healing Archives - Enlightened Solutions

Why Is Individualized Care for Addiction Important?

Written by enlightened solutions on August 23, 2022. Posted in Addiction Recovery.

No two people are exactly alike. You are unique and perceive and experience things differently than everyone else. When it comes to addiction, the same is true. How you respond, experience, and cope with substance abuse is specific to you. The way you process it and relate to your addiction can depend on personality, past trauma, any co-occurring disorders, and many other factors.

While any form of treatment is better than none at all, you will benefit far more from therapy and strategies that are assigned to address every angle. It is important to seek and select a treatment facility that is going to focus on you as an individual and will take the time to discover anything and everything that could have led to and reinforced your addiction. There are many advantages to having a treatment plan designed to address your specific needs.

What Is Individualized Care?

Individualized care refers to focusing on the person or client as an individual and avoiding using generalized strategies or plans for treatment. This is important in all forms of clinical care, as everyone has different needs, strengths, and goals. When it comes to addiction, substances used will vary, childhood experiences and environments will vary, other presenting diagnoses with vary, and lifestyles will vary.

It is so important to focus on a client’s specific situation to ensure treatment methods and strategies are going to be effective long-term. You need to be able to carry skills and knowledge with you after completing treatment and entering back into your life in recovery. Enlightened Solutions is careful to consider everyone’s specific situation upon admission. Our treatment team members meet daily to consistently ensure the best ongoing care for each client. We adapt your treatment plan as you go through the process and grow in your recovery.

Addressing Trauma

We know that trauma can have a significant impact on addiction and can even be the cause of substance abuse for many. It can be common to begin using opioids, benzos, alcohol, or other substances to try to cope with the side effects or memories of trauma. Additionally, substance abuse can increase the risk of experiencing trauma as you are more likely to be exposed to risky situations.

At Enlightened Solutions, all of our therapists are trauma-informed and approach treatment with the knowledge of how trauma can impact addiction and recovery. During your initial assessment, a full evaluation will be conducted to determine whether there is any presenting or underlying trauma that you may have experienced that could be impacting your behavior or thought patterns. It is important to address these issues to ensure you are able to remain sober and stay on track throughout recovery. We provide you with the tools to cope with and process your trauma in a way that supports your recovery. Learn more about our trauma track here.

Addressing Co-occurring Disorders

Another important purpose of a thorough assessment at intake is to identify any co-occurring disorders that may exist. This is important because having anxiety, depression, or any other mental health diagnosis can impact how you respond to treatment and can affect things like mood, motivation, sleep, and more. It is critical to understand how your diagnosis may affect you as you begin to adjust to life without drugs or alcohol.

Co-occurring disorders can be extremely common among those with addiction. Many will choose to self-medicate using drugs or alcohol and attempt to cope with symptoms of depression, anxiety, or mood disorders. Learn more about the relationships between substance abuse and mental illness here. Enlightened Solutions can provide you with the care and support needed to address your mental health while treating your substance use disorder (SUD).

A few of the common disorders that can often co-occur with SUD include:

Anxiety
Bipolar disorder
PTSD
Personality/mood disorders
Schizophrenia
Eating disorders
ADHD

When you decide to seek help and pursue treatment for drug or alcohol addiction, you want to be sure that you are selecting a facility that is going to take the time to really get to know you and understand your needs. Enlightened Solutions makes it a point to focus on every client as an individual to ensure we address the specific behaviors that lead to your addiction and help you learn to avoid them. We utilize various therapy techniques to treat the whole person and create lasting changes to support you and your lifelong recovery. Recovering from addiction is not easy but is very possible with the right support and strategies.

Individualized care for substance abuse is essential to success in treatment and throughout recovery. It is important to learn coping mechanisms and strategies that are applicable to your life and specific situation. It is also important to be aware of and address any trauma or co-occurring disorders that may be present, as these can affect your experience and responses to treatment. Enlightened Solutions specializes in individualized, holistic treatment for addiction. We aim to develop treatment plans for each client that address their needs as an individual. Our clinical team meets daily to assess the progress of each client and ensure treatment plans are appropriate and will continue to be effective. If you or someone you love is struggling with drug or alcohol addiction, we would love to help. To receive the best, individualized care for your addiction, or to learn more about your treatment options, give Enlightened Solutions a call today at (833) 801-LIVE.

