28 | February | 2014 | Craving Recovery

RIGHT AND WRONG ~ vs ~ WORKING AND NONWORKING

Recently while sitting and running a parenting group, the topic and/or question came up of “How do we start focusing on the positive rather than what’s wrong?” This topic tends to be a general issue rather than a parent specific issue. The issue at hand is that we spend more time focusing on what is wrong and thinking by doing this we can fix what is wrong and that our issues and troubles will be over. The struggle is that when we spend our time on what is wrong we tend to see it as a continual stream of wrong.

I enjoy working on motorcycles. I like being able to take a motorcycle that isn’t functioning well and by process of illumination, track down what is wrong and fix it. After stripping it down, this strategy works in helping me find the issue and putting the bike back together. The bike then tends to work more effectively. While this strategy may work on bikes, this does not work when it comes to human beings. Human beings are more complex creatures than a simple animate object that is designed to do specific tasks. Since it tends to work well in those areas, we have the tendency to apply this philosophy to the complexity of humanity. I cannot look at myself and simply through a process of elimination, track down one simple issue, fix it, and have my life become flawless from there forward.

There are a series of factors that play into the issues we all wrestle with. Rather than spending our energy focusing on fixing what is wrong, there is a more effective strategy when it comes to dealing with humans and our own humanity. One way is to simply shift our focus to look for those things that are “working” and “not working” in our lives. When I identify the “working” pieces of my life, I can then start to see them as universal truths. I can then apply these truths not only to the issues they are working for but also use them on the things I may be struggling with. For example, if I have the ability to let go of obsessive thoughts when it comes to work, that means I have the tools to let go of obsessive thoughts. Therefore, if I am struggling with obsessive thoughts in my personal life, by focusing on how I am dealing with them in my work life and the processes I used to let go, I can then apply these same tools to my personal life for similar results.

We as human beings have a tendency to default to wrong and right thinking when it comes to problem solving. That may work on a carburetor; it does not work on hearts and minds of men and women.

Dean N Nixon
Seminar Director, Life Coach

Statistics show that there is a far higher than average rate of drinking among college students, especially binge drinking. Using the Stages of Change to assess how ready a college student with a problem drinking pattern is to changing their behavior, but more importantly using motivational interviewing techniques as a brief intervention method to interrupt and change unhealthy drinking patterns was the focus in a recent study at Syracuse University (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007). The efficacy of Brief Motivational Interventions (BMI) was investigated and evidence indicated that (BMI’s) reduce risky alcohol use (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

In this study the authors hypothesized that Brief Motivational Interventions would be more effective when: 1) They were ready, according to Prochaska’s (Stages of Change) stages. 2) They had better self-regulation skills. 3)They had more awareness in social comparison. 4) They had lower present time perspective and higher future time perspective. 5) That women would be more effected by (BMI’s) (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

The study proved that readiness for change and better self-regulation had a great effect on one’s ability to reduce the number of drinks and reduce blood alcohol content but there was no direct correlation to the use of (BMI’s) as the intervention, it was just simply that they were better at self-regulating and they were ready to change (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

The students that were more aware of social comparison were not affected by (BMI’s), that over time their social awareness would most likely reduce consumption but not due to the intervention (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007). What I found most interesting is the student’s that did not have good future time perspective were affected more by (BMI’s) than those that did. Like the intervention caused them to think of future negative consequences they had never thought of before (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007). The last hypothesis that women would be more affected by the interventions was found to not be true (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

The most important finding is that Brief Motivational Interventions will promote the reduction of drinking regardless of the student’s readiness for change (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

In the second study reviewed the authors were exploring if (BMI’s) would have a similar effectiveness in lowering college problem gambling as it did in lowering risky drinking patterns (Petry, Weinstock, Morasco, & Ledgerwood, 2008). The study showed high rates of almost pathological gambling in college students and that 23% gamble weekly or more, and that gambling levels may be effected by Motivational Enhancement Therapy (MET) and Cognative Behavioral Therapy (CBT) interventions (Petry, Weinstock, Morasco, & Ledgerwood, 2008).

The study like the Syracuse University study on problem drinking showed that if problem gamblers where to be identified and if (BMI’s) were used it would significantly lower gambling for up to 9 months in as high as two thirds of the population (Petry, Weinstock, Morasco, & Ledgerwood, 2008).

Based on the findings of these two studies colleges need to explore the use of regular (BMI’s) for these two problem populations. The students would be more effective in school and many negative side effects from problem drinking and gambling would be reduced. As was mentioned in the study the first thing would be to identify the students currently experiencing these problems (Petry, Weinstock, Morasco, & Ledgerwood, 2008). Using the stages of change to identify those that are ready for change, and finding the student’s that already have better self-regulation skills would by the process of elimination help in identifying the remaining students with these problems that may be most affected by (BAC’s) (Carey, Henson, Carey, & Maisto, 2007).

References

Carey, K. B., Henson, J. M., Carey, M. P., & Maisto, S. A. (2007). Which Heavy Drinking College Students Benefit From a Brief Motivational Intervention? Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 75(4), 663-669. doi:10.1037/0022-006X.75.4.663

Petry, N. M., Weinstock, J., Morasco, B. J., & Ledgerwood, D. M. (2009). Brief motivational interventions for college student problem gamblers. Addiction. doi:10.1111/j.1360-0443.2009.02652.x