These evidence-based therapeutic approaches provide structured frameworks for understanding and changing thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. While working with a trained therapist is ideal for deep work, many of these tools can be learned and practiced independently to support your recovery journey. Rest & Recovery offers many in person workshops based on these topics as well. Remember to click on anything highlighted in PURPLE to go deeper into these topics.
What It Is: Liberation Place is a comprehensive online recovery and mental health resource that integrates DBT (Dialectical Behaviour Therapy) and Schema Therapy to help people understand the underlying "why" behind addictive and maladaptive behaviors. Created by Steven Morris, it offers an extensive library of tools, skills, and support that goes far beyond typical recovery resources.
The website contains detailed, accessible breakdowns of:
Structured guidance on creating:
Rather than simply managing symptoms, they help you discover your core values, align your life with what truly matters to you, and transform maladaptive patterns at their root. It's about building a life worth living, not just abstaining from substances or behaviors.
Personal Note: This resource has been profoundly helpful on my own journey. Steven has created something extraordinary - a place where people can access professional-quality therapeutic tools and genuine community support regardless of their financial situation. The depth and quality of the free content alone rivals many paid programs.
What It Is: Attachment theory explains how our early relationships with caregivers shape the way we relate to ourselves and others throughout our lives. Understanding your attachment style helps you recognize patterns in relationships and provides a roadmap for healing toward secure attachment.
Core Concept: The way you learned to seek (or avoid) safety and connection as a child becomes your default pattern in adult relationships. The good news? Attachment styles can change. You can learn to create more secure ways of relating at any age.
May become overly dependent on sponsor, therapist, or recovery community. Struggles with healthy boundaries. Needs constant reassurance about progress.
May resist asking for help, skip meetings, minimize emotions. "I can handle this alone." Struggles to be vulnerable in support groups.
Inconsistent engagement with support. May push away when help is offered but panic when alone. Trust issues with support system.
Can ask for help when needed, maintain healthy independence, handle setbacks without spiraling, trust the process while staying engaged.
Remember: Your attachment style isn't your destiny. With awareness, support, and practice, you can develop more secure ways of relating to yourself and others. This work is foundational for lasting recovery.
What It Is: CBT is based on the idea that our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are all interconnected. By changing unhelpful thought patterns, we can shift how we feel and act. It's one of the most researched and effective approaches for addiction, anxiety, depression, and many other mental health challenges.
Core Concept: Your thoughts aren't facts - they're interpretations that can be examined and changed. CBT teaches you to identify distorted thinking patterns (cognitive distortions) and replace them with more balanced, realistic thoughts.
When you notice a strong emotion or urge, write down:
Common thinking traps to watch for:
Depression and addiction make you want to isolate and do less. Behavioral activation fights this by scheduling activities that bring meaning or pleasure, even when you don't feel like it.
Practice: When you notice strong emotions, ask yourself: "What cognitive distortion might I be using right now?"
List activities in three categories:
Schedule at least one from each category daily. Do them even if you don't feel motivated. Notice: action often comes before motivation, not after.
Remember: Feelings follow actions. You don't have to wait to "feel ready" to start living differently.
What It Is: DBT was originally created for people with intense emotions and self-destructive behaviors. It combines acceptance ("I'm doing the best I can right now") with change ("I can learn skills to do better"). DBT teaches four main skill sets: Mindfulness, Distress Tolerance, Emotion Regulation, and Interpersonal Effectiveness.
Core Concept: You can accept yourself as you are AND work toward change at the same time. Both things can be true. This is the "dialectical" part - holding two opposing truths together.
Use this when you're about to act on impulse or say something you'll regret:
Example: You get a triggering text. STOP. Don't respond immediately. Step back (put phone down). Observe (I feel angry, my heart is racing, I want to lash out). Proceed (I'll respond in 20 minutes when I'm calmer).
Sometimes emotions are based on distorted thoughts or old patterns. When the emotion doesn't match the situation, act OPPOSITE to your urge.
How to use it:
Important: Only use opposite action when the emotion doesn't fit the facts. If the emotion IS warranted, express it effectively instead.
What is it? Completely accepting reality as it is, without fighting it. This doesn't mean you approve or that you stop working for change - it means you stop suffering by resisting what already IS.
