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The beginnings of the Deep Recovery Course go all the way back to 2007, with Working your Addiction Backwards. This was based on the Recovery Cycle, which was itself based on the familiar addiction cycle. I was working with a small recovery group and I drew the recovery cycle on the blackboard of the meeting room we met it, and it occurred to me there were Christian practices that answered and completed the addiction cycle. Having a diagram that is descriptive of a process is only moderately helpful. Having one that shows corrective strategies that answer the process is much more helpful. You can see how the Recovery Cycle works below.
But why mention this here and what does this have to do with changes for 2024? Admittedly, the Deep Recovery Course is challenging. It introduces concepts and raises trauma issues at a pace that is hard to cope with at times. While most people complete the course and return two or three times, 20% do not finish it. They usually come back a second or third time, but even then, they may struggle. We recognize that for this group, the pace has to be slower, the concepts explained more carefully and we have to focus on the skills more. The introduction of prayer as both a somatic and spiritual remedy has been very effective. But we have to spend more time on these, to help people overcome the trauma responses they struggle with. So, this means we will be restructuring the entire course.
The Deep Recovery Course will be more focused on the basics, which are presented with the first 7 chapters. This will result in a shorter course, 7 weeks. This is more manageable for people. the material from t he first 7 chapters will remain mostly the same covering how we understand recovery with the perspective of recovering the divine image, rather than only recovering from something we do that is bad. This reorientation resets the entire process in a positive and constructive light. Chapter four, with it's introduction of trauma and the ACE's survey will remain. And the following chapters that cover the Recovery Cycle and cognitive and emotional strategies will remain as well. However, the presentation will be a little simpler, so it is easier to grasp, and more time will be spent on learning to apply the exercises that help us process our emotions and thoughts.
What about the rest of the course? Chapters 8-11? Those chapters will be reserved for the Meta-Noetic course. The Meta course will retain all the chapters of entire Deep Recovery Course as it stands now, but some of that will be condensed, with other parts being omitted. The Meta course will focus more on the deeper patterns of our lives that lead to unhappy outcomes, but the overall approach will be how the Christian Faith is itself a neuro-therapeutic spiritual process. That course will be longer. Probably 9 weeks. Meta-Noetic is Curative Christian Discipleship for the 21st Century.
I will be covering the differences, and the concepts common to each in our January online training course. By the end I hope to provide a tool that helps people overcome the life-controlling problems that are creating unhappy results in their lives and then give them a way to grow further.