Addiction Treatment Consultation and Training

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Our General Approach

     NLP Advantage Group addresses United States treatment outcome literature for the past 20 years by Reid Hester and William Miller (1995) who assert:

     Our treatment philosophy is based on collaboration, not confrontation. We respect clients’ views of their problems rather than impose outside views. Clients participate in developing an individualized treatment plan by deciding the goals of treatment and which therapeutic approaches are most appropriate. Current research clearly indicates that giving clients choice in selecting goals and methods of treatment increases motivation and success.

     We focus on discovering and amplifying clients’ personal strengths rather than searching for deficits. Instruction in a specific model or view, traditional drug education, and labeling with psychiatric or other diagnoses (e.g., codependent) is rarely done. Our approach nearly eliminates the concepts of "resistance" and "denial" which are terms that often reflect therapists’ lack of flexibility in matching their clients’ frame of reference or motivation level.

     Drugs and alcohol at one time served a useful purpose, such as helping a shy person socialize and have fun. Therefore, treatment focuses on assisting the person to develop additional ways to meet these useful purposes. Motivation for change increases by helping clients to recognize the discrepancy between their current behaviors and their significant personal goals.

     NLP Advantage Group provides training so that therapists gain skills to elicit and utilize their clients’ model of the world (rather than utilize their own frame of reference) to provide assistance their clients would view as most beneficial. This is accomplished through training in Solution Focused Therapy concepts, advanced language skills, Motivational Interviewing, and specific Neuro-Linguistic Programming processes and interventions.

     We are committed to enhancing therapists’ abilities to discover and address the unique needs of their clients. We also assist facilities to offer a variety of treatment strategies matched to address the needs of individuals.

• Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). A system of precise goal setting, motivational techniques, and interventions to produce rapid, internally motivated change.
• Solution Focused Therapy. A brief therapy approach developed over the past 20 years at the Brief Family Therapy Center in Milwaukee, WI. Primarily the model is designed to help clients engage their own unique resources and strengths in solving the problems that bring them into treatment.
• Motivational Interviewing. A process originated by William R. Miller and based on principles of cognitive and social psychology, seeks to evoke from clients their own motivation for change and to consolidate a personal decision and plan for change.
• Accelerated Learning. Activity-centered learning that appeals to all learning styles and engages the whole brain, senses, emotions, and imagination for peak learning and performance.
• Community Reinforcement Approach (CRA). A broad-spectrum behavioral treatment approach designed to teach important coping skills for living. CRA’s underlying assumption is that misuse of substances continues because individuals lack important coping skills. CRA additionally offers clients a variety of research supported treatment options such as communication and social skills training, behavior contracting, and behavioral marital therapy. Research indicates there is more evidence of positive outcomes for treating chemical abuse and dependency using CRA than any other approach in existence today. *

*Holder, et al (1991); William Miller, et al (1995); and Finney and Monahan (1996).

• Improves client retention rates, reducing leaving against medical advice.

  • Therapists pay better attention to the client’s reality and reduce power struggles by:
  • Recognizing and suspending their own needs, judgments, perceptions, and advice.
  • Using precise language skills, open ended questions, and variations of reflective listening (e.g., amplified reflection, in which the therapist takes the client’s resistance a step further), reframing, and selective agreement.

• Acknowledging research that demonstrates clients’ resistance is driven by personal counseling style.
• Recognizing and avoiding confrontational styles and strategies.
• Increases client satisfaction.
• Decreases use of consultants, by increasing therapists' skill levels and willingness to manage issues of trauma, phobia, and anxiety.
• Provides additional ways to intervene with the challenging client, dual-diagnosis clients, thus improving morale and decreasing burnout.
• Improves ability to manage "group flow" by managing personal state and increasing flexibility.
• Increases therapists' enjoyment and well-being while in the training and in their work.
• Augments additional therapeutic skills within a group or individual setting.
• Facilities save time and money by more clearly understanding what their clients want and gaining increased variety and flexibility in therapy methods to address these needs.

