Step 2
Improving Your Skills
To be a good driver of your own process of change, you must use certain mental skills or capacities. The ones we have found particularly useful are self-acceptance, curiosity, self-reflective awareness and the ability to “sit with” feelings.All of these will come together in “urge-surfing”—a valuable technique that promotes reflection and consideration of change.
Self-acceptance
You didn’t plan to have difficulties. You didn’t choose to have the problems that you now suffer from. The choice to accept that you are here now is not giving yourself an excuse; it simply puts you in the best position to honestly assess what is happening and summon the self-support necessary to make positive change.Problems associated with substance use present opportunities to learn something about yourself. Try to challenge judgmental moralizing, self-blaming and self-shaming: These reactions close down exploration.Compassionate, pragmatic self-acceptance of where you are, the essence of harm reduction philosophy, is a powerful alternative. Recognize that your desire for change reflects positive motivation and awareness—two vital ingredients of the change process.
Curiosity
Curiosity brings openness to your learning. Being curious about how your substance use interacts with other aspects of yourself and your life—and whether there are self-defeating aspects of it—will provide a positive motive for reflecting on your use.
Self-reflective awareness
This is the ability to observe your thoughts, feelings, perceptions and behaviors keenly and without judgment. Noticing your moment-to-moment flow of experience enables you to discover the Event —> Thought —> Feeling —> Urge —> Decision —> Action sequences around your substance use.Self-reflection enables clarification of the meanings and functions that substances have for you. Simply describing your experience —rather than judging it as good or bad, useful or not useful, stupid or smart—is optimal here.
Sitting with your feelings
Sitting with your feelings—simply taking time to experience them without reacting— supports self-reflection. The greater your capacity to sit with your feelings, the more still you can be with yourself and the greater your ability to look inwards and become more self-aware. This is central to stopping impulsive or compulsive behaviors, which are reactions to intense feelings that are hard to tolerate.Our capacity to sit with our feelings improves as we practice, just like strengthening a muscle, increasing the intensity of feeling that we can tolerate in small increments.Slowing down the breath can help you to relax with what you are feeling, making it less uncomfortable. You can then name your feelings, or describe them in terms of the thoughts and sensations associated with them, which can help to demystify them and make them less frightening or overwhelming.
Learning the skills
You can cultivate these skills simply by reminding yourself to be curious, self-reflective and tuned in to what you are feeling as you move through your day.Some people also find it useful to have a time set aside each day to practice tuning in. Yoga, meditation and exercise are activities that support the strengthening of these capacities, and classes can provide a great deal of support for some.
Exercise: Awareness and relaxation training
Set aside 5-30 minutes. Pick a comfortable, quiet place where you will not be disturbed. Sit comfortably on a chair or cushion. Put on some quiet, relaxing music if you like.You can also partner with a friend, taking turns to read the instructions to each other. You can try this exercise with your eyes open or closed; many people find it easier to focus inward with their eyes closed.
Step 1: Scan your body.
Like a scientist or reporter, gathering information without judgment or interpretation, observe is what is happening in each part of your body in each moment. “Scan” your body mentally, focusing on the sensations you feel. Notice the sensations in your toes, then slowly work your way up, all the way to the top of your head.Can you feel tightness? Coolness on your skin? Can you feel your heart beating? The pulse throughout your body?Now shift your awareness to what you hear, see, smell and taste. Become aware of memories, thoughts and images that pass through your mind’s eye. Notice all of these experiences without judgment. If you find yourself moving away from this moment, getting hung up on a thought, gently move your awareness back to the present experience of sensation and perception.
Step 2: Slow down the breath.
Notice the sensations of your breath going in and out of your mouth and nose. Notice the rising and falling of chest and stomach. Exhale slowly, counting to four or six. Inhale a little more deeply than before, counting to four or six. Hold the breath for a moment when you get to the top. Then exhale once again, slowly and deeply.Continue breathing like this for three minutes.
Step 3: Breath out the tension.
As you inhale, focus on any tensions or discomforts that you feel. Imagine you can breathe them away as you exhale. Inhale healing, cleansing breath to the tension spots and exhale what you don’t want to carry with you. Imagine you can feel gravity pulling you down into the cushions under you.Give your muscles permission to stop working. Do this systematically from the bottom of your toes to the top of your head.
Step 4: Feeling-recollection.
Think of a word or phrase that describes a feeling that you would like to recall. Peaceful. Calm. Clear. Powerful. Grounded. Can you remember feeling this way and how it felt in your body and mind? Imagine you can inhale this feeling, carried by the breath. Inhale the feeling that you want and exhale what you want to let go.
Urge-surfing
Urge surfing brings all these skills together in a technique that can help you to explore urges to engage in substance use and other behaviors that you may be considering changing. It enables sitting with and reflecting on urges, without acting from impulse. This puts space around the urge, interrupting any habitual behavior, and makes it possible to consider alternative choices.Turn your awareness within and notice the urge. Take five seconds, three minutes or as long as you like to do this. Remember, you can always choose to do the habitual thing if you wish. But surfing the urge puts a little space between the urge and whatever you choose to do.“Hang out” with your urge and describe it in terms of the feelings and body sensations it causes, and the wishes and fantasies it brings about what you want from using. What needs might be expressed or communicated through the urge? Is there another way that you might be able to respond? Be aware that for as long as you choose to “surf the urge,” you are not acting from impulse or habit –you are in charge, in the driver’s seat.