Understanding Substance Use & Addiction

• Should I be concerned about my choices?

• Understanding the true purpose our addiction serves

• Walking the path of recovery, repair and healing

• Experiencing real freedom and a wholesome lifestyle

It is natural to desire and seek out comfort, pleasure and routine. In the same way, we instinctively attempt to avoid discomfort, adverse and unpredictable experiences. As a result, we tend to repeat actions that make us feel ‘good’, and avoid experiences that make us feel ‘bad’. Substance dependence and addictions form because the substance or behaviour we engage in serves to avoid the uncomfortable and seek the pleasurable, or at least the neutral.

It’s initial purpose may be to relieve boredom, pick us up, or add a sense of excitement. It may serve to dull uncomfortable feelings, quiet unwanted thoughts, or it may just help mentally check-out or escape. However, the consequences rarely - if ever - add any real long term value to our lives, or lead us toward the life we want to live and the person we desire to be. In actual fact, these unhelpful habits trick our mind and body into thinking it is working in our favour. But ultimately, it is robbing our freedom, our control, and we become dependent on it to feel normal.

Thankfully, the right approach to therapy can see you move from unhelpful thinking and living, toward a richer, freer and more fulfilling life. Identifying our values and practicing psychological flexibility can be the driving factor in breaking free from these vices. With professional support, we can learn the tools and techniques that move us from destruction, toward living a creative, intentional and flourishing life!