Very rarely do we see people come into recovery from addiction brimming with positivity, honesty and a caring attitude toward others. Instead, it’s much more typical to find “newcomers” feeling weighted down by distrust and defensiveness, callousness and alienation (if not resentment and malevolence), and a substantial amount of self-centeredness. However, as the saying goes,…
“Much of your pain is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.” – Khalil Gibran [Note: This blog-post is meant to address how those of us in recovery from addiction can deal most effectively with pain, focusing mainly on chronic pain. Although there may, at times, be some overlap,…
“The body is a boat that floats the soul in space and time.” – Saroj Aryal As people who are in recovery from substance abuse, there are a number of dimensions of our physical selves that need daily attention, if we’re to ensure we’re “covering the bases” properly. Besides the typically mentioned elements of our…
“Wisdom consists of the anticipation of consequences.” — Norman Cousins One of the most powerful “mantras” I heard when I was new in recovery was: “Play out the tape all the way through to the end.” And recently, I was able to help someone out by sharing some of my experience with it, which…
“Nothing truly valuable can be achieved except by the unselfish cooperation of many individuals.” – Albert Einstein While talking with a friend in recovery yesterday, he mentioned how important it was to him early on—when he first got into treatment for substance abuse—to let go of his intense grip on “self-sufficiency,” a character trait upon…
“Nature never sends a great man into the ground without confiding the secret to another soul.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “confide” as follows: ‘to trust’ And it defines “trust” as: ‘reliance on the character, ability, strength or truth of someone or something’ So, what does confiding in someone, trusting someone,…
“In family relationships, love is really spelled T.I.M.E.” – Dieter Uchtdorf When I was relatively new in recovery, it was pointed out to me I would do well to choose wisely who I spent time with, in order to more readily heal and strengthen—certainly not toxify or stress out further—my mind, emotions and spirit.…
“If we have trouble seeing the miracle of recovery, we’d better look again.” – Just For Today[1] I recall vividly how quietly scared I was when I first came into recovery. One of my foremost fears was simply that I was never going to get free from the grip addiction had on me – it…
I once told someone in my addiction recovery network about a guy who would brag about the length of his clean time, but always seemed angry. My friend’s reply was, “I actually know who you’re talking about. He may be abstinent, but that’s not the same as recovery.” I’ve seen over the years just how…
“Change is never painful. Only the resistance to change is painful.” – Buddha So often in early addiction recovery (or later for that matter, after months and years of being sober/clean), we find ourselves facing either relationship issues, work-related matters or other “life situations” that require us to change how we’ve approached them in the…