Healing From the Outside In

Written by enlightened solutions on February 27, 2021. Posted in Addiction, Recovery. Leave a Comment

A big part of addiction recovery is psychotherapy, also known as talk therapy. When most people think of therapy, that’s what they think of. The patient and the therapist talk. The patient talks about issues of concern and the therapist actively listens, guiding the conversation as necessary to help the client. Many types of talk therapy are used today and can be extremely beneficial.

But sometimes, we might feel like we are “talked out.” Maybe we have talked and talked and talked and it seems as if nothing has changed. We are tired of talking or we don’t want to talk. In the case of unresolved trauma, we might not be able to talk.

Fortunately, healing can happen in other ways. In addiction recovery, both the mind and the body need to heal. We can use the mind-body connection for healing. We can access the mind through the body. We can use various forms of touch in a therapeutic setting.

The Power of Massage

If you have had the good fortune to have a massage from a licensed massage therapist, you know how relaxing it can be–it’s hard for your mind to stay anxious when your body is relaxed. That is the mind-body connection in action. Psychological stress can be stored in our muscles and it can be massaged away. Although being in treatment for addiction is very beneficial in the long run–lifesaving even–it can be very hard work and stress can arise during treatment. In addition, anxiety is a common withdrawal symptom and a frequent co-occurring mental health disorder. Massaging away that anxiety is good for both the mind and the body and can create a profound sense of calm.

Acupuncture: An Ancient Healing Modality

Acupuncture is an ancient method of healing that originated in China. Very thin needles are placed at specific points in the patient’s body to treat various health conditions, both physical and mental. (The needles usually don’t hurt and many patients don’t feel them at all.) The goal of acupuncture is to improve the flow of the body’s energy, called the chi, along the body’s energy pathways, called meridians.

In the 1970s, acupuncture began to be used in addiction treatment and was found to reduce the stress experienced during withdrawal and cravings. The protocol used to treat addiction concentrates on five points on the ear and calms the nervous system, relieves anxiety, promotes healing of your organs, supports the work done by your liver, regulates emotions, and increases the strength of your breath. The benefits of acupuncture include increased energy, improved mood, reduced cravings, better sleep, inner peace, and relaxation. In fact, some patients become so relaxed during acupuncture sessions that they fall asleep.

Chiropractic Care: Connecting the Body and the Mind

A chiropractor once told a patient that the phrase “pain in the neck” was more than just a figure of speech. The idea that the weight of the world is on your shoulders is more than just a commonly used phrase. Many of us carry emotional stress and pain which manifests as physical pain in our bodies, particularly in our neck, back, and shoulders. If we are struggling with an addiction, the stress and pain we carry are even greater.

Chiropractic care is another treatment modality in which treating the body can have a powerful healing effect on the mind. The theory behind chiropractic care is that proper alignment of the skeleton and muscles, especially in the spine, will allow the body to heal itself. Chiropractic care is particularly effective for conditions involving muscles, joints, bones, and connective tissue throughout the body. Chiropractic adjustments can be a very powerful way to relieve pain. Chiropractors also work to improve the range of motion in the body’s joints and include exercise and physical rehabilitation in the treatment plans they develop for patients. The overall goal is to restore function and prevent injury in addition to relieving pain.

In treating addiction, a chiropractor will correct misalignments in the spinal column. When the spinal column is in alignment, the nervous system can function properly and can better process the natural “feel-good” chemicals that the brain produces. When this happens, addiction is easier to treat. Also, because the patient’s physical health has been restored, addiction is easier to treat.

The Value of Human Touch

Massage, acupuncture, and chiropractic care are all holistic treatment modalities that involve therapeutic touch–direct human contact. The therapeutic relationship–the bond between the patient and the provider–is part of the healing. When we were in the life of addiction, our relationships with other people may not have been healthy or based on trust. Part of recovery is learning to trust again. Building a therapeutic relationship with a health-care provider can be part of that process.

