Tips for Getting Through the Holidays Sober

The holidays can be extremely challenging for anyone trying to recover from alcohol or drug addiction. “Instead of the '12 Days of Christmas,' it was more like the '12 Days of Relapse Temptations,' wrote one blogger about her first sober holiday. 

So how do you get through the holidays sober? Here are a few tips that have worked for others in recovery. Take a look and see if they’ll work for you, too:  

• Identify your personal triggers. Recognizing and planning for triggers is a crucial part of relapse prevention. Do certain people, places, movies or songs stir memories of the times you were using? Make a list and share it with family and sober friends and/or your addiction counselor. Together, you can figure out how to avoid and/or manage these culprits. 
• Ask for help. Isolating yourself is perhaps the worst thing you can do this holiday season. Instead, reach out to loved ones and recovery peers to help you through the season. Attend support groups (online or in-person) and/or organize sober get-togethers with those closest to you. By surrounding yourself with those who support your recovery efforts, you are putting yourself in a position to succeed.
• Lend a hand. For many folks in recovery, helping out those less fortunate is a win-win during the holidays. You’ll make a positive impact in someone else’s life and be reminded of how far you’ve come and how thankful you should be. Some ideas: Volunteer at a local homeless shelter, wrap gifts at a nearby hospital or support someone else who is trying to recover from addiction.
• Flex your “no” muscle. It’s okay (and necessary) to turn down invitations to festivities that could trigger relapse. And, if the host is truly a friend, he or she will fully understand and support your commitment to your recovery. 
• Get moving. Exercising during recovery is a great way to reduce stress and build-up your self-esteem so you’re calm and focused on enjoying the festivities without alcohol or drugs. 
• Start a daily gratitude ritual. Over the next few days, wake up and write down one thing for which you’re truly grateful. Many people in recovery say practicing gratitude can help set the tone for a positive holiday. And, if it works, why not carry it into the New Year and beyond.
• Get in the spirit. Being sober during the holidays shouldn’t stop you from having fun! Bake some cookies, go for a hike, invite a friend for hot chocolate or check out a new movie — the possibilities are endless. Go ahead and build some new sober memories this holiday season. 

Wishing you joy, peace, happiness and lasting sobriety! 

Ready to Begin Recovery? 
If you feel it’s time for a new beginning, don’t let the holidays stand in your way. At Complete Harmony, we can tailor a treatment program to meet your needs at any time of year. To learn more, call 866-930-4673.

Meditating for Warmth and Gratitude This Season

We’ve talked about the importance of meditation for addiction recovery. To recap: A few of the many benefits include: 

• Better focus
• Increased self-awareness
• Improved impulse control
• Reduced anxiety
• Deeper spiritual connection

But did you know that meditation can also help you ward off the winter blues? Studies show that meditation can help improve connections in the brain to help us process emotions. What’s more, the right type of meditation can provide warmth and gratitude – the perfect combo to brighten your mood and help you feel abundant during the winter months.

NBC.com recently published meditation and mindful tips from Dina Kaplan, founder of The Path Meditation, designed to channel gratitude – even when you’re cold and sad. Below is a summary; give it a try or use it as a starting point to create your own. 

• Take your focus off the parts of your body that are cold (like your hands or feet) and turn your attention to an area that feels warm. For example, if you’re wearing a cozy sweater, feel the warmth of your arms. How does it feel? Examine the sensation.
• Now take a moment to be grateful for your warm sweater and be grateful for yourself for putting it on this morning.
• Engage your sense of sight. Do you see holiday decorations or leaves on the ground or an ornate architectural detail you’ve never noticed? What colors do you see around you? Admire the beauty of any nature or craftsmanship in your field of vision.
• Now take a moment to be grateful for all nature, colors and details and your fortune to notice and admire them.
• Tap into your sense of smell. Can you detect a nearby house fire or coffee from a café? Again, be grateful for all the delicious smells in your environment.
• Now go back to your sense of feeling. And ask yourself the following: What does your warm clothing feel like on your body? What does the ground feel like under your shoes? What do your shoes feel like on your feet? 
• Let the warm sensation of gratitude fill you up as you continue to light up your senses and enjoy the holiday season.

