Dallas Bragg teaches a trauma-informed technique for managing cravings: identify your "glimmers," vivid positive memories that spark gratitude, then practice placing your hand on your heart and breathing while visualizing them for 20 seconds. Repeated rehearsal weakens triggers and replaces the urge to use with warmth.
All right, do you want to take control of a trigger? Listen up. Deb Dana, an expert in trauma therapy, coined the word glimmer as the opposite of a trigger. As you know, a trigger is something that activates a trauma response in us or causes a craving to use meth. In our case, when a trigger happens, it is external to us. Then the craving is an internal response, meaning at that point we can choose whether to follow the craving Or finish it, as I say in my program. One powerful way to finish a craving is to bring up your favorite glimmer into your mind. So what you'll do is think of a person or an experience that instantly brings you gratitude and appreciation, like of the strongest kind. Maybe it's your puppy, maybe it's your memory of your grandma baking cookies, something. Have a glimmer that is so heartwarming it will cancel out the need to smoke meth and watch porn. Come on, that's a pretty low bar. Glimmers actually happen throughout your day too. An unexpected connection at the grocery store, a sunset on your drive home, an unexpected text from a loved one. Glimmers are something— are most of the time overshadowed by triggers because we tend to focus on the negative. Store a glimmer in your mind and take yourself there. Hand on your heart. Breathe deeply for 20 seconds, and I promise, with a few times practicing, triggers will lose their potency. Find your glimmer today!
