Practicing Self Love in Recovery

Writer’s Disclaimer: It’s hard. Very hard. I sit here by no means an expert on how to unconditionally love oneself on a daily basis. However, over my last several years in recovery, many well-respected members of the community have honestly and openly shared their struggles in practicing self-love, and then imparted their knowledge for the best remedies for negative-self image.

Practicing Self Love When Your in Recovery

For those who have trudged the unrelenting gauntlet that is active addiction, it is not a far stretch to assume you have walked out the other side with a lack of self esteem and self love. Throughout our drinking and using history, we do things we are not proud of; we hurt people that we care about; and we fall short on aspirations that we so deeply desire to achieve. We become so conditioned to hating ourselves and what we have done, the concept of any other way of thinking seems nearly impossible. In particular, when we finally do put down the drink or drug, we are left with only ourselves. No artificial remedy to quell our mind and our thoughts. It’s only us. We are left there to feel everything, the good and the bad… especially the bad.

For that reason, the common misconception is that when we stop drinking, we will automatically begin to love and forgive ourselves. That years of pain and torture will casually subside. As many of us who have relapsed before, we know that not to be true. Unfortunately, many of our suppressed self-hatred comes to the forefront of our mind… and we drink again.

Self Love is a Skill

Like riding a bike, computer programming, or lifting weights… self love is a skill. It is a practice that requires conscious participation and an unrelenting willingness to change. And most importantly, it requires time. Self love is not granted overnight, at least in many of our experiences. Think of all the years you spent hating yourself… do you really expect to automatically start loving yourself?

On top of your spiritual program of action, here are a few practical suggestions to practice self love in recovery.

1. BE THE PERSON YOU WANT TO BE, NOT THE PERSON YOU WERE

So you might ask yourself… if it were that easy, wouldn’t everyone do that? And the answer is yes. You are absolutely right. It’s not easy. How do I be the person I want to be if I’ve always been the person I am? If you’ve followed us for awhile, you know how much we believe that recovery is a team sport. It’s not a one-man show. If you don’t know who you want to be, find someone who is living a life that you could want one day. And talk to them. Ask them what they do on a daily basis. Ask them how they practice self love. Ask them what they do on a daily basis and how they live. You can slowly incorporate little nuances to your life that will mold you into the person you want to be. And the good news is you don’t have to do it alone. However, if you don’t change anything, and continue to live the way you did when you hated yourself… well, you know what you’re going to get.

2. IF YOU WANT SELF ESTEEM, DO ‘ESTEEM-ABLE’ THINGS

We are going to cover this in more detail next week! Stay tuned :)