Ben is a father of two, a person in long term sustained recovery and a passionate advocate for intelligent evidence-based policy surrounding education, treatment and recovery from substance use disorders. His professional background includes all aspects of organizational peer-professional integration and programming including training, coaching, and supervision as well as community and professional education and outreach. On the other hand, gratitude can also arise more outwardly towards others who have helped in your recovery process. Making an effort to practice gratitude regularly can have an incredibly positive impact on your mental health.
- By identifying things to be grateful for, you’ll be able to find the strength and motivation to keep moving forward.
- In recovery, the brain begins to heal and as it heals, with practice, selfishness and other damaging attitudes begin to fade away.
- Area, Leah managed provider outreach for a Denver area safety net clinic aimed at providing pro bono services to immigrant and uninsured populations.
- Gratitude does not and should not make us blind to the problems or challenges we face but rather empowers us to cope more effectively.
What are the benefits of gratitude?
These can help you heal from the effects of addiction and prevent further complications. Abusing drugs or alcohol can take a toll on your physical health, causing problems such as liver damage, heart disease, infections, or chronic pain. Active addiction can create a lot of negative emotions, such as shame, guilt, or regret, that can linger even after you stop using drugs or alcohol. For individuals or their loved ones grappling with addiction, the struggle to escape the cycle of substance abuse and addiction can be incredibly challenging.
Gratitude helps even if you don’t share it
For the past 35 years, he has soldiered for social justice, compassionate human services and recovery. Crystal Costello is a person and long-term recovery, surrounded by love, and full of gratitude for the life that she now has. She is currently working as the Advisory Committee Chair for Friends of Recovery Westchester.
Family and Children’s Programs
Practicing gratitude also teaches us how to love and respect ourselves, which enables us to love and respect others as well. This suggests that the mental health benefits of writing gratitude letters are not entirely dependent on actually communicating that gratitude to another person. As Top 5 Advantages of Staying in a Sober Living House people start to practice being grateful in their recovery journey, the feeling blossoms, especially as they approach Step 12 and start to carry the message on to others who are struggling with addiction. However, the recovery community has known the power of gratitude for a long time.
- Stephen has worked for the past 17 years in Behavioral Health focusing on Substance Use Disorder and recovery support services.
- You can do this in the morning, at night, or anytime during the day that suits you.
- Figuring that out is a natural first step in the mindful gratitude journey.
- In 2017, Shannon was promoted to her current role of Chief Operating Officer where she provides leadership to the agency’s 32+ programs and services over 7 locations in a 7-county region.
- She participates in several local and statewide work groups that are addressing issues that impact people who use drugs, including buprenorphine and Hepatitis C prevention and treatment.
The flip side is being resentful and seeing what’s wrong in life, not what’s right. And no matter which way we choose to look, there will be plenty to be found of both. When someone is addicted to drugs or alcohol, getting and using them becomes a priority –and recovery should be a priority as well.
Focus on What you Have
Regardless of whether you’re facing serious psychological challenges, if you have never written a gratitude letter before, we encourage you to try it. Much of our time and energy is spent pursuing things we currently don’t have. Gratitude reverses our priorities to help us appreciate the people and things we do. We wanted to distinguish donations motivated by gratitude from https://missouridigest.com/top-5-advantages-of-staying-in-a-sober-living-house/ donations driven by other motivations, like feelings of guilt or obligation. So we asked the participants to rate how grateful they felt toward the benefactor, and how much they wanted to help each charitable cause, as well as how guilty they would feel if they didn’t help. We also gave them questionnaires to measure how grateful they are in their lives in general.
Practical Ways to Have More Gratitude in Recovery
- Here’s a breakdown of what practicing gratitude is and five concrete ways you can do it.
- Stephanie is also a grateful person in sustained recovery; mother; social justice advocate; policy wonk and adventurer.
- Volunteer your time, or join a support group to share your experiences with addiction and help others in similar circumstances find their way to recovery.
- Then you can learn the techniques that will allow you to use it to help you in your recovery.
- He became involved in mental health and addiction recovery advocacy when he was only 15 years old.
Not only does volunteering help us get out of our heads and inot the present moment. This helps us to see and appreciate the good things in our lives now. Most everyone has heard the question, “Is the glass half empty or half full? ” this simple question illustrates being grateful and not being grateful. When we walk through life and see everything that is wrong, everything that isn’t going our way, everything that we wish was different, we will continue to see more and more of the same. The body needs healthy foods to heal from addiction, so improving your diet can play a major part in recovery.