Paddling through the struggles of drug and alcohol addiction is an undeniable feat. No matter how long the addiction or recovery, every addict’s journey is circumstantial and worthy of admiration. While it is crucial to prioritize recovery and maintaining sobriety, you should also leave room for celebration and praise.
Whether you have retained sobriety for a week, a month, a few months, or a year, progress is always worth celebrating. By celebrating progress, it creates positive reinforcement with sustaining sobriety as opposed to addiction.
Most importantly, recovery should be celebrated in a way you enjoy. Do you want to host a big public event or a private dinner celebration? Do you want to plan a vacation, or just get comfortable at home with a good book? There are a number of ideas you can try based on your own tastes and habits.
Treat Yourself
Perhaps you hear this phrase often after accomplishing something or having a bad day, and it is easy to dismiss. Yet many fail to understand the importance of rewarding and being kind to oneself in difficult times and achievements. Depriving oneself of rewards and positive reinforcement can make life more stressful than necessary.
Treating oneself does not need to be an extravagant reward or gift like a vacation to the Bahamas. It can be as simple as a snack, new movie or book, a manicure, massage, or going to a show. When you celebrate your accomplishments, you highlight to yourself just how critical that achievement is.
Indulging yourself in this way is not only a highlight but a prompt to keep going—to preserve sobriety. It serves as a reminder that you are alive, healthy, and will continue to taking care of yourself.
Start a Tradition
An addiction can make your life haphazard, with no sense of rhythm and constant interruptions. It can disrupt time with family, friends, and cause work quality and ethic to suffer at the office. However, traditions can mitigate this problem in a way that keeps relapse at bay.
If you start a tradition during or after recovery, doing so can be valuable in maintaining sobriety. It has been scientifically proven that traditions can have numerous positive effects on a person’s life. Traditions provide consistency, give something to look forward to, create memories, and strengthen bonds between family and friends involved.
Addiction can redirect you away from more important matters, and make you miss many opportunities. But new traditions can be as simple as starting a collection, vacation trips, family reunions, or activities with friends. By continuing traditions, you can accomplish and enjoy more than you would have in an addiction.
Help Others
In rehabilitation and recovery, it is imperative to prioritize and take care of yourself first and foremost. Once out of recovery, however, some feel done bringing so much attention to themselves. Instead of this focus, you may benefit better from dedicating your time and efforts to help others.
Some previous addicts choose to help other addicts out of recovery. Others may start participating in events such as charities and work with non-profit organizations. This helps shift perspective away from yourself and focus on improving the world as a whole. And for many, there is relief and joy to be found more in helping others besides themselves.
Nonetheless, taking care of yourself always has primary priority, which is what recovery is all about. When you celebrate your recovery, you highlight just how essential it was to reach this point. By applying such celebrations after recovery, you may realize just how vital it was for you to reach this point.
If you or a loved one is struggling with drug or alcohol addiction, contact a local Treatment & Rehab alternative in Tennessee. You might be interested in Discovery Place’s own treatment center alternatives, such as our 30 Day Residential Addiction Alternative Recovery Program or our Long Term Alternative Recovery Program in Burns, Tennessee. Call us for a free consultation at 1-800-725-0922.
