The second way to find the energy to continue in the changes neccessary to treat drug addiction is a healthy diet.

Food is the fuel for the body. How can you have lots of energy with poor fuel?
A 1996 University of California Study on 2000 children in Central America demonstrated:
Undernourishment causes less social interaction due to a lack of mental energy
By providing calories, protein, vitamins, and minerals they observed REVERSES in poor academic performance attributed to poverty
Stated simply, you study better, learn more and socialize more readily with a balanced healthy diet
Brown, J.L. and Pollit, E.,Malnutrition, Poverty and Intellectual Development, 1996, Scientific American, p38-43

This is one of the major reasons to enter a drug rehab. The regular schedule of groups, classes and counseling is interspersed with regular meals. Before entering a drug or alcohol rehab many people have had poor nutrition for years. How can you learn and look forward to a new great life if you have no energy. Exercise and diet as corny as is sounds are essential to success in rehab and success after rehab. Tomorrow we will add the power of a positive mental diet to energy levels. Again in treating drug and alcohol addiction, it is all about fundamentals, changes that will stand the long haul.

So yesterday I discussed the need to two elements to follow through on the changes we wanted in addiction treatment. To pursue our vision without drug and alocohol use we need energy and momentum. First I’ll deal with energy:

Change is work. The more the change, the more work is required. To proceed and follow through on our commitments we require a plan to increase and boost our energy levels
There are at least 3 ways to rapidly increase our energy level
Physical exercise
Healthy diet
Positive mental diet

Physical Exercise

Exercise elicits cortical alertness.

Good aerobic exercise puts your nervous system in a state of moderate arousal, IDEALLY suited for mental tasks.

Exercise relaxes you after experiencing stress.

So working up a good sweat gets your brain ready to work and decreases the energy robbing effect of stress. Could anything be more suited for dealing with drug and alcohol addiction. Mentally alert, more energy, and less stress. This is why all quality drug rehab programs have physical fitness as a major component. The last thing most people want to do in there first week of rehab is workout. It seems though for lot’s of reasons this is precisely what they need to do. So you want to achieve and succeed in your goals, start in the gym.

Staying with the theme of fundamental change as the basis of treatment of drug and alcohol addiction, think of the following questions. Again I want to stress by doing a rehab of our core values and beliefs you can and will make permanent change. Drug and alcohol rehab is always about core change.

How could changing our mental and physical diets and exercising regularly decrease the chances of relapse?
What are some of the common roadblocks to changing our mental and physical diet?
What do you need to do to develop a total vision for changing your body and mind ?

In the last two sessions we have begun work on some rather large areas. One being what is your purpose in your life, and closely tied to that, what is the most ideal work for fulfillment in your life. We have also chosen to work on some of the core beliefs and on strengthening and changing our core values. You have written some specific plans for growth and learning. You may even have made some public declarations of where you are headed.

Putting it all together
Everyone has good ideas
Everyone has good intentions
Everyone, at least on the surface wants to change
So what happens? Why do we start and many times slow down, wilt and fizzle?

Two things are critical if someone is to follow through. After the initial euphoria of deciding where you want to go, and of realizing you can change comes the non-glamorous not so thrilling insight of â??This is a lot of Work!â??
What two things will keep you going until the results start to take shape and you will never want to stop��

First of all, is a high energy level. Change is a series of tasks, and like all tasks, are they easier to accomplish with a lot of energy, or when you are tired and depressed?
Secondly is momentum. Think about daily rituals. When learning something new which is easier, the first day, the second of the thirtieth or the forty-fifth?

Again it may not be easy when in the middle of a severe addictive experience to come up with these. Drugs and alcohol rob you of energy. When constantly living day to day, how can you possibly get any momentum. Again this is why drug and alocohol rehabs are neccessary. Going to a rehab gives you the time, space and safety to start all of these processes I talk about. After leaving a rehab using the momentum for permanent lasting change. You don’t have to relapse, you never have to return to drugs or alcohol. More on energy and momentum tomorrow.

If raising our values and increasing our level of spirituality can really aide in the treatment of drug addiction, how do you do it?

How do you raise your standards? Simple, you decide. Look at where you are, and where you want to be down the road and you raise the expectation for yourself. If you wish to become more truthful, you start with the phrase â??I will be more honest with everyone I meet to-dayâ??. A good way to begin to really integrate it into your life is through meditation, a simple universal practice which cultivates attention and focus. The practice of meditation develops the focus and clarity required to know your real values and to develop them into a spiritual belief system.

Meditation is a fundamental mind sharpening practiceThrough meditation we can start to get to the answers to those difficult questions, like:
Why are we here?
What is are ultimate purpose in life?
Where are we going?
What do you really want out of life?

Again it is the answers to these questions that form the fundamental plan to change your life. These questions are the ones that when the ideal solutions are found for you will keep you away from drug abuse and stop the cycle of rehab, relapse, rehab, relapse, rehab, relapse, rehab…….

So find those answers, meditate and build a better spirtual life.

Life will help you make decisions in one of two ways. Either you will get the “subtle” hints it throws you or if you wait long enough, it will force you into a choice. Drug addiction treatment is no different. If your life is in rough enough shape, you will either willingly choose to go to a rehab facilty, or through some sort of intervention, you will be forced into a drug rehab.

