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The Path of Greatest Advantage: From Dependence to Self Determination

The ambitious goal of this web is to provide a structure for one of the important passages in life span development: From dependence on an external agent to self-determination.

Using an incentive - such as alcohol or a drug - to give you pleasure or relieve your pain can lure you into a trap, from which escape is unexpectedly difficult. The outcome literature is not kind to rehabilitation programs, and the most common treatment outcome is relapse. Good long-term outcome requires that the dependent person change in a fundamental way.

This web is designed for individuals who have developed a substance use problem, and who also have the cognitive skills to benefit from the tools this site offers.

You are unique in some fundamental ways, and some paths will be well suited to you, and others not. Your path to good long-term outcome is for your steps alone, and so you are encouraged to actively navigate you way through the large array of material offered here.

If this self-directed approach is a good match for you, the details of your particular solution will gradually become apparent as you perform the personal experiments described and observe what happens. So if you are ready to begin, please click one of the links to choose your next step.

c This mulitmedia presentation includes a trance formation audio file, which you may download to use in other situations. The goal of this and the other sections of this web is to provide the information and tools that will enable the intelligent layperson to escape the several traps that typically comprise an addictive disorder. This is an invitation to consider what you really want to do with this one precious life you have to lvie. If you are not sure, Ask Alice.
scrooge "Ask Marley - dickensian version" - Charles Dickens describes an elegant solution to the motivational puzzle in: "A Christmas Carol." Just as Ebinezer Scrooge finally learned what was of greatest importance to him, you can use this Dicensian exercise to develop the motivation to act in your own best interests.
pig "The Problem of Immediate Gratification" free publications in PDF format that provide summaries of recent findings in cognitive and neural science pertinent to addictive disorders.
ad People who become dependent repeatedly relapse because they are repeatedly taken in by the Soul Illusion. We naturally assume that we see things as they are, when in fact, our perception is biased toward local conditions. Consider how you appraised a lapse just before it happened versus a week later. Individuals don't relapse because they want to fail, it just doesn't seem like such a bad idea at the time.
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The Path of Greatest Advantage. Many individuals can intentionally alter their course and choose the direction of greatest advantage rather than continue along the path of least resistance. This section of the web describes specific tactics that you can apply to your own circumstance as well as a review of the general strategies to help you through the passage from dependence to self-determination.

spiral "The Soul Illusion" and "Pathology" are primarily text summaries of recent research, and as such are designed to appeal to your conscious, rational, analytic mind. For your unconscious, experiential, narrative mind, trance formation audio files in mp3 format are available for play or download. This experiential mode is of considerable value in transforming intellectual understanding into real-time performance.