Sometimes when you are in therapy, you reach a point where you feel like you are “talked out.” You might have an issue that you don’t want to talk about or you may have experienced trauma and are not able to talk about it. Fortunately, the mind can be reached through the body and healing can be brought about that way. This can happen through treatment modalities that involve therapeutic touch, including massage therapy, acupuncture, and chiropractic care. These treatment methods are among the holistic treatment modalities that we offer at Enlightened Solutions. We are a drug and alcohol treatment center located on New Jersey’s southern shore. We are licensed to treat co-occurring disorders that frequently accompany substance use disorder. If you are struggling with an addiction and are ready to seek treatment, call us at (833) 801-5483. We can help you build a life free from the pain and destruction of substance abuse.

How it Feels to Have Anxiety and Depression

Written by enlightened solutions on June 21, 2019. Posted in Anxiety Disorder, Mental Health. Leave a Comment

Having to deal with two mental health disorders at the same time can be draining and challenging. You not only feel anxious during your daily routine, but you also feel sad on a daily basis as well. Huffington Post asked those struggling with anxiety and depression what it is like to gain a better understanding and know how serious it is to look for treatment for both disorders.

Constant Fight with Yourself

Having anxiety and depression can mean that one minute, you are experiencing racing thoughts and emotions only to experience nothingness the next minute. You may feel like two people are talking to you. Your anxious self is telling you that there is something wrong with you and to get help, but your depressed self is telling you not to make an effort to get help since you feel too numb to worry about it. With these two selves fighting with each other, no one is winning if you are constantly battling yourself on a daily basis.

Caring About Everything and Nothing

When you are trying to control your anxious self and your depressive self, you feel like you cannot get any peace within yourself. It feels hopeless to win. You are struggling with the battle to get yourself out of bed when your depression kicks in, but you are also battling with all of the worries that you have waiting for you that is keeping you up while in bed. While your depression is yelling at you that you are worthless and nothing matters, your anxiety is telling you that you are not keeping up with your responsibilities or that something bad will happen to you.

Physical Symptoms

Anxiety and depression both come with their own physical symptoms. Sleep works differently with both mental disorders in that depression makes you feel more tired than normal, but your anxiety may cause you to always think, making it difficult to get any sleep. Anxiety can also lead you to experience chest tightness and stomach aches. The pains you are experiencing can also heighten your depression so it feels like these symptoms are never-ending.

Stuck in a Loop

Anxiety and depression together can also mean that the mental symptoms you experience are ongoing and you cannot shut them off. Anxiety is the constant feeling that everything has to go right. Depression is constantly feeling like you are always stuck. You know about everything that can go wrong and trying to make everything right, but you also feel like there is nothing that can be done so you have no choice but to feel stuck like this. With all of these constant thoughts, it is hard to tell if your anxiety came first or your depression. The point is that if you are battling both of these disorders, both of them need treatment.

Isolation

Being both depressed and anxious can lead you to isolate yourself from the ones you love. For example, having social anxiety can cause you to avoid any events that lead to social interaction like clubs, parties, meetings, mixers, etc. They are too busy overthinking what to say or worrying what others will think of them if they say something wrong. By doing that, you are increasing your depression by feeling more lonely. People who are depressed also withdraw from others thinking that they are not good enough for them or better off without them. By knowing your worth and carrying yourself with more confidence, making new friends will decrease your anxiety and depression symptoms.

Unpredictability

You spend your days feeling conflicted because you do not know if it is anxiety’s turn to make an appearance or depression. You want to spend hours sleeping in bed, but you also want to get up because you know you have important things that cannot afford to miss the deadline. There is a part of you that cares too much about what others think and another part of you that feels numb to the feelings of others. At parties, you may experience panic attacks when you are surrounded by a bunch of people you do not know, but also have no energy to attempt to socialize. This leaves you to deal with battling with two thoughts and you do not know which one to listen to.

