What Is Experiential Therapy?

What is experiential therapy? It is an effective treatment for both mental disorders and addiction. It involves a range of tools and activities that help you grow beyond your past experiences.

Our experiential therapy program gives you insight into the connection between your past and your addiction. It integrates different types of treatments into a more comprehensive treatment program. Let’s read more below to discover this effective type of treatment.

Experiential Therapy for Addiction

Treatment specialists use experiential therapy to treat addiction to drugs or alcohol. There are several therapy program options available such as: 

• Guided imagery
• Roleplaying
• Animal therapy
• Props
• Art or Music
• Crafts

Treatment centers also offer various recreational activities to help you work through a traumatic or emotional experience from your past. 

What is experiential therapy in addiction treatment?  Much of what triggers addiction is negative thoughts, feelings, or beliefs. Negativity often comes from traumatic experiences in your life. Experiences could include abuse, death of a loved one, natural disaster, stress at work, a divorce, or even a mental disorder.

Experiential therapy seeks to help draw the connection between your past experiences and your addiction.

How Does it Work?

An experiential therapy program provides structured activities that are led by a trained and certified therapist. The purpose of the activities is to encourage you to explore and release negative feelings and emotions such as fear, anger, shame, or disappointment.

These are feelings that you may have repressed or bottled up after your traumatic event. Instead of releasing them in a healthy manner, you may have turned to drugs or alcohol to self-medicate. This is a common reaction to past experiences. A therapist can help you face your negative thoughts and emotions and finally get them in a way that is productive and brings real healing.

Why Choose Experiential Therapy

Like any other form of therapy, you may feel uncomfortable sharing your thoughts and your feelings in an experiential therapy program. However, there are several reasons why experiential therapy is beneficial including:

• You learn strategies to deal with negative thoughts and feelings
• It provides a supplement to traditional individual talk therapy
• You can finally release your emotion in a safe environment
• It teaches you how to process disappointment and hurt
• Your therapist can help you achieve a sense of self-empowerment

It also helps you to take responsibility for yourself and your actions. You learn how to adapt and work with others, improve your communication skills, and become competent in key areas of your life.

This type of treatment helps with addictions and mental disorders including PTSD, eating disorders, anxiety disorder, depression, personality disorder, substance abuse, and even resolving family conflict.

Learn More at Right Step Hill Country 

What is experiential therapy? Learn more at Right Step Hill Country. We integrate this program into our treatment plan to ensure long-term recovery. To find out more about the experiential therapy program at Right Step Hill County, feel free to contact us at our addiction treatment center. Call 1.844.675.1628 to schedule a consultation with a treatment specialist.