1.  If you are still struggling, go to rehab.

Many addicts and alcoholics do not really see rehab as an option during the holidays, like that time is somehow “off limits” for them getting help.  Actually, going to rehab during the holidays can be an awesome experience, if you become open to the idea.  There are several advantages to spending Christmas and New Year’s in rehab:

* You discover a vacation that you never knew existed by removing yourself from the normal holiday routine.

* You remove yourself from lots of temptation at holiday parties, especially over New Year’s Eve of course.

* You think that you are “missing” the holiday, but you end up celebrating it in a unique way with a brand new “family” in treatment….a pleasantly surprising experience for most people.

If you are still struggling just to get clean and sober, and the holiday is threatening to steamroll you with massive amounts of stress, then just check out for a while and go to rehab.  There are a million excuses of why you can’t do this, but ultimately it beats ending up in jail or the morgue.

Bottom line: don’t let the holidays keep you out of rehab.  It is a great time to check in.

2.  Reach out and help others.  Engage in service work.

If you are not helping others on a regular basis in your recovery then you can stand to gain a lot by starting to do so.  You can not imagine the benefits of doing so until you actually get your feet wet and start helping others directly.  You can do this in a number of different ways:

* Take 12 step meetings into jails, institutions, or rehabs.

* Sponsor newcomers in recovery.

* Volunteer to help out, such as at a soup kitchen or even in a nursing home.

You will benefit regardless of who you help or how you help them.  But the maximum benefit is achieved when you help others in recovery to stay clean and sober.  So if you are struggling yourself, then you should focus on that.

Bottom line: Helping others in recovery is a powerful shortcut to strengthening your own recovery.

3.  Make a resolution and start exercising…before New Year’s day.

Almost everyone can exercise, and should.  Many people don’t.  Those who don’t exercise on a regular basis are forgoing a huge opportunity to feel so much better in their recovery.  Here are some tips to get you going:

* Don’t feel you have to join a gym or get a personal trainer or anything fancy. Simply walking for 30 minutes every day can be absolutely life-changing.  But you have to do it, and you have to do it consistently.

* If you can walk for 30 minutes, try increasing your pace a bit next time. You don’t have to be a world class athlete, but the real benefit kicks in when you go from “casual stroll” to “vigorous exercise that boosts your heart rate.”  You want to get a vigorous workout in order to really get the benefits.  Doing so will make you feel great, sleep better, lose weight, increase your heart health, and so on.  The benefits of vigorous exercise are practically limitless.  Start doing it on a regular basis and it will change your life.

Bottom line: Physical exercise is the most underestimated tool of recovery.  Everyone avoids it out of laziness.  Embrace it instead and start feeling awesome.

4.  Simplify to reduce stress.  Eliminate time and money wasters.  You will need more of both during the holidays.

Photo by bensonkua

Our lives can be hectic enough….with the holiday, it can get even worse.  Reduce the stress level and find inner peace by cutting away that which is not truly important.  You can do this in a number of ways:

* Say “no” to what you think of as obligations, but are really just chores that suck up your time and cause stress. For example, skip any holiday parties that are meaningless for you.

* Cut unnecessary bills for services that you no longer use. Ditch subscriptions that take money each month and demand time that you don’t have to waste.  The idea is to save money while eliminating things that suck up your free time.

You don’t have to eliminate every single luxury in your life, but instead you should get rid of things that are stealing your time and driving up your stress level.

Bottom line: Less is more.  If you can free up your time (and money) over the holidays, the amount of stress you experience will naturally go down.  Simplify.

5.  Embrace gratitude.

It is hard to be miserable, depressed, or filled with self pity when you are practicing gratitude on a regular basis.  This is the perfect attitude adjustment for anyone who is struggling with dark thoughts around the holidays.  Not to mention the fact that we have a near endless supply of cues around the holidays to remind us to be grateful for what we have in life.

When I personally recount my own path through addiction, it really is a miracle that I am here at all.  I was trying to self destruct in so many ways, but for some reason my higher power had mercy on me and brought me to recovery.  How easy it is to forget that though…..especially when we get wrapped up in the madness of the holiday season.

