At All Positive Options, we strongly believe in fostering education and awareness about addiction and recovery on a community level.  In all societies throughout the world, while addiction is a highly complex problem and systemic in nature, the direct and indirect damage it inflicts are most keenly felt on a very basic level within individual communities and neighborhoods.

Drug and alcohol addiction are directly or indirectly implicated in about 85% of all crimes.  Whether you're talking about property crime, child welfare issues, assault - you don't have to look far to find that in some way, alcohol or drugs were involved.  And as a result of that, 85 - 90% of law enforcement's budget and time is spent on those issues that are directly or indirectly related to drug and alcohol abuse.  In fact, many feel that if we made even a 25% dent in the number of people addicted to alcohol and drugs, not only would genuine "community policing" be possible, they'd be bumping into each other on the street.

A New Awareness

Thankfully, due to new scientific advancements in researching addiction, we're beginning to actually the profound neurological changes the addicted person goes through.  And we're beginning to understand both the genetic and environmental precursors that make one vulnerable to adopting an addiction.

One thing is patently clear - as human beings we're not all manufactured out of a "cookie-cutter," and as such, we're not all equally endowed when it comes to desire states, urges, compulsions and other factors that can cause a predilection to addiction.  At the very least, society is beginning to understand that addiction is not simply about poor choices, weak morals, and not being exposed to enough "anti-drug" messages.

And after thirty-five years of spending billions of dollars in waging the hopeless enforcement-based "war on drugs," society is finally realizing that you can't arrest and incarcerate your way out of systemic problems with a society.  Sooner or later you run out of room to incarcerate people and this is already the case in several regions of the U.S.  And the sad fact is, 3 out of every 4 persons currently incarcerated in most regions of North America are there for non-violent drug offenses.

Answering The "Why?"

So just like our web site, our community information sessions tend to focus on the "why?" of addiction and recovery.  Rather than assaulting you with dry statistics, we answer questions like "Why can't addicts and alcoholics see how destructive their addiction is to themselves and their families?"  "Why does a kid who seems to have the world at their fingertips turn to crack cocaine and end up addicted?"  "Why does a child who always had such a good relationship with their parents suddenly become withdrawn and detached and start hanging around with bad company, or spend 20 hours a day on their computer?"

And to understand the answers to these "why" questions, it requires more than statistics and scare tactics - it requires providing people with real insight and awareness into the nature of addiction and the reality of recovery.  In short, our sessions will enable you to get inside the head of someone with a potential for addiction, as well as a full-blown addict.

Our community information sessions are designed to be educational, entertaining and highly interactive.   Each presentation also allows for a question and answer session as well.  And please be advised, we receive a tremendous number of requests for community awareness sessions, and to that end, we currently require at least 45 days advance notice of a requested booking.

For a listing of presentation topics and our schedule for the next ninety days, please drop us a line HERE.

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