Steps:
Example: "I relapsed. I hate that this happened, but fighting the fact that it happened keeps me stuck. I accept that I relapsed. Now, what do I do from here?"
Remember: Acceptance is not giving up - it's the first step toward effective action.
What It Is: Schema therapy addresses deep, core beliefs about yourself, others, and the world that were formed in childhood and continue to drive your patterns as an adult. These "schemas" are like lenses through which you see everything - and they're often distorted by early trauma or unmet needs.
Core Concept: Your current struggles often stem from trying to cope with childhood wounds using strategies that worked then but don't work now. Schema therapy helps you identify these patterns, understand their origins, and develop healthier ways of meeting your needs.
"Everyone I care about will leave me"
"People will hurt or take advantage of me"
"I'm fundamentally flawed and unlovable"
"I'm incompetent and will inevitably fail"
"I can't handle things on my own"
"No one will ever truly care about my needs"
What It Is: EMDR is a highly effective therapy for processing trauma and distressing memories. It uses bilateral stimulation (usually eye movements, but also tapping or sounds) to help your brain reprocess traumatic memories so they're no longer triggering.
How It Works: Trauma memories can get "stuck" in your nervous system, causing you to relive them with the same emotional intensity. EMDR helps your brain complete the processing that was interrupted during the traumatic event, allowing the memory to be stored as "something that happened in the past" rather than "something happening now."
Sessions with a trained EMDR therapist
You'll identify target memories to process
While thinking of the memory, you'll follow the therapist's finger moving back and forth (or use tapping)
The bilateral stimulation helps your brain reprocess the memory
Over sessions, the memory loses its emotional charge
New, adaptive beliefs replace old trauma-based beliefs
Highly Effective For: PTSD, trauma, phobias, panic attacks, traumatic grief, disturbing memories that fuel addiction
What It Is: ART is similar to EMDR but often works faster and with less detailed discussion of the traumatic event. It uses rapid eye movements while you visualize the traumatic memory, then helps you "rescript" the memory with a different, less distressing outcome.
Best For: Single-event trauma, performance anxiety, chronic pain, phobias, traumatic grief
What It Is: NLP is a set of techniques for changing thoughts, behaviors, and emotional responses by reprogramming the way your brain processes information. It's based on the idea that language (both internal and external) shapes your experience of reality.
How you talk to yourself matters - your internal dialogue creates your reality
Changing the "structure" of your experience (how you think about it) changes the experience itself
You can model successful behaviors and patterns from others
Your mind and body are interconnected - changing one changes the other
Changing the meaning you give to an event
Creating a physical trigger (like touching your thumb and finger together) while in a desired state, then using that trigger later to access the state
Mentally traveling back to heal past events or forward to imagine desired futures
Breaking habitual thought or behavior patterns
Changing how you mentally represent memories (making traumatic memories smaller, dimmer, further away)
Practical Application: NLP offers many self-directed techniques for changing thought patterns, building confidence, and releasing old programming. It works well alongside other therapeutic approaches.
What It Is: IFS views your psyche as made up of different "parts" - like a family system inside you. Some parts are wounded (carrying trauma, shame, or pain), some are protectors (trying to keep you safe through various strategies), and at your core is your "Self" - your wise, compassionate center.
Wounded, young parts carrying pain, shame, or trauma
Parts that try to keep you in control and prevent pain (perfectionism, controlling, people-pleasing)
Parts that react when exiles get triggered (substance use, binge eating, self-harm, rage)
Core Concept: None of your parts are bad - they're all trying to help in the best way they know how. When you can access your Self and compassionately listen to each part, healing happens.
Notice when a "part" is activated ("Part of me wants to use, part of me wants to stay sober")
Get curious about the part: "What are you trying to protect me from?"
Listen without judgment
Thank the part for trying to help
Ask what it needs or what role it would prefer
Let your Self (compassionate center) lead
Why It's Powerful for Recovery: Addiction often involves "firefighter" parts trying to put out the pain of "exiled" parts. IFS helps you address the root cause with compassion rather than fighting yourself.
