Addiction recovery involves a lot of stress, work, and change. It is something that impacts every facet of someone’s life. However, the idea of “hope” can remain abstract, even in people who have been successful in their recovery thus far. Hope is something that each person will need to address in their recovery and the role it plays can fundamentally change how someone perceives their success in recovery or even the effectiveness and longevity of their sobriety as a whole.
The earlier that someone can find hope in themselves and their situation, the more effective the treatment will be. So addressing what hope is and how it affects each patient is important at any stage of recovery.
Hope Will Always Need to Be Addressed
Oftentimes, people are seeking therapy for their addiction and co-occurring mental health disorders because of an event in their life. Loss of job or being confronted and having a difficult conversation with loved ones can feel like someone is being attacked. As a result, many people are making their appointments for any stage of recovery from a very vulnerable, very low point in their lives.
Hope can feel fragile, if not completely out of reach. For someone to have hope in their own healing, they need to understand what hope is and why exactly they are choosing to seek professional aid in their recovery. In order for each person to dance with the idea of hope, they first have to understand that there is a “better” for them to pursue, and they also have to want to get there themselves. That is, not only does someone have to be able to imagine a positive result of their sobriety, but they also need to feel like it is something that they can earn and are allowed to have.
Hope Begins With a Goal, Not an Absence
Establishing a hopeful view of addiction recovery treatment begins with having a physical, tangible goal. Simply imagining the absence of something–whatever substance was being used to fuel their addiction–is often ineffective on its own. Rather, someone has to be able to chase a certain goal or result in which achieving sobriety is a step towards this brighter future.
Explore what overall life goals someone may want to accomplish, whether it be for themselves or for their family and loved ones, and work backwards in establishing the detriment that addiction has had on those greater goals. Establishing these goals are what can give someone hope. By establishing a tangible, real-world impact of a better life, each step of the recovery process can then be viewed in light of progress, constantly making this goal more and more real.
Hope Can Start Anywhere
Lacking hope for one’s own future can lead someone to question the idea of sobriety as a whole. Rather, without hope, they may resign themselves to live in more dire situations, thinking that they somehow deserve this kind of unfulfilled life. While finding that goal and establishing hope from that front is effective, the first steps that someone takes in experiencing hope for themselves can come in a variety of different forms, regardless of the overarching goal they hold for themselves.
Rather, hope can be birthed from simply making a positive contribution to someone, somewhere. This can take the form of providing food or cooking dinner for someone and receiving that “thank you,” or it can come in the form of meaningful community service. These need not be grand gestures to a crowd, and oftentimes, these positive impacts are instead very personal and intimate.
Helping a stranger carry heavy groceries that they may be struggling with can hold a lot of power for someone and their own personal journey with hope and recovery. It shows someone that there is change and that they are able to make the changes and positive impacts that they want in their own lives. Hope can be birthed from experiencing this change in one’s self or experiencing someone’s change in view of them.
The Desire for Change
Hope is something that cannot be simply given to someone. Rather, it is something that they have to choose to allow themselves to feel. Proving that someone can make changes in their lives and work towards goals outside of, or in spite of, their addiction is a powerful tool. However, they will still have to make the decision that they want to recover and want to continue to pursue their goals.
As a result, hope is something that can never be ignored. There is no step at which someone can be considered “full of hope” and thus not need to continually talk about their goals, hope, and accomplishments. Hope is also constantly fluid. By itself, it is simply the feeling for a desire for change and doesn’t necessarily tie itself down to a single goal or aspect.
Rather, the way that each person engages with hope can constantly change, and thus needs to constantly be at the forefront of someone’s mind through recovery. It is a difficult thing to maintain, and unfortunately, can be a very easy thing to lose, which opens the paths to someone returning to previous behaviors or detrimental coping mechanisms, or even allowing relapse to set in.
Recovery will look different for each person. However, there are always options available for each person to regain that hope needed for the future. At Alta Centers, each person can individualize their needs during detox in order to understand the best mindset and change that they need going forward. Providing a strong sense of community and companionship, Alta Centers prides itself on using the individuality of each person to have the group grow as a whole, all while providing a safe and luxurious environment to explore hope, sobriety, and the goals for the future. For more information on how Alta Centers can help you, call today at (888) 202-2583.
