Often times when a client gets to a drug and alcohol rehab center their goals and dreams are battered and bruised. Sometimes their only goal is they just want to stop using.  When it comes times to set goals they quickly snuff out any great ideas with thought of nobody will hire an ex-addict.  Or they may feel their past criminal acivity in support of their addcition will again stop them.  So it is hard to get past the negative voice in their head.

On way of geting past this is to use a corny little phrase, but still a very effective one.  It is, "If I could wave a magic wand and change ANYTHING about my life, what would it be?"   Immediately sometimes a client will say this is stupid, I not going to try something so silly.  Answer with, " sure it is silly, but if you had to answer the question like you life depended on it what would you say?"  By sitting down and repeating the question a few times finally some answers start to appear. The moment you get an answer jot it down on a pad and simply ask, "What else would I change if I had a magic wand?"

It is important to keep asking the question, fast and over and over.  We want you to spill out as many answers as possible without letting the negative voice in your head start to desroy your ideas.  Once you have a large list and can truly think of nothing else, start to prioritize the list.  Here's a non-limiting question to use.  If all of these ideas were possible, which one would I do first? Keep going until you have ordered your dreams.  Using these few questions is a very effective way of breaking out of the, I've screwed up my life and can't get my dreams rut, that a lot of clients are in when they first come to a drug and alcohol rehab center.  If you don't ask the universe for what you want, you will never get it.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 20th, 2007 at 10:23 am and is filed under Drug Rehab. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.