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Hello there!
So many people have recommended “Wired In” to me over the past six months or so. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to actually wire myself in! It’s a real joy to become a member of this vibrant online community.
So… here I am, and having spent a few bewitching hours last night reading through some of the blogs, profiles, and articles here, I thought I’d dive in and introduce myself….
I always find it hard to begin to describe who I am, and what I do, as I have the good fortune to be involved in a diverse array of ventures.
First things first – I’m in recovery! If I had to sum up who I was in just a few words (although I warn you in advance that’s not going to happen!) – I’d say my main concern is a passionate belief in recovery as a central organising principle – although in terms of the UK recovery movement, I’m most definitely a newcomer!
My main activities fall under that recovery-shaped umbrella. The main ones being:
I’m an enthusiastic advocate of the transformative power of education. It is my hope that as we work towards an authentically recovery-orientated approach in the UK – we’ll see increasing attention paid to the important role education can play in long-term recovery.
Education raises expectations and creates opportunities, and can therefore powerfully catalyse the journey from “addict-self” to “recovered-self”.
A few other bits and pieces – I’ve worked as a project worker (concentrating now on my research and embryonic recovery-orientated activities); I lecture occasionally at Liverpool Hope University in Theology, Philosophy and Religious Studies, and I’m a practising Buddhist.
Like many of the wonderful people who I have worked alongside, and who supported me in the early days of my own recovery journey – I think working in this field – in whatever capacity and despite all the challenges, as a front-line worker, a residential project worker, a researcher, commissioner, service manager, clinician….is a real privilege.
The dedication and commitment of others constantly amazes me.
The journey of recovery is like no other – so utterly profound, it is both humbling and inspiring to be a part of that.
Looking forward to getting to know you!
Stephen B.
What a true privilege to have you true our community Stephen. You have fascinating background, I just don’t know where to start.
Fascinated with the topic of your thesis – can’t wait to hear more! Have far have you progressed? What research techniques are you using – the academic coming out in me! I am reading a fascinating book on spirituality and recovery called the Soul of Recovery. You must contact Wynford Ellis Owen of the community who is VERY interested in spirituality.
Can’t wait to hear about your personal recovery journey.
Mark Gilman said some really good things about you when we met last week.
I could go on and on, but things to sort just now – and we have plenty of time to interact!
My very best, David
Stephen Bamber, Welcome to Wired In!
Look forward to meeting up tomoz.
Stephen, wow, you make me proud to be in recovery! welcome my friend welcome x I think i will be seeing you soon as david best invited me down to manchester in june to be at the recovery research i think with yourself and mark gilman and liverpool hope uni, what a great name for a uni. I too am an avid enthusiast of education in recovery, and one day i hope to be able to spell lol. Big hug and welcome xxx
Great to see you as a new member in the community Stephen. Spirituality is the core of my recovery. My flame burned low in active addiction and burns brightly in recovery.
Your enthusiasm already bubbles through your writing. I’m looking forward to hearing more.
Dear all,
Thank you so much for the warm welcome and kind words. Apologies for not responding to you individual comments – I’ve not quite figured out how to do that. The warmth of the welcome and generosity of words has really touched me – although I confess I’m not surprised- recovery is full of wonderful people, and it’s great to be here!
Stephen
David – I’ll add another comment to answer your questions, and I’ll be sure to add some post in the very near future with some broader issues relating to my research and my own recovery. Will be a pleasure.
Jo – Looking forward to seeing you too- although I suspect we’ll have met by the time you read this!
Annemarie – so glad you can make it in June! Look forward to meeting you then – should be a great day. I’m going to post a wider invite here once the final details have been ironed – hopefully early next week.
PeaPod – thank you for your welcome and for sharing about the importance of spirituality in your own journey – I’ve really enjoyed reading some of your very thoughtful posts and comments, and look forward to reading more!
Yenwarp – thank you too for the warm welcome. My thesis isn’t finished yet – I’m roughly half way through – but I’ll be blogging and reflecting on my research here – and see the comment below in response to David’s questions. Although my research is theoretical – it will be informative to hear the thoughts and experiences of others in terms of spirituality, addiction and recovery. I never tire of discussing it!
