4 steps to cope with addic­tion Reduce addic­tive beha­vior - a lear­ning pro­gram

The exer­cise module offe­red for dow­n­load ser­ves to reduce your own addic­tive beha­viour. With the help of a lear­ning pro­gram logi­cally struc­tu­red in indi­vi­dual steps, you will work out the gene­ral requi­re­ments for redu­cing your addic­tive beha­viour in the first three steps. These are a pre­re­qui­site for step 4, where the topic of "addic­tion" is dealt with spe­ci­fi­cally.

This pro­gram was cre­a­ted on the basis of scien­ti­fic prin­cip­les. It allows you to do some­thing about each of the pro­blems your­self by actively wor­king through the text and using the exer­ci­ses pro­vi­ded.

So you will need some time and effort to get results. The advan­tage is obvious: you do not rely on super­fi­cial "tips" or advice lite­ra­ture, but take per­so­nal respon­si­bi­lity with regard to the issues where you want to achieve impro­ve­ment..

Effects of inappropriate thoughts on addictive behavior

The effects of inap­pro­pri­ate thoughts (men­tal eva­lua­ti­ons) on addic­tive beha­vior are a per­pe­tua­tion of addic­tive beha­vior and fear of with­dra­wal sym­ptoms:

You think in cer­tain situa­ti­ons (events, pla­ces, times ...) when you have cer­tain fee­lings (e.g., fear, anger, or dejec­tion) or when you have cer­tain bodily sen­sa­ti­ons (e.g., ten­sion, rest­less­ness, and with­dra­wal sym­ptoms), for exam­ple, that you need to smoke, drink, eat, take pills, or the like. So you asso­ciate a spe­ci­fic trig­ge­ring event (A) with your pro­ble­ma­tic use (beha­vior-C).

Two other fac­tors are cru­cial to main­tai­ning this asso­cia­tion:

Beha­vior

• For many indi­vi­du­als who exhi­bit such addic­tive beha­vior, it is because they have long been accu­sto­med to respon­ding to cer­tain events, fee­lings, or bodily sen­sa­ti­ons with pro­ble­ma­tic con­sump­tion. When such an event occurs, they react almost auto­ma­ti­cally with the ingrai­ned habit of thin­king that links that par­ti­cu­lar situa­tion or fee­ling (A) with pro­ble­ma­tic con­sump­tion as a reac­tion (C). They do not con­si­der alter­na­tive beha­viors at the moment of occur­rence of that situa­tion or fee­ling.

Addic­tion / cra­ving

• Because you are used to your pro­ble­ma­tic con­sump­tion, once you stop, with­dra­wal sym­ptoms appear after some time. In response to noti­cing these with­dra­wal sym­ptoms, you react with thoughts like, "I feel like I need this addic­tive sub­stance and now I abso­lu­tely must have it!" You feel a cra­ving for a ciga­rette, alco­hol, food, or pills, for exam­ple, and give in to that cra­ving. This means that you con­ti­nue your pro­ble­ma­tic con­sump­tion.

To change some­thing about your pro­ble­ma­tic con­sump­tion, it is import­ant that you change cer­tain things:

• It is import­ant that you work on chan­ging your inap­pro­pri­ate eva­lua­ti­ons.
• You need to rea­lize your almost auto­ma­tic connec­tion bet­ween cer­tain events (A) and your pro­ble­ma­tic use, and try to inter­rupt this auto­ma­tism.
• You must rea­lize that when you expe­ri­ence with­dra­wal sym­ptoms, you do not have to use again, but choose to do so in order to escape the unple­a­sant sen­sa­ti­ons that arise. You can also choose not to con­sume and then, of course, have to endure the likely unple­a­sant with­dra­wal sym­ptoms.