There are few treatment programs that can prove quite as invaluable to adolescents and young adults in need of the best-targeted substance abuse intervention in Miami than the SMART Recovery 4-point program, the product of the not-for-profit SMART organization. Manifesting in daily online meetings, face-to-face meetings around the world and an online message board and 24/7 chat room, the SMART Recovery program has already been instrumental in assisting individuals' recovery from all manner of addictive behaviors.

SMART stands for Self Management And Recovery Training, and the attendant program consists of four prongs: Building and Maintaining Motivation, Coping with Urges, Managing Thoughts, Feelings and Behaviors and Living a Balanced Life. Taken together, these points draw on evolving scientific knowledge to guide individuals away from dependence on alcohol, drugs and other harmful substances.

The purpose of the SMART Recovery program alongside other approaches to substance abuse intervention in Miami is to teach an individual to alter what may presently be self-defeating thinking, emotions and actions, to the end of a better quality, more satisfying life. Tools and techniques are taught that enable an individual to take responsibility for the changes in their own lives, so that they become truly self-empowered and self-reliant. Meetings are educational, making use of open discussions, while the program also advocates that prescribed medications and psychological treatments are used responsibly.

En route from the first point of the program to the fourth, participants on the SMART Recovery program are encouraged to learn and practice the use of a succession of tools - ranging from Stages of Change, Change Plan Worksheet and Cost/Benefit Analysis (Decision Making Worksheet) to the ABCs of REBT for Urge Coping and the ABCs of REBT for Emotional Upsets. Also covered in the program are such tools as the Hierarchy of Values, Brainstorming, Role-playing and Rehearsing and USA (Unconditional Self-Acceptance).

With no path of recovery being the same from one individual to another, adolescents and adults may benefit from combining their participation in the SMART Recovery program with other forms of substance abuse intervention in Miami, as can be offered by Family Recovery Specialists.

Editor’s Note: Family Recovery Specialists (http://www.familyrecoveryspecialists.com) are represented by the search engine advertising and digital marketing specialists Jumping Spider Media. Email: info@jumpingspidermedia.co.uk or call: +44 (0)20 3070 1959 / +34 952 783 637.