Stages of Change - SMART Recovery Tips & Tools That Work

The 5 Stages of Change
While the depiction of the Stages of Change has evolved, for the past few decades, it has been expressly described as follows:

1. Precontemplation (no near-term consideration of a change of the particular target behaviour; problem behaviour seen as having more pros than cons);

2. Contemplation (seriously considering change; seeking information about problem; evaluating pros and cons of change; ambivalent; not prepared to change yet);

3. Preparation (made a decision to change and ready to change in attitude and behaviour; may have begun to increase self-regulation and build a plan to change);

4. Action (modifying the problem behaviour; learning skills to prevent reversal to a full return to problem behaviour); and

5. Maintenance (sustaining changes that have been accomplished and integrating the new pattern of behaviour into lifestyle).

Professor Stephen Rollnick, one of the founders of Motivational Interviewing (MI), has said that the tools and the spirit of MI can be used to help individuals move from one of stage to another. And it is universally recognized that the process of movement from one stage to the next is almost never a linear one. The illustration in the SMART Recovery Handbook, Third Edition, is of a spiral. Psychologist Christopher C. Wagner of Virginia Commonwealth University has said that individuals may move from one of the stages in the TTM to another (and back again) in the same therapeutic session (or SMART Recovery meeting).

Some lay people have alternative terms for the last of the stages in the TTM. Rather than maintenance, the State of New York Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services refers to the Maintenance stage as the stage of Wellness. The fourth part of SMART Recovery’s self-empowering program, living a balanced, positive, and healthy life, incorporates the Maintenance stage of the TTM. In SMART Recovery meetings that I facilitate, participants often characterize the Maintenance stage as one of heightened self-care.

Like the recovery journey generally, behaviour change is not easy and moving through the stages of change not only involves moving forward and backward many times but also often (quite often) involves slips or lapses.

In Substance Abuse Treatment and the Stages of Change: Selecting and Planning Interventions, the authors write that the Stages of Change each have “a unique set of tasks, attitudes and behaviours” and that “movement through the stages of change is facilitated by the client’s involvement in stage-relevant experiential and behavioural processes of change.”


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