Core values to guide recovery are often different from person to person. Different people have different reasons for abusing substances. As a result, the bedrock values a recovering substance abuser must embody might change from person to person.
But there are values common to many substance abusers in the midst of successful recovery. These values are familiar to people who aren’t substance abusers themselves. They are common amongst successful and well-adjusted people everywhere.
Certainly, one of the core values to guide recovery, vigilance is an absolute necessity for most substance abusers. Successfully resisting the sometimes constant temptation to relapse requires vigilance against triggers that might endanger our sobriety. We must be vigilant to avoid the triggers in the first place and, in the unfortunate event we come across them, we must be vigilant to fight the resulting temptation.
Also, we can’t be temporarily vigilant. A constant state of vigilance is required to guard against the consistent possibility that a single slip could interrupt months or years of recovery.
Another of the core values to guide recovery, responsibility requires us to take ownership of our own choices and behaviors. We can’t blame others or our circumstances for our predicaments. Everyone has a reason to get high or drunk, and most people don’t take it.
A sense of personal responsibility helps to insulate us from self-defeating and self-pitying logic. If we’re not getting down on ourselves about the unfair hand we’ve been dealt, we’re more likely to resist the urge to fall back into old habits.
Finally, forgiveness requires us to let go of our past failings and focus on what we can do to change ourselves for the better. Many of us have made countless mistakes and bad choices. We may have hurt others. We’ve probably hurt ourselves.
But recovery requires that we leave those bad choices in the past. We can learn from those choices, but we can’t dwell on them. We can change our behavior but we can’t change the past.
The list of core values to guide recovery is much longer than the one we’ve included above. We could add Compassion, intelligence, strength, and determination to the list and it still wouldn’t be complete. Recovering substance abusers demonstrate many laudable qualities as they fight to remain clean and sober.
That’s why we at San Antonio Recovery Center care so much. We know how hard substance abusers work to get and stay clean and sober. So we want to work just as hard to help them. We offer many comprehensive and affordable treatment options, including:
We design our programs to assist the whole person, rather than just a constellation of symptoms. We treat our patients’ bodies, minds, emotions, and spirits to help them win the battle against addiction and relapse. If you’d like some help with your own fight, give us a call at 866.957.7885. We want to help.
contact us now!
