My fiancé and I are getting married in October and he’s having the hardest time finding dress shoes. The dress code is cocktail and he’s getting a beautiful suit custom made but doesn’t have shoes yet. He’s a size 9.5 8E but can squeeze into narrower shoes if needed. Please provide any recommendations, we’re desperate!
My fiancé and I are getting married in October and he’s having the hardest time finding dress shoes. The dress code is cocktail and he’s getting a beautiful suit custom made but doesn’t have shoes yet. He’s a size 9.5 8E but can squeeze into narrower shoes if needed. Please provide any recommendations, we’re desperate!
You get something out of every behavior—even the ones you’re thinking of changing. Otherwise, you wouldn’t engage in them.
What do you get from your addictive behavior?
At one point, you decided these benefits outweighed the costs. Do they still? The Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) tool can help you take a look at both the positives and negatives of a behavior.
To use this tool, simply consider the costs and benefits of your addictive behavior. Then consider the costs and benefits of abstaining. You don’t have to change anything today. Just start by being curious and honest with yourself.
An example of a completed CBA is shown below:
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Benefits of engaging in my addictive behavior
Costs of engaging in my addictive behavior
Benefits of abstaining from my addictive behavior
Costs of abstaining from my addictive behavior
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After completing your own CBA, take a step back and look at what you’ve written. Does anything surprise you about your answers? You might notice that the rewards of the behavior tend to be short-lived, while the costs build up over time. And often, the benefits of stopping take time to feel—but they’re worth it.
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
Your goal is to abstain from or moderate your addictive behavior. But it is sometimes hard to see a difference between what you are doing and what you could do differently to achieve your goals.
The Three Questions exercise can help you bring these two perspectives into focus so you can identify the discrepancy between them.
Comment below your answer to these three questions:
Now, answer the next two questions:
Once you see the discrepancy between your feelings about what you’re currently doing (2) and your feelings about changing your behavior (5), you can use that difference as further motivation to stop using.
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
My daughter was on Suboxone for 4 years and off of fentanyl but relapsed recently when she got off the Sub. She's been tapering and considering going to inpatient treatment, but also thinking of getting through it at home with my support (mostly taking care of her dog).
I've just passed my 20 year anniversary off of IV coke, but I've never been addicted to opiates so not sure what I can do to help her get through this as easily as possible. I've been around friends in opiate withdrawal and it's horrible.
Any advice at all will be much appreciated, thanks y'all!
Overcoming addictive behaviors is a journey that involves more than just abstaining from substances or detrimental habits.
It's about rediscovering yourself, finding joy, and engaging in activities that provide a deep sense of fulfillment and purpose.
Comment below on of your recovery pursuits or passions, or one that you would be interested in trying.
Your new pursuit or passion could be anything that you find deeply engaging and rewarding. For some, it might be creative pursuits like painting, writing, or making music. For others, it could be physical activities like hiking, gardening, or practicing yoga. Even continuous learning, like taking courses, learning a new language, or picking up a new instrument, can be incredibly fulfilling
To find your new pursuit, consider what you're passionate about or what you've always wanted to try. It's about exploration and allowing yourself the freedom to make choices based on what makes you feel alive and connected!
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
Living a balanced life…has a nice sound to it, doesn’t it?
A meaningful life is one that is in balance, one in which adequate attention is given to the activities that express your values and priorities. No matter what those values may be, many of us do not live our life in balance, or in a manner that consistently sustains the things we value most.
Reflect on the areas in your life that hold significance for you. These may be family, work, romance, friendship, health, leisure, personal growth, or spirituality.
Are you satisfied with each of these areas of your life? For example, are you happy with your personal growth? Are your relationships fulfilling? Do you find satisfaction in your work?
Comment below on what changes you want to make (if any) to “round out” your life.
This reflection isn't about fostering guilt or discontent but about understanding where you are now. Perhaps the exercise showed you that you're involved in too many activities, or that you have a dream or desire that you’d like to focus on more.
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
We all have values in life, and they underpin all our feelings and decisions. However, we rarely think about them explicitly.
The Hierarchy of Values (HoV) tool provides a structured way to write them down and then focus on what matters most.
Take a few minutes or so and make a list of the things that are important to you. Once that is completed, pick out the five things that are MOST important to you and share them in the comments below. There are no “right” or “wrong” answers.
Below is an example of a completed HoV:
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What I Value Most:
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This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
Strong emotions are inevitable.
Whether we consider them "good" or "bad," strong emotions can result in us behaving in self-defeating ways.
As a result, learning to reduce extreme emotions could make it easier to change how we act. Using the ABC tool, we can do just that.
The ABC tool helps us to examine the thinking and beliefs that are causing us to feel these extreme emotions. In doing so, we stop being victimized by our own thinking.
Below is an example of a completed ABC:
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Activating event (The event that triggered the urge): My boss yelled at me today in front of my coworkers.
Belief about the event (What I believe about A -- find the irrational demand): He shouldn't yell at me! He has no right to embarrass me in front of my peers! It's not fair!
Consequence of the belief (How I feel and how I behave as a result of B): I'm really mad and I want to stop at the bar for a drink on my way home!
Dispute the irrational belief (A more helpful belief about A that replaces the irrational belief): Who says my boss shouldn't yell at me? He yells at my coworkers, too. Who says life is always fair?
Effective thinking change (How I feel and act as a result of D -- my new rational belief about A): While I don't like to be yelled at and feel upset, this guy yells at everyone. He's not worth giving up my sobriety.
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What's a situation you worked an ABC for recently? If you haven't worked the tool before, recall a situation that upset you recently and give it a try in the comments.
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
Hi SMARTies!
On r/SMARTRecovery over the past month or so, I've noticed a significant increase in the number of posts that are unrelated to the SMART program. Many of them are caught instantly by the Reddit mod filters or by myself within a few minutes, so hopefully it hasn't been too obvious to you all that this is going on. Behind the scenes, though, it has increased my moderating duties quite a bit.
Most of these rule-breaking posts are actually cross-posts from other subreddits --- hence why they seem out of place here. In order to curb the sharing of this unrelated content, as of this morning, I've disabled the cross-post feature on r/SMARTRecovery. You will still be able to post and comment as usual, nothing has changed there. You simply won't be able to directly share posts originating from other communities.
As we try out this new limitation, please continue to report any rule-breaking posts you come across. Even if you're unsure, go ahead and flag the content and I will review it ASAP.
Thanks so much!
u/Low-improvement_18
Triggers are the things that lead to urges.
Triggers can be thoughts, emotions, activities, sights, sounds, sensations, or a time of day, week, or year. As you can see, almost anything can be a trigger.
The huge number of potential triggers can feel overwhelming, but the great news is that triggers are predictable once you identify them.
How many triggers can you identify? If you feel comfortable, leave a comment below to share them with the community.
While you brainstorm about your triggers, you might find it helpful to remind yourself this -- just like your brain once learned an association between your addictive behavior and your trigger, it can learn a new, healthy one. You might react to triggers for a while, but with practice, those reactions might only last for milliseconds.
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.
The urges you feel aren't you.
They are merely a feeling or an impulse you experience, something separate from who you are.
Personifying your urge, or giving it a name, may help you deal with it by reminding you of this fact -- that the urge is something outside of yourself.
Have you named your urge? If you feel comfortable, leave a comment below to introduce it to the community.
If you haven't named your urge yet, give it a shot! For example, you might find it useful to give it a name that describes what it feels like when the urge comes on (ie. "The Brat," "The Salesman," "The Whiner," "The Enemy").
This tool and others like it can be found on the SMART Recovery website and in the handbook.