Eric, this is a great post and mission. Ive lived in Boston for seven years. The tragedy of human adaptability is how quickly we acclimate to the suffering of others. Plight is pitied initially, then is regarded as nuisance, recedes into callousness, and finally disappears as scenery in the background.
If you observe how young suburbanites interact when visiting the city for the first time and encountering poverty, addiction, and human desperation in all its baseness, often they insist on equality. To phrase it as a mental thought, “this man nodding off in front of me is as good as me”. And there is truth to that . . . but also a distortion.
I find it is much more dignifying, more accurate, and more grounding to look without flinching and say internally “I am as bad as you are. You cannot be worse than me.” It changes the internal experience on a sensory and emotional level. There is no pity nor a bleeding heart of compassion, but a firmness of solidarity.
Hey Austin. A bit late on the reply here but your comment wasn't one I took lightly either and thought about it a few days before coming here to respond.
You know I'm really starting to firmly believe that unless you have "felt" and "lived" something, you really have no idea whatsoever how aligned you are with truth.
I was probably told stories about purpose, alignment, and self-actualization thousands of times in my first 44 years of living (I'm now 45). But until I found this purpose and alignment within myself in a bathrobe in Dubai in early January of this year (Why was I in Dubai you might ask? Well THAT is a story I refuse to tell unless I can tell it right because it's wild) I now know I never understood what this was. I never could even believe it or in it because at least for me its description sounded like a Disney movie and not representative of the darkness and demons I was sort of subconsciously navigating.
But now it's the only thing that matters to me. Anyway this is just a long-winded way of saying that after thinking about your post for a few days I realized that I'm almost certain its impossible to write what you wrote the way you wrote it without having "felt" and "lived" it. And one of my ultimate goals with Recovery Compass is directly tied to this as the fight I want to take on is one of values and perspective shifting as lived experience almost yields no leverage in the very careers and job positions that desperately need it the most ***HEALTHCARE*** I'd love to connect with you on LinkedIn and stay in touch.
This is fantastic. I've always wondered how much of substance abuse is self-medication (I've had multiple family members who turned to substance abuse to cope with physical and emotional pain), but it totally makes sense that the environment acts as a kind of an over-arching guide toward or away from abuse, regardless of the initial causes.
Be careful, though; the adoption of systems-level design in health care and recovery could upend the entire broken system. And considering how many people benefit from that broken system, your approach could generate all kinds of opposition from highly moneyed interests.
I wouldn't put it past entrenched players to try and undercut your work by lobbying for legislation that makes your work illegal with the stroke of a pen; tech legislation is all the rage right now, and this is a tried-and-true playbook for them. Painting your systems-level approach as "de-humanizing" might be effective against legislators who don't know much about it - and who benefit financially from believing it.
So, if you haven't already, you might want to find some organizations with lobbying muscle that you can ally with. Because you may need some legislative cover in the future.
I appreciate the enthusiasm for it John. I'm sure you are seeing in your line of work with corporate AI adoption that the power dynamic in some respects has shifted towards those in the "unofficial channels". I do some selective AI coaching myself and I find the more a person is able to explore and learn AI in a way where IT adapts to THEM vs them adapting to it, is really one of the most striking factors in accelerated adoption.
Same goes for the movement that I'm most passionate about. Too long for a comment response box but the vision I have benefits from the asymmetric battle dynamics in favor of me and Recovery Compass because (optimism baked in) being in the 95% has been a burden for those waiting in line trying to access what is beyond the gatekeeper. But there has only been a power dynamic imbalance due to the 5% having control over the rule book, the goods, the resources, etc but that I think is changing when the 95% no longer perceives whats behind the gate to be a source of value and I'm hoping we're headed to a place that the alternative to what they offer doesn't involve the gatekeepers nor permission.
You know its funny - when I read your comment I immediately turned to my fiance and said "from the VERY first comments I received immediately after starting Recovery Compass to now when people get a snapshot of the comprehensive vision and potential value, one of the top 2-3 immediate responses is 'Be careful, lots of people don't want to shift the finger pointing from 'the broken drug addict with a drug problem' to 'overwhelmed and operating from a state of scarcity due to the system's design'. And its far far worse than broken. It's performance and output are aligned perfectly with the system's foundation.