• Interviews to determine facilities’ specific outcomes and the current philosophies and beliefs that determine treatment.
• Description of current research to design treatment that more effectively achieves desired outcomes.
• Assessment of individual communication skills and management styles.
• Analysis of results to identify strengths and existing problems.
• Training modules and intervention strategies to resolve problems.
• Follow-up meetings or interviews to ensure progress.

     Training is custom-designed based on interviews with the facility. Brief demonstrations of each concept are followed by practical exercises and role-play. Group discussion elicits additional applications. Training may contain the following five elements:

1. Solution Focused Principles, such as:
   • Emphasizing action rather than insight to help clients to feel and think differently.
   • The meaning of your communication is the response one gets.
   • The person with the most flexibility in a system has the most influence.
   • People respond to their map of reality, not to reality itself.
2. Defining Goals and Treatment Planning
   • Treatment is guided by having clients specifically determine in behavioral terms what they want from treatment. Goals must be:
   • Salient to the client rather than the therapist or treatment program.
   • Small rather than large.
   • Described in specific, concrete, sensory, and behavioral terms.
   • Described in situational and contextual rather than global and psychological terms.
   • Stated in interactional and interpersonal terms rather than individual and intrapsychic terms.
   • Described as the start of something rather than the end of something.
   • Described as the presence of something rather than the absence of something.
   • Realistic and immediately achievable within the context of the client’s life.
3. Strengths Orientation
   • The focus is on discovering and amplifying clients’ personal strengths rather than searching for clients’ deficits. Specific questions are used to elicit a client’s unique resources and strengths.
   • Miracle Question – "Imagine that when you go to bed tonight a miracle happens and the problem that brought you here is solved. What do you suppose will be the first thing that will indicate to you that the miracle has happened?"
   • Sensory Specific - " What would you be seeing, hearing, and feeling if this was the last day of your treatment? What would be specifically happening differently in your life?"
   • Coping Sequence – "How do you prevent the problem from getting worse?"
   • Scaling Question – "On a scale of 1 to 10, how motivated are you?"
   • Exception Question – "Are there times when the problem does not happen though you expect it to?"
4. Language Skills, such as:
        Using open-ended questions, variations of reflective listening (e.g., amplified reflection, in which the therapist takes the client’s resistance a step further), reframing, and selective agreement.
5. Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) Training
        Skills and interventions from NLP offer therapists concrete tools:

NLP Foundations -This ten hour training provides the foundation for NLP

Interventions.
Guiding Presuppositions of NLP
Rapport, Sensory Acuity, and Backtrack Frame
Well-Formed Outcomes
Structure vs. Content
Detection and Intervention with Sensory Systems-visual, auditory, and kinesthetic
Associated and Dissociated States
Accessing and Changing States
Perceptual Positions
General Frame for Interventions
Anchoring
Precision Model Language

NLP Interventions - Interventions require approximately two hours each for demonstration, practice and discussion about application.

• Anchor Integration and Spatial Anchoring – extinguishes stimulus/response behaviors by applying internal resource states to problematic situations.

• New Behavior Generator – easily changes behavioral patterns.

• Visual Squash- integrates internal conflicts, such as "part of me wants to drink but the other part of me doesn't want to...."

• Swish – effective for resolving anxiety that develops over time, resolving fear of flying, stopping smoking or nail biting. Develops self-esteem and motivation.

• Neurological Levels – aligns capabilities, beliefs and values, identity, and purpose to personal goal. Also helps determine at what level to intervene with client.

• Phobia and Trauma Process – resolves responses to unpleasant memories and traumas such as PTSD, drug "flashbacks", accidents, abuse, illness. Also resolves phobic responses in Specific Phobias.

• Releasing Enmeshment Process – creates sense of separate self for enmeshment issues as well as breaks unhealthy attachments to substances.

• Meta-Outcome and Conflict Mediation – determines the deeper outcome a person/s desire so that additional options may be generated to reach outcomes.

• Reimprint- transforms the negative impact of past events and increases resources to develop current capable responding.