Bottom line: There is almost no emotional state that gratitude cannot overcome.  Get in the habit of practicing gratitude on a daily basis, and it will be much easier to so when stressful situations arise.

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I also want to say thank you to all of my readers here at the Spiritual River.  Everyone have a safe and happy holiday!

God bless….

Recommended Reading

• Overcoming Addiction
• Addiction Recovery is about Discovering New Layers of Information
• 10 Ways to Embrace Creative Recovery and Take Your Sobriety to the Next Level
• Warning: Taking Massive Action in Drug Addiction Recovery Could Result in Creating an Awesome Life that You are Genuinely Grateful For
• Holistic Addiction Treatment Center

1.  Move your body.

Good old exercise.  First on the list because this is one of the most underestimated aspect of recovery, in my opinion.  I had no idea what a tremendous impact regular exercise could have on my recovery until I forced myself to start doing it a couple times each week.

Everyone pays lip service to the idea that regular exercise can have a big impact and make you feel better, but most do not really embrace an active lifestyle and turn it into a real force in their recovery.  Those who commit to turning exercise into a habit start to really notice the benefits of it, and then there is no turning back.  It becomes a part of our lifestyle, as natural as breathing.

Regular exercise is such a powerful factor in overcoming addiction that there are entire programs of recovery that are based on exercise alone.  Unbelievably, physical exercise is the entire treatment model, and there are people who follow this program and achieve long term sobriety.

If there are hundreds of people who have found sobriety through exercise alone, do you think it could potentially help you out in your recovery?  You bet it can.

Not only will regular exercise help you to directly overcome addiction, but it also helps you to be healthier from an holistic perspective.  Not only that, but it is a major factor in fighting depression, which can be fairly common among recovering addicts and alcoholics.  There is no excuse for not embracing this powerful recovery tool.

2.  Make a major, structural change in your life.

This was a huge key for me and the very thing that kick started a successful life in recovery.  The structural change that I made was to move into a long term treatment center.  I ended up living there for a long period of time and the added structure that it gave me had a huge effect on my recovery.  There are other changes you can make that would have a major impact on your life–for example, attending 90 meetings in 90 days.  These are the types of commitments that are necessary to create massive change in recovery.

Recovery is all about change.  What better way to incite these changes than to make a huge commitment to daily action?  This goes beyond good habit development and creates a huge change right in the structure of your life itself.  Instead of focusing on making lots of small surface level changes in your life, you can take a powerful shortcut by making one or two foundational changes in the structure of your life (i.e., committing to 90 meetings in 90 days and following through with it creates a foundation for recovery).

Focus on big, structural changes if you want impressive results.
3.  Develop a habit of helping others in recovery.

This works like magic.  It even works in spite of the addict, if they are willing to put in the footwork.  In other words, helping other recovering addicts will strengthen your recovery, even if you do not want it to.  Even if you don’t see the connection.  It works like magic.

Let me give you an example.  When I was in my second year of recovery, my sponsor at the time basically signed me up to chair an NA meeting in a drug rehab facility each week.  At the time I did not see this as being beneficial and I actually thought I would do better to focus on other things.  Little did I realize that my sponsor was pushing me into 12 step work in order to help my recovery too.  So I started learning how to help others in recovery, and I also started learning the true value of doing so.

Later on I got a job at a drug rehab center, and now I work with recovering addicts and alcoholics directly.  And of course I also connect with people here on Spiritual River.

All of these connections are helpful, but they could easily be exchanged out for different types of relationships with people in recovery.  The important thing is to find a way to help others in recovery.  Find a way to connect.  Find a way to network that works for you.

You have to find your own path in recovery.  And you have to find your strengths that allow you to make a real impact on people.  This might require some exploration and experimentation.  Maybe 12 step meetings are not your thing.  That is OK, as long as you put in the work to find meaningful connections in recovery.  If you are not reaching out and helping others, then you are not living up to your full potential in recovery.
4.  Appreciate every lesson that life gives you.

What is gratitude in recovery?

- It is the ability to take a “bad situation” and extract the lesson and meaning out of it.

- When you take a “problem” and see the opportunity for growth in it.

