I will use free hearts as a model for the above topic. CBT means cognitive behavioral therapy. The pillars of CBT are thoughts, behavior and emotions. These pillars are interconnected and are the ones we use to deal with addiction. Freed Hearts Uganda uses the third wave of CBT but most approaches are from the second wave.
Spiritual exercises: due to different faith approaches, inventory making, reflection, meditation or call itself awareness is the first program in the morning. For Free Hearts, there is a special bias for Christianity because most of the members are Christians. The bible is used as a tool for data collection which include; thoughts about humility, forgiveness, the golden rule, meekness and not judging. These may look Christian but they are universal software for mind changing.
Psycho-education (PED): this is mainly for data giving. It emphasizes the hardware of human body and the substance of abuse. The brain operation is the central topic dealing with how substances affect the brain and every system of the body ( immune system, CNS, respiratory system, digestive system, etc ) and also understanding the substances themselves like how ethanol affects the brain, THC, Nicotine and other substances.
Cognitively, we want to make our clients aware of the damages that can be caused by the above. “you cannot abuse substances, substances abuse you.” this is a nacada catch words in Kenya which are very true.
RPP: this covers a lot of self help approaches to personal improvement. An overview of these can include; Anger management, forgiveness, temptation, fear and worry, depression, anxiety, classic conditioning, denial etc which all affect cognitive ability of someone and this is where we use the third wave of CBT.
CBT itself: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has gone through 3 waves.
The 1st wave was from German Psychologists initiated by Edmond Freud who expanded on psycho-analysis with many others like…….etc.
The 2nd wave was initiated by Dr. Teddy Beck and others which mainly picked on thoughts, emotions and behaviors. These are ones we use in addiction recovery for self realization because they are open and goal oriented.
The 3rd wave, we shall expound it more in other articles because it is very wide. But in this statement, the 3rd wave takes off because of new biases and various needs that have developed e.g. issues with homosexuality, new different kinds of diseases and many new class A substances.
Finally, this topic is open for your advice and criticism.
THE TRUTH
in my classes, we always handle the Truth as the most powerful tool in the human mind that can change behavior especially addiction. This is true but it must be contextualized. Which type of Truth are we talking about for we have cultural Truth, moral Truth, societal Truth, scientific Truth, etc.
Inorder to get this Truth, we must have stepping stones. These include;
1. Consistence. Must be consistent. Does not change.
2. Must be universal. So applicable everywhere.
3. Must be positive in changing behavior itself.
4. Must be multicultural. Applicable to all cultures.
Now we ask ourselves, where can we get such a Truth. Because even scientific Truth can be changed with new understanding and discoveries. For example; during my school time, I was taught that light travels in straight waves. But recently, I learnt that light has mass. So the Truth is that light travels in straight waves and has particles. Therefore, such a Truth cannot be used in addiction recovery for addiction never changes. Once it is an addiction, it is an addiction.
This calls for a quantified Truth and I have found out that they are software in our minds or thinking that are consistent, universal, positive and multicultural. And this can be got from the Bible.
Let us consider one of them; Forgiveness.
Humanity is in dire need of forgiveness and nobody ever has found it useless. It is always consistent. It holds all universality values, it is multicultural and positive.
I will deal with this topic in another article.
HOW TO VERIFY THE TRUTH FROM THE BIBLE.
In our previous article about the truth, we emphasized the software of forgiveness being universal, consistent, positive in changing behavior and multicultural.
How do we trust that the bible is a good source of truth.
It is consistent. The theme which the bible handles in all its 66 books and its over 40 authors is consistent “GOD is good”. Though they are many authors and books, they don’t contradict on this theme.
The Bible was written for over a period of 2000 years in more than 3 languages,………, Hebrew and Greek and the writers were from different cultural backgrounds from Africa, middle east and Asia. And such a variety of sources can be trusted as the truth.
Archaeological discoveries have found out that all mentioned places, names of people, actually existed which means the Bible is a historical book that is mentioning historical events, people who existed.
Other writings: we have other writings from other sources that mention the same events that that the Bible does too which means actually independent sources conform the truth that the Bible exposes.
The challenge at hand is translations and mindsets of people who make such research. Finally, science itself has never contradicted any concept spoken by the Bible, in fact the Bible has helped science in many ways. For example; the understanding of the universe, instinct cultures and human activities.
This article is not conclusive, it requires your citation and positive criticism.