Self-Management And Recovery Training (SMART)
Mutual Help for Skills Based Addictive Behavior Change

SMART Self Management and Recovery Training: This mutual self-help movement has emerged as a leading alternative support group for face to face and online help. An excellent forum by which all forms of addictive behavior can be addressed through the mutual support and encouragemtn of others that are motivated to gain freedom from addiction and independence from addictive behaviors.
 

SMART Recovery® Is Recognized By:

The Center for Health Care Evaluation
The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)
Advancing Science of Drug Abuse and Addiction
The American Academy of Family Physicians
The US Department of Health and Human Services
The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM)


Other Noteworthy and Useful Mutual Support Groups Include:

• Women for Sobriety
  
• Moderation Management
• Secular Organizations for Sobriety
• Life-Ring Secular Recovery
• Alcoholics Anonymous

Moving From 12 Steps to SMART Recovery
       ~Tom Horvath and Alan Marlatt, Ph.D.
"When SMART Recovery coined it's name in 1994 it also explicitly stated that it would keep modifying its recovery program in the light of empirical findings. The original program was based on Cognitive Behavior Therapy and relapse prevention as applied in a self-help format. Since 1994 SMART Recovery has incorporated more motivational components, based on the success of motivational interviewing. Mindfulness components are currently under review.

Despite SMART Recovery's foundation in empirical findings, if there is a patron saint of SMART Recovery, it is Albert Ellis.(One might wonder how Al would take up the role of a patron saint...). Even though REBT itself is not widely used in addiction treatment, Ellis is widely viewed in SMART Recovery as the foundation on which the cognitive-behavioral treatment of addiction is based. For the average non-psychologist, CBT is about thinking rationally in order to "feel" better and behave more adaptively.

For most SMART Recovery members distinctions between the schools of Ellis, Beck, Michenbaum, Seligman or others are not worth bothering with. Albert Ellis is Dr. Rationality. The accessibility of Ellis' many books, not to mention their often colorful language, has made him the natural choice to read for many SMART Recovery participants. Furthermore his concepts (and counseling exercises) are also presented as components of the SMART Recovery Handbook.

So at a typical SMART Recovery meeting, in addition to members doing their CBAs (Cost Benefit Analysis), they are also doing their ABC's (Activating event, Belief, emotional or behavioral Consequence). They are watching out for musturbation, awfulizing, and catastrophizing. When a new idea emerges, they wonder what Dr. Ellis would think of it." (Hovath & Marlatt)


SMART Recovery Now Offers Online Meetings:
At Smart Recovery.org, 7 Days a Week!

There are about 300 face to face meetings, mostly in the US, but also emerging in other countries. Like the British empire of old, the sun never sets on SMART Recovery. There is a rapidly growing number of meetings in prisons and other correctional settings. In the US this increase has been based on court rulings in effect in nearly 20 states, that the government cannot order someone to attend a 12-step meeting because of its religious content.

Dr. Ellis supported SMART Recovery in a number of ways. He reviewed books for the SMART Recovery newsletter. His Institute in NYC was the site of SMART Recovery trainings. He was a member of the International Advisory Council.

Severe addictive behavior is an excellent example of irrationality. It is fitting that Al's work would have found a lasting place SMART Recovery. There participants not only learn to overcome addictive behavior, but also how to lead more functional and happier lives. It's what Al wanted for all of us.

Although Albert Ellis (the founder of REBT)  was only slightly involved with substance abuse treatment or research, a significant part of his legacy may turn out to be his impact on US and international addiction treatment, and in particular, addiction self-help groups.


In the mid1980s a California social worker named Jack Trimpey was upset about the typical insistence that the 12-step approach was the only way to recover from addiction. Trimpey wrote "The Small Book," titled to place it's contents as an alternative to the AA Big Book. He also started Rational Recovery, a network of free self-help groups. The groups were just like AA: free, open to all, and supporting abstinence, except that the program of recovery was quite different. Both his book and his groups were based on a combination of REBT, and Trimpey's ideas about coping with craving.

In 1991 Trimpey gathered a volunteer board of advisors, who met in Dallas. This group evolved, with Trimpey's blessing, into a non-profit organization, incorporated in 1993. The non-pr oft was to run the Rational Recovery groups, while Trimpey provided his for profit services near Sacramento. By 1994 differences of opinion about the proper direction for Rational Recovery resulted in the non-profit changing it's name to SMART Recovery. By Jan 1, 2000, Rational Recovery stopped operating any free support groups as a matter of policy" (Hovath & Marlatt).


Dr. Patrick J. Hart
Beyond Addiction Counseling:
Addiction Treatment Program Alternatives in Seattle
Alternatives and Additions to Traditional Rehabilitation Centers
Drug & Alcohol Abuse: Chemical Dependency Evaluation & Treatment