Finding Holistic Treatment for You
At Complete Harmony, we encourage the use of many different cutting-edge techniques to help clients heal the mind, body and spirit, including mediation. To learn more about our treatment center and our approach to addiction recovery, call today: 866-930-4673.

Why You Should Embrace Being Uncomfortable

We likely don’t have to tell you that the recovery process is far from an easy journey. It’s a challenge and you ‘ll likely feel uncomfortable along the way – from detox, or talking about your history of addiction to a counselor, or trying a new holistic treatment, or making amends or socializing without the crutch of drugs or alcohol. 

Whatever the cause, learning to be comfortable with the uncomfortable parts of recovery is a crucial step toward successfully living clean and healthy. Think about it. If everything came easy, if you were never challenged, if you only remained in your comfort zone, you likely wouldn’t even be in rehab today. You can’t grow and improve without being a little uncomfortable.

In fact, millions of successful people – inside and out of the recovery community – swear by this strategy to successfully achieve their goals. The first step: just show up. 

That’s right. Just by seeking help for your addiction, you’re already beginning to learn. It’s never comfortable or easy to start something new and you may even reach a point when you want to quit. Don’t. This is the time to push yourself past your comfort zone and remind yourself that you’re committed to your recovery and there’s no turning back.

But how do you do this? Some experts say to “fake it to you make it.” In other words, you might be thinking to yourself “I can’t do this.” “I don’t know what I’m doing.” “I’ve never done this before.”

Here’s where you can teach yourself to fake confidence. Try a little positive self-talk: “I can do this.” “I'm a quick study.” “I’ll get the hang of this in no time.”

This is also when your support network really counts. Share your uncomfortable stories with your recovery peers, friends and family. Talking about these experiences with others will help put things in perspective and you’ll likely learn some new strategies for being more comfortable in these situations, too.

And, above all, remind yourself that recovery takes time and confidence comes from practice. Each time you push yourself beyond your comfort zone, you’re one step closer to overcoming the challenges of lasting sobriety. 

Holistic Addiction Treatment by the Sea

Located at our beautiful beach community retreat in Southern California, Complete Harmony serves individuals seeking an alternative to conventional drug and alcohol recovery. To begin your journey toward mindful empowerment, call today: 866-930-4673.

Tips to Stay in the Present

In today’s busy world, it’s all too easy to get distracted from the present and what’s truly important – namely, your recovery. And while it’s pretty easy to be mindful for a few moments, it takes discipline to bring mindfulness into your every day. 

Luckily, a little training can help you build your mindfulness muscle. And once you develop the skill, you can make it a regular part of your daily journey toward sobriety. 

Here are few tips to help you stay in the present: 

Get familiar with your negative feelings. A big part of mindfulness is paying close attention to your thoughts and feelings without judging or trying to fix them. Take time to think about the feelings that tend to cloud your thinking and distract you from the present moment. You may even consider jotting them down so you can refer to the list as a reminder. For example, a few common recovery emotions you may be struggling with include:  

• Anxiety
• Regret
• Guilt
• Fear
• Loneliness

Question your thoughts constantly. You’ll need to flex your mindfulness muscle daily to keep it strong, so this means making an effort to always question (and then let go of) any negative thoughts – especially the ones that get in the way of a healthy recovery. 

Count your breaths. The simple act of focusing on your breath will help you focus on staying in the present. The next time you feel distracted, give it a try: Close your eyes and take a deep breath in for the count of four. Now,  exhale slowly for a count of four. 

Create visual reminders. Whether you tie a string around your finger, wear an elastic around your wrist or hang a few post-it notes in everyday places, visual reminders will help you snap back into the present moment. 

Finding Holistic Treatment for You
At Complete Harmony, we encourage the use of many different cutting-edge techniques to help clients heal the mind, body and spirit, including acupuncture, yoga, mediation, massage therapy, and others. To learn more about our treatment center and our approach to addiction recovery, call today: 866-930-4673.

What You Should Look for In Recovery Friends

Forming the right friendships is an important step in your recovery. Your new sober life should be fulfilling, and sober friends can help make that so by providing support, connection, and fun. 

Having sober friends is also an integral part of your emotional health and reintegration into society. Making friends will teach you to relate to others without the crutch of alcohol or drugs. 

On the flip side, hanging out with the wrong peers can threaten your hard-won sobriety. Especially during early recovery, you might need a little help deciphering healthy from unhealthy relationships. 

