Be Your Advocate: Learn to Accept the Experience of Addiction as a Path to Uncover Your Potential

By Dr. Adam Schilling

While in the midst of addictive behaviors, it can be easy to define ourselves by the worst things we’ve done. When moving away from addictive behaviors, it can be almost seductive to tell ourselves how unworthy and defective we are because of all the people we have hurt, including ourselves. The good news is that we have the power to decide who we are and what will become of our lives—not in spite of what we’ve been through, but because of what we’ve been through. We get to choose how to value all parts of our stories.

As a teacher and guide, Dr. Adam Schilling relies on his professional experience as a coach of positive psychology, relationships, and addiction treatment to invite those battling addiction to use their experiences as a doorway to understanding the inherent goodness that lives within. As he presents various approaches to interacting with aspects of the mind and body, Dr. Schilling offers information and tools, specifically related to the voices in one’s own head, to cultivate a sense of awareness, acceptance, and even appreciation for the powerful process of uncovering what can be as opposed to recovering what was. By learning these skills, identifying negative factors driving addictive behaviors, and thinking and feeling through intentional lenses, new positive personal story lines can be developed and optimistic futures can be brightly forged.

Through sharing practical wisdom, real-life stories, and positive perspectives, Be Your Advocate is an invitation to this well-lit path.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: May 9, 2023
• ISBN: 9798765239988

Dr. Adam Schilling

Dr. Adam Schilling holds a doctoral degree in higher education and social change, a master’s degree in marital and family therapy, and a bachelor’s degree in psychology. He has also completed training and certification courses in both sex addiction and positive psychology. Dr. Schilling is in private practice as a coach in positive psychology, relationships, and addiction treatment.

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Contents

Introduction

Part I: Hear the Call

Chapter 1: Waking Up

1.1Everyone has a story.

1.2It is entirely possible for you to engage in a process of becoming better and better.

Chapter 2: Framing Addiction

2.1The label of addict is different from the concept of and experience with addiction.

2.2Your addiction has been a result of a lack of information. You have the ability to learn the information that was lacking, rehearse the necessary changes, and give yourself permission to not define yourself by what you did not know.

Chapter 3: Uncovery

3.1Treat your experience with addiction as a process of uncovery.

3.2Many cultures honor rites of passage. This often involves triumph through struggle. Moving beyond your addiction is a process of triumph through struggle. Find and incorporate the necessary tools for the journey.

Chapter 4: The Story That Counts

4.1Your life has a story, and that story has a narrator. The voices in your head comprise this inner grand narrator around thought (GNAT). The voices are not who you are. They are parts of your current thinking habits.

4.2Paradigms are blocks of thought that are based largely on assumptions from the past.

4.3For the purpose of efficiency, your GNAT operates largely on assumptions of thought. With the intention of keeping you safe, these assumptions tend toward the negative. An example is hyper focusing on things that could be perceived as bad, whether they are inside of you or outside of you. It doesn’t mean that those things are actually bad. It’s merely how they’re being thought about or perceived based on your current thinking habits.

4.4Moving away from your addiction is a process of emulsification. You are digesting and processing what you do not need and keeping what you do need. It’s time to let go of beliefs that no longer serve you.

4.5You are not the sum result of your behaviors. Who you are now is your decision.

4.6No matter what you have been through or what you have done, you deserve to thrive!

Chapter 5: Uncover Your Advocate

5.1Your journey with addiction can be a passageway to deep understanding, insight, and gain. Your relationship to your addiction can be your ally.

5.2Your evolution is a process that you can trust. It’s a naturally occurring phenomenon. Your intention sharpens and directs this process. When you work hard, let go, and allow yourself to trust your process, it will happen through you more efficiently.

5.3You have inherent goodness within you. Addiction is an opposing information source that has been narrating destructive, addictive habits.

5.4You have a voice within you that knows what’s best for you and is always ready to be called upon. The awareness of what you do not want provides the key to knowing what you do want. Meet your Advocate.

5.5Your Advocate will make more sense to you as you learn to trust yourself.

5.6Your true nature is benevolent and kind. If this wasn’t a fact, you would not feel anything negative about the things you have done or thought. This means that you actually have the capacity to care deeply and are fundamentally a good person.

Chapter 6: Perspective

6.1Your reality is created and shaped by what your brain focuses on. Train it to focus on information that will create success.

6.2Change is a universal constant. Since everything is changing all the time, there is no need to associate fear with it. Learn to let go.

