Measuring Your Progress

Clients can measure their progress by comparing their current status to the goals they set at the beginning of their change program. These goals may relate to their substance use; to other areas of their lives such as physical, mental, or spiritual well-being, or relationships with family or friends; or to any other problem or issue that clients are working on changing. Progress is improvement or positive movement toward identified goals. Sometimes progress is significant and happens quickly. Other times progress is less significant and happens slowly. The goals of this chapter are to learn to define and measure the progress the client has made this far and to recognize that progress shows in many aspects of one’s life, just not substance use.