When you think about your recovery journey, what comes to mind? WRAP, wellness tools, your support system perhaps. What about personal responsibility? You could have the best support structure, WRAP and peer support – it won’t truly help your recovery until you decide what changes need to happen in your life and you take steps to make them happen.
There’s a reason Personal Responsibility is one of the key concepts to recovery; it involves taking action and doing what needs to be done to get well and stay well.
It’s not easy and it can take time. When you take ownership of your life and your future (remember YOU are an expert on yourself) you gain back control of your life
I’ve included personal responsibility prominently in the WRAP resources we have available on the website and also in my books.
Mary Ellen Copeland, PhD, developed Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP) with a group of people with lived experience who were attending a mental health recovery workshop in 1997. She is the original author of the WRAP Red Book, as well as dozens of other WRAP books and materials. She has dedicated the last 30 years of her life to learning from people who have mental health issues; discovering the simple, safe, non-invasive ways they get well, stay well, and move forward in their lives; and then sharing what she has learned with others through keynote addresses, trainings, and the development of books, curriculums, and other resources. Now that she is retired, and that, as she intended, others are continuing to share what she has learned, she continues to learn from those who have mental health issues and those who support them. She is a frequent contributor to this site.