6.3Being able to discern the actual seriousness of a situation and proportionate responses are invaluable skills.

6.4There is a natural tendency for inner conflict to exist within you. That does not mean there is something wrong with you. It means you are a person who is complicated and has different parts. The story you tell yourself about experiencing the conflict is the actual issue.

6.5Resolving the inner conflict is a constant process because a part of you is always desiring. Deciding how to pay attention to the experience of the desire is a fundamental component to shifting how you think.

6.6Your perspective is your responsibility.

6.7It is entirely possible to use traumatic experiences to propel you forward (post-traumatic growth) as opposed to keeping you stuck in the past (post-traumatic stress). It depends on the meanings that you’re able to assign to the experiences.

6.8Use proper lighting to see the big picture.

6.9Your addiction has profound purpose.

Part II: Tools for the Journey

Chapter 7: Behaviors

7.1Your choices are how you contribute to the life you want to build.

7.2By changing your behaviors, your brain will see itself differently, and you will start to feel better and make different decisions more naturally. Introspection guides this process.

7.3Identifying and then following your values is an efficient way to set your course.

7.4An element of decision-making involves discernment regarding perceived gains and losses.

7.5The concept of discipline is a values-based process that involves grit.

7.6Your habits are shortcuts and are ways that your mind creates efficiency. With intention, you can use this ability to your advantage.

7.7You can design your environments to prime yourself for success.

7.8It’s important to be aware of your thresholds. Be kind to yourself in the process of building your ability for tolerance.

7.9How you show up in your life will drive your purpose and meaning. Being intentional and authentic in your choices is an art form that will have tremendous benefits.

Chapter 8: Emotions

8.1Experiences and labels within your emotional landscape are incredibly nuanced, may be difficult to navigate in parts, and take practice to understand. Valuing the inherent goodness within you as you understand yourself helps.

8.2Emotions are neither good nor bad. However, they tend to be experienced as positive and negative—and both of them are informative. Difficulties with this concept lie in the narrative that is created by the experiences of them and in the labels used to describe them.

8.3How you talk about your emotions and feelings is a component to self-perception theory, which means how you make meaning from how you create the narrative about your life.

8.4Primary emotions are your initial emotional reactions to a stimulus. Secondary emotions are emotions and feelings that are experienced as a result of the perception of those primary emotions. These can be very confusing and overlapping. Understanding both your primary and secondary emotions can bring clarity.

8.5The negative force of the Shadow is a seductive magnet that can pull you into complicated and toxic negative feelings. The force behind your Advocate is the opposite direction. How you are paying attention is crucial.

8.6Learn to fact-check whether the emotions and feelings you are experiencing are accurate and proportionate to what’s being presented.

8.7Stop hunting for things to be scared about.

8.8Emotions are transmitted and received. You are a conductor on both ends of the spectrum. Tune your instrument to practice knowing what is you and what is not you.

8.9You get to manage and tune your emotional landscape.

Chapter 9: Thoughts

9.1Thoughts and emotions are intricately related.

9.2Repetitive thinking is a natural function of the mind. Train it to your advantage.

9.3Your mind constantly creates mental simulations. This is a natural process, so decide which realistic and optimal simulations to run.

9.4Practice sensing when your mental narration sounds like a Tormentor. It may be orchestrating your default thinking.

9.5Practice fact-checking the accuracy of your thinking.

9.6Self-esteem is a thinking process that comes largely from the process of coping.

9.7How you think others think about you isn’t how they think about you; it’s how you think they think about you, which means it’s actually how you’re thinking about yourself. Other people judging you is actually you judging yourself through their eyes, but happening in your own mind.

9.8People are far more self-absorbed than you may realize. Notice how self-absorbed you are with your own thoughts. Everyone else is doing that too. How people think about you is their business. Stop trying to do it for them.

9.9Think like a champion!

Chapter 10: Reality

10.1You are the architect of your reality. Design kindly.

10.2Your awareness can continually deepen.

10.3You can intentionally direct how your heuristics shape your worldviews.

10.4Let your imagination work in your favor.

10.5Wisdom is evolutionarily beneficial. By gaining wisdom, you will be helping yourself, your family, and society as a whole. The process of moving away from the context of addiction may very well leave you wiser.

10.6The process of mourning creates space for more abundance in each new morning.

10.7Your addiction can exist in the past by keeping your Addict contained.

10.8Travel lightly.

10.9Direct the quest.

Part III: Homecoming

Chapter 11: How Do I Know This Is Working?

11.1You and your story deserve dignity.

