Looking Your Best to Feel Your Best
Recovery is a difficult process that takes its toll on each person in different ways. Stress, anxiety, and depression are all exhausting feelings, especially when someone is exposed to them on a daily basis. Getting through these tough times is a challenge, but it is possible. Maintaining a healthy path for sobriety starts with feeling confident in oneself, which can be a hurdle in itself depending on the day. However, beginning each day by looking one’s best can go a long way in reinforcing this confidence, and even simple tasks such as proper hygiene routines and getting dressed can hold large amounts of influence over how someone may be feeling for the rest of the day.
The Importance of Feeling Good About Yourself
Feeling good about yourself is an essential part of recovery. Finding ways to reinforce the positive changes that someone is making in their lives can be hallmarks of establishing a healthy lifestyle and relationship to recovery as a whole. However, recovery is also a time where feelings of shame, guilt, or depression may be very prevalent and the dangers of these feelings cannot be understated.
These emotions may cause someone to think that they are unable to recover, or somehow aren’t worthy of a happy, healthy life, which can compromise the recovery process. Regardless of how someone chooses to reinforce their confidence, feeling good about oneself is the first step that someone has to take each day in recovery. Not only can feeling good about oneself reinforce their decision to recover in the first place, but it can also create needed motivation and a renewed sense of purpose into every therapeutic activity that someone tries. Feeling good about oneself first and foremost can make the other parts of the recovery process more potent and more positive.
Creating a Proper Hygiene Routine
Proper hygiene is often one of the first parts of one’s day that is neglected as someone’s use of drugs or alcohol increases. Reestablishing a hygienic routine is a way for someone to actively begin to reclaim their day and begin promoting their recovery and own physical health above their use. Regular showers, teeth, and skincare, and even sleep schedules are all a part of this routine that helps someone begin to create their positive daily image.
Establishing these routines encourages each person to continuously focus on themselves and their own care, rather than worry as much about external factors. While someone may want to look their best when they are going out, it is just as important for someone to feel their best even if they are going to be spending the day indoors with the family. Establishing this routine begins to program a person to think of themself and one’s own self-care on a daily basis, and overall leads to a better body image and confidence through the recovery process.
These routines are also essential for the physical healing that needs to take place in recovery. One’s use of drugs or alcohol can take a big toll on the body and recovering from the experience takes time. Hygiene and nutrition are essential for this healing to properly occur and can provide the body with the energy it needs to repair much of the damage. This can also be a reinforcement on its own, as watching one’s own skin clear can be a constant reminder of one’s progress and the positive effects of recovery.
Getting Dressed
Getting dressed in the morning can also alter a person’s expectations for the day and the clothing that one chooses is a powerful method of reaffirming one’s new, sober identity. Choosing to get dressed in the morning, rather than lounging in pajamas, can prompt the mind to expect to get things done or to engage in either social or physical activities that continue to facilitate one’s healing through recovery. Even just mentally preparing oneself for being active through the day can instill a more productive mindset for the day to come, and encourage each person to engage in personal therapeutic techniques along the way.
Clothing is also one of the best ways that someone can express themselves. Whether someone is wearing their favorite color, a shirt with their favorite sports team or movie character, or a hat with a fun quip, clothing can be how each person begins to announce their new, sober identity. Changing one’s own style through recovery can be a testament to how much someone has grown, especially as they become more comfortable in their clothes and in their own skin.
Feeling good about oneself and their progression through the recovery process is a battle that happens every day. Establishing morning routines to help start each day with the right mindset, as well as using even one’s own wardrobe to their advantage in recovery, all play a part in helping you be able to take on the daily stresses and challenges that recovery may bring. Small steps are always necessary to tackle big challenges, and a constant battle requires each person to consistently set themselves up for success each day.
Regaining your confidence and building on your sense of self-worth are both crucial aspects of recovery. At Alta Centers, our luxurious space and focus on inclusion and community create an environment that helps everyone begin to recognize their own worth in recovery. Learning how to reaffirm your decision to get sober creates a foundation of progress in your path to recovery and opportunity. The professionals and community atmosphere at Alta Centers can personalize your time with us in order to develop a plan that is unique to you and your goals, using your own interests to develop individualized approaches for recovery. If you or a loved one are suffering from an addiction to drugs or alcohol and the feelings of depression or anxiety that come with it, Alta Centers can help you take the first step towards your sober future today. Call to speak to one of our caring professionals about your unique situation and how we can help you at (888) 202-2583.
