Recovery is no game, but that doesn’t mean we can’t use the elements of games to help us in our recoveries.
What is Gamification?
Gamification is the process of using elements traditionally associated with games in other areas of life. We see this all the time. Google Maps, for example uses gamification to encourage you to help them rate various business by allowing you to earn points. Frequently gamification will provide rewards to make existing tasks more fun, and some sort of way of tracking it with progress bars or levels.
Using Gamification in Recovery
One of the best books on the subject of gamification with respect to health is Chris Hardwick’s book “The Nerdist Way: How to Reach the Next Level.” It describes various methods to address where you are in your life, where you want to be, and how to help get yourself there. In his book, Hardwick essentially shows readers how they can visualize their life as a role playing game to improve in the areas they need to. You can keep track of your progress, and even set it up so you can score points from your friends’ improvements so you have further incentive to help them reach their goals as well.
We can use gamification to help us pursue our recovery goals by literally drawing a path from where we are to where we want to be. We can have goals and missions along that map, including things like attending support groups, seeing therapists, exercising, etc that can provide us with points. With a certain number of points we can reward ourselves with something we like.
Level Up
Obviously gamification isn’t for everyone. But many people do get the dopamine hit of reward by seeing points grow or a figure move along a board. For those of us who respond well to that manner of thinking, you might look into ways that gamification may be integrated into your custom recovery plan. If you’d like to learn more about addiction recovery Florida residents can call us at (833) 596-3502.