- The chance to learn new things, and appreciate the lesson for what it is.

- Gratitude is the mindset of success in recovery.

When you practice gratitude and can appreciate a simple situation, you are basically telling your higher power “I am grateful for this problem/opportunity and I want to learn from it.  Please help me to do so!”

People underestimate gratitude all the time.  They do not realize that simply practicing this type of mindset elevates their consciousness automatically.  For one thing, you are more aware of problems/challenges, and then to take it a step further, you are actively seeking out the knowledge, the practical application for yourself.

Have you ever heard someone complain a lot about how rotten their luck is, and how badly things have turned out for them?  This is the opposite of gratitude.  They are basically telling their higher power: “Thanks for nothing!  I appreciate none of this, and I am not taking positive action to fix anything.  I blame others.”

Can you see how much power the person gives away when they choose to complain about their situation?

On the other hand, if they choose gratitude, then they can say: “Thank you for the opportunity you sent me today.  I did not like the situation but I learned something about myself.  Even though I was uncomfortable with it, I worked through it and I gained some new insight.  I will know better next time this situation comes up and I will be better prepared to deal with it.  I am stronger now because of it.  Thank you for the lesson and the growth.”

It might sound a bit corny to celebrate your problems like this, but when you do so consistently and practice gratitude, you start to see how your problems become smaller and smaller.  They still happen, but when they do, they are no longer earth shattering like they used to be, and now you are learning from them.  Each new problem is a gift; an opportunity for growth.  Every time you get upset or experience discomfort, you have an opportunity to learn about yourself or practice acceptance.

And thus you start to appreciate all of life, both the good and the bad.

5.  Make caring for yourself a priority.

How do you build up healthy self esteem in recovery?

One way is to fake it.  Take care of yourself.  Treat yourself well.  Treat your body better.  Start eating healthier.  Do a bit of exercise.  Get clean and sober and stick with it.

After a few weeks or even just a few days you start to feel better.  This is physical, of course, and the trend can continue on and on.  Exercise, fitness, nutrition….the sky is the limit.  Take care of your body, even if you don’t really feel compelled to do so.

Ever notice how the ex-smokers in recovery always tend to have at least a few years sober?  My theory is that this trend is a function of self esteem.  When we first get clean and sober, we don’t love ourselves enough or feel compelled to care for ourselves enough to give up the cigarettes right away.  It all comes in due time though, as you see many people in long term recovery eventually turn to fixing their overall health.

Of course it goes beyond the physical as well.  We have to take care of ourselves emotionally, spiritually, socially, and so on.  Some of this comes back to balance.  We want to take care of ourselves in every way that we can.  This is important for at least 2 simple reasons:

1) Taking care of yourself makes sense from a recovery standpoint. We did not get clean and sober to just roll over and die.  We want to be healthy, live a healthy life, and help others to recover.

2) Taking care of ourselves promotes healthy self esteem. They are tied together.  If you boost your self esteem, you protect yourself from relapse.  The more you value your life (and take good care of it), the more you will protect it from the threat of relapse.

It took me quite a while to really embrace this idea in recovery.  Eventually, I quit smoking, started exercising regularly, and started to seriously consider some dietary changes….but this took several years of sobriety before I was able to make these changes.  And again, I think it was a function of self esteem.  I was holding back from making these positive changes because I did not value my life enough to do so yet.

6.  Declutter, simplify, and eliminate.

Even though creative recovery is essentially about building with positive action, there is still a time and a place to remove the clutter and the excess from our lives in order to make way for the new.

You can start with your stuff.  Get rid of junk you don’t use or need.  You don’t have to give away all of your worldly possessions, but you can get this mental ball rolling by getting rid of clutter that you don’t need.  Even physical belongings can occupy mental space in your head.  It is not about the stuff….it is about the mindset of simplicity, reduction, efficiency.

Then go beyond this.  Get rid of toxic relationships in your life that are no longer working for you.  Seek to cut extraneous things in your life that no longer serve you.  Develop the mindset of ruthlessly cutting that which does not empower your life.

