IT IS TIME TO START LIVING RATHER THAN JUST SURVIVING

New Year, New Me! Come on, I guarantee I am not the only one that has used this cute cliche as the new year begins. I said it with pure motives, and I always believed that this would be the year I would conquer every one of my resolutions, Unfortunately I always found myself back to the "New Year, Old Me" before the month ended. So, what was different about 2023? To be honest, I still made a list of New Year's Resolutions that I didn't keep. I didn't join the gym, I wasn't able to quit drinking coffee or eating chocolate, my bank account still isn't ready for retirement, and the addict in my life spent a good portion of the year in an inpatient recovery facility. But in the midst of my unmet expectations one thing happened that I never saw coming. I began my own recovery and through it learned to start living rather than just surviving.

Anything in life worth having takes work, and recovery has been no different. I wish I could have walked into my first meeting broken and walked out healed and whole but without the work, there would not have been any growth. It was day by day, meeting by meeting, phone call after phone call, devotion after devotion, and prayer after prayer that the change began to happen. At the end of each meeting everyone would grab hands in a circle and say, "Keep coming back, it works if you work it", and they were right.  My favorite recovery slogan became "Live and Let Live", and I started letting it change my mindset. I have often heard that lasting change must begin in the mind, so I had to gain an understanding of the words before I walked them out. The first "Live" in the slogan was for me, and the "Let Live" was for my addict. What that would look like would take me months to figure out.

Most of us living with an addicted loved one, even if they are in recovery, have fallen into a caretaker role. Even if we didn't realize what we were doing, we have become the enable, rescuer, and most destructively the enforcer. How could I live my own life if I was using all my energy to control his. Then one day while I was praying, I felt like God was telling me to give him some rope. I thought that sounded like a great idea, because I had a LOT of ideas what could be done with that rope. I'm pretty sure my ideas were not aligning with God’s, so I decided to give him some rope, and let God take over from there. That meant hands off for me, and it released me from the caretaker role. I became aware that if my addict never experienced the consequences of his actions change would most likely never happen. You can't control anyone, but you can sure make yourself miserable trying. I learned to detach not from the person, but from the situation and I finally had the peace I was so desperately searching for.

Now it was time for my "Live" and to determine what that would look like. It started with taking care of myself first. I know that may sound selfish, but if I'm not okay then no-one will be okay. You can't pour from an empty pitcher, so I began the process of filling my own pitcher. I learned through meditating on God's word that it was okay to love myself. Mark 12: 30-31 says "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as YOURSELF.' There is no commandment greater than these." God is not just suggesting we love ourselves; he is commanding us to. I began to focus on my own physical, emotional, and spiritual needs and the change began to happen. This will look different for everyone, but for me I began enjoying hobbies I forgot I had. I started my Blog. My attendance at church became more consistent. I began an exercise program. I took on a service role in my recovery group. I began attending more weekly recovery meetings. I even went back to my old job that I loved.

So yes, this year is a "New Year, New Me", but it didn't start with a list of unrealistic resolutions. In contrast, it started with the realization that I was powerless over addiction and my life had become unmanageable. Today I encourage you to begin your path of self-care. There is no better day than today to begin your own recovery, even if your addict is not ready to start theirs.