• Grief Process – resolves long standing grief by amplifying ability to connect positively with lost loved one.

NLP Integration - This three hour training solidifies how to match interventions to clients and maximize success.

     NLP Advantage Group merges clinical expertise and mental conditioning training to deliver specialized addiction treatment programs and seminars to athletes.

     Following is an overview of the program NLP Advantage Group designed in 2001 for The Sporting Chance Clinic, Tony Adams, captain of Arsenal Football Club, England:

     Our Chemical Dependency Program is dedicated to providing athletes the most powerful therapies available today. We offer inpatient and outpatient chemical dependency services as well as treatment for compulsive behavior patterns, such as gambling. Using action-orientated methods, athletes gather effective tools for taking back control of their lives.

     Our program is based on the state-of-the-art treatment model known as the Community Reinforcement Approach (CRA). CRA is a broad-spectrum behavioral treatment approach for substance abuse problems. CRA’s underlying assumption is that misuse of substances continues because individuals lack important coping skills. CRA teaches clients these important coping skills for sober living.

     CRA offers clients a variety of research supported treatment options such as communication and social skills training, behavior contracting, and behavioral marital therapy. In addition, CRA utilizes precise goal setting and motivational techniques to tailor treatment to the individual and produce rapid, internally motivated change. Research indicates there is more evidence of positive outcomes for treating chemical abuse and dependency using CRA than any other approach in existence today.

     Along with our commitment to offer a diverse package of proven treatment strategies matched to meet the needs of the individual, we specialize in meeting athletes’ unique needs. Comprehensive medical and nutritional assessment, physical fitness regimens, and pain and stress management are provided. Additional program components include Communication/Behavioral Skills Training, Relationship Therapy, Relapse Prevention, Peak Performance, and Social and Recreational Support.

     Our treatment philosophy is based on collaboration, not confrontation. Athletes clarify goals and talents, rebuild their self-esteem, strengthen relationships and reconnect with inner resources that transform and enrich their lives. Treatment helps individuals change self-destructive patterns, release emotional blocks, and rebuild their lives.

     The Medical staff of consulting physician, Master’s level primary therapists, chemical dependency counselors, nurses and behavioral health technicians provide 24 hour care and supervision. The treatment team includes a fitness director, physiotherapist, yoga instructor, and masseuse. Specialists also provide psychological testing, psychiatric evaluation, and acupuncture as needed. 24 hour Security to ensure confidentiality is provided.

• Medical and nutritional assessment. Also comprehensive assessment that includes the Alcohol Severity Index (ASI), InDuc 2L & 2R, OQ 45.2, and laboratory testing consisting of a urine drug panel and a blood collection/chemical panel that measures liver enzymes. Our Medical Director consults regularly with the team physician with the athlete’s permission.

• Services include referral for detoxification.

• Services may be delivered in an inpatient or outpatient setting using group, individual and family therapy. Athletes participate in developing an individualized treatment plan by deciding the goals of treatment and which therapies are most appropriate. Research clearly indicates that giving clients choice in selecting goals and methods of treatment increases motivation and the likelihood of success.
• 3-4 weeks of intensive treatment followed by less frequent sessions. The duration and frequency of sessions is determined by each individual’s emerging needs.
• The program utilizes motivational strategies, behavioral/communication skills training, peak performance strategies, pain management, stress reduction, physical fitness regimens, social skills training, trauma resolution, relationship and family counseling, and relapse prevention techniques.
• Follow up evaluations at three, six and twelve month intervals
• One year of free weekly Aftercare

     This training draws on advanced behavioral technology. Athletes learn to disengage from negative attachments to substances and people and respond with greater freedom. Modules include drug refusal skills, assertiveness training, problem solving skills, conflict resolution, listening skills, conversation skills, and giving and receiving feedback and criticism.

     When significant others emotionally withdraw or verbally vent their frustration, the troubled relationship can be used to legitimize continued use of substances. A vicious cycle develops. If the relationship does not improve, any changes in substance use may only be temporary. Relationship Therapy is action-orientated and focuses on teaching communication, negotiation, and problem solving skills. Couples learn to find mutually acceptable solutions to their problems. This initial learning process takes weeks, not years.

