Behavourial Strategies to Change By
Avoidance Strategies
Avoid having unnecessary access to money. Only carry with you what you need for the day. See Financial Strategies.
Avoid temptations to gamble. See Work sheet 2: My List of Warning Signs (below)
Ideally, avoid gambling establishments completely.
Avoid going to gambling venues alone - be with a supportive person.
Structure work and leisure times to avoid isolation, loneliness, and boredom.
Avoid being in the company of gamblers - friends and associates who gamble. Increase your network of non-gambling friends.
Avoid listening to the races, or other gambling broadcasts.
Avoid reading the racing form or checking race results.
Identifying Triggers That Lead to Relapse
See Work sheet 2 - My List of Warning Signs (above)
Identify times, cycles/patterns of when you are most vulnerable to relapse.
Relaxation
The ability to relax (especially at will) is an important skill to learn if you want to maintain your recovery from problem gambling. Once you feel deeply relaxed and your mind clear of unnecessary clutter, you can then spend some time in silent reflection - listening to your inner voice (the wise self within).
Relaxation has many benefits: releases stress, lowers high blood pressure, helps you to think clearly, helps to control impulses and compulsions, increases creative thinking, helps you to sleep better, and feel energetic, optimistic, and confident.
There are many relaxation techniques for a person to experiment with. There are many books on the subject too.
A common technique for relaxation
1. Find a quiet location free from distractions/interruptions.
2. Assume a comfortable position. Many people find sitting upright with your hands resting naturally on your lap, works very well.
3. Develop a mental device to help you to relax quickly. Choose a word or phrase - a mantra - to focus on, such as "relax", "calm", "quiet", "peace", or "love". Once you pick your word, stick with it. Repeat this word to yourself when going into relaxation. Over time, you will associate that word with the calming effects of relaxation -helping you to relax sooner.
4. Let your eyes close gently and take a few moments to relax your muscles and to quiet your mind. Sometimes a few deep breaths can help prepare you for deep relaxation.
5. Now breathing calmly, become aware of each breath. Use your slow, natural rhythm of breathing to repeat, to yourself, your focus word or phrase.
6. Adopt a passive attitude, which involves letting go of thoughts and distractions. Don’t fight them, just let them gently drift out of your conscious mind - to pass on.
7. Continue with this exercise for 10 to 20 minutes. Give yourself some time to come out of your relaxed state.
8. For best results, don’t fall asleep.
Thought Stopping
Here is a useful way to interrupt disturbing thoughts - such as relapsing into problem gambling.
1. Thought stopping works best as soon as you are aware of the disturbing thought. The more you do it the less frequently you will experience the disturbing thoughts.
2. Shout "stop", to yourself, in a commanding voice. For emphasis, simultaneously slap your leg, or a chair. Say "stop" with enough strength to momentarily stop your thought processes.
3. After you say "stop", immediately direct your attention to something other than gambling. Repeat to yourself some appropriate, assertive, affirmation; such as: "I am me, and I am okay. I don’t need to gamble".
4. If you find that at this stage you are somewhat tense, use your relaxation response word, or phrase, to calm you down. See Relaxation.
Another technique is to loosely wear an elastic band around your wrist. Every time you start thinking about relapsing into problem gambling, snap the elastic band against your wrist. The idea is to produce diversion from your thoughts of relapsing. As soon as you accomplish the diversion, pay immediate attention/focus onto something other than gambling.
Overcoming Self-Defeating Behaviours
Here is a method of controlling and modifying patterns of confounding habits. Examples: gambling, drinking too much, using drugs, lying, cheating, perfectionism, shyness, etc.
1. Identify your problem-causing behaviour.
2. Specify to yourself when, where, and with whom the behaviour comes into play. Identify patterns and cycles with your behaviour.
3. Intercept the behaviour when it is practised. Catch yourself out when you are about to engage into your self-defeating behaviour. The earlier the better. This improves with practice. The goal is to intercept it at the earliest stage of your cycle - when you choose to behave in a certain way. That is, to be able to choose to behave differently than you want to.
4. Develop replacement techniques. First find a more appropriate behaviour to replace the self-defeating one - asking yourself: "What would a person in recovery do in this situation?", or, "What should my best friend do in this situation?" Or you could look into the following:
a.What did you used to do before you developed the self-defeating behaviour?
b.What ways do you practice to replace other self-defeating behaviours?
c.Find out what others have done to replace their unwanted behaviours.
5. Barriers to changing behaviours are usually linked to some fear. Be realistic about your fears of changing. Most fears are unfounded - they cannot be proved unless tested. Test to see if your fear is actually justified.
6. Learn from mistakes. Ask yourself: "What did not work?". "What can I do differently?"
7. Nurture your success:
a.Acknowledge the benefits of changing your self-defeating behaviour.
b.Own your success - pat yourself on the back.
Decreasing Life Stressors
What are My Stresses? See Work sheet 7: Coping Skills Checklist (below).
To provide detailed information on all the coping skills listed, is beyond the present capacity of this website. The Coping Skills Checklist will help you to identify the coping skills you feel you need to improve on. The more appropriate coping skills you have the less likely you will use problem gambling as a way of dealing with life stressors.
Look for ways to improve your coping skills. Seek professional advice, community workshops and training courses, counselling, self-help books, and other web-sites that might provide the information you need.
Getting Support
The more support you can muster up, the more help and motivation you will have towards changing. Here are some suggestions:
Family members, partner, understanding friends, other ex-problem gamblers, counsellors, and spiritual leaders.
Self-help books, web-site information, documentaries, etc
Community Self-help: Gamblers Anonymous, Gam-anon (for family members), and any other self-help group that can support you to change.
Recreation
Problem gambling, more often than not, takes up a lot of a person’s spare time. Gambling has become the main form of recreation. Some other form of recreation is needed to replace problem gambling. The best form of replacement recreation is something that is related to your attraction to gambling. Sometimes it might require some form of skill and risk taking, or it could be some form of solitude. Here are some suggestions:
Leisure and Sports
Activities that require a certain amount of skill and risk taking: bike riding, horse riding, surfing. etc. Activities that provides solitude --> fishing, gardening, athletics, swimming, surfing, bushwalking, camping.
Hobbies and Interests
Any hobby that requires research, analysis, planning, experimenting, or anything that is similar to your way of gambling. Anything that presents interest and challenge --> educational pursuits, creative activities.
Vocational Needs
Job satisfaction is the goal. What is job dis-satisfaction? It is when workers perform dull, unchallenging, repetitive jobs - which can lead to stress, boredom, and physical and emotional ill health.
Job dissatisfaction creates resentments, and sometimes on a daily basis. Look for ways to increase job satisfaction. Some possibilities include: learn to relax when stressed, look for interesting aspects of your work - think beyond your immediate tasks, further training or cross-training, and take-on task related challenges where practical.