Epilogue

Facts

References

Introduction

Mike has been a client since 2014. When he entered the treatment center after several weeks in an inpatient facility addressing his addictions to sex, compulsive relationships, alcohol, and various other substances, he was in his midthirties, was good-looking, made a solid income, and came across as exceptionally entitled. Mike was married to a woman with whom he had a two-year-old girl. This was his second marriage. His first marriage dissolved because of his adulterous and deceptive behaviors. At the time, his current marriage was looking to head down a similar and painful path.

Mike generally followed treatment recommendations as long as they were convenient for him. It wasn’t uncommon for suggestions from me or other members of our treatment team to be met with eye rolls, sarcasm, or just flat out saying, I’m not going to do that. He was defiant, snarky, and intimidating. He pissed off most of the staff, but I liked him right away.

His wife joined treatment shortly after he did, and, through her, we learned much more about Mike’s massive and intricate web of lies and betrayal. So much pain had been caused by this man. His lying continued throughout his initial treatment. It was tough to know who Mike actually was or, rather, who he was trying to be.

Over time and underneath all the defiance, I could sense an undercurrent of unease in Mike, which, at the time, also resonated with my own discomfort in my own skin. Sometimes Mike demonstrated this feeling with simple hesitation, anger, stubbornness, shame, or dread. Eventually, we were able to distill these feelings of Mike’s to a predominating and lingering fear of not being in control. Beneath the surface of uncomfortable entitlement were immature parts of Mike that he had learned to compulsively use substances and behaviors to mitigate and soothe. Until uncovering qualities about these aspects of Mike’s reality, Mike did not have a clear picture about how to maturely conduct himself. He had deluded himself with layers of masks about how he wanted to be perceived. Assuming the appropriate mask to wear in any given situation in order to be perceived as acceptable (or, more commonly, better than others) became his routine. While this charade had allowed him to become financially successful and relatively stable, his life had always lacked purpose and direction. Lacking purpose and direction in combination with a lack of understanding of past hurts, current denial of chaotic patterns within his mind and body, a lack of awareness for his impact on others, and misinformation about how to intentionally conduct a life of well-being had led Mike to where he was.

His marriage ended a year into his program. His wife was done with the lies. Understandably, she decided on a different path for herself and for their child. By that point, Mike and I had formed a unique clinical bond. I found his struggles and narrative to be intriguing. He continued to challenge my suggestions and input. He also continued to lie and then confess. Each time he lied, it opened an opportunity to reflect to him that, under all of the masks—no matter what he did—he was not the jerk that he kept trying to hide from himself and to prove to the world that he wasn’t.

Once his divorce settled, Mike’s intention for our sessions changed. He no longer had the motivation to prove to his wife that he was doing what he needed to do in order to change. The focus of his sessions began transitioning from addressing the disempowering label of cheating addict into embracing an empowered framework of a man who had navigated through the worst part of his adult life and, in that transition, was now standing in an unfamiliar world. Aside from a few minor slips, he wasn’t acting out anymore. He wasn’t in a relationship where he was overly focused on proving himself in order to be seen favorably (so he could then see himself favorably). He had come to understand problematic issues from his childhood through participating in consistent psychological and emotional practices. He had learned about many of the root causes of his addictive impulses and habits. He was single, had a good job and a home, and shared custody of their daughter, whom he spent considerably more time with. He exercised regularly, ate well, and had a solid friend network.

From childhood and through his early adult life, Mike’s brain developed in such a way as to be prone to compulsive behaviors and obsessive thoughts. What that ultimately means is that Mike’s brain formed around interpretations of experiences that sorted information in a messy way. His experiences, coupled with genetic and biological predispositions for aspects of life such as intensity, isolation, and breaking rules, facilitated a subjective reality where Mike’s addictions developed. Like untamed and unchecked weeds, these patterns grew in his mind and body and became his background operating system. His thoughts, emotions, and behaviors were warped with this inaccurate information.

With time, dedication, and practice, Mike did the work to learn how to successfully and consistently avoid behaviors that were causing so much damage, learning to train his mind to create much more positively habituated thinking and feeling. He will always have those formative memories from childhood that originally shaped the way his brain filtered information. He will not forget many of the devastating decisions that he made in years past. However, those aspects of life, with practice, lost their weight and stopped being the object of Mike’s focus. He realized that he was not the victim in his story. Mike’s goal was to learn to orient himself differently around his mind and his body. He was able to do that and, if you haven’t already, you can too. Like Mike, you’ll be able to see that the process of gaining true control over these qualities of life can be a foundation for your liberation.