Challenge of Accomplishment

It can be hard to get things done when you have two conflicting thoughts telling you how to go about it. Your anxious side is telling you that you have to get things done right now or something bad can happen. This can be something like a project, answering an email, getting together with someone, etc. Your depressive side, on the other hand, is telling you that you are a failure, a fraud, and that you will not get anything done. This can make it hard for you to get anything done when you cannot make up your mind of what to do.

Loss of Hope

You feel like not giving yourself the self-care that you know you should give yourself because your thoughts are telling you to do the exact opposite. You need to tell yourself first that it is okay to not feel okay. Acknowledge that you need to get yourself help so that you can feel good about yourself and your life. Treatment will teach you how much you matter and to be in control of your depression and anxiety symptoms.

Located on the shore of Southern New Jersey, Enlightened Solutions is a recovery center that uses evidence-based therapies and holistic healing to treat addiction and mental illness. With the opportunity to learn about therapies that are keyed in to healing the human spirit and learning about new stress-reducing techniques centered around a 12 step network, you will ensure a lasting recovery. For more information, please call us at 833-801-LIVE as we are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Healing Our Toxic Energy

Written by enlightened solutions on December 10, 2018. Posted in 12 Step Program, Healthy Living. Leave a Comment

When we are working towards recovery, abstaining from our addictive drugs and behaviors is only half the battle. We also must heal our energy that has been adversely affected by our struggle with addiction. Our energy is made up of our thoughts, emotions, fears, habits and behaviors. Our energy can dictate our moods, patterns and cycles. Having unhealed energy can mean we’re manifesting more struggle rather than the healing we’re hoping for. Healing our toxic energy is a crucial step in our recovery process.

We often are unaware of our energy and whether or not it is healthy. Our energy is often something we don’t have a conscious understanding of. Energy operates on unconscious and subconscious levels, and the first step in healing it is becoming conscious of it. We can start by paying more attention to our feelings and our moods. How do you feel when you first wake up? If you’re filled with anxiety upon waking, for example, your energy is one of fear. How do your emotions and moods fluctuate throughout the day, how do they operate, and how do they cause you to act? Are you filled with anger and resentment? Are you worried, stressed, pessimistic or negative?

Take note of how you’re treating the people around you. How would you describe your relationships? Are you easily frustrated and impatient with other people? Do you find yourself treating people with unkindness and disrespect, and then feeling ashamed afterwards? Are you often involved in some kind of conflict, tension or interpersonal disharmony? Do you trust people or do you keep them at a distance? How do you resolve conflict? Are you able to listen and communicate in healthy ways?

Take inventory of your self-talk. Do you speak to and about yourself in disparaging or uplifting ways? Are the words you choose full of negativity and self-hatred? Are you constantly beating yourself up, criticizing yourself, judging yourself and knocking yourself down? All of these are signs you have unhealed, toxic energy within you dictating the ways in which you feel about yourself.

Once we’ve grown our conscious awareness about the energy we’re carrying within ourselves, we have a better understanding with which to heal it. Energy practices we can use to heal ourselves include meditation, prayer, reiki, tapping and energy clearing. We can work with a spiritual guide or therapist to address our unhealed energy. The more we actively work to create positive energy within ourselves, the stronger our foundation is for healing and recovery.

The community at Enlightened Solutions is here to provide you with the support, encouragement, love and care that come from our own personal experience with recovery. Call (833) 801-LIVE today to start your journey towards healing.

An Unhealthy Sacral Chakra

Written by enlightened solutions on November 23, 2018. Posted in Addiction Recovery, Alternative Therapy. Leave a Comment

Our sacral chakra is our second energy center and governs our emotions, sexuality, creativity and manifestation. These things are all related, and when we carry extreme shame or other negative emotion pertaining to one, it can greatly affect the others. For example, when we carry shame around our sexuality, we have a harder time exploring and expressing our creativity, and our power to manifest what we want in our lives is hindered. Unhealthiness in any of these areas can cause us to have an imbalanced sacral chakra.

When our sacral chakra is out of balance, we have a hard time expressing, managing and processing our emotions. We might feel overwhelmed and confused about our emotions, or we may feel numb and have difficulty feeling them at all. We might not have the skills we need to identify our emotions and to navigate them. As a result, we can become further removed from our sense of self and find it hard to connect with our intuition.

