply this: Regardless of what you’re trying to accomplish in your life, raising your awareness can only help you to achieve your goals. Along with regular mindfulness, practicing some honest self-assessment can also help you become more effective by examining your strengths and weaknesses.

Recovery Encourages a Holistic Approach

Addiction is a complex disease that affects the whole person. It doesn’t just alter someone physically, but it also breaks them down mentally, disrupts their social bonds, kills their spiritual side, and disrupts them emotionally as well. Addiction affects the whole person. So it makes sense to treat the whole person.

Spiritual solutions fall short. A holistic approach is required to properly treat the recovering addict.

For example, most addicts in recovery underestimate the power of exercise and the profound effect it can have on their well-being. It’s not initially clear to an addict how regular exercise can help them to stay clean and sober in the long run unless they jump in with both feet and start doing it. It is only in retrospect that the true benefits of a holistic approach become clear. When we grow and progress in all areas of our lives, it has a cumulative effect that far exceeds our expectations. This is the power of the holistic approach.

How you can apply this: Regardless of what you’re trying to accomplish in your life, raising your awareness can only help you to achieve your goals. Along with regular mindfulness, practicing some honest self-assessment can also help you become more effective by examining your strengths and weaknesses.

Recovery Necessitates Giving Back and Helping Others

There is a saying in traditional recovery programs: “You have to give it away to keep it.” This means that we have to carry the message of recovery to other addicts if we are going to stay sober ourselves. The reason for this is because the act of reaching out and helping others with addiction is so incredibly powerful in helping ourselves. In particular, helping others in recovery:

1) Reinforces what we need to do ourselves to stay sober. Helping others is both teaching and learning.

2) Produces good feelings for having helped someone out.

3) Forces us to grow ourselves in order to set an example for those we are helping.

4) Boosts our self esteem and helps us to care for ourselves more.

It is not clear to most people how helping others will directly benefit themselves, but in doing so, all of these benefits and more are realized.

How you can apply this: Reach out and help others. This will benefit you as listed above and also give your life deeper meaning and purpose. When you help others it makes a real difference and that becomes very empowering.

Bringing it all together

So here is the helpful take away for you:

1) Create. Use creation to make a new life for yourself. Strive towards your vision.

2) Aim for awesome. Use overwhelming force to dominate your goals.

3) Raise your awareness. Use mindfulness to guide you in your life.

4) Use a holistic approach. Grow in all areas of your life.

5) Help others. That’s the win-win that empowers everyone.

Patrick is the author of the Spiritual River. Give him a visit if you want to learn how to help an alcoholic.

In this video podcast or video blog (vlog)I I talk about what I see as the two major types of meditation. There are meditation systems which encompasses a very large, rule-filled system for meditation and there is simple meditation that is almost a pure physical effort without any of the fluff.

Video 3, Meditation: Two Types >

This is a .wmv file and plays with Windows Media Player. The file is about 41MB in size and runs for 37 minutes. This is the largest video - and they likely won’t be this large again. I wish someone could invent the magic video compression codec that gives me 30 minutes at just 1MB.

If you want your audio to sound better, try to copy the settings (in general) from the equalizer image below for Windows Media Player. Vern sounds best at these settings or raising the left side up just a little overall.

Here is a short video about the temple I filmed the video above at. It’s called, “Wat Tum Sang Phet” and is located in Krabi, Thailand. They are developing it to include a road around the limestone karst lined with fruit trees and vegetables. They’ll likely have cave tours. It’s a really quiet Buddhist temple and the abbot there is very kind - always inviting me in for tea and fruit when he sees me.

Wat Tum Sang Phet, Krabi, Thailand >

This video is 9MB and about 8:40 in length.

Enjoy!

Best of Life!

Vern

A cave at the Buddhist temple “Wat Tum Sang Phet”

Over 10 years ago when I started meditating I was in a state of mind where I didn’t want to follow a religion. I didn’t see any truth in religion as many of the beliefs require faith in something that I cannot prove or disprove. I’m a very logical person and faith in the supernatural does not happen for me, unless I experience it directly.

I became interested in Buddhism in about 1995 I think it was. I’ve read a lot about Buddhism over the past 10+ years and I have come to see that there are really 2 types or lines of thought about what Buddhism is. Even here in Thailand there are two camps so to speak.

2. The second type are those that believe in the whole -ism. The whole ball of wax including the hundreds of rules for monks and everything that Buddha and all the important meditators and Buddhists after him said and did. The Buddhist machine here in Thailand is huge and very rich. Superstition plays a large part in Buddhism here and most Buddhists believe that if they give money to the local temple they will earn karma points and go on to better things in this life and in the next life.