Great post. I agree that we treat addiction in the US completely wrong. We are treating the symptom--drug/alcohol abuse--when the root cause is as unique as every individual suffering in the horrific cycle of addiction. After experiencing firsthand the broken system with a loved one, I was appalled at the one-size-fits-all approach and lack of innovation.
Thank you, Eric Brakebill Jones, for turning the system upside down and applying your lived and tech experience to precipitate what needs to be a seismic change in antiquated attitudes and treatments. And thank you, Devansh, for platforming this incredibly important topic.
Hi Celeste. Thank you so much for your feedback on my post. I wouldn't say I've turned the system upside down yet. In fact everyday I'm seeing this is going to consume every ounce of my energy until the day I die. It's so important to error on the side of going too slow right now with Recovery Compass because these nascent foundational stages will largely dictate its fate. Yet there are so many layers to get through until the system is turned upside down. A-typical PMF factors like perspective-shifting. In order for many of my ideas to advance and manifest into some tangible value-add for any government-oriented or more established healthcare provider, there needs to be some kind of buy-in to what I'm proposing and reimagining. And to that I say: I'm thinking hard about it.
“The sentence that stayed with me wasn’t even the 94% line.” Thanks for writing this, David. It was the counselors asking me why I sat through benzo withdrawal — seizures, hallucinations, tremors so violent I couldn’t hold a razor — when I could’ve walked through their doors for that phase instead.
I understand this equation. Treatment that requires you to surrender your name, your narrative and a diagnosis before anyone will examine the rest of your existence is not treatment. It’s tuition. Many thousands do it every year and still fill beds that were sized years before they walked through those doors.
Helpful stuff starts after recovery journalism leaves off: the drug was never the whole problem. It makes next to no difference if the intervention “worked” if the person sitting across from you fails to add up to human in their eyes. No addict ever cried during a meeting because DBT kept them alive. They cry because someone was present after the building was still burning.
The Eaton fire crew did more crisis intervention than MASCI. Three city blocks from the orange crush so the residence “doesn’t count.” That right there embodies your system. Pain that doesn’t fit the criteria doesn’t matter. Your mother staying awake 15 hours fixing an apartment you couldn’t is antithesis of that. That’s milieu therapy in its rawest form; what triage notes purports to accomplish.
Guess I’m always going to bristle when “AI + assessment = individualized plan” sounds like the app= is treatment. Tech can eliminate a barrier. It will never substitute for relationship work. If this platform truly allows folks to bypass “declare yourself deficient” and still receive an actionable plan built around your life — kids, housing status, 2am emergencies, proverbial couch — that’s the worth building towards. Everything else are just hire humans.
Recovery doesn’t equal widgets on a dashboard. It’s being able to access help without first checking a box that you are a disorder.
Hi Belle. Thank you for this one. I have read it several times since it landed.
The counselors asked you the same question they asked me, and I suspect we sat through that phase for the same reason. You named the price: surrender your name, your narrative, and a diagnosis before anyone will examine the rest of your existence. Tuition is the right word. Removing that exact toll is the whole reason Environmental Response Design exists.
On "the app is treatment": we agree completely, and I want to say it plainly. The technology's only job is the barrier. The relationship is the treatment. I wrote in the piece that WHO provides the intervention matters more than what intervention they provide, and the fourteen months of building since have only hardened that. Nobody ever cried at 2 a.m. because a dashboard kept them alive.
What has changed since June is that the framework grew up. ERD became a full manuscript, submitted to a peer-reviewed journal this month, built to deepen the two dimensions of the field's own placement criteria (the ASAM Criteria) that name a person's environment and then starve it operationally. And the assessment now opens with one question and zero labels: what is this costing you, zero to ten. Answerable on day one, by anyone, without checking a box that you are a disorder. Kids, housing status, the 2 a.m. emergencies, the proverbial couch, that is the life the plan gets built around.
My mother passed in April of last year. What you saw in her 15 hours is the thing I am trying to make the system capable of. Thank you for seeing it.