This will lead to a rethinking of bad habits in recovery.  Many recovering addicts and alcoholics finally quit smoking cigarettes after a few years in recovery.  This is just a natural progression as they seek to simplify their life and continue to take positive actions.

This is not a sales pitch for minimalism.  Rather, just dipping your toes into this mindset and taking a few actions will give you a refreshing perspective.  You will feel lighter, more simple, and grateful.  When you eliminate the negative, you make way for positive action.

Removing clutter from your life always feels positive….just like when you are finally finished cleaning the house and everything is tidy.  This is the mindset that can fully embrace creative action.  You have cleared a path for success at this point.

7.  Learn, grow, and evolve in recovery.  Change your recovery strategy to match this growth.

Change your recovery strategy.  To some, this sounds like blasphemy.  Why would we change what is working?  Doesn’t this idea lead us closer to relapse?  If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, and so on.

What I have observed in recovery is the exact opposite, though.  Those who stay stuck in early recovery tactics do not do well in the long run.  To put it simply:

What got you sober will not keep you sober.

Let me give you an example.  There is a drug and alcohol treatment center where they have regular AA and NA meetings, right on-site.  They also have a wing that has been converted into a long term rehab for men.

Now, several of the men who live at that long term will stay stuck in the meetings right there at the treatment center, and never venture out to see other “real world meetings” on the outside.  Invariably, those who do not venture out and find the “real recovery” end up relapsing.  Those who push themselves to go the extra mile and attend various meetings always seem to do much better.

And so it is with recovery: what got you through your first 2 weeks of sobriety will not get you through your fifth year of sobriety.  Why not?  Because we grow and change in recovery.  We evolve.  Our needs change as we stay sober and learn new coping mechanisms and new ways of dealing with things.  For example, instead of needing to vent and let of steam due to frustrations, we might have a growing need to help others in recovery.  Or instead of relating to other addicts and alcoholics so that we can better identify, we might transition to a point where that becomes unimportant, but instead we have a need to push ourselves toward holistic growth.

Addicts who resist this idea become complacent and could eventually end up relapsing.  Those who embrace the idea that recovery strategies can evolve are better able to handle the journey into long term sobriety.

Don’t stay stuck.  It could kill you.

8.  Overcome resentment, self-pity, and victim mentality.

These are all “early recovery” kind of problems.  And to be honest, I think they are really more along the lines of “active addiction” or “headed for a quick relapse” kind of issues.  You just cannot allow these 3 things to keep controlling you in recovery and expect to stay clean.  Let’s take a closer look:

- Resentment – of course traditional recovery wisdom warns against the dangers of resentment, and for good reason.  If you are harboring anger against others and can’t find a healthy outlet for it, or a way to work through it, then it is going to keep dominating your life.  If you still get stressed out over small, seemingly insignificant events, or if you have people in your life who can still push your buttons to the point where you think about drinking, then that is a huge red flag right there.  No one should have so much anger and resentment that they cannot enjoy peace for the majority of their day.  Carrying around a chip on your shoulder is a recipe for relapse.

Dealing with resentment is a process, of course.  You can start with traditional techniques, such as those that involve step work.  Simply identifying the problem is a huge step.  Using spiritual devices like prayer, meditation, or simply talking with others can help you to work through the anger.  Whatever you do, you cannot just let it fester without dealing with it and expect to stay sober.

Self pity – I personally have a tendency toward self pity and so I had to learn how to completely shut it down in order to avoid relapse.  What I did was to create a zero tolerance policy for myself, much in the same way that I addressed the glamorizing of drugs and alcohol in early recovery.  I simply did not allow myself to “go there.”  As soon as you notice the thoughts of self pity, shut them down.  Do not allow it.  This worked very well when combined with a huge effort and focus on cultivating gratitude.  Self pity cannot exist in the presence of gratitude.  A mindset of gratitude completely destroys all traces of self pity.  And of course, this takes focused effort and real work in order to practice gratitude regularly.

