Recovery is a promise that you’ll be able to handle life on life’s terms. Unfortunately, life’s terms aren’t always pleasant! Maintaining serenity and sobriety in between is key. Here are 3 ways to get out of a funk in recovery and set your perspective back into a healthy place.
List Everything That’s Wrong
You might think this seems counter-intuitive. It is indeed a practice in reverse psychology. You’ll find that by listing everything that seems wrong, the end of the world, catastrophic, etc, you’ll gain some perspective. To take the exercise one step further, put a number from 1-10 to measure how severe and life-impacting that particular experience is. There may well be many things in your life which are truly tumultuous. Being sober and in recovery might even be on there. Honesty is a primary principle in recovery. You’ll find that you cannot honestly tell yourself being sober is the worst thing in your life and likely that many other problems you are having aren’t as bad either.
Take a Break
But I can’t take a break! You are likely to exclaim. When we feel like everything is swirling around us in an unbreakable frenzy we feel like we cannot take any time to ourselves. It is common in recovery for those who are newly sober to take on too much. Eager to be accountable, have responsibilities, and fill empty time, we create more than we are able to handle yet and we struggle to maintain it all. Taking a break doesn’t necessarily mean taking a vacation, dropping all responsibilities and letting go completely. Sometimes it is necessary to take a day off to relax and get things in order. Other days the only thing you can do to take a break is to simply take a deep breaths- a few, if you have the time.
Check Your Expectations
Expectations are a shortcut to disappointment. Once we start becoming comfortable with the idea of being sober, we don’t have to set high expectations about staying sober anymore because it has become normal. We set our sights on other parts of our lives that we think are more important than they are. Staying sober one day at a time is a great responsibility, even after months or years of recovery. Checking in with our expectations can help us discover where we are setting the bar too high for ourselves and as a result disappointing ourselves, fueling critical self-talk.
The philosophy of Cypress follows our unique vision of holistic and therapeutic addiction recovery. To learn more about our treatments and our staff, explore our website or give us a call at 866-217-2636.