David, all:
I’m coming to end of my second year part-time, but in reality have been formally researching this for over 3 years. To that end, I’m about 40,000 words into my thesis. I’m hoping to move to full time in September, which will give me a good 2 years to complete and submit my thesis.
In terms of methodology, my research is theoretical – rooted in the classic “critique of ideas” approach often used Arts and Humanities. Here’s an edited extract from my recent funding application to the Arts and Humanities Research Council – It might help give you a better idea of my research.
“My research represents a continuation of academic interest developed during my undergraduate studies in the ambiguity surrounding the concept of spirituality. In order to advance a robust concept of “spiritual technologies” to help clarify the academic uncertainty surrounding the concept of spirituality, it became clear that my professional interest in addiction, spirituality, and recovery represented an area of advantageous and unexplored source material: the converging discourses of addiction and recovery have yet to be engaged with the academic study of spirituality. Furthermore, the emerging academic field of addiction and spirituality currently lacks a critical dimension and is dominated by quantitative and qualitative studies of patterns of religiosity in the “addict” as a subject. My research project will thus be positioned as a natural evolution in this nascent area of study.
The central research question of my interdisciplinary research project is ‘What can the journey from “addict-self” to “spiritual-self” tell us about the nature of spirituality contemporarily?’ In order to focus and delimit the boundaries of this project, I have conceived of two clear, distinct, and mutually contingent research goals as a response to my central research question.
First, in a development of Michel Foucault’s account of ‘technologies of the self’, a concept of ‘spiritual technologies’ will be proposed as a tool for reframing spirituality discourse to avoid some of the ambiguities that presently characterise the field.
Second, I will offer a critical analysis of the emerging field of addition and spirituality – founded on the analytic approach of Foucault, and augmented by contemporary critical material, in particular the field of critical psychology and recent studies in the sociology of religion.”
I’ll unpack some of this in some upcoming blog posts….
Also, keep an eye out for an invitation I’ll be posting in the next week or so to a symposium on 29th June, Manchester, organised by myself and DB. from University of West Scotland, supported by the ever-inspiring Mark Gilman and NTA North West. This is the event flagged up by annemarie in her comment to my post.
The broad aims of the informal gathering (a “coalition of the willing” as DB has put it) is to work towards forming a UK specific research agenda to best support the development of the UK recovery movement. One on the tangible outputs of the symposium is to inaugurate the “Recovery Academy” – envisaged as a vehicle for supporting UK recovery research and building bridges of recovery by acting as a hub connecting researchers, recovering communities, agencies and practitioners to encourage the development of a shared knowledge/ resource base and facilitate the growth of a common, affirmative language of recovery in the UK.
Would be great to have you – and anyone interested – there, if you can make it. I’m hoping to finalise a few last details this week, and will post invite early next.
We’re also exploring the possibility of swiftly following up this with a conference in September at Liverpool Hope – the first annual conference of the “Recovery Academy”… a gathering of researchers, recovery community ambassadors, practitioners, and anyone with an interest in moving the UK recovery movement forward.
Liverpool Hope have kindly agreed to offer (significantly) preferential rates to enable us to keep costs a minimal as possible for the proposed weekend event and to encourage those on limited incomes to attend. In reality, this means sponsorship, and of course also dependent on the number of delegates who are willing and able to pay the (cost-only) conference fee. In the current economic climate this will be challenging – but not impossible…..I’ll keep you posted!
Great stuff Stephen. The recovery researcher academy, conference etc is bang on. Count me in. My only problem is I am spending a lot of time here now, but I can try to kick start things on this side of the world. Or at least help link in researchers here. Please keep me in touch with all happening.
DaveB is a great guy, excellent researcher and committed to this agenda. We need to convince funders that this needs funding. We also need to keep the findings transmitted to all levels, rather than primarily to peer-review journals. And get recovered people involved in the research.
I was just wondering whether it would be helpful for more people to see your comment – could you copy it, preface it with a sentence (DC asked you… ) and then stick it in a blog. I’ll help make sure lots of people see it.
Let’s crank up this agenda and get a good deal of enthusiasm, drive and talent on board.
Fascinating sounding thesis. I was reading this book on recovery and spirituality on a beach in Oz and I thought I ned to read this again – I wasn’t quite what ‘spirituality’ was actually – it might not have even been the same in different settings. I thought I was being thick, or brain dead by the sun, sand and waves.
