The Importance of Gratitude

The practice of gratitude, meditation, and deep breathing does wonders for calming your physical and emotional being. When you feel overwhelmed, anxious, or depressed, try a guided gratitude meditation to help gratitude in recovery ground you. Engaging in a spiritual or mindfulness practice like meditation, yoga, or prayer can better connect with your body’s capabilities and create space in our lives to reflect on thoughts of gratitude.

Practicing gratitude is all about being grateful and thankful for what you have. When you focus on all the things you don’t have, it creates an attitude of ungratefulness and fosters negative emotions like jealousy and anger. Negativity can be detrimental to your recovery and make a life in sobriety seem dark, empty, and lonely. Gratitude isn’t just a nice thing to practice — it’s essential for long-term recovery.

Take on Challenges with a Positive Mindset

They tested whether the simple incorporation of gratitude journaling for 3-weeks would positively affect these areas of participants’ lives. Gratitude, referred to as one of the “foundational virtues in the creation of happiness” [3], works at combatting the negative emotions that may be present in recovery. The conscious act of noticing and appreciating the positives in life and outwardly exuding positive energy and thankfulness contributes https://ecosoberhouse.com/ significantly to one’s happiness and satisfaction with life circumstances. Individuals who are more appreciative of their life, the people in it, and their own strength often feel more in control of their lives and emotions. These feelings are essential during a time when things may feel beyond one’s control. It may also help individuals view recovery as a challenge that will help them grow instead of as an obstacle that could overtake them.

If you or a loved one are struggling with mental health or substance abuse, we can help. These feelings are not uncommon among addicts, especially those who have just entered early recovery. But it is these negative feelings that drive destructive behaviors like drug abuse. And it is positive feelings (like gratitude) that can help us overcome them. Gratitude for even the smallest courtesies can promote a consistent sense of thankfulness. If someone holds the door for you or lets you merge into traffic on a busy road, make a conscious effort to be grateful.

The Importance of Expressing Gratitude During your Recovery

It can be a spontaneous emotion, but it can also be an act and a practice that you cultivate. Practices rooted in mindfulness can offer individuals a holistic approach to care. For example, meditation, mindful movement, and breathing exercises can help those struggling with mental illnesses or psychiatric conditions. Living with gratitude is a chance to change your perspective in the present to a positive view rather than a negative one. Instead of seeing the world through a negative lens, you’re actively seeking out a pragmatic one. Recovery is never simple, nor easy, but through gratitude, you may find a more optimistic, productive, thoughtful version of you.

However, no matter how you come by it, practicing gratitude in your daily life can transform it from one of doom and gloom to one of peace and joy. This is particularly true for people in recovery from alcohol or drugs. Another way to look at gratitude in recovery is from an opposite perspective, that people are unhappy because they want the things they do not have while failing to recognize all that they do have.

Breaking The Chains of Childhood Abuse: Resilience & Reduced Substance Use

To practice daily gratitude means viewing the world through a lens of appreciation. This becomes evident in your interactions with others throughout the day. A grateful attitude propels you through life, sporting a compassionate heart versus a chip on your shoulder. In fact, integrating gratitude into your daily life becomes, in essence, a reflection of the spiritual awakening you’ve experienced in recovery.

It will take time to heal the wounds of the past, in you and in others. It will also take an effort to get out of the practice of negative thoughts of how we view ourselves. When you make that shift into a grateful mindset you radiate a very attractive and influential positivity. Another way to practice gratitude is to shift the tone of your conversations to eliminate self-blame.

Practicing gratitude will help you see the small blessings every day. That makes maintaining sobriety and avoiding relapse that much sweeter. Holistic practices include a range of other therapeutic options for a whole-person approach to treatment. They focus on the connection between mind, body, and spirit and are usually implemented alongside evidence-based modalities such as CBT.

It can feel like no one is on your side, often times not even yourself. This selfish line of thinking can cause any sort of recovery to diminish over time. Fighting addiction can make it difficult to see that we’re using this idea that anyone and everyone is against us is solely a defense mechanism. Further, practicing gratitude helps you look outward, to all the wonderful things that surround you, rather than keeping you focused inward, which can lead to feelings of negativity and despair. Gratitude, when practiced daily, enhances hope, increases physical and mental wellbeing, and helps overcome the more difficult times we all face. For many, our brains have been wired and become accustomed to thinking one way—often negative.

At the very least, it can be helpful for improving negative emotional states. There’s an old saying in many Twelve Step fellowships that goes “a grateful alcoholic will never drink” or “a grateful addict will never use”. While clearly scientifically impossible to prove and surely not “evidence-based”, this theory seems to hold some weight in relation to the importance of gratitude in recovery. Qualities that often are absent for the addict or alcohol still in active addiction. “I’m different,” “Me vs. the world” or “Everyone is out to get me” are all common ways of selfish thinking when in the throes of addiction and using.