Eric, this is a great post and mission. Ive lived in Boston for seven years. The tragedy of human adaptability is how quickly we acclimate to the suffering of others. Plight is pitied initially, then is regarded as nuisance, recedes into callousness, and finally disappears as scenery in the background.
If you observe how young suburbanites interact when visiting the city for the first time and encountering poverty, addiction, and human desperation in all its baseness, often they insist on equality. To phrase it as a mental thought, “this man nodding off in front of me is as good as me”. And there is truth to that . . . but also a distortion.
I find it is much more dignifying, more accurate, and more grounding to look without flinching and say internally “I am as bad as you are. You cannot be worse than me.” It changes the internal experience on a sensory and emotional level. There is no pity nor a bleeding heart of compassion, but a firmness of solidarity.
wishing your ventures the best,
austin
Hey Austin. A bit late on the reply here but your comment wasn't one I took lightly either and thought about it a few days before coming here to respond.
You know I'm really starting to firmly believe that unless you have "felt" and "lived" something, you really have no idea whatsoever how aligned you are with truth.
I was probably told stories about purpose, alignment, and self-actualization thousands of times in my first 44 years of living (I'm now 45). But until I found this purpose and alignment within myself in a bathrobe in Dubai in early January of this year (Why was I in Dubai you might ask? Well THAT is a story I refuse to tell unless I can tell it right because it's wild) I now know I never understood what this was. I never could even believe it or in it because at least for me its description sounded like a Disney movie and not representative of the darkness and demons I was sort of subconsciously navigating.
But now it's the only thing that matters to me. Anyway this is just a long-winded way of saying that after thinking about your post for a few days I realized that I'm almost certain its impossible to write what you wrote the way you wrote it without having "felt" and "lived" it. And one of my ultimate goals with Recovery Compass is directly tied to this as the fight I want to take on is one of values and perspective shifting as lived experience almost yields no leverage in the very careers and job positions that desperately need it the most ***HEALTHCARE*** I'd love to connect with you on LinkedIn and stay in touch.
Send him a message! I'm sure he'll love talking to you
This is fantastic. I've always wondered how much of substance abuse is self-medication (I've had multiple family members who turned to substance abuse to cope with physical and emotional pain), but it totally makes sense that the environment acts as a kind of an over-arching guide toward or away from abuse, regardless of the initial causes.
Be careful, though; the adoption of systems-level design in health care and recovery could upend the entire broken system. And considering how many people benefit from that broken system, your approach could generate all kinds of opposition from highly moneyed interests.
I wouldn't put it past entrenched players to try and undercut your work by lobbying for legislation that makes your work illegal with the stroke of a pen; tech legislation is all the rage right now, and this is a tried-and-true playbook for them. Painting your systems-level approach as "de-humanizing" might be effective against legislators who don't know much about it - and who benefit financially from believing it.
So, if you haven't already, you might want to find some organizations with lobbying muscle that you can ally with. Because you may need some legislative cover in the future.
I appreciate the enthusiasm for it John. I'm sure you are seeing in your line of work with corporate AI adoption that the power dynamic in some respects has shifted towards those in the "unofficial channels". I do some selective AI coaching myself and I find the more a person is able to explore and learn AI in a way where IT adapts to THEM vs them adapting to it, is really one of the most striking factors in accelerated adoption.
Same goes for the movement that I'm most passionate about. Too long for a comment response box but the vision I have benefits from the asymmetric battle dynamics in favor of me and Recovery Compass because (optimism baked in) being in the 95% has been a burden for those waiting in line trying to access what is beyond the gatekeeper. But there has only been a power dynamic imbalance due to the 5% having control over the rule book, the goods, the resources, etc but that I think is changing when the 95% no longer perceives whats behind the gate to be a source of value and I'm hoping we're headed to a place that the alternative to what they offer doesn't involve the gatekeepers nor permission.
You know its funny - when I read your comment I immediately turned to my fiance and said "from the VERY first comments I received immediately after starting Recovery Compass to now when people get a snapshot of the comprehensive vision and potential value, one of the top 2-3 immediate responses is 'Be careful, lots of people don't want to shift the finger pointing from 'the broken drug addict with a drug problem' to 'overwhelmed and operating from a state of scarcity due to the system's design'. And its far far worse than broken. It's performance and output are aligned perfectly with the system's foundation.
