One of the best things we can do for ourselves as we’re working to recover is transform the relationship we have with our pain, our difficult emotions, our addictions and mental health issues, and our tough life experiences. Our instinctive response to pain is to resist it. It hurts, so we try to avoid feeling it. As we heal, though, we learn that resisting our pain, especially with drugs and addictive behaviors, only worsens our pain and keeps us from being able to heal ourselves. When we can change our relationship with our pain to be one of acceptance instead of resistance, we open ourselves up to exploring the lessons and spiritual tests our challenges have to offer us.
As we learn more about ourselves, we become more conscious, more mindful and more self-aware. We start to explore the patterns we’ve been developing and perpetuating for most of our lives. We learn more about the toxic thought patterns and limiting beliefs we’ve been practicing thinking, repeatedly, that have been contributing to our unwellness. Mindfulness teaches us to be curious about our pain, to sit with our pain, and to observe it. Rather than running from it and avoiding it, we want to begin to be able to feel safe confronting it and dealing with it. That is where learning can take place. We want to dig deeper and see what we can learn from all of our difficult experiences. Our pain adds to our growth. We wouldn’t be who we are, beautiful and special, without the mistakes we’ve made and pain we’ve endured. Our challenges become part of our purpose, and the more we can explore our pain, the more light we let into our hearts.
What is your pain trying to tell you? What are your wounds here to teach you? There are lessons in every hardship and spiritual tests in every obstacle. We want to get to the point where our mental and emotional challenges don’t continue to scare us into denial, avoidance and resistance. Can we learn to embrace our pain and investigate its deeper meanings? Can we take the lessons we learn from our pain to help other people going through similar things? Can we use our pain to empower us and push us forward?
Riverside Recovery is committed to helping you uncover the issues fueling your addictions. Our treatment programs include multiple forms of therapy, family workshops and mindfulness-based relapse prevention education. Call (800) 871-5440 for more information.