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The Importance of Solitude for Healing

Many of us struggling with addictive behaviors and issues with our mental and emotional health often find ourselves in toxic relationships, fear-based relationship patterns, and unhealthy interpersonal dynamics. Many of us have a very hard extricating ourselves from unhealthy relationships, and many of us fear being alone. Whatever our addiction story entails, many would agree on just how hard it can be to be alone, and also on how important solitude is for healing.

When in a co-dependent relationship, it can be easy to forsake some of your identity for the sake of the partnership. For some of us, we give up our identities entirely, and the relationship is our main focal point, or worse, our obsession. It can be nearly impossible to focus on your own healing when thinking of yourself not as your individual self but as this other person’s partner. We might start to think of ourselves only in terms of the relationship, rather than all the things that made up our personality before the relationship: our interests and passions, our goals and dreams. Instead we have become simply this person’s partner, and our true self no longer exists for us. The problems in the relationship become all-consuming, and we consistently prioritize the other person and the relationship over our own health, wellness, even safety. Perhaps we totally lose interest in our lives. Perhaps we feel we can’t live without this other person, and the thought of losing them sends us into despair. It is safe to say we have become reliant on this other person, on this relationship, and on our current life circumstances to define us. The status of our relationship determines our self-worth, and if we are at odds in our partnership and we don’t have the strength of our inner power to bolster us, we just fall apart. We analyze everything through the lens of the relationship and prioritize the conflict, the issues, the drama over our own inner peace.

As we continue to generate more inner turmoil, we come to see that our circumstances are reflecting that turmoil. Eventually, for many of us, we feel enough is enough, and that we can no longer withstand it. That is when we opt for what many of us knew we needed all along, solitude.

Solitude can be daunting and even terrifying when you’ve been emotionally dependent upon other people for so long, but it allows you to do the hard work of going inward to process your pain and fears, to sit with yourself and grow stronger in your sense of self, to ground and center yourself in your purpose. Your time in solitude can help you to discover new healing tools you might not otherwise have been open to receiving. Be brave and know that you have the power to do what is best for yourself.

We listen, and we understand. Many of us have personal experience with recovery. Enlightened Solutions offers therapy, mentoring, and friendship. Contact us today.

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