Victim mentality – Another popular form of self-sabotage.  People who are stuck in a victim mentality mindset are doomed to relapse unless they can pull themselves up out of it.  And that is the whole key right there–nothing more is required in order to put yourself back on the proper path of recovery, other than a profound shift in attitude.  If you keep blaming everyone else for your problems, then you will have all the excuses that you need in order to relapse.  If you continuously blame others, then you will never shift the focus on to improving yourself and challenging yourself to grow from a holistic standpoint.  Real recovery can not occur when you are stuck in this unhealthy frame of mind.  The whole key is to regain positive thinking and take personal responsibility for your own personal journey today.

9.  Stay growth oriented and keep pursuing holistic health to defend against complacency.

This is the long term goal of recovery: continuous holistic growth.

What does that mean?  It means that you need to keep pushing yourself to grow in new ways.  Everything builds up to this process of living:

- Learning new things.

- Appreciating everything, both the good and the bad, and taking a lesson from everything.

- Pushing yourself to improve.  Facing discomfort in your life as a growth opportunity.

- Working with others as you learn more about yourself.  Empowering your own life in a quest to better server and help others.  Becoming effective and then returning that gift to the world.

How can you fall victim to relapse when you are engaged in such positive action on a regular basis?  You can’t.

There is a balance that every recovering addict needs to find: that between acceptance of self and the push for self improvement.  If you get too comfortable, then push yourself a bit.  If you get overwhelmed and down on yourself, then give yourself a break and find some self acceptance.  But whatever you do, don’t get caught in the land of complacency, where you think there is no more growth to be had and nothing left to be learned.  Find the discomfort in your life and face it head on.  Face your fears and conquer them.  Use your talents to help others in a unique way.  Push yourself a bit.

Don’t coast.

10.  Find vision and purpose in your life and pursue it with passion.

What exactly is “finding vision and purpose?”  Are those just feel-good words?  Inspirational recovery words that are basically meaningless?

No they are not.  Vision and purpose can lead you to real action.  Let’s take a look:

Vision - what do you want to see happen in your life?  Now that you are clean and sober, what are you going to do?  What do you want to become of your life?

Furthermore, how can you serve the world?  When you become the best person you can be in recovery, how does that best serve others?  Answering these questions can lead you closer to your vision.  It is not so much that you have to find a “cause,” but only that you have to find what really gets you passionate about helping others.  What moves you emotionally?  Follow your heart to find your vision for the world.

Also: don’t force it.  Let yourself grow in recovery and don’t feel like you have to go climb a mountain today.

Purpose – Everyone has a tiny little overlap between the following two areas: what they are good at, and what the world most needs from them.  Finding where these two areas intersect is all about finding your purpose in life.  For many people in recovery, this will have something to do with making connections with others in recovery.  Maybe you will sponsor newcomers in a 12 step program.  Maybe you will take meetings into rehabs and institutions.  Or maybe you will find a way to connect outside of traditional recovery programs.  It doesn’t really matter.  What is important is finding this tiny area of overlap where you can really use your talents to help others, serve the world, and make a difference.

Creative recovery is all about unleashing your inner potential.  It is about finding a path of continuous growth and having the courage to keep pushing yourself.  Don’t allow yourself the “luxury” of self-acceptance.  Push yourself to create the life you really want.

Special note: If you found this article helpful, please share it with others.  Thanks!

Recommended Reading

• Overcoming Addiction
• 5 Ways to Supercharge Your Recovery, Avoid Relapse, and Dominate Your Addiction Over the Holiday Season
• Warning: Taking Massive Action in Drug Addiction Recovery Could Result in Creating an Awesome Life that You are Genuinely Grateful For
• 10 Reasons that Addicts and Alcoholics Fail in Early Recovery
• Holistic Addiction Treatment Center

Photo by Geraint Warlow

Sections:

* Massive action flows out of total surrender

* Prescription for relapse: failure to take massive action

* Massive action leads to consistency in early recovery

* Holistic health and massive action

* Long term recovery: how massive action lays a foundation for continuous growth

* Fighting complacency in long term recovery through massive action

Massive action flows out of total surrender

What is massive action? Nothing fancy…it is just what it sounds like. But so few people actually have the gumption to take the necessary amount of action in order to really change their life.

Addiction is a lifestyle. If it is not a lifestyle, then you are not addicted….maybe you are just abusing drugs or something. But if you are truly addicted, then drugs (or alcohol) infects every part of your life. It dominates your whole person on many different levels.