Hi David,
Will do! Really great to have you on board. Agree re: getting enthusiasm, drive and talent on board – fantastic to see such momentum developing
Christopher Ringwald’s “The Soul of Recovery” is great contribution to the field.
There’s a substantial amount of work written on spirituality and addiction- although it is fragmented across a whole range of disciplines.
Interestingly, William Miller, who co-authored the recent “Addiction” editorial (Addiction, 104, 2009, pp. 685-86) included in “Daily Dose” is one of the leading researchers in the field. In a hugely significant undertaking, he and colleagues have compiled a bibliography of nearly 2,000 references pertinent to spirituality and addiction. It’s available from CASAA in Endnote format here:
http://casaa.unm.edu/biblio.html
Their discussion on this:
Geppert, C.,Bogenschutz, M.P., and Miller, W.R., “Development of a bibliography on religion, spirituality and addictions”, Drug and Alcohol Review, 26:2007, pp. 389-395.
Exciting times ahead for all recovery minded souls!
The Ringwald book is very good – but I need to read more. The American Indian stuff is fascinating.
I know of Bill Miller’s work, but I missed the reference list. Wow and thank you. That’s going on DD soon.
You’ll start to see new dimensions to DD over time which will help better educate and inform people.
Truly exciting times ahead and I hope they will be well documented in and by teh community. Bill White emphasised to me how important it was to document this coming history.
David –
Absolutely agree with your comments regarding expanding this agenda outside of peer-to-peer journals etc. That’s the whole idea of the Recovery Academy. So that research can be informed by, and inform, recovery-orientated thought and practice as best of possible.
I also share your thoughts about getting in recovery involved in research – absolutely vital. One of the things that I’ll be talking about at the symposium are possible ways to do that.
Here in Liverpool, the huge mental health trust has a very active service user group that’s taken very seriously by the trust. One of their interesting projects is called SURE – Service User Research and Evaluation – a small team of committed service users and carers who carry out research and evaluation commissioned by the trust, receiving full training and remuneration for their work. I’ve had a really informative discussion with Lindsey Dyer, co-ordinates the group. She and her team are willing to share their skills and experiences. Just one possibility amongst many!
Stephen
Involving SURE sounds great. Must also get some of them on the community! Pity I missed you last week. I had a flying tour, which included Liverpool.
We’ll meet soon no doubt. For now, I can keep informing you what teh day will be like – I am seven hours ahead. Getting ready for an evening of Cracker, which I never saw first time around! He did more for getting students into psychology than anything else.
I’ll tell you what though my students (before I escaped academis) loved this field and my course. Masses of them wanted to work in the field. Many would LOVE what we are doing. Keep them invigorated in your part of the world and I’ll do the same here as soon as I can get something set up here!
Hi David,
welcome to wired in, I have a feeling of spiritual growth that came from finding a space that helped me come out of myself.Whenever I have someone with a desire to stop drinking come to me I enjoy explaining the spirituality side of Recovery as most if not all can grasp some recall of childhood religion which gives a firm foundation to proceed with education. My grandmother made sure we went to Sunday school and I often say to people didn’t you go to Sunday school once then leave the religious side as soon as the seeds are sown and move onto the AA spiritual side of program and then they have an understanding of the choice of alternative thinking and realize they can actually still make decisions themselves whilst respecting others perception of a God of their own understanding.
I agree with you entirely the brain requires re-educating in an area of knowledge that will be beneficial to help the person negotiate the passage of life enjoyably.As you know we can do this by formulating a case study with our clients.
I was so ill I went to 2 AA meetings for a long time then trained in counseling skills in order to have the ability to communicate efficiently. This has led to a Bsc in Addictions and I feel spiritually led and live my life in that manner with respect for others and except life on life’s terms.
My feelings about the future education of recovery workers from observation of others and my personal experiences over the past 30 years are that workers at all levels are going to require dual-diagnosis skills in order to fully understand the real syndrome and the dynamical force that drives the Addiction.
I’m presently studying mental health in depth because a high percentage of people Ive met over the years have this problem.
