Wellness

5 Helpful Lifestyle Habits for Recovering Addicts

posted by Chris Valentine

Are you recovering from drug addiction?

Addiction affects every facet of life. It deeply intertwines with each decision recovering addicts make from day to day.

This means that choosing sobriety requires healthy habits. Winning the constant battle means taking care of your mind, body, and soul.

Life constantly presents challenges and temptations that put a recovering drug addict at risk. Keep reading to learn 5 healthy habits that will help you on your journey through addiction recovery.

1. Eat Healthily

Everybody should always stay aware of what they put into their bodies. This holds especially true for a former drug addict, as certain substances can trigger cravings for their drug of choice.

But this goes deeper than trigger substances. Choosing to eat a healthy diet will help you feel better inside and out.

Once you become constantly conscious of putting only healthy foods into your body, you will not want to spoil that dedication with unhealthy substances. Selecting a diet conducive to recovery will also heal your body from nutritional deficiencies developed while using.

2. Stay Fit

Build a body that you want to take care of. Doing this can help in several ways.

You will simply feel better about yourself. More than that, exercise improves mindset and reduces depression, which can trigger drug use in addicts.

Routines also help with recovery from addiction by limiting free-time that can lead to boredom. It also gives you a sense of accountability when you set a time, place, and routine to follow. Accountability drives people to make better choices.

You can do light exercise, like a daily walk or hike, or you could amp it up a bit and make a rigid fitness routine for the gym. Make exercise fun! Create a routine that makes you feel good, challenges you, and that you can stick with for the long term.

3. Mentor Somebody

Talk with your therapist about creating this habit while recovering from addiction. Though it can help you with your recovery, becoming a sponsor too soon can also set you and the other person backward.

Once you and your treatment facilitator feel that you are at a point in your recovery to do this, it will help pay it forward, for all of the support you received during your most difficult times.

It will also help you remember the point you came from, so you can see how far forward you traveled. Remember that suboxone withdrawal a little more clearly now?

Taking on a leadership role will heighten your sense of responsibility and self-efficacy, which will keep you on the sober path.

4. Tell Only Truth

Nobody lies like an addict. They lie for the survival of the addiction.

Making a habit of only telling the truth will remove you from the addict lifestyle. Do it even when it makes you look bad.

This will not only change your thinking for the better. If you do start to struggle, this habit will make you tell the truth about it to prevent a relapse.

5. Read

Occupy your free time by filling your mind with the right material. The more you learn, the more empowered you will feel. Empowered people do not let anything, especially not a drug, control them.

Some great reads that will heal your mindset include:

  • You are a Badass -Jen Sincero
  • The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People -Stephen R. Covey
  • The Alchemist -Coelho
  • The Power of Positive Thinking -Norman Vincent Peale
  • Love as a Way of Life -Gary Chapman

Cultivate healthy thinking, because what you plant in your mind will grow your actions.

Recovering Addicts: Implement Your Healthy Habits Now!

It takes 21 days for an action to turn into a habit. So start building these helpful lifestyle habits today!

Recovering addicts should always stay aware of their decisions, so consciously build your unconscious choices. Read more wellness tips on our website!

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