Life can be overwhelming and chaotic, especially if you struggle with addiction. From balancing all your personal and professional responsibilities to nurturing your relationships, battling addiction cravings can make it extremely difficult to authentically gauge your thoughts and feelings without judgment.
At Atlanta Recovery Place, we provide the support and resources essential to start your road to recovery. With our team of counselors and support staff, we’re here to help you every step of the way to live a healthy, happy life free from addiction. Mindfulness is one way to help with addiction recovery. That’s why in this article, you’ll learn what mindfulness is and how mindfulness can help in addiction recovery.
If you or someone you know is struggling with addiction, contact us today to learn more about how we can help you live a long-lasting life of sobriety.
Atlanta Recovery Place is a Georgia addiction recovery center here to help you today.
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness involves being presently aware and accepting of your thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surroundings. Mindfulness is non-judgemental, meaning you don’t see your thoughts and feelings as good or bad, but rather you allow yourself to be aware of those moments to find clarity, reflect, and learn from those thoughts and feelings.
The key to mindfulness is accepting the present moment– thoughts, feelings, and all. Anyone can practice mindfulness and reap the life-changing benefits.
There are many benefits of mindfulness. This includes:
- Reduces stress and anxiety
- Reduces rumination
- Improves memory
- Improves focus
- Reduces emotional reactivity
Therefore, mindfulness can significantly improve your mental and physical well-being to live a happier, healthier life, which can also help improve your relationships.
Why is Mindfulness Important in Addiction Recovery?
Mindfulness in recovery is important because mindfulness helps actively pay attention to and respond to your thoughts and feelings at any present moment, not react to them.
Here is a breakdown of why mindfulness and addiction recovery can help you live a sober life.
Accept the Present Moment
First, mindfulness forces you to be aware of the present moment, whether you like it or not. Often, people tend to resort to alcohol or drugs as a means to cope with painful emotions, thoughts, or past trauma that may seem too difficult to bear on their own. Unfortunately, turning to drugs and alcohol as a way to cope with these painful thoughts and feelings can easily turn to addiction and an inability to accept those painful emotions. Therefore, mindfulness allows you to practice accepting and responding to those painful emotions rather than avoiding them and turning to suppress those uncomfortable feelings with drugs and alcohol.
Helps You Relax
Next, mindfulness helps you to relax and learn how to handle your stress in a healthy manner rather than resorting to substance abuse. This can be extremely helpful in addiction recovery as you’ll surely undergo stressful times throughout life. And yet, to maintain sober and not relapse, knowing how to handle stress effectively and relax is critical, so you don’t resort to old coping mechanisms.
Helps You Intentionally Respond Rather Than React
It’s important to learn how to respond to situations that may invoke feelings of stress and discomfort in your life. Rather than immediately reacting to that event and potentially relapsing, mindfulness for addiction teaches you how to put things into perspective and feel less threatened when negative feelings, thoughts, or situations occur.
Promotes Compassion
Unfortunately, addiction can not only hurt you, but it can damage relationships with friends and loved ones. Building up a feeling of compassion can help you connect with others and reestablish a positive, healthy relationship and support system with those you may have hurt in the past. Having a strong support system you can lean on in life is essential to maintaining long-term sobriety.
How Can Mindfulness be Utilized in Recovery?
Mindfulness meditation is a popular form of mindfulness in recovery. Mindfulness meditation involves finding a quiet space, free from any distracting background noise, where you can focus and be present in the moment. During this time, you can allow your thoughts and feelings to wander, without judgment, which can help you reflect on your past experiences and how to work towards long-term sobriety. You can also focus on your breathing as a way to be more aware of the present moment and your thoughts and emotions.
Atalanta Recovery Place Provides Mindfulness-Based Therapy for Substance Abuse
Mindfulness in recovery can be an effective way to be more presently aware of your current thoughts and emotions to break free of addiction.
At Atlanta Recovery Place, we provide comprehensive care for you to achieve long-term sobriety. While addiction can make you feel ashamed and isolated, mindfulness for addiction is an effective treatment option to help you on your recovery journey. From alcohol addiction treatment to drug addiction treatment and more, we’re here to provide you with the support and resources essential for recovery. If you or a loved one is struggling with addiction, contact us today so we can help you break free from addiction.