Sometimes our sacral chakra is imbalanced because we’re carrying sexual shame from a traumatic experience. Sometimes we feel ashamed because of the cultural taboos around sexuality that make us feel wrong or sinful for enjoying sex. Our sexual energy can become repressed, and we might not know how to express our sexuality in healthy ways. We might become compulsive sexually, or on the other hand we might shut down and not open ourselves up to allow ourselves to have intimate partnerships.

A misaligned sacral chakra can hinder our ability to express our creativity. Many of us have creative talents and passions that get lost or buried under the busyness of our daily lives and responsibilities. We forget the artistic things we loved to do when we were younger. We can feel disconnected from the beautiful parts of ourselves. We might become depressed from the lack of creative outlets so many of us need in order to be happy.

When we have an imbalanced sacral chakra, we can struggle to manifest because we don’t have a clear sense of who we are, how we feel, what we want in life, or the direction in which we’re headed. As a result, we are often manifesting from a place of confusion and misguidedness, causing all kinds of things we don’t want to show up in our lives. We don’t have clarity around our emotions, our purpose or our direction, so it can be very difficult to direct our energy towards manifesting in positive ways.

Holistic healing is a major focus here at Enlightened Solutions. Call (833) 801-LIVE for more information on our treatment programs.

An Imbalanced Root Chakra

Written by enlightened solutions on November 21, 2018. Posted in Addiction Recovery, Alternative Therapy. Leave a Comment

Our chakras, or energy centers, can develop imbalances, especially after traumatic experiences, which can contribute to our feeling depressed, anxious, insecure, unstable and off center. Imbalances in each chakra can lead to unique emotional difficulties correlated to our energy.

The root chakra is our first chakra, and it represents our sense of safety and security. It governs the energy pertaining to our survival and instincts. It is associated with how safe, secure and grounded we feel, both within ourselves and within the world around us. When our root is healthy, balanced and in alignment, we feel supported, guided and protected, both by our inner strength and our higher power. We have confidence in ourselves, in who we are and in where we’re headed. We feel sure of who we are. We feel connected to our purpose, we can set clear goals for ourselves, and we can take steps towards accomplishing them. We believe in ourselves, and we know that we are strong, powerful and capable.

When our root chakra is imbalanced, we can feel ungrounded and uncentered. We can feel as though we don’t have a strong sense of security or stability. We can feel insecure, suffer from low self-esteem and be overly anxious. We can feel lacking in emotional and financial support, not only from ourselves but also from the people around us and the world as a whole. We don’t feel self-assured or at peace within ourselves. We struggle with feeling bad about ourselves, we feel guilt easily, and we carry shame within us, often for many years.

When we don’t feel grounded within ourselves, we struggle to make decisions. We can feel as though we don’t have a clear sense of direction and aren’t connected to our inner guidance system. We often feel stuck. We can really struggle with our sense of purpose in life and have a very hard time following our intuition. We can feel lost and overwhelmed.

When our root is imbalanced, we can have a very challenging relationship with fear. While fear is a normal and natural part of life that helps to keep us safe, we can really struggle with fear when we don’t have a basis of groundedness and self-assuredness. We can suffer from phobias and debilitating insecurities. Because we don’t feel safe and secure, it can be very hard for us to express our fears and to get help facing them. We can become caught in cycles of suppressing our emotions and our fears, which can greatly contribute to depression and anxiety. We can seek solace in things that aren’t good for us, making ourselves susceptible to developing addictions.

Recovery involves the holistic healing of our minds, bodies and spirits. Enlightened Solutions is here to help. Call (833) 801-LIVE.

The Importance of Chakra Healing

Written by enlightened solutions on November 20, 2018. Posted in Addiction Recovery, Alternative Therapy. Leave a Comment

When working to heal from our addictions and mental health issues, sometimes we focus disproportionately on our minds, on our troublesome thoughts, on the fears and pain we mentally have a hard time letting go of. We forget that all of these things – our thoughts, our emotions, our fears and painful memories – impact our energy not just our minds. Our energy governs and affects everything in our lives. Working to heal our minds without also working to heal our energy is like trying to solve half the puzzle. The remainder of the puzzle has yet to be clarified and processed. Working with our energy centers, or chakras, is a powerful way to heal ourselves in a holistic way.