When you are in the midst of your addictive behaviors, it is easy to define yourself by the worst things that you’ve done. When you enter the process of moving away from addictive behaviors, it can be seductive and maybe somehow satisfying to tell yourself how unworthy and defective you are because of all the people you’ve hurt, including yourself. Those consequences are real and can produce incredible pain. But when all of that is done and behind you, who are you then? What defines you? Is it your addictive behaviors? Is it all the pain you’ve caused? There is a tempting trap that many people fall into, which is continuing to define yourself by the worst things you’ve done. However, if you are stuck in defining yourself by your past, then you are not in the driver’s seat of your life. You are living in the past. There is no going back. There is only one direction your life is going—forward.

In reading this book, you give yourself the possibility of being able to decide who you are and what will become of your life after the chaos of addiction. You get to be the one who determines how high you will soar. Because of all that you’ve been through, you have a unique perspective on suffering. Because of suffering, you can experience deep joy.

As everything is vibratory in nature, there are constant patterns of ups and downs. When you are seeing something, you are registering and processing frequencies of light. When you are hearing something, you are registering and processing frequencies at a different level, which are experienced as sounds. When you are feeling something, you are registering and processing frequencies within the body, which are experienced as emotions and feelings. This vibrational world we live in means that thoughts are also vibratory and that your thoughts and emotions are vibrationally linked. Your mind is narrating a story about you that is in direct correlation to how you are feeling about yourself and your life. We’ll be getting much more into these processes later in this book. You’re going to see that you are much more in control of all of it than you’ve probably ever imagined.

No matter what may have happened to you or what you have been through, it is entirely possible for you to truly shine and to live an incredible life, not in spite of what you’ve been through, but because of what you’ve been through. You have the opportunity to move in an entirely different (opposite) direction.

This opposite direction became the new focus of Mike’s motivation to continue on his path. And this is what Mike, and countless other people who chose to engage with me in this work, are choosing to focus on once the addictive behaviors have been contained and once the dust has settled.

How can I claim and cultivate the ultimate meaning from my addiction?

Helping you find the answers to that question is the purpose of this book. This book’s intention is to be both a call and a guide. It is a call to come home to a deeper self that your addiction has been mistakenly and unsuccessfully clawing to find. This book is also a guide to familiarize you with information that you have likely been missing along your path. These steps can facilitate an awakening that can result from being intentionally present in the process of evolving away from the tumult of addictive behavior.

Some of the information will be repetitive at times, but the goal is for continuity, clarity, and ensuring that learning is happening. Repetition and reinforcement greatly promote understanding in the process of knowledge development and successful skill establishment. You will also be presented with various approaches to different concepts and many references to literature. If any of these seem interesting, please investigate them further. Being your own curious explorer is a tremendous asset.

This material is meant in a supportive way toward the recovery community. This book’s purpose is to contribute to the cause of moving away from the momentum resulting from experiences in and around addiction. This content is intended to move you to a much deeper sense of awareness, acceptance, and even appreciation for the powerful process of uncovering—as opposed to recovering—what has been driving addictive behaviors and how to think and feel about it all from a different perspective. However, if you are in the process of coming to terms with or understanding past wounds—which is absolutely OK—or perhaps still in the process of gaining significant distance from overly indulging in addictive behaviors, this material might not be ready for you just yet. If either or both of these are the case, then participating in this kind of work right now will perhaps not make sense for where you are, which is fine. You can return to this material when you’re ready.

What sets this material apart from other materials is the focus on positive psychology. Perspectives about flourishing, optimal functioning, individual strength identification, and personal well-being ground this material.

This material is also rooted in realism. One must know how to respond to situations accurately and accordingly. Addiction is difficult. The brain is powerful. I’ve been to many of the places that you’ve been to, and I’ve felt many of the things that you’ve felt. And, if I haven’t personally been there or felt it, I’ve worked with someone who has. I deeply empathize and validate your experiences. You are not alone.

I believe that you can learn how to engineer yourself in order to uncover a best path forward as a product of your addiction. Through this work, I hope you’ll be able to see that the ultimate issue underlying your addictive behaviors has always been your relationship with how you think and how you feel, which has been shadowing how you have been able to conceptualize your life. With time, energy, and practice, all of those aspects can keep getting better and better.

No religion will be emphasized or presented. However, any way that you choose or not choose to incorporate it is welcomed.

