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Road to Recovery

Mistaken Belief #1

Mistaken Belief #2

Mistaken Belief #3

Mistaken Belief #4

Mistaken Belief #5

Mistaken Belief #6

Mistaken Belief #7

Mistaken Belief #8

Mistaken Belief #9

Mistaken Belief #10

Mistaken Belief #11

Mistaken Belief #12

Mistaken Belief #13

Mistaken Belief #14

Mistaken Belief #15

Mistaken Belief #16

Mistaken Belief #17

 By: Terry Gorski with additions by: Lee Jamison

A MISTAKEN BELIEF IS SOMETHING THAT YOU BELIEVE TO BE TRUE AND ACT AS IF IT WERE TRUE WHEN, IN FACT, IT IS FALSE.

Mistaken Belief #13: Thinking about relapse will bring it about.

Fact: Ignoring the possibility of relapse is more likely to bring it about. Those who acknowledge the possibility and think about how it is apt to occur can take action to prevent it.

John put it this way, “When I started in AA they told me to stick with the winners. So I got next to people who talked about serenity and success at sobriety. I avoided those people who talked of fears of getting drunk and experiences in which they had to hang on by their fingernails. The only problem was that the ‘winners’ I was sticking with were not alert for relapse warning signs and they did not plan for managing them. As a result, when problems with their sobriety arose, they couldn’t cope. Now I see that the winners are those who recognize that any alcoholic or addict can relapse and, therefore, take precautions to prevent it.

Charley Brown once said: “No problem is so big or so complicated that you can’t run away from it.” Unfortunately this is not true. The problem of relapse must be dealt with. There is no way to run away. You always take yourself with you. Fortunately there are hundreds of professional counselors, doctors, and nurses devoting themselves to the problem of relapse.

The belief that thinking about relapse will bring it about creates areas of “forbidden thinking.” You believe that you cannot allow yourself to think about the possibility of relapse because thinking about it will bring it about. You therefore do not take action to prevent relapse. If you do not do anything about the problem it gets worse. It does not go away by itself. Relapse grows in the darkness of ignorance and dies in the light of clear accurate thinking.