Healing our energy is of critical importance to our recovery. When our energy is healthy, we can work with our thoughts and emotions in productive ways without being derailed by the sheer power of them. We can heal from our traumatic experiences without being completely overwhelmed by them. We can process our painful memories, and although we may never forget them, we can release the hold they have over us. Our energy doesn’t have to be dictated by our pain. We can heal our energy and as a result be able to incorporate our pain into the fullness of our being, into the light and love of our inner power. This process enables us to accept our pain in order to heal it. We can allow it to be a part of what strengthens and empowers us rather than what ultimately takes us down.

When we have unhealthy energy imbalances, we suffer from debilitating anxiety, depression, panic attacks and other mental health issues. We can struggle with other related challenges such as insomnia, eating disorders, body image issues, deep insecurities, complexes, phobias and neuroses. We can live our lives in pain and fear, not knowing there is another way to live. Many of us turn to whatever we find helps ease the pain, whatever makes us feel better, distracts us and helps us to escape. For some of us this escape becomes an obsession with food and we self-destruct by overeating, bingeing and purging, or we starve ourselves, all in an attempt to forget our original pain with food as the medium. For others, the escape comes in the form of addictive substances such as drugs and alcohol. For many people, it is a compulsive behavior such as sex, gaming, gambling, or other risky behavior.

Healing from our complex emotional issues means taking inventory of how our energy has been impacted over the course of our lives. Our minds are not the only things affected by our mental health issues and addictions. They are ailments that are related to the health of our energy, emotions and spirits, just as much as they are related to the health our minds.

We’re here to help. Call (833) 801-LIVE for information on our treatment programs.

Prayer for Healing

Written by enlightened solutions on November 8, 2018. Posted in 12 Step Program, Alternative Therapy. Leave a Comment

Prayer can be a helpful healing tool, whether or not we consider ourselves to be religious people. We can pray to any higher power, and what we call that higher power matters much less than how we can connect to it. If we believe our higher power created us, then we are a manifestation of it. That power is within us. We have the power to heal ourselves, to create the lives we want for ourselves. Accessing our inner higher power allows us to do that, and prayer is a helpful way to connect to it.

Prayer is not something that is limited to people who attend church. Anyone can pray, and you can pray to whatever higher entity brings you comfort. You can pray to your inner self, which has all the strength and wisdom of your higher power.

Prayer can take any form as long as it resonates with us. We sometimes think of praying as asking for what we want, but prayer can also be communicating with our higher power. We can release our pent-up emotions and we can share our distressing thoughts, knowing our higher power already knows all of it. We can ask for guidance, we can ask for strength. We can ask to be lifted through our struggles. We can pray for forgiveness when we’re struggling with shame and anger, we can pray for healing when we’re in pain.

This process can bring us enormous peace. It can help us feel calmed, soothed, comforted and nurtured. It can make us feel rejuvenated in our faith and purpose. We’re reminded we’re never alone. We are being supported, protected and guided. When we pray, we allow ourselves to surrender- to a power bigger than us, to the idea that we’re not operating our lives alone. We don’t have to feel isolated in our pain.

Prayer is something we can also do with our loved ones. We can pray together and allow it to bring us together. We can strengthen our connections with each other and our higher power. Many families make prayer a regular practice, before meals, before bedtime, during difficult challenges.

Prayer, like meditation, allows us to connect to our inner voice, our higher power and higher consciousness. When we are open to it, we can receive signs, messages and tangible guidance that we can interpret to help us along our way. We aren’t alone in our healing.

Enlightened Solutions is here to help. Call (833) 801-LIVE.

How Denial Holds Us Back from Healing

Written by enlightened solutions on October 22, 2018. Posted in 12 Step Program, Addiction Recovery. Leave a Comment

When we deny any part of ourselves, we hold ourselves back from experiencing the fullness of our life experience. The same is true for our pain. Being in denial about our fears, traumas and pain means we cut off entire parts of ourselves. Our difficulties help inform our life paths and are part of what makes us who we are. When we deny them, we essentially deny ourselves.

