Is shame preventing you from moving forward with your addiction recovery? Shame is common for people struggling with substance use issues, but it doesn’t have to keep your recovery at a standstill. You can learn acceptance in addiction recovery by understanding your imperfections while embracing a more hopeful and forgiving outlook. Here we’ll look at several ways to introduce acceptance into your life, such as forgiveness, positive affirmations, and acknowledging the negative parts of life.
Forgive yourself and ask for forgiveness
Forgiving yourself can be difficult, especially when you’ve hurt yourself and others while misusing substances. You may feel guilt or shame for everything you’ve been through. Forgiveness isn’t about pretending the problems didn’t happen or minimizing everything. It’s about being honest about the issues while allowing yourself to create a new path forward. You don’t need to beat yourself up each time you have a reminder of the difficulties you’ve been through. And when you ask others for forgiveness, you may not always get the answer you want. The other person may still feel raw emotion when they think of your substance misuse, and they may not be able to forgive you at the moment you ask. This can feel discouraging, but asking can at least open up the conversation for the future.
Practice acceptance in addiction recovery through positive affirmations
Daily affirmations can serve as positive reminders to accept each moment as it comes. Here are some tips on building an affirmation habit.
Affirm and accept your journey every day
Affirmations of self-acceptance can seem awkward at first, especially if you’re used to making excuses or using negative self-talk. Affirming and accepting your recovery journey each day can help you shift your mindset over time.
Post affirmations where you can see them
Create notifications or write post-it notes with your affirmations and put them where you’re most likely to see them. This makes your words part of your environment, reminding you to check your mindset throughout the day.
Use first-person and present tense
Affirmations work best in the first-person and present tense because they put you in the here-and-now. Practice acceptance with statements like these: “I accept who I am today and look forward to who I am becoming.” “I forgive myself for the past while I take small steps towards the future.”
Acknowledge the negative to practice acceptance
Ignoring your feelings can make things worse. Pushing them off may give you a short-term break, but it’s just kicking the can down the road. Your emotions will keep coming back, causing more issues with your recovery and mental wellbeing. It may seem backward, but facing the negative aspects of your life can actually help. It’s possible to acknowledge the uncomfortable aspects of your addiction journey while also embracing positivity. Instead of being pulled down by your shame or emotional pain, you can be mindful of these feelings and then come back to one of your affirmations. Your negativity may loosen its grip, opening you up to a more flexible and positive way of coping. This redirection both acknowledges your discomfort and offers another path forward.
Practice acceptance—outpatient treatment can help
Recovery can be hard sometimes, but outpatient addiction treatment can help you stay on track. Group sessions and having a therapist can help you maintain your affirmations as you practice acceptance in addiction recovery. Are you ready to step forward with your recovery? We’ll take the journey with you one day at a time. Call our P.A.T.H. Nashville or P.A.T.H. Worcester at 1-888-622-7809.