My conclusion from recent experience helping someone with Epilepsy and Alcoholism plus PTSD caused by untreated combat stress is Gps,doctors,treatment centers did not have the capabilities to come to a helpful diagnosis.Clever bright intelligent workers and doctors though no knowledge of pharmacology of dual-diagnosis treatment and welfare of not a diverse group this is our main group we should be applying our efforts to to make real change in our community.
Its really great your here as you have an enormous amount of knowledge that will make change possible in the lives of others.
Good luck with your ongoing research.
Hi Stephen,
it would be great to hear on how we can incorporate the spiritual approach into mainstream treatment.
thanks, Chris
Hi Chris – thanks for the welcome.
Goodness me, what a question!
For me, this question is absolutely huge because of the astonishing array of issues that it raises. I wish I could answer your question more fully – am a little busy at the moment, but I’ve started writing a blog post on spirituality, which will I hope will give people an bit of an insight into some of the complexities that surround this question. Hopefully will be up in the next day or two (or three…)
In the meantime – to give you a brief, but probably dissatisfying answer – in fact consider it more of a set of discussion points rather than an answer to your question
First, I would question there is a singular “spiritual approach”. Just as recovery acknowledges that that there is no one solution, and affirms the importance of recognising diverse pathways etc., so too there is no one single “spiritual solution”.
Second, I think talking about spirituality becomes more meaningful in a paradigm of recovery rather than a paradigm of treatment.
Spirituality can often be an important component of recovery – the most cited example being of course 12-Step mutual self-help fellowships – where concepts of “spiritual awakening” and “higher power” explicitly situate the fellowship in what we might call “spiritual approaches” to recovery.
However, remember there are secular recovery-orientated approaches too. For example – I chose to go to a TC (Phoenix House, now Phoenix Futures) because I was very clear that I didn’t want “God” to have anything to do with my recovery!! I was an angry, broken young man at the time – and had a lot of personal issues with God!- (now resolved, I hasten to add – we get on fine now, despite my not believing in him…)
I often say – “I don’t believe in God” – (I’m a Buddhist, after all – a very bad Buddhist, but a Buddhist nonetheless). However – I am aware of the presence of God in my life….
How so? Through the faith of my family, and some of my friends; through the spirituality of those I know who are in the fellowship…. in interacting with them I sense the presence of God – their God – acting my life.
So when one takes a recovery-orientated approach to spirituality, the question changes a little. In terms of recovery management (which should always be client-led) – that might be about having a sensitivity to the individuals religious upbringing and being aware of the variety of spiritualities that populate the recovery spectrum. To offer an over-simplistic example -those with a Roman Catholic background may flourish in one of the Cenacalo communities.
It is often said that Buddhism is like a flawless jewel that reflects the colours of whatever cultural surface it is placed upon: hence the diversity of Buddhist traditions – from the reflective stoicism of Sri Lankan Theravada, to the penetrating wit of Japanese Zen, to the polychromatic verve of Tibetan Buddhist Tantra.
Perhaps 12-Step spirituality can be seen like this.
“The life of this world has been made attractive and desirable to mankind. Unlike some other religions, Islam does not negate this love nor deem it as inherently evil. Rather, they are natural desires, which Allah created in us and only need to be channelled into what Allah has allowed or encouraged and not allowed to control our actions and beliefs even in disobedience to Allah Most High. So this life is a temporary place of testing which determines our permanent condition in the life hereafter” – Mislatti Islami, ‘Step 4: We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves’.
(http://www.al-muminun.info/MIFAX/mifax12.htm. Mislatti Islami are a 12-step Islamic tradition, catering to the culturally-specific recovery needs of the Muslim community. Home page of the same site: http://www.al-muminun.info/MIFAX/mifax.htm.)
‘The canonical Twelve Step literature, Alcoholics Anonymous (The Big Book) and Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions (The Twelve and Twelve) although intending to be ecumenical, is still burdened by the religious/spiritual language of the time in which it was written. With the emergence of Eastern philosophical teachings over the past thirty-five years, many of us longed for another way of hearing the Twelve Step ideas. – Buddhism/Twelve Step Group Guidelines’. (Kevin Griffith. Available http://www.kevingriffin.net/study_guide.pdf Kevin is the author of One Breath at a Time: Buddhism and the Twelve Steps, St. Martin’s Press, New York, 2004.)