     Relapse prevention is vital in achieving long-term success. A personalized plan for each athlete that focuses on reducing cravings and the desire for substances eliminates many of the physical, mental, and emotional patterns that lead to relapse.

     This component of our program helps athletes take charge of their athletic performance via changes in their mental processes. Specific skills and exercises strengthen athletes’ confidence and concentration and decrease performance anxiety.

     Our slump-busting component identifies and corrects mental strategies resulting in sub-par performances. Athletes learn to make the shift from "over analyzing' to trusting themselves - a useful skill not just for sport, but for life.

Athletes practice several ways to relax and calm their minds. This resourceful perspective creates openness to new options and solutions in their lives.

Inability to manage chronic pain or injuries may contribute to substance abuse. Athletes gain information on the mind’s role in healing from pain and injury and practice pain management techniques that result in measurable relief.

Athletes are encouraged to develop interest and participation in social and recreational activities that are pleasurable and do not involve substance use. Athletes are also introduced to self-help groups supportive of sobriety, as represented by Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous. 

     Problems in recovery often involve difficulties with managing triggers and moods, communicating, limiting beliefs, unresolved traumas, and setting and obtaining goals.

     Elite athletes must also manage the pressure of living in a fiercely competitive world in which performance, productivity, and worth are being scrutinized by owners, coaches, teammates, fans and media. Recovering athletes often know what they should be doing, but are frustrated about how to do it.

Peak Performance for Athletes In Recovery provides the how through key processes and skills from Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) that can be applied immediately.

     The training is designed for athletes who have made the commitment to resolve alcohol, drug, or mental health problems and want to take charge of their thoughts and feelings to enhance sobriety and their game.

     This is an experiential one to five day seminar including lively presentations and demonstrations followed by practice augmented by a workbook.

• Clarify vague goals into firm, achievable outcomes.
• Build up and Anchor inner resources, like confidence and peace of mind.
• Unhook environmental triggers and respond the way you want.
• Handle disagreements and relate with more flexibility and understanding.
• Disengage from negative attachments to substances and people.
• Program personal behavior for success in upcoming situations.
• Change unwanted behaviors with little time and less effort.
• Align behavior, beliefs, identity, and mission for action.
• Design individual relapse prevention plan.

     These mental toughness skills and strategies decrease anxiety and fear and improve concentration and self-confidence to:

• Handle big match pressures.
• Block out razzing crowds.
• Shake off lousy calls.
• Overcome scoring slumps.
• Bounce back from errors.
• Stay self-confident.

- Coaches working with athletes in recovery will gain unique skills and perspectives

• Resolving recent or past trauma and Specific Phobias (fears of flying, elevators, height, etc.) that interfere with clients’ goals. 1997-2001 Trauma Consultants at Cottonwood de Tucson.
• Designing treatment for athletes with addiction problems. 2000-2001 Clinical Consultants of The Sporting Chance Clinic, Tony Adams, captain of Arsenal Football Club, England.

A three-day seminar for 12 step sponsors (or those wanting to be sponsors) Sponsorship is like mentoring and coaching. We will apply proven strategies from business coaching models to Addiction recovery. We will use demonstration and practice to equip participants with skills. Attendees can expect to leave with:

• The skill sets of mentoring, such as…
• Skills to help your person access powerful resource states
• Powerful belief systems to facilitate change
• Precision language skills
• Reframing skills, such as…
• Language skills (see Motivational Interviewing language sets)
• Specific new ways to solve problems, such as…taking a different perceptual position

A 7 and 9-day life enhancement seminar.

     This seminar is designed for people who have been in recovery and the general population. We will utilize processes from NLP, journaling, meditation, and accelerated learning to gain tools and techniques to enhance recovery and life.

• powerful goal setting tools, (well formed outcome)
• build in resources (anchors)
• resolve old beliefs that are creating stuck states.