This book is divided into three parts. Part I, Hear the Call, contains chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, which, together, provide foundational and scaffolding concepts on which part II will build. Part II, Tools for the Journey, contains specific information, data, and techniques that develop and practice concepts presented within part I. Specifically, those concepts focus on behaviors, emotions, thoughts, and reality. Part III, Homecoming, contains the final chapter, which will set the stage for what life can look like when these elements are in competent balance. While this material is not guaranteed to be some kind of quick fix or form of salvation, it is designed to provide quality structure on which to build a new perspective about your experience with addiction. However, since this is your journey, that perspective is yours and only yours to cultivate.

In order to provide tools for this journey, the chapters have been divided into leading guideposts, which are all listed in the table of contents. You can think of the guideposts within chapters as mini lessons. Practice must occur in order to firmly establish connections within the brain and the body. Repetition is also intended to create a new form of habituated thinking.

You will see exercises targeted at practicing specific forms of change. Do them. The time and energy that is needed must come from you. You are worth every single decision to intentionally create a better life for yourself. You are special. You are unique. You are you, and there has never been—nor will there ever be—any other you than the you that is here right now. So, let’s treat you like the incredible, beautiful soul that you are and get some momentum going.

I understand if you’re skeptical. I was too once. So was Mike. You have an opportunity here to take the worst that you’ve done and been through and create a virtuous frame of reference. It is entirely possible. Give it a shot.

We’ll begin with a piece of my own story about a series of events where my own perspective was, rather jarringly, shaken.

Part I

Hear the Call

There is no authority to bless our need to enter life but the voice within,

- Mark Nepo, The Risk to Bloom

Chapter 1

WAKING UP

1.1 Everyone has a story.

Sitting on the top bunk in a jail cell the morning after the combined effects of your alcohol and mushroom consumption wears off is, shall we say, an interesting vantage point. I don’t know how many floors up I was, but it was high enough off the ground to feel like a gargoyle silently perched above a busy street that I had driven down many times before. It was a Monday morning. The bologna sandwich the guards had served us a few hours ago when it was still dark outside wasn’t holding me over. Throughout the early morning, no matter how many times I asked a passing guard what time it was, I was ignored. There were about ten other guys in the cell with me. I tried to not talk to or make eye contact with any of them. Many of them looked defeated, weary, and lost. Looking back, they were probably thinking the same about me.

There was some part of me that knew that this situation was bad. I kept telling myself that I didn’t belong here—that things like this didn’t happen to me. I mean, yes, I was sitting in jail, but it didn’t feel like I was going to just skate out of this one—as I had done so many times in my younger partying years when I miraculously didn’t get pulled over or arrested or overdose or who knows what else. Through all the previous reckless and selfish behavior that I engaged in and received little to no consequence for (or, rather more accurately, the consequences I had ignored), I had maintained a steady level of denial and belief in delusional invincibility. But this time it was different.

Just before I had climbed up to my solitary and stationary position on the bunk bed, I had returned from a meeting in a small room with a detective. Just before that, my name had been called by one of the officers. Since my belief was that things this bad didn’t really happen to me, I had assumed that my name being called meant that I was being released. Awesome! Time to go home. I had assumed that the nightmare was over. I had made a phone call on one of the public phones in the cell to a friend the night before. He had been present at the time of the arrest, and we had tried to formulate a plan to get me released when we spoke the night before. He told me that they were doing what they could, but since it was a Sunday night and the detention facility handled releases on Mondays, I would be spending that night in jail. What I came to find out was that meant that the guys I was sharing this cell with who had been detained on Friday or Saturday had been there since then. At least I’d only be spending one night instead of two or three. No wonder so many of them looked defeated. I had no idea the system worked like that.

So, when the officer called my name that morning, I thought it was the signal that my friend was coming to take me home. When the officer came though, he took me in a different direction than where I had come from the night before. We went right instead of left down the corridor, which was the opposite direction that I came from after going up the elevator from the booking station. I remember thinking, Wait, don’t we go the other way? The answer is no, you don’t go that way when you’re being summoned to speak with a detective. You’re not going home yet, silly. This new chapter of your story is just getting started.

The conversation that followed with the detective was humiliating and horrifying. The questions he asked started to paint the picture of the seriousness of the situation as well as how the story of the events was in the process of getting tangled up. He asked if I had been drinking the day before, and I said yes. He asked if I knew what I had done, and I said yes. He asked if I knew of the specific allegations that I was being charged with, and I said no. He read them to me. I denied them fervently because they were not accurate. He then reminded me that I had just said that I had been