When looking at spirituality from the point of view of recovery – its helpful to look at the spiritual ecology of individual recovering communities. Each community will have its own spirituality, its own traditions, its own texts, its own language, rules of governance, ethical codes, ideals, and rituals…. even if not explicitly “religious”. For me – Phoenix House was a profoundly spiritual experience – and yet during my nine month program, no-one uttered the word spirituality at all!
This type of view is congruent with the “historical-contextual” approach to studying spirituality, two other being the theological approach, and the anthropological approach. Again – more on this to come….
Where one needs to take great care is in tendency to couch spirituality in seemingly innocuous terms, such as “wellbeing”, “fulfillment”, “personal growth” – I would argue that these are dimensions of global health, not authentic spiritual experience. Furthermore, they are connected to the commodification of spirituality that is a characteristic of out contemporary culture, and often about simply becoming a “more productive member of society”. If one does not take great care; if we foist this type of maximisation of utility upon those in recovery in the guise of spiritual experience, we ignore the transcendent dimensions of religious experience.
For more on this see the excellent: Jeremy Carrette and Richard King, Selling Spirituality: The Silent Takeover of Religion, Routledge, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, 2005. Especially Chapter 4: “Selling the Soul: The Business of Spirituality”….“Spirituality has become the primary means facilitating the corporate takeover of religion.”; p.123
Let me end with an extract from a paper I presented recently introducing my research to faculty and peers here in Liverpool:
“Our 21st century global consumer culture is saturated with spirituality-related products and services. The decline of institutional forms of traditional religious life has been accompanied by an eruption of new religious movements and spiritualities, catalysed by the market colonisation of the religious sphere by the aggressively expansive and unrestrained forces of free-market capitalism. Religious elements from non-Western, non-Christian cultures and faith traditions are appropriated, commodified, and transformed into consumable products and services for the lifestyle sector of the Western economy. In this colourful cultural and economic milieu, it is difficult to distinguish between authentic expressions of spiritual practice and the empty, eviscerated religious products of the spiritual marketplace”.
Stephen B.
Thanks Stephen I’m a person centered counselor and feel I work in a spiritual manner when working with others.Because AA and NA are so readily available and free to attend they can make a big difference in managing ones recovery and the message I would like to convey is that it is a spiritual program not a religious one as you are aware.
I had an interesting talk with a Islamic CBT counselor last year in a Mosk about Recovery with the view to help them with the western treatment procedure for helping those with addictions.It transpired we both collaborated and I questioned about were in the Quran lay information about the change process and Gods wishes for the person suffering that could be valuable to start the change process whilst engaging in building a therapeutic relationship within a different culture.The significant finding was in Surah 13 Ar-Ra,d 11,…Allah will not change the(good)condition of a people as long as they do not change their state(of goodness)themselves…,this I feel is good to know when working with those of Islamic faith.Im heavily into trying to relate and understand different cultures and find real meanings that enable dialogue to commence that produces a meaningful client counselor relationship.Like you I have a spiritual God with a for me a Christian grounding but go always with the clients lead and keep it simple and come straight out of indepth relgious debate.
Hi Chris.
The inter-cultural work you’re doing is really valuable. A swift search of one index unearthed this, which may possibly be informative in your practice as you explore this area.
G. Hussein Rassool, (2008). “The crescent and Islam: healing, nursing and the spiritual dimension. Some considerations towards an understanding of the Islamic perspectives on caring.”
Journal of Advanced Nursing, Volume 32, Issue 6, Pages: 1476-1484.
Stephen.
Stephen,
thanks Ive got access to journals I,ll look that up.My main work is with Veterans now from a holistic approach so I’m encompassing the FAMILY who are so glad to be counseled as well as the Veteran.I,ll not make your first forum in Manchester, I,ll meet up with you one day and I’m sure our talk will be productive,isn’t it great to come to one website and find significant informative knowledge that helps us grow.
Stephen,
It slipped my mind I have G.Hussein Rassool (2006) Dual-Diagnosis book its awesome and I followed this with Integrated Treatment for Dual Disorders (2003) by Mueser et al which is a really full comprehensive manual that covers everything to do with dual-disorders.