Westerners tend to be of this variety. Well heck, the majority of people tend to be of this variety. People love to follow a system and to compare their system to others. They love to talk about their religion and debate all the little points in it. It gives them something to do that they think is worthy of their time and effort.

Buddhadassa Bhikkhu called this type of Buddhism the “tumor” that has distracted us from what Buddhism truly is.

1. The first type of Buddhism is the simple, believe nothing until you try it for yourself line of thinking. I really like this style of Buddhism. Buddha said, believe nothing you hear if it doesn’t jive with your experience. He cautioned people not to believe what HE said without trying it out and finding the truth in it. This means we’re free to experiment with meditation and about anything in the realm of Buddhism on our own. It means we need not follow the entire game of Buddhism and all that has been built up around it to call ourselves ‘Buddhist’.

Buddhadassa Bhikku, founder of Suan Mokkh Buddhist temple in Chaiya, Thailand was someone that believed Buddhism was vastly different from the other religions of the world. He even wrote a book, “No Religion” which details his view on the subject. It’s a very small book and given away freely here in Thailand. Occasionally you can find it at Buddhist temples in the USA. Another of his books which illustrates his ideas about the right kind of Buddhism is, “Handbook for Mankind.” You can download the free PDF version of this book at Buddhanet’s page here. Scroll down to find it. This is a quote from that book…

“The real Buddhism is not books, not manuals, not word for word repetition from the Tipitaka, nor is it rites and rituals. These are not the real Buddhism. The real Buddhism is the practice, by way of body, speech and mind that will destroy the defilements, in part or completely. One need not have anything to do with books or manuals. One ought not to rely on rites and rituals, or anything else external, including spirits and celestial beings. “

And another…

“Buddhism does not demand conjecture or supposition; it demands that we act in accordance with what our own insight reveals and not take anyone elses word for anything. If someone comes and tells us something, we must not believe him without question. We must listen to his statement and examine it. Then if we find it reasonable, we may accept it provisionally and set about trying to verify it for ourselves. This is a key feature of Buddhism, which distinguishes it sharply from other world religions.”

In this video I talk more about Buddhism and the two lines of thought about what Buddhism really is, and what I believe in personally.

Video 2, Buddhism… Two Basic Lines of Belief >

This is a .wmv file and plays with Windows Media Player. The file is about 9MB in size and runs for 22 minutes. This was an experiment at the smaller resolution - 176×144. Future videos will be at 320×240 which will be much bigger!

If you want your audio to sound better, try to copy the settings (in general) from the equalizer image below for Windows Media Player. Vern sounds best at these settings… though in this particular video - the sound from the first 4 minutes is not good. It gets better. I’ve learned something about compressing the video that small!

Enjoy!

Best of Life!

Vern

Psst: I almost forgot, below is a photo of where I shot the video today - awesome place!

This is my first attempt at video for the Aim for Awesome site. I know what I want, but I don’t know how to get there yet. I noticed in this first video I’m too mellow for the first part, I’d like to get more energized like around the 9:30 minute mark you’ll see that I’ve changed delivery quite a bit. I know how to fix that for the future - shoot a few takes first and get comfortable with talking to the camera.

Talking to a video camera is not an easy thing. It’s not easy to pretend it’s a friend you’re talking to at Barnes & Noble… but eventually it feels comfortable enough at some point and the video starts to work.

Questioning your religious beliefs is something I feel very strongly about. I went from Catholic to Christian to Buddhist to nothing and maybe swinging back around toward Buddhism at the present. But a basic form of Buddhism that pretty much consists of: Try it. If it works, use it. If it doesn’t work, toss it.

At some point the Buddha said:

“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.”

So many times I see people go through life playing the game of whatever religion they were indoctrinated into without questioning it.

They never ask themselves…  Where did it come from? Is it the perfect truth?

A serious effort, a no holds-barred questioning and critique of your religious beliefs is called for. It’s a must. Your religion is the ultimate guide for your life. The one that holds the keystone to your beliefs, thoughts, decisions, actions, how you treat others and yourself… your career… and the meaning you derive from life. Your religion better be up to the challenge. It better be PURE truth or it’s not good enough.

In this questioning your religion video I cover:

• My experience with religion and how I went about questioning and challenging my religious beliefs over the years.
• A shot of southern Thailand from almost 1000 feet up a limestone mountain as a storm comes in.
• What I consider the 3 levels of truth or knowledge.
• Why questioning your religion is so important!

Questioning Your Religion, Video 1 >

Best to right click the video and choose “Save target as…” if you’re using FireFox browser or “Save file as” if you’re using IE browser. This video file is .wmv and opens with WIndows Media Player, is about 12 minutes long and about 13Mb in size.

Enjoy it! Comments welcome. Feel free to criticize.  I aim to improve on this first video greatly!

Best of Life!

Vern