Many people, as the result of a brush with the law, end up attending court-ordered AA meetings. People in prison often have access to treatment programs of varying sorts and often AA meetings are held in prisons.

Relatively few people seem to be aware of Rational Recovery, a sobriety program that can be practiced by anyone, anywhere, regardless of their beliefs or personal situation. There is no requirement to attend meetings, rely on a group for support, adopt a "higher power" (mind, you can if you want to--RR does not dictate how to live, think, or believe), any of the usual requirements found in AA or related groups.

The basic principles of Rational Recovery can be learned in a few minutes and will be found at www.rational.com. They will also send literature to anyone on request if I recall correctly. It seems to me that their techniques might be very helpful to those who are incarcerated and unable to avail themselves of some of the better-known means of treating addictions.

Let me be very clear that I have no objection to anyone who finds help through AA or another 12-Step program. I have often found AA meetings an excellent source of fellowship and support--and have never come away from a meeting feeling worse than I did when I arrived. But the simple tools of the Rational Recovery program have been of great help to me, and I must credit Rational Recovery with the fact that I have remained sober for all but a few months of the past 13 years. This after two rounds of traditional inpatient treatment resulted in a total of three days' sobriety.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone else who has had similar experiences, and especially anyone who has used RR while incarcerated. I believe it is a program which ought to be far more widely known than it is now.

I was interested in finding out more about this program, but the link sent me to an IBM site. Hope you correct the address. Thanks for the info.

My apologies--the correct address is: www.rational.org .

For additional information about the origins of RR and the applications its principles have for other ares of life, try a Google search for Albert Ellis and Rational-Emotive Therapy. Nathaniel Branden's Biocentric Psychology is somewhat related as well. Lots of food for thought, interesting reading, and quite possibly, some significant help for people who do not have access to or cannot benefit from the more established self-help programs out there.

SAdly this information is not free (www.rational.org (http://www.rational.org)) and requires an on line membership. That leaves some of us out in the cold.

Thanks for listing the names of the authors of this program. Will try that avenue.

Well that stinks--and certainly wasn't true when I originally posted the information!

Several of Jack Trimpey's books should be available through libraries. He tends to editorialize far more than is necessary, but once you get to the useful information, it is useful indeed.

Rational recovery is an absolute joke! There is no help in that program, there is no accountability, and it says you can have a drink now and then. If you are an alcoholic or drug addict you know you cannot ever touch the stuff again. I have been through treatment a few times and now they have this "rational" recovery and personally for me I think it's a joke. It would never work for me. I'm full fledge wholeheartedly AA.

Find God-and be accountable to someone, or your recovery will be jeopardized!!!!

Jack Trimpey's major failing is that he seems to make almost a full-time career out of bashing AA. He is wrong in that--AA helps many people and is to be applauded for that. But it is not the ONLY way to get and remain sober. Some people simply don't seem to get any help from AA, and I'm glad there are alternatives available. Sobriety is sobriety, whatever path you take to achieve it.

Mind, I can't "take a drink now and then" either--but anyone who believes they can is welcome to make the experiment (as stated in the Big Book). I have been involved with AA since 1993, regularly attend meetings, and am sober. While I have some rather complex spiritual beliefs, I haven't exactly "found God" either (see the chapter "We Agnostics", again in the Big Book). I continue to use, as I have for many years, the "Addictive Voice Recognition" technique which is the basis of Rational Recovery. It works.

I've seen AA's harp about "AA is the only way" in meetings. I've seen others take people to task because they were taking antidepressants or the like and therefore were not "sober" in the eyes of these members. And I've watched a lot of people attending their first meetings listen to that sort of thing and never come back.

Thankfully, most AA groups are not nearly so rigid, and keep Bill W.'s admonition about openmindedness in mind. Jack Trimpey could benefit from a dose of the same medicine, but I don't think that's a reason to throw out the baby with the bathwater, so to speak.