Addiction affects you physically. It affects your relationships. It affects your job, your work performance, your spirituality, and so on. It affects who you choose to hang around with and who you spend your time with. It pushes you away from certain people and traps you in destructive patterns of your own making.

Because of this all-encompassing nature of addiction, and the way that it infiltrates and infects your entire life, the only way to overcome such a condition is through taking massive action.

Now there are other pieces to the puzzle, I realize this. We need to know how to live and what actions we need to take in order to recover. But quite honestly, that information is freely available through many different outlets, and anyone who is truly ready for change can ask for help and gain access to this knowledge.

The main roadblock for 99 percent of addicts and alcoholics is a lack of action. The key to taking this action comes through total surrender.

What is total surrender? Surrender occurs when an addict or alcoholic:

- Gives up the struggle to control their drug or alcohol use.

- Stops manipulating situations and other people in order to support their addiction.

- Abandons the idea that they can find happiness through drug and alcohol use.

- Agrees to try a new way to live as suggested by someone else or a specific program of recovery.

- Has reached a point where they cannot picture their life continuing, either with or without their drug of choice.

These things describe a state of complete surrender, and if the addict has not yet reached this critical point, it is unlikely that any real recovery can begin. The reason for this is because they will not be moved to take massive action and make the drastic changes that are necessary unless they have reached this point of desperation.

Prescription for relapse: failure to take massive action

We can see the recipe for failure easily enough: just watch any number of newcomers in recovery, and watch as the majority of them end up relapsing over the next few weeks and months. Ask them what went wrong. Ask those who relapse what led to their demise. Invariably they will all tell you:

- They stopped following through on their initial recovery plan (stopped going to meetings, stopped going to treatment, etc.).

- They did not devote massive amounts of time to recovery on a daily basis, failing to make recovery the number one priority in their life.

- They did not put in the necessary footwork to start building a new life (for example, in a 12 step program, they failed to work through the steps with a sponsor, etc.).

- They did not establish new routines and build new healthy relationships, falling back instead on their old routines that led into trouble.

In all cases it is a lack of action that led to relapse. Why is this the case?

Because the addict is drawn to use drugs naturally at this point. That is what they are comfortable doing. It is actually awkward for the addict or alcoholic to NOT use drugs. It is so easy to revert back to our old ways. Relapse is the most natural thing in the world. It is effortless. If we do nothing to change our environment, change our thinking, change our natural response to things, then we will naturally reach for our drug of choice when put to the test. For an addict, using drugs is normal. It is easy. Of course it takes massive change to avoid it.

We have to change everything. Our thoughts, our reactions, our environment, where we spend our time, who we hang around with. It all has to change in recovery if we are to remain clean.

These changes all require action!

All of this change demands that we get active. If we do nothing, then no changes will occur and we will naturally pick our drug right back up. Doing this is easy and natural for a recovering addict. It happens effortlessly.

Putting in the effort to avoid relapse is what early recovery is all about. If you don’t take action, you revert back to your old coping mechanism. And that leads to relapse.

Massive action leads to consistency in early recovery

One of the big pieces of the puzzle for those in early recovery is consistency. Maybe a newcomer goes to a few meetings, or talks with a sponsor, or goes to treatment for a while, but then they slack off a bit and before they know what happened they are using again. How can they gain the consistency that they need to stay clean and sober?

The answer is massive action. This is the only way to build the foundation in recovery that is going to be strong enough to see a newcomer through the first few critical months of sobriety.

For example, consider long term rehab. Living in a treatment center is a unique form of massive action that allows the recovering addict to draw from many resources. Generally they will go to meetings on a regular basis, have group therapy, see a counselor, and so on. All of this happens while under the accountability of a treatment center providing a safe and stable environment. Most people balk at the idea of living in rehab for several months, and this is no surprise. Massive action takes a lot of work.

