Addiction: what if relapse were actually a necessary step towards real healing?

Whether it is alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, drugs such as cocaine or gambling, going back to using, or to the harmful ritual, in our daily life after stopping for a few days, weeks or months is not the failure we tend to think it is. On the contrary, it is a key step in the healing process, if we take the time to understand the mechanisms at play.

Why do we give in after stopping?

The reasons for relapsing after stopping are many, and each one deserves a close look, but we will come back to that. Here are a few of the major ones:

• Stopping on willpower alone: it is much the same logic as extreme crash diets. Stopping too strictly, without understanding the mechanisms that drive the addiction, carries a huge risk of relapse. Because, as mentioned earlier, willpower is a limited energy, like a battery that runs flat when it is drawn on too much, from constantly fighting yourself and your unconscious mechanisms (which are by nature stronger and more resilient than our conscious efforts).
• Gaps in the net: many of the clients who go through my programmes meet one or a few relapses along the way. And that is a normal process! Why? Because as we move forward, we identify particular situations that lead to using: uncomfortable emotions (frustration, boredom, anger, disappointment…), triggering events (conflicts, a social occasion that permits or encourages using, the loss of a loved one). And if we have not yet had the time and the chance to find a suitable way of responding to that situation, the addiction can come back temporarily.
• The link with pleasure: if the addiction is still mainly associated with pleasure, there is a good chance that in moments of frustration, or simply after working hard or putting a lot of energy into something, the addiction remains the default reward. It is a sign that the question of pleasure has not yet been properly explored, to find other ways — healthier, more alive and truly chosen — of getting back those positive feelings (pleasure, wellbeing, fulfilment, reward).
• Fear of what others think: a sense of belonging to a group or an identity (the rebel artist, the rock'n'roll spirit…) has often grown up around the addiction. Sometimes we chose our relationships because we shared those rituals of using. So even if, for all the best reasons in the world, we have decided to stop following the group's pull towards the friendly drink, the social cigarette, the peace pipe and so on, our ancestral unconscious reminds us, with masterful bursts of fear, of the risk of being rejected or abandoned by the group, of coming across as the killjoy or the resident antisocial, and of ending up alone.

More on willpower: Why can't I stop? →

So why is a relapse so unpleasant?

What makes going back to an addiction so painful, difficult or uncomfortable is all the emotions and thoughts that wake up in the face of a situation perceived as a failure:

• Guilt / shame: "I have no willpower"; "All that effort for nothing"; "I ruined everything in one evening"; "I'm letting down the people who believed in me, yet again."
• Resignation / discouragement: "I'll never manage it"; "It's stronger than me, it's in my genes / in my nature."; "I've been trying for years and nothing works: I'm a hopeless case." This is learned helplessness: after repeated attempts perceived as failures, the brain takes on the belief that no effort will ever have any impact on the end result. But here is the good news: with a little help, it can be undone!
• Self-criticism: "I'm useless!"; "I'm weak!"; "I have no discipline."
• Passing exhaustion: "I'm so tired of fighting all the time."; "I don't have the strength to start all over again from scratch."

So the problem isn't the relapse, but how we react to it!

Often from school onwards, and especially for the less academic among us, we were taught to fear failure, as if failing made us someone "bad" or "weak".

By linking the bad mark with shame, we ended up confusing running into a failure with having — or even being — a problem.

Yet once we are rid of that guilt, a mistake is no longer a problem or a drama. It is simply valuable information, a lesson that shows us what didn't work so that we can do better the next time.

"I never lose. I either win or learn." — N. Mandela

"I made no mistakes; they are what built me." — C. Price

"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." — A. Einstein

"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." — W. Churchill

"Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently." — H. Ford

Another attitude towards relapse

There is a line from Viktor Frankl that I often quote to explain simply, without any jargon, why it matters to observe our behaviours and their triggers in a given situation if we want to free ourselves from them. It is, notably, the principle behind cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).

"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our freedom."

• The stimulus is what actually happens (an emotion, an event, a thought, etc.).
• Our response is our behaviour (relapse by default and, later on, the reaction we choose).
• The space is our ability to take the time to observe, and then to choose that behaviour.

The more we observe, the more perspective we gain. And the more perspective we have, the more we can choose our behaviour in a given situation.

Watching consciously: the yoga of choice and freedom →

So, concretely, what do we do after a relapse?

1. Observe the emotions tied to the relapse, without taking sides

First, we observe the uncomfortable emotions that come with the relapse (guilt, shame, a sense of failure, of powerlessness, etc.).

Our best refuge at that moment is to go into the physical sensation rather than into our thoughts when these emotions arrive. In the same way that, if a storm broke while we were out in a forest, we would settle by the trunk of the tree rather than up at the top.

To make this easier, we can name these emotions ("well, I'm feeling guilt", "I'm feeling shame") and feel them until they pass.

2. Observe, factually, what happened

What situation set off the urge to use?

• A particular emotion or sensation (anxiety, loneliness, a spike of stress, a tight throat, tension in the stomach, etc.)
• A particular event (a conflict with someone close or at work, the anniversary of a difficult moment, a party, a night out, a reunion)
• A state you were looking for (pleasure, relief, relaxation, freedom, a bubble)

3. Visualise, imagine, try out new responses

By spending enough time inside ourselves to welcome these emotions, situations or emotional needs, we discover that our intuition gradually creates new ways of responding to these situations, better suited to our happiness (pleasure, fulfilment, health, overall wellbeing).

How do we approach this in a session?

All this work is sometimes hard to do alone, because you have to be both the observer and the guide. And if our energy is already being drawn on elsewhere (work, family, everyday challenges) and our observer muscle (our awareness) is not yet very developed, it can take a very long time!

So this is the stage where being supported is especially useful: you can let yourself be fully immersed in welcoming the uncomfortable emotions, visualising the situations linked to the recent or potential relapse, and intuitively creating new strategies.

On the one hand, interactive hypnosis allows us at the same time:

• to develop a direct, natural connection with the states we were seeking through the addiction (a mental break, a bubble, motivation, freedom, pleasure, confidence, etc.);
• to welcome, and set at a distance, all the uncomfortable emotions that prevent those sought-after states from being sustained and from growing naturally;
• to visualise and transform the risk situations (the ones where a relapse is possible) by imagining and trying out a new way of reacting to them, one that is more aligned and therefore free of the addiction reflex.

On the other, coaching helps us build, in a very accessible, concrete and effective way, new habits and new ways of nourishing the states we are after (serenity, pleasure, adventure, confidence).

We look at how to put them in place simply and gradually, and at all the barriers that could stop them from happening. All of this without any question of effort or discipline. The emphasis is always on pleasure and on the practical side. If there is effort, there is a block. What we look for together is an approach that flows naturally, from the natural source of desire and fulfilment.