Recently, I released a video titled "Is AA(Alcoholics Anonymous) a religion?" You can watch it HERE.

Now, I pose the question, Is alcoholics anonymous a cult? What about narcotics anonymous or any of the unknown' for that matter? (read to the end to get my opinion).

You've probably heard that AA is a cult, but we're going to take an objective look and find out what qualities of AA are like a cult, and if AA isn't a cult, what the heck is it? 

I think the best way to tackle this question is to look at the qualities of a cult and see if AA has any of those qualities.
Spoiler alert! -- It has some of those qualities.

The first quality of a cult is having a questionable commitment to a leader. If you're familiar with alcoholics anonymous, you know that it was created by someone named Bill Wilson. Eventually, he brought along a friend named Dr. Bob, if you had to say someone was the leader of alcoholics anonymous, it would be Bill and Bob, for sure, but neither...

Advanced strategies of recovery.

How do you create a life that you love and that you can maintain?

Let's identify what those beginning strategies are.

• detox
• managing triggers/craving
• changing people, places, and things

All of those seem so blatantly obvious and that's why it's so important to learn those skills to get sober from substances. Keeping your sobriety is another story, am I right? There are some more advanced skills that you need to adopt if you want to manage them.

You see, for me, recovery management is, is all about sanity management. If you want to keep your sobriety or recovery long-term, you have to keep your head on straight. The reason why that's so important is that when you get yourself in an awful situation or you're upset when life throws you curveballs. These are the times that are likely to send you spiraling backward.

The first one on the list of advanced recovery skills is you have to learn to deal with problems and address them as they happen. We all...

How do you rebuild trust after addiction has come in and destroyed your family? These are the foundational things that have to be there if you want to rebuild trust. I'll advise both sides-- the person that's addicted and the family. 

Believe it or not, this is a two-way distrustful situation. The person with the abuse problem feels like their trust has been broken too. That's the thing about addiction, it causes chaos, heartbreak, and no one comes out of it unscathed.

I'm going to tell you what you need to do as an addicted person first. This isn't going to be easy to hear or easy to implement. But it is necessary!

1. The first (most important) thing you need to do is OWN UP to the damage you've caused. When you cause distress to the people that you love, they need to hear that you understand the depth and magnitude of what kind of position you put them in. You have to be vulnerable about this. You made choices along the way that got you in this situation, right? It's time to...

Emotional triggers--we all have them some are sometimes they're more difficult to deal with than others. Instead of trying to stay away from emotions, it’s important to learn healthy ways to deal with all the different emotions you might experience.  

I'm going to break this down into a 4-step simple process.

Read-(Recognize, Evaluate, Ask, Decide)

Recognize when you're having an emotional trigger. Be conscious of when you're triggered. Why is this helpful? When you're emotionally triggered, your brain drives the boat when it's activated. But we want the thinking part driving. To avoid this, you have to activate the thinking part of your brain. We don't make good decisions when we make them emotionally.

Evaluate where the emotion is coming from. "Am I being emotionally triggered by something that's going on currently?" OR "Is this something that went on in my childhood that is coming back?"

Ask yourself what you want to do about it. Let...