We can’t experience real healing and transformation when we’re denying who we are. In order to move out of our pain, we have to be able to accept it. Accepting something allows us to surrender to it, and both acceptance and surrender are alchemical processes that can transform our pain into peace. Coming to terms with our most painful thoughts and emotions brings us a sense of peace that we cannot find if we are fighting them. Resisting our pain amplifies it, gives it strength and adds more momentum for it to continue to hurt us. Denial is a form of resistance. If we can accept our challenges as part of who we are, we can incorporate them into the light of our inner strength. If we can’t accept them and continue to deny them, they are essentially excluded from that light and never have the opportunity to heal.

Accepting our addictions and mental health issues might be one of the hardest things we’ll ever do, but it’s a crucial step in our recovery process. How can we heal ourselves when we don’t accept entire parts of who we are? The answer is, we can’t. We have to find a way to embrace self-acceptance if we want to move forward, otherwise we remain stuck. We continue our self-destructive patterns. We stay in our unhealthy relationships. We perpetuate our toxic cycles.

Denial might feel easier at first. “Ignorance is bliss.” When it comes to our thoughts and emotions, however, we come to learn that we can’t run from them forever, and trying to hide from them only tightens their grip on us. Our addictive behaviors, thought patterns and limiting beliefs are a manifestation of our fears and also feed off of our fears for as long as we allow them to. When we face our fears, we starve them of the oxygen they use to breathe (our denial), and eventually the light of our courage extinguishes them.

Choosing recovery is one of the hardest, best things you’ll ever do for yourself. The community at Enlightened Solutions is here to help. Call (833) 801-LIVE.

Mindfulness for Healing

Written by enlightened solutions on October 5, 2018. Posted in Alternative Therapy, Recovery. Leave a Comment

Most of our suffering happens without us being fully conscious of it. We often don’t know why we feel the way we feel. We aren’t aware of the ways in which we are contributing to our own challenges. We don’t have a clear understanding of what we’re going through and what caused it. Our subconscious minds direct most of our thoughts and behaviors, so much of our suffering is happening outside of what we are conscious of. How do we become more aware and grow in understanding?

Mindfulness teaches us to put our conscious attention on the issue or task at hand. It asks that we slow down, get quiet, be still, and allow ourselves the space and time to really be present. We often are focused elsewhere, caught up in another issue, or distracted by other things. When it comes to our mental and emotional health, we can learn how to bring mindful awareness to our thoughts and emotions, which can help us to move through them in healthier ways.

Breathing and Meditation

Focusing on our breathing is one form of meditation, and the more we practice, the more we can slow down our racing thoughts. When our minds are overly active, it is hard for us to have the clarity that helps us to process our thoughts and feelings. We might be easily overwhelmed, confused, distracted, or agitated. We might feel like we’re all over the place. We might be inundated with sad and anxious thoughts. Breathing and meditation help us to develop more control over our thoughts. We learn to direct our thoughts in ways that benefit us rather than contribute to our mental and emotional stress. As we slow down and process our emotions, we give ourselves the opportunity to really heal.

Self-Reflection

Self-reflection is the foundation for recovery. We often move through life without consciously reflecting on our issues, behaviors, cycles and patterns. We don’t often look at our mistakes to see what lessons we can glean from them. Sometimes we feel too depressed to reflect, sometimes we are afraid or in denial. When we are struggling with our addictions and mental health issues, sometimes we don’t do the work of analyzing for ourselves what may have caused these issues, how our inner world manifested them, and what we can stand to learn from it all.

Start by being open and honest with yourself. Ask yourself questions such as “what is really bothering me? Why am I depressed? What subconscious fears am I burying underneath my addictive behaviors?” Write in a journal. Talk to someone. Anything we can do to bring more mindful awareness to our issues can help us to heal them.

We believe in the power of holistic healing at Enlightened Solutions. Call (833) 801-LIVE for more information.

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