Amber Hollingsworth walks you through sharing your personal-change materials with two or three trusted people and setting up concrete accountability checks: regular check-ins, reminders, drug tests, monitoring meetings. The idea is to lock in support while you're thinking clearly so it's there when things get hard.
Chapters
You have went through and decided, do you have a problem or don't you? You've decided how bad of a problem it is if you have one. You've looked at your pros and cons and decided what changes you would like to make, what you're willing to make. You've identified possible roadblocks you could run into and what you're gonna do about those roadblocks. You've got a much better understanding of willpower. You've identified the positive supports and all that kind of stuff to put in your life. You've done all the hard work already. What I'd like for you to do in this section is remember those supports that you identified in the last section, those two or three people or more that you're gonna tell. Remember we talked about not being in secrecy. What I'd like for you to do is take all of the materials that you've compiled through this process, whether you did it online and you have it all typed up or worksheets you filled out, maybe you just doodled it in a little notebook or you kept a journal, wherever that is, Whatever work you've complet, I'd like for you to take that and share it with the supports that you have. At least two or three that we talked about. The reason is, is because if you start getting off track, you've already done this whole map of who you are and what you need and what works best and what's going to throw you off track. And that will help these supports know how to help you better. And I want you to have conversations with them and say, hey, if you see me doing this, probably not good, think you should ask me about it. Or if you know yourself and you know you'll get defensive, maybe that's not what you want to do. But you tell them what it is that you need. You might want to ask them to drug test you regularly. You might want to ask them to make sure and check in with you and make sure you, you know, did your daily reading or did you go to your meetings. They want to ask them, did you do what you're supposed to do. Maybe you want them to ask you, hey, have you been hanging out with so and so? Because you know that's a temptation you are going to set up and create your own accountability structure. And when you do that, it's going to help you stay committed. And you're going to do it now while you're in your good thinking, because they're going to be some hard times to come and you want to create this and get these things in place because it's going to hold you together on the days you don't want to keep doing it. In the moments that are hard, this is what's going to keep you moving in the right direction. And like I said, if this stuff that you did, you wrote it on scrap paper and it's sloppy. I don't care if you didn't do every single bit of it. I don't care. Take what you have and sit down and share that with someone. Sit down and share with them the reasons why you want to make this change. Sit down and share with them your fears, your worries, your concerns. Now you're not telling this person, hey, you know, like, kick me out of the house if I use again. That's not what I mean by accountability. Accountability is just checking in with you. It's just, hey, are you doing what you said you're gonna be doing? Not for any kind, like, punishment reason. Literally just asking you the question and checking in with you is helping you stay accountable. Because, you know, it's kind of like, you know, if somebody's gonna ask you about something, you're like, you're more likely to do it. You know, they're gonna follow up on that. This is just you putting all that in place.
