Healing is a journey. Life is full of roads to take and paths to follow, and healing is often one of those. Addict or not, everyone experiences healing throughout life, healing from choices, from pain, and from consequences. Healing is what allows us to recover from our stumbling, and to move on to be a better, stronger person.
Addiction and the way of life it causes is one of the many things that requires healing. There is healing from the addiction itself. There is healing from the damage it caused to others. There is the healing of self.
Addiction hurts the mind and body of the user. No matter the substance, it controls the addict in many ways. Healing allows recovery from that, but healing is more than just recovery. It is recognizing the power an addiction had and making a commitment to not return to it. It also requires recognizing and remembering worth; an addict can not only regain who they were and how they lived, but can become better. They can be more.
Amisha Patel said, “Life is all about evolution. What looks like a mistake to others has been a milestone in my life. Even if people have betrayed me, even if my heart was broken, even if people misunderstood or judged me, I have learned from these incidents. We are human and we make mistakes, but learning from them is what makes the difference.”
So many dominoes fall when addiction takes a hold of a family member or friend. Relationships can be strained, jobs lost, and lives shattered. To recover from addiction and to fully behold the damage that resulted can be devastating. It may even cause a strong desire to go back to the addiction instead of coping with the wreckage.
Part of the healing after recovery is to see the damage and to do what it takes to fix it. Life will never be the same after addiction, but you can use the struggle of overcoming addiction to start completely valuing your life and your relationships. Addiction can be a milestone in character growth. By fixing the damage that resulted from an addiction, a person can learn courage, humility, and diligence. So many other lessons are available in all aspects of the addiction recovery journey that leads to ultimate healing.
For some, this recognition and healing may be harder than the physical toll of recovery. In the end, healing is required to completely overcome addiction.
Hippocrates said, “Healing is a matter of time, but it is sometimes also a matter of opportunity.”
Recognize healing as an opportunity and a journey. It is a hard road, but one that leads to a better place. Take it.
