Type 4 - The Individualist

Key Traits: Self-aware, sensitive, creative, emotionally honest, introspective
Challenges: Moody, self-conscious, self-absorbed, temperamental, withdrawn 

• Basic Fear – Having no personal identity or significance.

• Distorted Desire / Passion – My envy gives me a sense something essential is missing

• Leaden Rule – I treat others as insignificant “nobodies”

• Manipulation Technique – Intensify feelings, dramatize uniqueness

• Red-Flag Fear – Ruining one’s life and wasting opportunities

• Wake-Up Call – Holding on to and intensifying feelings through imagination

• Lost Childhood Message – “You are seen for who you are.”

• Core Identification & Self-Image – “I am sensitive, creative, exceptional.” 

• Desire: To maintain uniqueness

• Invitation to Abundance – Let go of the past; be renewed by experience

• Healing Attitude – “Maybe there is nothing wrong with me… maybe others do understand me.”

Emotional Intensity and Dysregulation: Fours typically have problems with melancholy, self-indulgence, and self-pity. Their intense emotional experiences can become overwhelming, making substances attractive as ways to either intensify or numb these feelings.

Identity Crisis and Significance: The core fear of having no identity or personal significance creates existential anxiety that substances might seem to address, either by providing a sense of identity or temporarily relieving the pain of feeling insignificant.

Romanticization of Suffering: Fours often maintain certain moods and feelings and may romanticize their emotional pain, viewing substance use as part of their authentic, artistic, or unique experience.

Social Withdrawal: Withholding themselves from others due to feeling vulnerable and defective leads to isolation, which increases vulnerability to substance use as a primary coping mechanism.

Cognitive Impairment

Mental fog blocks Fours’ access to their inner emotional world and creative expression. Cognitive difficulties feel like disconnection from their authentic self.

Memory Problems

Memory issues interfere with Fours’ ability to maintain connection to their emotional experiences. They view memory problems as threats to their emotional authenticity.

Emotional Dysregulation

Emotional extremes feel both overwhelming and more authentic than emotional numbness. While difficult, emotional volatility may feel more authentic than the emotional numbing often experienced in early recovery.

Sleep Disturbances

Sleep problems create a complex relationship between fatigue and emotional access.  Sleep issues may provide time for emotional processing but interfere with creative expression.

Motor Coordination Issues

Coordination problems disconnect Fours from their body and physical self-expression.  Physical symptoms interfere with their embodied sense of authenticity.

Stress Sensitivity

Emotional sensitivity feels both authentic and overwhelming. Stress sensitivity creates ambivalence – it feels true to their nature but difficult to handle.

Phase 1: Return of Denial – Inability to recognize and honestly communicate thoughts/feelings

• “These dark feelings are just part of my unique emotional depth.”

• “No one else could understand the complexity of what I’m experiencing.”

• “This melancholy is part of my authentic recovery journey.”

Phase 2: Avoidance and Defensive Behavior – Avoiding anything that triggers uncomfortable emotions

• “My recovery journey is too unique for others to understand.”

• “These surface-level recovery approaches work for ordinary people, not someone like me.”

• “I need to protect the authenticity of my process from others’ shallow advice.”

Phase 3: Crisis Building – Life problems accumulate due to denial and isolation

• “These problems are proof that life is inherently tragic and disappointing.”

• “No one else understands how uniquely difficult my situation is.”

• “These crises are somehow connected to my deeper, authentic self emerging.”

Phase 4: Immobilization – Complete inability to initiate action, controlled by circumstances

• “Nothing I do will matter because I’m fundamentally flawed and broken.”

• “If only someone could truly understand my unique pain, I could heal.”

• “I’m trapped in this emotional darkness that no one else could comprehend.”

Phase 5: Confusion and Overreaction – Impaired thinking and emotional volatility

• “No one understands me and their shallow responses make me mad.”

• “I can’t think clearly through this overwhelming emotional chaos.”

• “Everyone dismisses my pain as drama when it’s actually real.”

Phase 6: Depression – Severe mood disruption affecting normal functioning

• “This depression proves how uniquely damaged and hopeless I really am.”

• “No one has ever felt pain this deep – I’m truly beyond help.”

• “This suffering is my authentic self – dark, broken, and irreparable.”

Phase 7: Behavioral Loss of Control – Inability to maintain recovery behaviors

• “These ordinary recovery approaches don’t address my situation. It’s too unique.”

• “I don’t care about conventional treatment when my problems are so complex.”

• “Why should I follow standard programs when my experience is so different from others?”

Phase 8: Recognition of Loss of Control – Denial breaks, awareness of powerlessness emerges

• “This suffering proves I’m fundamentally broken beyond any hope of healing.”

• “Maybe using would help me access my authentic feelings again.”

• “I’m lying about being okay when this pain is actually killing me inside.”

Phase 9: Option Reduction – Only three perceived options: insanity, suicide, or substance use

• “I’m consumed with rage at this meaningless existence and false hope of recovery.”

• “The only options left are madness, suicide, or using to end this unbearable pain.”

• “I can’t tolerate those shallow people in recovery who don’t understand real suffering.”

Phase 10: Acute Relapse Period – Complete functional breakdown

• “I can’t contain these overwhelming emotions and I’m completely unstable.”

• “I’m so emotionally exhausted that I can’t function in daily life.”

• “Maybe using would help me access my authentic self again.”

Phase 11: Return to Active Addiction – Actual resumption of substance use

• “I’m gonna use so I can connect with my true emotional self.”

• “If I use mindfully, it will help me access the deep feelings that recovery has numbed.”

• “This meaningful use is part of my unique journey that others wouldn’t understand.”

 Releases 

• I NOW RELEASE turning my anger and aggressions against myself.

• I NOW RELEASE all self-hatred and self-contempt.

• I NOW RELEASE all feelings of hopelessness and despair.

• I NOW RELEASE all self-sabotaging thoughts and actions.

• I NOW RELEASE feeling that I am inadequate and defective.

• I NOW RELEASE the fear that I am unimportant and undesirable.

• I NOW RELEASE feeling shameful and misunderstood by others.

• I NOW RELEASE being distraught, fatigued, and inhibited.

• I NOW RELEASE feeling that people always let me down.

• I NOW RELEASE all unrealistic expectations of myself and others.

• I NOW RELEASE all claims of needing to be treated differently.

• I NOW RELEASE all self-indulgence in my emotions and behavior.

• I NOW RELEASE all self-doubt and emotional vulnerability.

• I NOW RELEASE wanting to protect myself by withdrawing from others.

• I NOW RELEASE all wasteful fantasies and romantic longings.

• I NOW RELEASE dwelling on the past to prolong my feelings.

Affirmations 

• I NOW AFFIRM that I am not defined by my feelings.

• I NOW AFFIRM that only the feelings I act on express who I am.

• I NOW AFFIRM that I open myself up to people and the world.

• I NOW AFFIRM that I use all of my experiences to grow.

• I NOW AFFIRM the goodness of my life, my friends, and myself.

• I NOW AFFIRM that I love myself and treat myself gently.

• I NOW AFFIRM that I am free of the damage of my past.

• “Maybe my pain isn’t so unique that others can’t relate…ordinary recovery tools can work for extraordinary people like me.”