Whoisthisfor/professionals-addiction
A New Approach to Mental Health & Addiction Treatment: A Model of Health
For professionals working in the fields of addiction, mental health, and recovery, the current landscape is often frustrating. Despite years of research, funding, and treatment innovation, outcomes remain discouraging.
- Why do so many clients relapse after treatment?
- Why do mental health conditions seem to be rising despite increased awareness and intervention?
- Why does it often feel like we offer tools and techniques that provide only temporary relief at best?
The reality is most traditional approaches operate within a model of illness – one that sees people as broken, chemically imbalanced, or forever battling their past. This is where The Infinite Recovery Project offers a different path: a health model rather than a disease model.
This isn’t another treatment modality, psychological framework, or set of techniques. It’s a complete shift in how we see human experience and healing.
Why Traditional Approaches Fail
to Create Lasting Change
If the dominant model worked, we wouldn’t see the revolving door of addiction treatment, the increasing number of mental health diagnoses, and the continued rise in pharmaceutical dependence.
Dr Thomas Insel, former Director of the National Institute of Mental Health, admitted after decades of research:
“I spent 13 years at NIMH really pushing on the neuroscience and genetics of mental disorders, and when I look back on that, I realize that while I think I succeeded at getting lots of really cool papers published by cool scientists at fairly high costs – I think $20 billion – I don’t think we moved the needle in reducing suicide, reducing hospitalizations, improving recovery for the tens of millions of people who struggle with mental illness.”
Similarly, Dr Allen Frances, who helped shape modern psychiatric diagnoses, later reflected on how over-medicalisation and over-diagnosis had created a mental health system that labels but doesn’t heal:
“There is no definition of a mental disorder. It’s bullshit. I mean, you just can’t define it… these concepts are virtually impossible to define precisely with bright lines at the borders.”
If two of the most influential figures in psychiatry acknowledge that the traditional model isn’t working, what are we missing?
The Core Issue:
The Model of Illness vs. The Model of Health
The model of illness is built on:
-
Separation
The practitioner is the expert; the client is broken. -
Diagnosis & pathology
Problems are medicalised, labelled, and treated as lifelong disorders. -
Tools & techniques
Healing is seen as managing symptoms rather than dissolving suffering at the root. -
A focus on what's wrong
Treatment reinforces the idea that people are defective, keeping them stuck in self-judgment.
The model of health is built on:
-
Wholeness
Nothing is fundamentally broken; suffering is a misunderstanding, not a disease. -
Innate intelligence
The mind and body are designed for healing; when we stop interfering, recovery happens naturally. -
Experiential insight, not intellectual learning
The practitioners must deeply see this before guiding others. -
A focus on what is right
Healing is not about fixing people but reconnecting them to their innate well-being.
The Role of the Practitioner:
Beyond the "Expert" Position
One of the biggest shifts professionals must make is letting go of the idea that you are the expert and your client is the one who needs fixing.
When practitioners see themselves as the experts and the client as the one with the problem, they unknowingly perpetuate the suffering they are trying to resolve.
Clients enter treatment believing: “There is something wrong with me.”
When professionals offer techniques, coping mechanisms, and interventions without seeing their innate well-being, they unconsciously confirm that belief: “Yes, there is something wrong with you, and I am here to help fix it.”
This is the fundamental problem with top-down approaches: they perpetuate struggle instead of resolving it.
Infinite Recovery’s approach is experiential, not theoretical. You cannot help someone access their innate health unless you have seen it yourself. This is why training is essential – not to teach new techniques but to shift how you see your clients and yourself.
Why Most Professionals Haven't
Been Trained in Mental Health
One of the biggest myths in the field is that professionals are trained in mental health. The truth? Most doctors, therapists, and psychiatrists have only been trained in mental illness.
Dr. Daniel Siegel, author of several best-selling books, interviewed over 74,000 mental health professionals face to face, asking if they’d ever attended a lecture on ‘mental health.’ Only 5% answered yes. The other 95% hadn’t learned anything about ‘mental health,’ only mental illness. (Siegel, D. J. 2011. The Neurobiology of “We”: How Relationships, the Mind, and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are [Audiobook]. Sounds True Publishing.)
Medical professionals study pathology, diagnosis, and treatment – but almost no time is spent on what mental health is. They are equipped to name disorders, manage symptoms, and prescribe medicines, but they have no real framework for understanding well-being beyond the absence of distress.
This is why so many people remain stuck – even after years of therapy. Treatment becomes a process of managing dysfunction rather than dissolving suffering.
A true model of health doesn’t ask, “How do we reduce symptoms?”
It asks, “What creates suffering in the first place – and what happens when we see through it?”
The Infinite Recovery
Approach for Professionals
Infinite Recovery offers an entirely different way of working with people struggling with addiction and mental health challenges grounded in trauma and spiritual realisation.
- We do not see addiction as a lifelong disease - it is a learned coping mechanism, and when the underlying misunderstanding dissolves, so does the need for it.
- We do not believe mental health is something to be "achieved" - it is already present, waiting to be uncovered.
- We do not rely on behavioural techniques or symptom management - we help people see differently so that change happens effortlessly
And this begins with you, the professional.
You cannot guide someone into deep transformation if you haven’t experienced it yourself. That’s why this training isn’t just about your clients – it’s about you.
- Do you truly see your well-being?
- Have you questioned your assumptions about mental health?
- Are you ready to look beyond diagnosis and treatment to something deeper?
- You're in the right place if you feel the pull to explore this for yourself.
How to Get Involved
At Infinite Recovery, we offer opportunities for practitioners to explore a transformative perspective on addiction and mental health, including:
- A fresh, trauma-informed framework for addiction and recovery
- Experiential learning - not just theory, but something you directly witness and embody
- A shift from illness-based models to a focus on innate well-being and resilience
- Live discussions, reflective inquiry, and authentic conversations beyond the textbook
- Practitioner transformation — because you can only guide clients as far as you have gone yourself
Get in touch to learn more, ask questions, and explore whether this approach can support your work. The field of mental health and addiction is evolving – and together, we can be part of that change.
Key Takeaways
- The traditional model of illness reinforces struggle by seeing people as broken.
- The model of health recognises innate well-being and dissolves suffering at the root.
- The biggest barrier to real healing is the separate "me and you" dynamic as a result of trauma.
- You cannot lead someone to well-being unless you deeply see it yourself.
- Infinite Recovery offers a new way forward - for professionals ready to question what they've been taught and see something radically different.
Contact Us
Are you ready to explore?
Let’s begin.