The road to recovery presents a number of obstacles and challenges. Maintaining the sobriety is one of these challenges. These simple tips will help guide you on the path to personal growth and freedom from addiction.
It takes both strength and courage for someone to face their issues with substance abuse and one of the bravest things someone can do is admit they have a problem and to begin a course of correction. The path to recovery can be a tough an enduring process that can challenge our strength and determination. What comes as a result of the process makes the destination well worth the journey.
Simple Yet Effective Tips to Help Stay Sober
Here are some tips to maintain sobriety and creating a daily routine.
Create a Daily Routine
Creating daily routines and practices helps to reshape our actions through repetition and allows us to develop better habits. Morning routines are a great way to kick off the day and help to build momentum and help establish a positive mindset that will carry over into your activities for the rest of the day. By taking a weekly self-inventory we can adjust our routines to address the areas that we need the most improvement and then work to incorporate daily practices that will help shape new behaviors and actions. In the beginning, there will often be resistance to change but stay strong and what seems hard now will soon be a breeze.
Journal Daily
Journaling allows us to keep track of our thoughts and offers a way for us to track progress. Journaling can be a cathartic process that allows us to release what’s on our mind onto paper. It offers a way to remain mindful of where we have been focusing our attention and makes us aware of what has been running in the background of our mind. One quick way to improve our happiness and mood is to incorporate a daily gratitude practice.
By making a daily list of at least 3 things we are grateful for, we can shift our perspective from the bad to the good in our lives. By reframing things in a positive light we learn to react and see things differently. This shift in perspective in an incredibly powerful tool that can make a huge impact in all areas of our lives.
Journaling allows us to set goals and to track progress. By setting both short-term daily goals and long-term bigger picture goals, we can use our journaling practice to break down our big seemingly impossible goals into smaller, more manageable daily practices, that help guide us on our journey to where we want to go.
Get moving
Incorporating more movement into your day provides a huge benefit to your overall wellbeing. Hard strenuous exercise isn’t a requirement to reap the many benefits of incorporating more movement into your lifestyle. Throw on your shoes and go for a walk, hop on your bike, head to the gym, try a new sport, or take a hike in nature. There are a number of ways to incorporate more movement into your day, find something fun you enjoy doing and try and get outdoors for the added benefit of some sunlight exposure.
Physical activity is great for calming the mind, improving your levels of happiness, promoting the release of endorphins that make us feel good, and helping to take our mind off our problems with substance abuse.
Eat nutritious food
This may seem obvious but the benefits of a simple shift in the way we eat can have huge broad-reaching benefits. Our body needs the right amount of nutrients to aid in recovery and to maintain a balanced mood state. When you eat good, nutritious food, you naturally feel good. This positive mood state will help you make healthier choices, which leads to us feeling better about ourselves. You can also make cooking homemade nutritious meals a hobby to enjoy.
Not sure where to start? An easy change that can provide a huge impact on your overall wellbeing is focusing on eating more whole foods and working to slowly eliminate processed and packaged foods and refined sugars from your diet. Shoot for organic when possible but choose conventional whole foods over organic processed foods.
Unlock creativity
Stepping into creative space is a great way to recharge, recuperate, and connect with what really matters. Write poetry or journal your thoughts, get some paint, grab a musical instrument. Having a creative outlet is a great way to channel energy in a positive way. Creative expression can be a therapeutic tool that allows us to calm our minds and get into a state of flow. You don’t need to be a talented artist or musician to enjoy the benefits of exploring our own creativity.
Make a date with yourself
Everyone needs some me-time every once in a while. It gives you a chance to reconnect with yourself, with what you want in life, with who you are, and what you truly represent. Make time to value yourself and practice self-love and compassion. Give yourself permission to focus on just you for a change without feeling like you’re being selfish. Schedule time during your week to do something you really enjoy.
Help someone in need
There are countless ways to help out, and when you help others, you make yourself and others around you feel good in the process. You can volunteer regularly or simply make an effort to incorporate small meaningful actions into your daily practice. You can help other people in recovery, or find other places in your community, such as soup kitchens, homeless shelters or youth programs where you can support others. If you don’t have time to volunteer, small meaningful gestures such as lending a helping hand, holding a door open, or offering a genuine compliment to someone help to provide a feeling a positivity in our lives.
Get help and realize that you don’t have to do it alone
Substance abuse is a complex and challenging issue that many people today are struggling with. It’s important to realize that those struggling with addiction are not in it alone and that the resources and support that are needed to recover are there for them.
Self Care in Addiction Recovery
At NuView Treatment Center, we offer an incredibly unique and comprehensive out-patient treatment program that utilizes a wide range of integrative modalities to offer a highly personalized approach to recovery.