Positive Friend Qualities
Any new friend should be supportive of your sobriety and share similar goals and values. This will help ensure that you stick to healthy habits and stay motivated to reach your recovery goals and follow your sober dreams. Other positive qualities to look for in a new sober friend include:

• Honesty and trustworthiness
• Kindness
• Compassion
• Self-awareness
• Dependability
• Non-judgmental
• Good listening skills
• Strong understanding of personal boundaries
• Healthy sense of humor
• Supportive and encouraging
• Able to express emotions and feelings in an honest and direct way

Friendship Red flags

In addition to looking for positive qualities and personality traits, it’s also helpful to ask yourself the following questions while getting to know a new friend: 

• Is this person reliable or dependable?
• Do I feel better or worse when I’m with this person?
• Does this person make me feel insecure?
• Do I feel controlled or manipulated in any way?
• Is this person jealous or possessive?
• Do I have any concerns about this relationship?

Relapse Prevention at Complete Harmony
From identifying high-risk relationships to learning mindfulness techniques that center you, our relapse prevention and aftercare planning will empower you and slowly eliminate the dangerous urge to self-medicate. To learn more, call today: 866-930-4673.

Healthy Activities for Fall

Fall is filled with an abundance of healthy activities that suit the season and your recovery goals. Here are a few ways to take advantage of the many ways autumn can strengthen your body and mind as you work hard this season to get (and stay) sober.  

• Rake some leaves. This fall chore happens to be a great workout. For added fun and calorie burn: Jump in the piles a few times or recruit some friends and have relays around bagging the leaves. 
• Cook up some healthy fall treats. Roast some fall veggies like Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes or whip up a light butternut squash soup. For a healthful dessert, pop some apples in the oven and sprinkle with some cinnamon. 
• Go for a long hike. Time spent with Mother Nature has been study-proven to calm activity in a part of the brain linked to mental illness and reduce your mind’s propensity to “ruminate” — or focus on negative, self-focused patterns linked with anxiety and depression.
• Play a pick-up game. The benefits of playing flag football or soccer with a group of friends or recovery peers are double-duty: You’ll get in a good workout and socialize. 
• Make time to volunteer. There’s nothing like cooler temperatures to remind you about the importance of helping others who lack hot food and a warm place to sleep. Volunteer at a nearby shelter or participate in a coat drive -- any good deed to give back and remind you to be grateful for what you have. 

Tis the Season for Recovery
If you or a loved one is searching for an addiction treatment program that blends conventional and alternative strategies for healing, our team can help. Nurturing mind, body, and spirit, we provide a continuum of treatment for residents and outpatients. Call Complete Harmony today: 866-930-4673.

The Stages of Change

Successful addiction recovery requires change – a change in your mindset, behaviors, actions, feelings, goals, relationship with yourself and others – and you’ll experience these changes in different stages. 

Most successful self-changers go through the stages three or four times before they make it through the cycle of change without at least one slip, according to the experts at SMART Recovery®, who describes the stages of change as follows: 

• Precontemplation Stage: People in the pre-contemplation stage of change usually show up in therapy because of pressures from family, friends, employers, or courts.  They tend change the topic of conversation when others address their problem and place blame and responsibility on factors like genetics, family, society, destiny, the police, etc. 
• Contemplation Stage: Contemplators may feel like “I want to stop feeling so stuck!” In other words, they have come to acknowledge that they have a problem but struggle to understand its causes and wonder about possible solutions. People in this stage may be researching addiction and treatment.
• Preparation Stage: Most people in the preparation stage are planning to take action and are likely making final adjustments before they take action to change their behavior. Still, individuals in this stage may need a little convincing. 
• Action Stage: This stage requires the greatest commitment of time and energy. During this stage, people overtly modify their behavior and their surroundings and change becomes more visible to others.
• Maintenance Stage: This stage helps to prevent relapse or return to the precontemplation or contemplation stage. After all, change never ends with action, notes the experts at SMART Recovery®.

Begin SMART Recovery® at Complete Harmony

SMART Recovery® is ideal for men and women seeking an alternative to the 12-step approach to addiction treatment. At Complete Harmony, our team will help you determine whether this type of addiction recovery program is right for you. To learn more, call today: 866-930-4673.