Beginner’s Thoughts: An Important Tool for Recovery

Dr. Robert Weiss LCSW, CSAT

Let yourself be quiet for a moment and bring your mind back to the first time you experienced something you didn’t expect. This may be your first time attending a recovery meeting, your first visit to a new city or some other novel experience. Do you remember how to understand every detail, notice fresh eyes in people, behavior, color and many other aspects? This is the “beginner’s mind”, the ability to handle any task or have no bias or opinion even without understanding anything. Unfortunately, as we get used to our daily routine, our brains begin to take things for granted, stop paying attention to commonplaces and lead to us becoming more agile and unaware of things inside and outside.

Why is the mind of beginners important for recovery? In short, recovery is an ongoing learning process that can be greatly enhanced by open thinking. How many of us convince ourselves that we can actually go for a day without drugs or sex? In recovery, how many of us have been instructed by trust-based sponsors, perhaps with some doubts, but willing to seize the opportunity? This is the mind of beginners, and is crucial to the most important principle of restoration (acceptance) because it allows us to see beyond the closed world and begin to open up to new ideas and experiences.

Why do addicts lose the mind of beginners? Some of these can be explained by shame and stigma surrounding addictive behavior. Drug users gradually become dishonest because the consequences of their actions accumulate and they begin to lose any ability to objectively observe their plight. Over time, they have strong thoughts and beliefs in resisting a life of change.

The mind of beginners may also be lost because the addict becomes the “expert” when it is addicted, and the person who becomes an expert is the exact opposite of the mind of beginners. I have worked with substance abuse, and they have far exceeded my molecular structure and impact on various drugs, and clients with a high level of nutritional knowledge about my eating disorders. But despite extensive knowledge, they still cannot save themselves from their addiction.

Finally, the beginner’s mind fades away due to so-called confirmation bias, which is what someone sees what they expect to see, subconsciously ignoring facts or data points that are not related to their expectations. For example, if I think recovery is impossible, I might notice that those who relapse and minimize are reducing the success of those who have no one to a greater extent.

Here are some tips for keeping beginners’ minds:

1. Open to possibilities. Drug users can be very tired, hold strong opinions, and determine what works (or doesn’t work) for them. Therefore, try to recover without comments or expectations. Pay attention to what you need to do now. A psychotherapy called solution therapy uses a “miracle problem” to burst out this limited worldview, requiring the client to imagine that he or she will notice whether he or she has a miracle overnight, and he or she wakes up and discovers life. A great improvement.
2. Learn while studying. Keep a new recovery experience by keeping the mind of beginners. Working with new immigrants is an excellent way to trigger memories of their own insights and experience their growth. When you feel resistant to certain aspects of your recovery plan (you will), follow another advice you often hear in the room: take what works and leave the rest.
3. adapt. Even for those with the least recovery time, anyone’s behavior, emotions and prospects can change dramatically. It is not uncommon for some aspects of the recovery plan to work properly for a period of time, but it is just lost in effectiveness. For example, it may be necessary to curb behavior in the first place. Later, he or she may need reflective feedback from sponsors and friends about emotional issues. It is important to recognize that tools for working today may not work tomorrow and may therefore need to adapt.

Beginner’s mind keeps us in touch and is one of the great inspiring forces of healing: the miracle of healing.

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If you or someone you care about is struggling with sexual, pornography, or material/sex addiction, please help. Seeking integrity to provide hospitalization for sexual, pornographic and material/sex drug users as well as low-cost online task force. Meanwhile, sexAndRelationshiphealing.com offers a variety of free webinars and visit discussion groups, podcasts, and more.