I guess the main difference between these two is how much damage do you want the drug and alocohol abuse to cause before you consider rehab. If you wait until life forces you into making a change, the damage will be much greater, and the result is usually poorer in treatment. By making the choice yourself you usually insure a better result. Why? Simply you will have more options so the odds of finding a better one is higher. By waiting until the “law” or massive and dire finanacial straits force you into a rehab, your choices will be so few that the chance of a great match is lower.

In this discussion we always will talk about fundamental solutions to drug addiction and mention drug and alcohol rehabs that deal with treating the fundamental causes. This means a willingness to change by the person seeking treatment. Addiction is not a disease, it can be beaten permanently. Drug addiction treatment does however require a total willingness to change. Force cannot do this. Make the choice for a better life. Make the choice to enter a rehab facility before the courts or life leaves you with no choice.

I’m not going to finish yesterday’s segment today. If your don’t mind I’m going to push that off until tomorrow. There is a couple other points I’d like to make. I was listening to several people talk about drug abuse and addiction today and I’d like to talk about their point of view. They pretty much had the idea that anyone who abused alcohol or drugs got what they deserved if they ruined their lives. They couldn’t imagine any public funding for drug rehabs what so ever. They saw more and longer jail sentences as the solution. Lock them up and throw away the key. They claimed the “high” moral ground and placed those using alcohol and drugs as somehow below them.

I’ll keep this brief. What a crock of crap. Hardly an enlightened response, but I’m so tired of this point of view. Drug addiction and abuse is like a nuclear bomb going off in a family. It damages everyone, the person using alcohol and drugs, the parents, the siblings and also a spouse or any children present. This doesn’t include friends co-workers and empolyers. All of these people get hurt. I suppose the kids of someone addicted to drugs deserves to be punished as well. Drug addiction destroys families. Drug addiction damages future generations.

Drug addiction treatment and rehab is so cost effective when all the factors are considered, that it is just unbelieveable that some people continue to advocate more police, prisons and laws. Prisons don’t raise kids, parents do. Let’s help people into drug rehabs so everyone can get on with a better life.

What Values And Beliefs Would Support Your Relapse Prevention Plan?

Think about the someone who it actively in their drug and alcohol addiction. Some one who definately needs drug rehab but won’t even consider going to rehab. What do they think about themselves and their future? If we truly want someone to stop abusing and drug or alcohol for that matter, what beliefs would help them most?

If you believed the following ideas totally and firmly, would it not aide in preventing relapse?
Everything you need is already inside of you
You have a valuable purpose to complete while you are on earth
Permanent change is possible
You are always free to make a better choice

The answer is obviously yes

People when faced with a crisis or difficult situation respond in one of two ways
Many ordinary people when faced with very challenging situations, find unbelievable courage, and risk or even lose their own life for a stranger they have never met. In other words they RAISED their standards.

Unfortunately the reverse is also true. Many people when faced with difficult challenges consistently and repeatedly lower their standards. As their level of spirituality and their values drift lower they find themselves exhibiting behaviors that several months or years before they would have never considered. Is this what happened during your addiction experience? Drug and alcohol abuse, take their toll on stardands. Many times the standards have sunk so low that drug rehab is the only viable choice. Rehabs are a safe place to look inward. Rehab is for change. Rehab is for growth.

The key is to realize that change in oneâ??s level of spirituality and values is a choice. The way to deal with lifeâ??s adversities and difficult situations is to RAISE your standards. In your heart you believe you can raise your standards and change your values or else you would not be reading this now.

Change comes about in two ways: by force or by choice. In drug and alcohol addiction treatment change by force is temporary and weak at best. It is change by choice the makes the difference. People who choose on their own to enter a rehab usually have a much better outcome. I’ll talk about how to make that choice tomorrow.

Choose your Character and Choose your Life

Itâ??s not how funny you are
Itâ??s not your traits and idiosyncrasies
Itâ??s not whether youâ??re cool or a geek
It is what you do in a time of crisis, when you donâ??t have time to think of the right thing. It is what you do when no one is looking and the chance of anyone finding out it remote.

It is during the most active phase of drug and alcohol abuse that character suffers the most. While using drugs most people let their values constantly slip and erode. While trying to come up with the money to support their drug habit, or cover up their drug and alcohol use that they get to a place where they will do or say anything. When going through a drug rehab program it is quite important that a program to raise and re-establish the character that was lost be undertaken. Again as I have said over and over, it is this work that is the heart of drug addiction treatment.

When you visualized your perfect work, and your ideal occupation, what kind of person was in the middle of that dream? How did you need to be to fit in that dream?
Character Traits:
Were you unquestionably honest?
Were you dependable?
Did you have high standards?
Did you take good care of your health?
Were you trustworthy?
Were you respectful? Kind? Caring?
Were you organized? Knowledgeable? Diligent?

Take a sheet of paper and rate yourself as you see yourself now on a scale of 1 to 10 on each of the character traits.
Then re-do the questions, from the point of view of the person who is in the person you wish to become. Rate the â??future youâ?? from 1 to 10. Is there a difference?

If you truly wish to never abuse drugs and alcohol again, you then want to consider working very hard to close the gap in those numbers. People who leave a large gap in those numbers will be at a drug and alcohol rehab again and again in their life. Superficial changes will not lead to permanent sobriety. Change the numbers and change your life.

Can You Change Your Values And Beliefs?

In order to become the person in your goals you may have to change some of your beliefs
Is this possible?
If so, how can you do it?