<3
Great post. I agree that we treat addiction in the US completely wrong. We are treating the symptom--drug/alcohol abuse--when the root cause is as unique as every individual suffering in the horrific cycle of addiction. After experiencing firsthand the broken system with a loved one, I was appalled at the one-size-fits-all approach and lack of innovation.
Thank you, Eric Brakebill Jones, for turning the system upside down and applying your lived and tech experience to precipitate what needs to be a seismic change in antiquated attitudes and treatments. And thank you, Devansh, for platforming this incredibly important topic.
I'm glad you liked it. I hope your loved one is better now. Eric is doing exceptional work so I think you should check him out if you're interested
Hi Celeste. Thank you so much for your feedback on my post. I wouldn't say I've turned the system upside down yet. In fact everyday I'm seeing this is going to consume every ounce of my energy until the day I die. It's so important to error on the side of going too slow right now with Recovery Compass because these nascent foundational stages will largely dictate its fate. Yet there are so many layers to get through until the system is turned upside down. A-typical PMF factors like perspective-shifting. In order for many of my ideas to advance and manifest into some tangible value-add for any government-oriented or more established healthcare provider, there needs to be some kind of buy-in to what I'm proposing and reimagining. And to that I say: I'm thinking hard about it.
“The sentence that stayed with me wasn’t even the 94% line.” Thanks for writing this, David. It was the counselors asking me why I sat through benzo withdrawal — seizures, hallucinations, tremors so violent I couldn’t hold a razor — when I could’ve walked through their doors for that phase instead.
I understand this equation. Treatment that requires you to surrender your name, your narrative and a diagnosis before anyone will examine the rest of your existence is not treatment. It’s tuition. Many thousands do it every year and still fill beds that were sized years before they walked through those doors.
Helpful stuff starts after recovery journalism leaves off: the drug was never the whole problem. It makes next to no difference if the intervention “worked” if the person sitting across from you fails to add up to human in their eyes. No addict ever cried during a meeting because DBT kept them alive. They cry because someone was present after the building was still burning.
The Eaton fire crew did more crisis intervention than MASCI. Three city blocks from the orange crush so the residence “doesn’t count.” That right there embodies your system. Pain that doesn’t fit the criteria doesn’t matter. Your mother staying awake 15 hours fixing an apartment you couldn’t is antithesis of that. That’s milieu therapy in its rawest form; what triage notes purports to accomplish.
Guess I’m always going to bristle when “AI + assessment = individualized plan” sounds like the app= is treatment. Tech can eliminate a barrier. It will never substitute for relationship work. If this platform truly allows folks to bypass “declare yourself deficient” and still receive an actionable plan built around your life — kids, housing status, 2am emergencies, proverbial couch — that’s the worth building towards. Everything else are just hire humans.
Recovery doesn’t equal widgets on a dashboard. It’s being able to access help without first checking a box that you are a disorder.
Hi Belle. Thank you for this one. I have read it several times since it landed.
The counselors asked you the same question they asked me, and I suspect we sat through that phase for the same reason. You named the price: surrender your name, your narrative, and a diagnosis before anyone will examine the rest of your existence. Tuition is the right word. Removing that exact toll is the whole reason Environmental Response Design exists.
On "the app is treatment": we agree completely, and I want to say it plainly. The technology's only job is the barrier. The relationship is the treatment. I wrote in the piece that WHO provides the intervention matters more than what intervention they provide, and the fourteen months of building since have only hardened that. Nobody ever cried at 2 a.m. because a dashboard kept them alive.
What has changed since June is that the framework grew up. ERD became a full manuscript, submitted to a peer-reviewed journal this month, built to deepen the two dimensions of the field's own placement criteria (the ASAM Criteria) that name a person's environment and then starve it operationally. And the assessment now opens with one question and zero labels: what is this costing you, zero to ten. Answerable on day one, by anyone, without checking a box that you are a disorder. Kids, housing status, the 2 a.m. emergencies, the proverbial couch, that is the life the plan gets built around.
My mother passed in April of last year. What you saw in her 15 hours is the thing I am trying to make the system capable of. Thank you for seeing it.
Eric