Dallas Bragg argues that methamphetamine recovery fails when the goal is just "stop using." Instead, separate the goal (become your best self), the tactic (stay abstinent), and the metric (count use episodes over time). Tracking episodes across months removes shame and shows real progress.
Listen, successful meth recovery is about perception. Period. Shift your perception and you will see trajectory. Here is one major shift that I've seen elevate many men's experience, and that is the difference between goal, tactic, and metric. For many of you, the goal is to stop using meth. Well, if that's your goal, that distills your recovery down to a binary pass/fail, relapse/abstinence measurement. That perspective which often leads to a shameful experience when you relapse. I'd like to invite you to think of your recovery journey this way. The goal is to be the best version of yourself. The tactic is abstinence from meth. The metric is how many times you've used. This way, the expectation is not that you never use, but you zoom out and you look at your journey from a metrics point of view. So for example, in the past 6 months, maybe you've used 2 times. Compare that to the previous 6 months. Is it better? Is it worse? Now look forward and find more ways to show up as your best and highest version. That's your goal. Focus on that, and I promise you that meth use episodes will decline, and that is success.