     This two to five day intensive seminar is designed for mental health professionals and focuses on techniques to resolve trauma and phobias that interfere with sobriety. Using action-oriented methods, you gain advanced language skills, processes and techniques to effectively resolve your clients’ traumas and Specific Phobias in briefer periods of time. You will also learn techniques to minimize and resolve chronic debilitating feelings and moods, such as fear and anger.

     The seminar content draws from Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), Emotional Freedom Technique, and meditative processes. Brief demonstrations of each skill are followed by practical exercises and role-play. Group discussion elicits additional applications so you leave with both knowledge and concrete tools to make a difference in your clients’ lives as well as in your own life.

     This seminar is custom-designed. Based on the number of training hours, the seminar may contain the following:

Well-Formed Outcome – an initial interviewing method that defines the goal in sensory- specific, concrete terms; instills hope by orienting the client to a future state when the problem is resolved, identifies and increases personal resources to resolve the problem, and identifies barriers to reaching goals.

Phobia and Trauma Process – resolves responses to unpleasant memories and traumas such as PTSD, drug "flashbacks", accidents, abuse, illness. Also resolves phobic responses in Specific Phobias.

Reimprint – transforms the negative impact of past events and increases resources to develop current capable responding.

Time Line Therapy – utilizes perception of time and visual/kinesthetic dissociation to shift perspectives about past traumatic events and feelings.

Anchor Integration and Spatial Anchoring – extinguishes stimulus/response behaviors by increasing and applying internal resource states to problems.

Swish- effective for resolving anxiety that develops over time, and resolving fear of flying. Develops self-esteem and motivation.

Neurological Levels – aligns capabilities, beliefs and values, identity, and purpose to personal goal. Also helps determine at what level to intervene with client.

Grief Process – resolves long-standing grief by amplifying ability to connect positively with lost loved one.

Releasing Enmeshment Process – creates sense of separate self to resolve enmeshment issues.

Intervention with Sensory Systems – detecting specific visual, auditory, and kinesthetic cues that trigger traumatic memories.

Associated and Dissociated States – recognizing and utilizing perceptual positions (such as fully re-experiencing a past event or observing the event calmly from the outside) to most effectively resolve traumatic memories.

Language Skills – using Precision Model and Hypnotic language patterns, open-ended questions, reflective listening, and reframing.

Emotional Freedom Technique – an energy therapy technique that utilizes meridian points to reduce or resolve traumatic or unpleasant memories.

Peak Performance for Recovery (2-3 days)

     This training addresses common problems in recovery such as communicating, managing triggers and moods, limiting beliefs, unresolved traumas, and setting and obtaining goals.

     People in recovery often know what they should be doing, but are frustrated about how to do it. Peak Performance for Recovery provides the how through key processes and skills from Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) that can be applied immediately. The training is designed for people who have made the commitment to resolve alcohol, drug, or mental health problems and want additional tools to enhance sobriety.

Peak Performance for Recovery is an experiential seminar including lively presentations and demonstrations followed by practice augmented by a workbook.

• Clarify vague goals into firm, achievable outcomes.
• Build up and Anchor inner resources, like confidence and peace of mind.
• Unhook environmental triggers and respond the way you want.
• Handle disagreements and relate with more flexibility and understanding.
• Disengage from negative attachments to substances and people.
• Program personal behavior for success in upcoming situations.
• Change unwanted behaviors with little time and less effort.
• Align behavior, beliefs, identity, and mission for action.
• Design individual relapse prevention plan.

Special Note:
- Additionally, therapists who work with people in recovery will gain unique skills and perspectives.

Clients 

Priory Hospital, London, England
Sporting Chance Clinic, England
Cottonwood de Tucson
Carondelet Behavioral Health
Cigna Behavioral Health
Our Town Family Center
Saguaro Vista Ranch

Send questions or comments to:
Webmaster - Michael Starr
apache6@eatrhlink.net

NLP Advantage Group
2919 E. Broadway Suite 210
Tucson, AZ 85716
(520) 323-5033
(520) 320-9784 (fax)