Building motivation
Finding your own reasons to change — and holding onto them when the work gets hard.
SMART Recovery, a different way to do the work.
Not everyone connects with a 12-Step room — and you don't have to. SMART Recovery is a science-based, self-empowering way to work on change, built around tools you can actually use rather than steps to follow. It's offered here as part of the program.
How it works
The four points SMART is built on.
SMART Recovery is built around a simple, well-tested framework — a set of skills rather than a set of steps.
Coping with urges
Practical tools to recognize a craving, ride it out, and let it pass without acting on it.
Managing thoughts and feelings
Spotting the patterns of thinking and emotion that lead to use, and learning to change them.
Living a balanced life
Building a life with room for meaning, routine, and the things that make recovery worth it.
At Jasper Grove
Part of the program, not the whole plan.
SMART Recovery is offered here as on-site peer-support meetings, inside residential treatment — alongside 12-Step (AA and NA) meetings, so you can lean on whichever fits you. It sits alongside the clinical work — individual and group therapy, CBT, DBT, trauma-informed care — not in place of it. Some people use both SMART and 12-Step; some just one. There's no wrong way to work your recovery.
Common questions
SMART Recovery, answered.
What is SMART Recovery?
SMART stands for Self-Management and Recovery Training. It's a peer-support program built on cognitive-behavioral and motivational principles rather than a spiritual framework, organized around a 4-Point Program: building motivation, coping with urges, managing thoughts and feelings, and living a balanced life. Meetings are discussion-based and facilitated, and the tools are the same ones used in CBT.
How is SMART Recovery different from AA or NA?
Both work, and neither is a lesser option. The main differences: SMART is secular and doesn't use a higher power or the steps; it treats addiction as a behavior that can be changed rather than a lifelong disease requiring lifelong meeting attendance; it has no sponsors, using facilitators instead; and it expects people to eventually graduate rather than attend indefinitely. Some people use both.
Do I have to choose between SMART and 12-Step?
No. Jasper Grove hosts both on site, and plenty of people try both and keep whichever fits — or use them together. Being told there's only one route to recovery is a common reason people give up on peer support entirely, and it isn't true.
Is SMART Recovery evidence-based?
Its tools come directly from cognitive-behavioral therapy, which has substantial evidence behind it for substance use disorders. SMART is recognized by SAMHSA and the NIH as a mutual-support option. The research base for mutual-support programs generally is less extensive than for clinical treatment, which is why SMART is part of care here rather than a substitute for it.
What actually happens in a SMART meeting?
A facilitator opens, people check in on what's happened since last time, and the group works through a specific tool — a cost-benefit analysis of using, an urge-tracking exercise, a technique for disputing the thoughts that precede a lapse. It's practical and discussion-based rather than confessional, and you're not required to identify yourself as an addict or to speak at all.
Do I have to say 'I'm an addict'?
No. SMART doesn't use labels, and how you describe yourself is left to you. For some people that difference is the reason they engage with peer support at all.
Can I keep going to SMART after I leave?
Yes, and that's the intention — meetings run in person and online worldwide, and continuing peer support is one of the more reliable predictors of staying well. Finding meetings near home is part of the aftercare plan built before you leave.
Take the next step
Recovery that fits how you're wired.
Whether SMART Recovery, 12-Step, or both speak to you, it's part of the care here. Admissions answers 24/7 — call and we'll talk through what treatment looks like and check your coverage.