Another example might be someone who dedicates themselves to a 12 step program and fully immerses themselves in it. Instead of just doing daily meetings, they might go far beyond this by getting involved with other members of the fellowship, working with newcomers directly, and so on. Instead of just showing up to meetings and giving lip service, they are living the program on a daily basis through meaningful connections with others in recovery. Their 12 step work extends outside of meetings and this is where they take massive action and derive real meaning in their recovery.

12 step programs are one path in recovery. There are other paths. The important factor is massive action, not the specific program you choose to recover with. Because 12 step programs are so widely available, they make a really good starting point for the newcomer, and give plenty of direction when it comes time to take massive action.

Thus, my suggestion for early recovery is not to quibble over which path you are on. Find the positive actions that are working for others in recovery, and then start using them in your own life in a really big way. Don’t just work a program of recovery. Embrace it, own it, live it, and let it become a daily part of your life. This is the best way to create the foundation that is necessary for long term recovery. Without massive action, and without this consistency in early recovery, people are bound to end up relapsing before they even get a handle on recovery.

Holistic health and massive action

So we have seen how massive action can help someone in early recovery. But what about long term sobriety? What role does taking massive action play in securing our continued success in recovery?

In my experience, there is a strong connection between holistic growth and long term recovery. I am also convinced that a deliberate effort at achieving holistic growth will lead to better results in long term recovery. For example, consider the recovering addict or alcoholic who:

- Quits smoking cigarettes.

- Starts exercising on a regular basis.

- Eats healthier food.

- Seeks emotional balance.

- Discards unhealthy relationships.

- Seeks spiritual growth.

- Continues learning and seeking knowledge.

And so on. All positive actions, all part of holistic growth. Are they all directly related to staying clean and sober? Not necessarily. But, they all help. That is the point behind holistic growth. They can all play an indirect part in helping a person to achieve a better life.

Remember that addiction affected us in many different ways, on many different levels. An holistic approach to growth in recovery is one way to try and restore ourselves to full health.

Now, take a look at that list again and think about whether or not those things happen on their own, or if they require great effort and massive action.

Yep….you guessed it. Holistic growth requires massive action.

If you want to improve in all areas of your life, then guess what? That requires real effort and decisive action.

Long term recovery: how massive action lays a foundation for continuous growth

Recovery is a learning process. Many people have described it like the peeling of an onion, where we continue to peel back layers about ourselves and are continuously rediscovering who we really are. So how does massive action lead to the peeling of this onion? How do we get to the point of continuous growth and development in recovery, while continuing to learn about ourselves?

This process starts out slowly in recovery. Many people will find their way through this process by using the 12 steps. Others can make this journey of self discovery in other ways. There is no one process or tool that will get you there. But all addicts will share similar experiences on this road to addiction recovery.

For example, a recovering addict might have several sources of discomfort in their life. These could be resentments, fears, relationship problems, or any number of possible roadblocks. Regardless of what process they choose to use, the addict will eventually have to face these discomforts in order to find real freedom. This is the peeling of the onion. We find the problem areas in our lives (through sensing discomfort) and then work through the issue to gain real freedom. We face our fears and grow in the process of doing so.

It all starts with identifying the problems in our lives and becoming willing to take action on them. We might still be peeling the onion at 5, 10, or even 20 years sober. And guess what? It demands massive action every time we plunge deeper into the rabbit hole. It takes real guts to keep looking at ourselves, finding our flaws, and making corrections. It takes real action.

Fighting complacency in long term recovery through massive action

What happens sometimes in long term recovery is that a person will get lazy. They might stop growing, stop learning, stop peeling the onion. When that happens, the risk of relapse increases greatly.

So how do we fight complacency? Through continuous action, of course. Staying involved with helping others in recovery is a huge piece of the puzzle. But we also do well to keep pushing ourselves towards holistic growth.

If we have made it through early recovery then we know what processes work for us. Of course, we have to have the courage to keep looking at our sources of discomfort and striving to improve ourselves in a holistic manner. This is the willingness part of the equation. We have to remain willing.

And after that? It’s all about action.

Recommended Reading

• Overcoming Addiction
• Addiction Recovery is about Discovering New Layers of Information
• 51 Things You Should Know About Addiction Recovery
• Surplus in Addiction Recovery
• Holistic Addiction Treatment Center