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Archives for 2015

New Year’s Resolutions? Try Intentions Instead!

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Originally posted in December 2010

In the immortal words of John Lennon, another year is over and a new one’s just begun.

Isn’t it interesting how we, as a society, agree that this is the time to give ourselves and our lives a complete and total new makeover? We have decided that at this time of the year we will revisit the year we’re leaving behind, dissecting it to see what worked for us and what didn’t. And on top of that, we need to make sure that we meet all of our “resolutions” quickly and perfectly or else we have failed – no pressure there!

While there is nothing wrong with re-assessing yourself from time to time and exploring changes you would like to make, the problems come when you allow yourself to over-identify with the “hype” of the season. It is one thing to make the overblown and often unrealistic New Year’s resolutions that you think you should make at this time of year, and quite a different process to take stock of where you are, in present time, to see what you might like to be doing differently so that you can live your best life.

RESOLUTION vs. INTENTION

My dictionary defines resolution as “the action of solving.” It stands to reason, therefore, that if we are looking at making resolutions, we will be focusing on problems in our lives that need to be solved. We will be looking at what we think is “wrong” with us and how to “fix” ourselves. Common examples of resolutions might be losing weight or going to the gym more often because we see ourselves as being too heavy. Whatever our resolutions are, the perception will be that something is wrong with us and we need to fix it.

Accidental vs. IntentionalAn intention is different. My dictionary defines intention as “the determination to act in a certain way.” This has nothing to do with seeing yourself as a problem that needs to be resolved; instead, intentions are about becoming aware of different ways that you would prefer to be in your life. Some examples of an intention might be to become more patient with the people in your life, to treat others with more kindness, or to feel like you’re making a positive difference in the world. [Read more…]

Surviving the Holidays When Loving an Addict

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We all know that the Holiday Season is upon us. Depending on where we live, many of us began being pummelled with Christmas commercials on TV even before Halloween had come and gone. As we move into December, we are seeing the familiar media ads depicting gloriously happy families, all enjoying being together—opening gifts by the lavishly decorated tree and having sumptuous meals at their festive dinner table—smiles all around, nice and cozy. It all looks quite wonderful, doesn’t it?

frustrated womanBut the truth is that very few families are actually like that at holiday time these days. For those reading this, more and more of you are becoming very aware that Addiction is all too often an uninvited guest in our families—creating all sorts of problems and draining us of our emotional energy and good will.

That is actually becoming the norm in most families, all over the world—but the reason we don’t see this reality depicted in the holiday commercials is obvious: retailers want us to buy their products and addiction doesn’t ‘sell.’ That being said, the reason they show us these happy families over and over at this time of year may well be to assist us in knowing what we’re missing so we can feel badly about our lives. If people feel bad about themselves, they think, they’ll buy more and more of our goods just to distract themselves from their pain.

Here is the way I see it: we each have a choice about what we want to buy into. It’s totally up to you whether you want to go along with this somewhat nasty marketing scheme. Your other choice would be to face your reality head-on and make your decisions from that place. Your holiday season this year does not have to be a bad repeat of the one last year, with Addiction as an uninvited guest yet again—there are ways for you to avoid this from happening.

Please click here to find out what I’m doing to help you through the holiday season, and beyond, if you are the loved one of an addict.

Sometimes Love Looks Like “No”: When to Set and Maintain Healthy Boundaries

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This article was originally posted on October 2, 2013. 

Is it possible to have a healthy relationship with someone who is in active addiction? What needs to happen for that to occur?

If you are in that situation, you have probably wondered about this many times.

THE QUESTION OF THE DAY

Several weeks ago I was interviewed on Talk Recovery radio, a new program on Vancouver’s Co-Op Radio station, dealing with addiction and recovery issues. I was honored to be chosen as their very first guest, and I had a great time talking with the interviewers about my book Loving an Addict, Loving Yourself: The Top 10 Survival Tips for Loving Someone with an Addiction and the work I do with the loved ones of people struggling with addictive behaviors.

The Question of the Day that was posed for the show was: Is it possible to have a healthy relationship with someone who is in active addiction? Throughout our lively discussion, we touched on many important topics—not the least of which was the importance of knowing the difference between helping and enabling. At one point, one of the interviewers, Frances, quipped, “Sometimes love looks like No,” which I thought was just brilliant—thank you, Frances, for putting it so succinctly.

It’s so true—sometimes love really does look like “no.” We know that loving parents take the time to teach their young children not to do unsafe things such as touching a hot stove or running into a busy street. Sometimes there are even consequences for behaviors such as these that put children at risk, so that they will come to understand that they can’t do whatever they like whenever they like. In this way, children can learn how to think a potential action through to its logical conclusion—a necessary skill that can enormously assist a child’s decision-making process well into adulthood. [Read more…]

Family Addiction: Are You Affected by Another Person’s Addictive Behaviours?

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Are you the loved one of someone struggling with an addiction?

Would you like to become part of the solution, instead of staying stuck in the problem?

These days, addictive behaviours are so rampant that it’s virtually impossible to imagine how many people are affected by them. Having worked as an Addictions Therapist for over 25 years—with both addicts and their loved ones—what I know today is that for every one addict, there are generally at least 10-20 people directly affected by that person’s addiction.

Think about it: there are parents and grandparents; partners and spouses; girlfriends and boyfriends; brothers and sisters; aunts, uncles and cousins; bosses and colleagues; teachers and fellow students; friends and neighbours; even doctors and therapists—just to name a few. [Read more…]

Fentanyl – What We Can Do About It

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Yesterday someone I know asked me why I wasn’t writing anything on my blog about fentanyl—which has become such a horrific problem lately. Although I had thought a few times about perhaps addressing it, I would stop myself with this thought:

“What could I say that hasn’t already been covered in the news? What could I possibly add that would be of any value?”

I’m glad my friend challenged me about this, because today I see that I’ve made a mistake by thinking that way. So I’m writing about it now—but from a different perspective than other media stories I’ve heard.

There really isn’t much for me to add in terms of the factual information being imparted to us whenever we catch the news on TV or the radio. I’m aware that using this drug in even tiny doses is potentially deadly—it seems that all it really takes to kill someone is 2 grams of it, apparently equivalent to 2 grains of salt. Not being a scientist or medical person, all I can do is take what I’m being told as truth. But even if some of the information is inaccurate or downright wrong, this fact remains—people are dying because of fentanyl, and we need to do whatever we possibly can to stop it. [Read more…]