Recently we discussed the benefits of enjoying new activities for your addiction recovery process. Today, let’s turn our attention to a particular powerful activity.

The ancient practice of yoga.

There are many different schools of yoga from the slow-paced, calming practice of Hatha, to the more rigorous and energizing practice of Ashtanga. Each school has its own merits and each is suited for a particular time of day and mood.

But no matter which you choose to practice today, yoga’s greatest benefit, and it’s greatest lesson in recovery, is the practice of mindfulness.

Mindfulness is just that—the practice of being present and mindful in this very moment of your entire presence physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

Without realizing it, most of us in and out of recovery live our lives totally outside of our bodies, virtually numb to everything that is happening. Rarely do we feel, both physically and emotionally, at every moment.

We numb ourselves with the Internet, television, text messages, smart phones, over-working, and the rigours of daily life. For those of us with addictions, we sought out extreme measures to keep ourselves numb from our pain, sadness, and anxiety, or to simply quiet our overwhelming thoughts.

Mindfulness brings us back into our bodies.

Through practicing mindfulness on the mat, we become aware of our minds, and its thoughts and feelings. By requiring us to align our breath with our movement, yoga does not allow us to numbly or blindly move through our practice. Instead, we must focus and concentrate to bring thoughts, movements, and breath into alignment.

By far, the greatest lesson of yoga is learning how to take our mindfulness off the mat and learning to live our daily lives mindful of our own selves—our thoughts, bodies, and emotions—and of others. 

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Drug use is, for the most part, an attempt to escape daily life, and the stress, anxiety, and sometimes seemingly insurmountable problems that come along with it.

We all use different coping mechanisms to deal with these. Some of us were fortunate to learn early on healthy coping mechanisms on which to now rely on. The rest of us, on the other, did not. For those of us suffering from a drug or alcohol addiction, we rely on our substance of choice as the coping mechanism that we think works best.

But in reality, we are only fooling ourselves. Drugs and alcohol only dampen the negative feelings; they are merely temporarily blocking them out—the key word here being temporarily. Inevitably, when the effects wear off and we’re left sober, those feelings of stress, anxiety, sadness come rushing back.

Drugs and alcohol do not work to solve or resolve our problems. Sometimes, because of their negative effects on our emotional well-being and general outlook on life, they only make things worse. Never mind their familial, professional, financial, and sometimes judicial consequences.

The goal of addiction rehab, as part of your recovery from a drug or alcohol addiction, is to learn new, healthy and beneficial, coping mechanisms through professional psychotherapy and counselling. Activities like exercise, art, and even hobbies may also help to fill the void left by drugs or alcohol.

Without drugs or alcohol in your life, you will find a pretty large void in your life—probably bigger than you initially expected. Especially in the early stages of your recovery, there will be a void in your time. The time usually spent drinking or doing drugs will need to be filled with something else healthier and more constructive.

As well, you will need something to replace drugs or alcohol as a means to relax, to alleviate stress, anxiety, and even boredom; as something to do when you’re happy; as something to reward yourself with; and as something to comfort you.

Addiction treatment helps you to be mindful to not replace your old, unhealthy, habit with a new one. Working with an addiction counsellor while in treatment helps you to find a suitable, best-fitting way to deal with your negative feelings in a constructive way.

What are some of the other ways that you count on?

From the January 10th 2009 issue of the Harvard Mental Health Letter, research has found that women find it harder than men to recover from addiction.

Women, research shows, tend to progress more quickly from use to dependency and addiction, more quickly develop medical or social consequences from their addiction, and are more susceptible to relapse after a period of sobriety.

The reasons for the gender difference, on the other hand, are not yet clear.

However, researchers have found that a woman’s menstrual cycle appears to affect the craving and use of some illicit drugs. Studies have shown that during the luteal phase, quitting cocaine appears more difficult and less successful, whereas it is easier during the follicular phase. Hormonal fluctuations may, researchers have concluded, increase cravings for cocaine, as well as nicotine, affecting the initial phase of recovering from a cocaine addiction.

Conversely, men are more likely to be afflicted by addiction than women. For example, in the 2008 US National Survey on Drug Use and Health, it was found that 11.5% of males 12 years and older had a substance abuse or addiction problem, compared to 6.4% of females.

Women and Addiction Treatment Programs 
Researchers concluded that women are less likely to enter an addiction treatment program, but once there, are just as likely as men to recover.

Gender differences can and should, on the other hand, affect addiction treatment. Traditional addiction treatment programs were developed based on research on men. According to the Harvard Mental Health Letter, until the early 1990s, addiction research focused primarily on men. Now, however, agencies require federally funded studies to enroll more women.

Now there is a growing body of evidence that female addicts face challenges that male addicts simply don’t, especially in terms of familial responsibilities. The Harvard Mental Health Letter’s authors recommend a better appreciation of these gender differences in order to help women avoid the pitfalls of addiction, including relapse.

Source: The Harvard Mental Health Letter
Photo credit: Nevit Dilmen courtesy of Wikipedia