Beating Addiction and Finding Recovery

Beating addiction is a journey, not an event. Any recovering alcoholic or addict will tell you that overcoming addiction is a process that unfolds before you for the rest of your life. But what exactly does this process entail, and how can we go about pursuing it successfully?

Surrender

Before you can even attempt to beat any form of drug or alcohol addiction, you have to surrender fully to the disease. What exactly does this mean?

It means you have to stop fighting with yourself in terms of trying to control your use. You have to give up the idea that you might one day be able to drink or use drugs like a normal person can. If you are hanging on to the idea that one day you might be able to control your drinking or drugging and thus use successfully, then you are setting yourself up for failure.

Surrender is a process. It just happens; I’m not sure that you can really initiate it if you are truly not ready to give up. Most people would say you have to “hit bottom” first. If you are still having fun with drinking and drugging, then chances are not good that you can surrender to the disease. It is only after addiction has caused you a lot of misery that surrender becomes possible. It is only after the fun times are long gone that a person might consider the idea of recovery.

Beating addiction is a tough road and it takes a monumental effort. The alternative is to continue to self medicate and that is so much easier, even in the face of grave consequences.

Supercharge your recovery with a holistic approach Because addiction attacks a person’s mind, body, and spirit, the solution must also address each of these areas of your life. That is what makes a holistic approach so useful in recovery. So often in recovery I have seen people focus heavily in one area and neglect the others. This always leads to relapse.

A holistic approach addresses these problems. You physically abstain from chemicals and start treating your physical body much better. At the same time a successful recovery program will push you to grow spiritually. You’ll also mature emotionally as you repair relationships, and also socially as you develop a sober network of friends in recovery.

Don’t just eliminate….create a new life

Beating addiction requires you to replace an entire lifestyle. It’s not just the drugs and the alcohol that was ruining our lives; it was the lifestyle that went along with it all.

When we get clean and sober, there are a number of different holes in our life. One of the main holes is the time and activities associated with actually using the drugs and the alcohol. Maybe we went to certain bars, hung out with certain people and used drugs, or whatever the case may be. We all had our “watering holes.” And we spent a lot of time at them.

So really what we are faced with in order to beat addiction is to fill those holes. We can’t just sit around and expect to stay entertained…this is a recipe for relapse. Instead we need to create a new life in recovery. This is a whole topic in and of itself that can be expanded on a great deal.

Find a passionate replacement strategy

Another one of the “holes” in early recovery is the spiritual void that is left when we remove the drugs and the alcohol. Beating addiction requires you to fill that hole—be it through spiritual, religious, or natural means. But there is definitely a need for purposeful and passionate living to replace the fervor with which we pursed chemicals in our addiction.

There are a number of creative replacement strategies that can be used to grow spiritually, and there are a number of ways to start exploring the creative life in recovery. Beating addiction can be purposeful and exciting.