Areas of importance
Tool Overview
Which areas of life are important to you? Which areas need greater attention? What do you wish you had more time for?
When To Use This Tool
Use as a group discussion tool
Using the balance pie at any time in your recovery. The pie represents the different areas in your life following these steps:
How To Use This Tool
- Label each slice with an area of your life that is important to you. For example, family, friends, spirituality, romance, health, work, recreation, personal growth, money, physical surroundings, etc.
- Think of the pies' outer edge as being completely satisfied (10) and the centers as being very dissatisfied.
- Rate your level of satisfaction in each of the areas you’ve listed by placing a dot on the middle line of each pie slice to indicate the level of satisfaction you have in that area.
- After you rate each slice, connect the dots to create the outside perimeter of your pie. What does it look like? Is it round and full or does it look like some areas are not as filled out as others?
- Now ask yourself:
- Are my true values and priorities reflected here?
- Am I involved in too many activities? Is there too much on my plate?
- How much of my time is spent caring for others? For myself?
- What area(s) needs more attention? What needs less attention?
- Is there a dream or desire that I’d like to focus on?
- What changes do I want to make? What can I do to ‘round out’ my life?
To move towards a more balanced life, allow yourself more time for the areas that show gaps - those places where pieces of your pie are missing. When doing so, be sure to focus on the whole picture of your life, not just specific areas.
Helpful Links
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Tool Overview
The ABC Model is a good way of understanding how we can help change our feelings and behaviour by challenging our thinking.
When to Use This Tool
The ABC Model is a good way of understanding how we can help change our feelings and behaviour by challenging our thinking. It helps us uncover beliefs that are not helping us /contributing to the behaviour we are trying to change.
This exercise may be done in the group setting but can also be very useful for participants to look at between meetings.
How To Use This Tool
When working with urges: To analyze a lapse/relapse or to develop coping statements for an anticipated lapse/relapse.
In the event of a lapse, the question to ask is not “What made me do that”, but rather, “How did I talk myself into it?” It is not the urge (A) that causes the lapse (C). It is our beliefs (B); our irrational self-talk.With emotional upset:
The ABC Model can also be used to work with emotional upset or frustrations that may occur at any point in the recovery journey. The ABCs allow us to discover our unhelpful beliefs which contribute to emotional upsets. Disputing helps us eliminate our irrational thinking so we can both feel better and do better. In SMART Recovery we teach that we feel the way we think; it’s not unpleasant events that disturb us, it’s the way we think of them. By changing our thinking, we change how we feel.Identifying and Disputing Unhelpful Thinking.
Disputing is a process of challenging the way we think about situations. It’s about trying to look at thoughts more accurately. Disputing unhelpful thinking can help us make more informed decisions about thoughts instead of just acting on them. Balanced thinking leads to effective new beliefs.