What It Is: Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a collaborative, person-centered counseling approach that helps you explore and resolve ambivalence about change. Rather than being told what to do, MI helps you discover your own reasons and motivations for changing.
Core Principle: People tend to believe what they hear themselves say. MI creates space for you to voice your own arguments for change, which strengthens your commitment far more than external pressure ever could.
Not expert/patient, but collaborative relationship
Meeting you where you are without judgment
Prioritizing your wellbeing
Drawing out your own wisdom and motivation rather than imposing advice
Four basic skills used in Motivational Interviewing that you can use in conversations with yourself or with supportive others:
MI recognizes that ambivalence (wanting to change AND not wanting to change) is normal. The key is exploring both sides without judgment, then tipping the scale by emphasizing your own reasons for change.
Why It Works: MI is collaborative and non-confrontational. When you explore your own motivations without pressure, resistance decreases and genuine commitment emerges.
What It Is: Brain entrainment is the process of using external stimuli (sound frequencies, light, new experiences) to influence your brainwave patterns and literally rewire your brain's neural pathways. This isn't metaphorical - it's actual neuroplasticity in action.
The Science: The synchronization of brainwaves is a phenomenon termed 'entrainment' known to support neuroplasticity, a critical brain rewiring and reorganization process that allows us to learn, heal and develop.
Your brain produces electrical activity at different frequencies, each associated with different mental states:
Deep sleep, healing, unconscious processing
Deep relaxation, meditation, creativity, dream state
Calm alertness, light relaxation, reflective states
Active thinking, focus, alertness, problem-solving
Peak focus, high-level information processing, insight
How They Work: Binaural beats are an auditory phenomenon that occurs when two tones of different frequencies, which are presented separately to each ear, elicit the sensation of a third tone oscillating at the difference frequency of the two tones.
Example: Play 200 Hz in your left ear and 210 Hz in your right ear. Your brain perceives a 10 Hz "beat" - which happens to be in the alpha range (calm, relaxed alertness).
(required - each ear needs different frequency)
for best results (pre-task priming)
for enhanced effect
Free Resources: Search YouTube for "binaural beats [your desired state]" or use apps like Brain.fm, Insight Timer, or mynoise.net
The Concept: Your brain builds neural pathways based on repeated patterns. Addiction creates STRONG pathways (cravings, triggers, automatic responses). To weaken these and build new ones, you need to:
Your brain doesn't distinguish clearly between imagination and reality when it comes to emotional processing. You can literally reprogram traumatic memories by consciously changing the narrative:
Why This Works: As neurons get stimulated, they begin to emit electrical and chemical messengers and form neuropathways that have influence over our thoughts, emotions and behaviors. By repeatedly thinking new thoughts and taking new actions, you physically change your brain's structure.
The Bottom Line: Your brain is not fixed. Through intentional practice with binaural beats, new experiences, and conscious story rewriting, you can literally rewire your neural pathways and create new default patterns. This is the biological basis of recovery.
What It Is: Narrative therapy views problems as separate from people. You are not your problem - you are a person who is dealing with a problem. This approach helps you "re-author" your life story, externalizing problems and reclaiming your identity beyond your struggles.
The problem is the problem, not the person ("Addiction has been affecting your life" vs. "You are an addict")
Examining how you've come to believe certain "truths" about yourself
Writing a new narrative that highlights your agency, resilience, and values
Connecting with who you are beyond the problem story
The Power of Narrative: The stories we tell about our lives shape our identity and our future. By consciously choosing to tell a different story - one that acknowledges pain but emphasizes resilience, growth, and agency - you literally create new possibilities for who you can become.
Remember: You are not your diagnosis, your mistakes, or your struggles. You are the author of your life, and you can write a new chapter anytime.
These therapeutic modalities aren't mutually exclusive - many people benefit from combining approaches. CBT and DBT provide practical tools for daily life. EMDR and ART address trauma. IFS helps you understand internal conflicts. NLP and narrative therapy help rewrite old programming.
Try what resonates. Work with trained professionals when possible, especially for trauma work. Rest & Recovery also offers in-person workshops based on these (and many other) modalities. And remember: the fact that you're exploring these tools means you're already engaged in the work of healing.
🔧 THERAPEUTIC MODALITIES