Many people who live life one day at a time are active participants in living. Life requires action and healthy action becomes the gift of doing. In our wellness we can do one day at a time a little better than we did when we kept our focus on yesterday or tomorrow. Neither yesterday or tomorrow is a place where we need to live in today. We need to do today, today. What we know is yesterday has given us the knowledge and the skills to live contentedly in today. This is the reality of growth. Yesterday has taught us how to prepare for the future and we do so by doing what needs to be done today. Every good tomorrow is often the result of the preparation and planning of yesterday’s today. Yesterday, today and tomorrow are important. When we understand this we understand the importance of living and doing in today. Yesterday’s struggles prepared us for today. Tomorrow’s dreams were prepared and conceived in the gifts of today’s doing. Nothing was perfect. Nothing will be perfect. When we realize this today’s healthy actions become the gift of doing. We find living wellness in today. It’s important. Peace.
There is a realization that comes to people in one day at a time recovery. This realization is that life is good. A realization that many of us have is that we find reality and we realize that we are not fundamentally different from others. We breathe, we eat, and we sleep. Though many of us feel like we’re different we are all fundamentally the same. Again – we breathe, we eat, and we sleep. We do gravitate towards people who share similarities with us because we all need love and belonging. People in one day at a time recovery know that life is good. We all have to adapt to difficult situations. We understand reality and being reasonably happy. The reality that we have found has also shown us we can be happy, joyous, and free. Joy does happen. Welcome to reality one day at a time. Be grateful. Peace.
Some people living in one day at a time recovery might of have the opportunities of listening to our loved ones express tirades of trouble after we repeatedly and repeatedly refused to get help for our realities of living in active addiction and the pain and discomfort that we were causing for not only them but ourselves too. This usually occurs at interventions in which they are actually attempting to tell us that we are actually killing ourselves. Much frustration has led up to such action but in all reality they are telling us that they love us. When we understand this maybe, just maybe, we’ll accept the help we need. Perhaps then we will understand the reality of one day at a time recovery and the wellness that comes with it. Peace.
For most of us living in one day at a time recovery we understand that finding and living in recovery is a reality for everyone. Recovery is not limited to only white, straight, evangelical Christian men just like hitting bottom is not limited to only white, straight, evangelical Christian men. One day at a time recovery is recovery and bottoming out is bottoming out. When we understand this we will understand that we are all inextricably connected to each other and that many people living in recovery actually live in glass houses. We really don’t want to throw stones do we. A one day at a time reality check teaches us this. Peace.
Many people who are new to living in one day at a time recovery take a few minutes of quiet time and put their thoughts and their feelings down on paper shortly after they have risen to face the day. Often they will do a list of what they plan or need to do for the day. The reality of this brainstorming session is to keep the day simple. When we finish such tasks we will feel a sense of accomplishment be they work responsibilities or leisure activities. This is a simple effective way of helping us organize our day. It’s a tool of recovery. It keeps us in our current twenty-four hour period. Peace.
Many people living in one day at a time recovery understand when the stressors and worries of tomorrow are interfering with today we are in all reality not living in today. A cold cruel truth in radical acceptance can lead us to what can be perceived as a defeating and morbid thought which is that no-one is promised tomorrow. In radical reality we know that this is true but many of us live as if there is hope for tomorrow and if there is hope for tomorrow, we do what we can to prepare us for tomorrow while we are living in today. The simple acts of living in today, and doing what we must do today can prepare us to do what we need to do today for today and tomorrow so that both today and tomorrow will be doable. The simple acts of participation in today’s works can ease the realities of stress and worry. Perhaps then we can find the calm. We also know the reality of reaching out when we are simply overwhelmed. At times we need to seek professional help or we could need the help of family and/or friends. Stress is often a contributing factor in relapse. The sooner we reach out for the better. We all deserve to live healthy and doable lives. Again reach out. It gives us choices and in our choices we find our freedom from active addiction one day at a time. It’s a better reality. Peace.
Those of us who live in one day at a time recovery understand that we sometimes feel perplexed and that we sometimes feel amazed. There are even times that we feel both perplexed and amazed at the same time. We can feel perplexed because the bondage of self drives us into a world of complete defeat causing active addiction which seems to be rooted in countless amounts of self-centered fear. In another reality we were amazed that this self-centered fear led us into one day at a time recovery. In other words we reached out for help. We were soon to learn that God, the spirit, or the universe solidified our recovery through the actions and words of other people and we learned to follow suit. We discovered that we were recipients of grace. We said to ourselves, “Why me?” and “Why me?”. We discovered that we can feel perplexed and amazed at the same time. When this happens we usually get to understand gratitude and we continue to live in one day at a time recovery because of it. Something has transformed the bondage of self into the reality of self-obsessive freedom and it can be kind of amazing. We have shaken hands with our shadow self. Peace.
As we begin to grow in one day at a time recovery we begin to understand the necessity of hitting the reset button for the second time in sequences of resetting it again and again while trying to navigate the realities and adversities of life. One of the reasons we need to reset and reset and reset again is we foolishly think that anxiety will always be kicking our butt. And perhaps it has or perhaps it will but hopefully we learn to keep our eyes on the prize. The prize is that we live day after day while remaining abstinent from our addiction and in all reality we learn that we have coped and continue to cope with anxiety even though when we are in our struggles it doesn’t seem like it. We have learned to reach out for support (peer and professional) and we have discovered its benefits. When we adapt to hitting the reset button for the second time in sequences of again and again we learn the reality of our growth and we give ourselves credit where credit is due. We need to know this. Peace.
Many people living in one day at a time recovery know the reality of hitting the reset button. The first time we do this is because addiction has made our lives unmanageable. This often happens in our twenties or early thirties but in all reality it can happen at any age. The troubles we have or the trouble we are in lead us to seek for help. If we find solid recovery many of us free a sigh of release (thank God we are alive and thank God for one day at a time recovery). It was our bottom that brought us to recovery and a solid recovery at that. Life is good. We have learned a shaded reality of ourselves that is enough to create manageable lives. We learn how to be grateful which is important. We find peace.
Many of us living in one day at a time recovery know that one day at a time recovery is actually having the opportunity to hold that tiny bit of magic in our hands from time to time to time. The magic is that we get to live in abstinence from our addiction which creates a freedom few of us really know how to appreciate. This is the freedom for one day and one day only that we do not have to live in constant struggle with ourselves in which we have to choose whether to pick up and use or whether we have to pick up the phone and reach out for help. Many of us choose to pick up the phone. In doing so we experience that tiny bit of magic which many of us call grace. It keeps us free from active addiction. We’ve found hope. Peace.