Group Objective: To explore deeply held core-false-beliefs that lead to addictive tendencies and behavior.
Key Teaching Points: Unconscious beliefs and the programming we received growing up often lead to addictive behaviors. This group will provide practices that will allow clients to explore the origins of these beliefs, question their validity, and release them in an interactive process.
Materials Needed: Flat river rocks, paint pens, and an outdoor space to throw the rocks safely.
Reading from Conscious Recovery: If we’re born with a solid connection to our divine nature, what happens to that connection? Most of us come into a world that teaches us about fear, separation, and competition. We learn things about ourselves and our world that are contrary to the fundamental truth that we are whole and perfect. Adults, often well-meaning, try to prepare us for the world by teaching us to fight, to wall off our emotions, to criticize. These lessons are based on lies that I call “core false beliefs.” The deepest root of addiction is this: we learn and we appropriate core false beliefs, which break the connection with our true nature. This fragments us and pushes us to turn outward for validation, love, and peace of mind.
Our core false beliefs, which frequently stem from generalized unresolved trauma and spiritual disconnection, may leave us feeling broken. In response, we might look for things to make that feeling go away. That is often the foundational malady of addictive behavior. I have seen it repeatedly: What is most often at the core of addictive behavior is this sense of brokenness within and the search for something outside ourselves to help us manage the resulting discomfort. Looked at in this way, addictive behavior can be seen as a strategy, even a brilliant strategy, for survival. When our sense of self is fragmented, when we see ourselves as fundamentally broken, that’s a very, very painful way to live. We feel like we’re surviving rather than thriving, walking around with a sense of separation, a feeling of fear, a belief that we can’t reveal our true selves because there’s something wrong with us.
Residential: Week 4 Group Outline Recovery Rocks
(10 minutes) Meditation
(10 minutes) Check-in: Everyone says their name and something about their inner critic and core false beliefs. (Critical self-talk).
Review Shared Agreements
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One Person Speaks at a Time
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Confidentiality
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Share the Air
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No “Fixing”
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“I” Statements
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Feedback Upon Request
(10 minutes) Introduction of Topic: Brief educational overview of how core- false-beliefs develop and how they lead to addictive behavior.
Share these key points: (You might want to write these on the board or flipchart for discussion):
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We come into this world “whole” and connected to who we are
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Through various types of trauma, we develop core-false-beliefs
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These beliefs get trapped in the subconscious and impact our lives
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It is important to bring them into conscious awareness to be free
(5 minutes) Teaching Point: Draw a picture of the “seed and tree” and talk about how the seed represents our unconscious beliefs. (We can spend time “trimming and decorating” the tree but nothing really changes unless we get down to the seed).
(5 minutes) Group Process: Identify one core-false-belief. Go around the circle and have everyone simply say their belief. (No feedback or comments). Core-False-Beliefs usually start with “I am…” or “I am not…”
(15 minutes) Group Process (Dyads): Have participants interview each other regarding their chosen core-false-belief using the following four questions. (You might want to write these on the board or flipchart for discussion):
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Where did this belief originate?
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How do you feel when you believe it?
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When does it arise?
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What would it take to be free from it?
(25 minutes) Group Project: Have everyone write their core-false-belief on a flat rock. Now, walk to a place (woods, body of water, etc.) to throw the rock while saying some version of “I now release this belief/lie, etc.”
You may want to say: “People often ask if it is really as simple as writing the belief on a rock and throwing it. My answer is this: Maybe, but for most of us it is simply a reminder that if we find ourselves returning to the critical thought we can remind our self that we “threw it away.”
(10 minutes) Closing Process