What is Mindfulness?
“Mindfulness is not just being present in the moment. Mindfulness is how am I present in the moment in a way that aligns with my values? Knowing what I’m doing, why I’m doing it, whether it’s healthy or not, whether it supports the person I want to be. In other words, it’s really living with intention and purpose and aware of when we get off track.”
Madeline Says Emotions are Difficult in Addiction
Often times emotions are difficult to communicate with one’s self.
It blocks us from our values because we cannot honestly cope or face what is in front of us. Madeline talks about how these emotions and how they can bubble up.
“My addiction journey has run back a couple of years. I’d say about three and a half. My dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer when I was 14 and shortly after that I started using so my dad’s illness and my illness have gone hand in hand and I was an IV heroin user. Things progressed super fast. You know, when you remove the drugs and alcohol, the solution, all of those feelings start bubbling up and it’s like the dam has been broken down and it’s just this flood of emotion. And those were emotions that I didn’t know how to cope with, because I hadn’t for such a long time.”
Don’t Obey Every Thought
“Now when I spent years chasing after that sense of relief that comes from alcohol and drugs. I am still very driven by those feelings of insecurity, of not being good enough of having to achieve, of having to overachieve. So the mindfulness approach is really giving me a freedom that I’ve never really found. It never really occurred to me that I did not have to obey every thought that I had. And when I say I was a prisoner, I meant most of the time my mind just drug me around everywhere I went. It was think, feel, react, think, feel, react.”
Living in Alignment with Your Values
In our addiction, we don’t live in alignment with the true values that we hold dear. Our sense of well-being just erodes and deteriorates. Everyone comes in with the center critique and shame and guilt and all these emotions around their addiction. A lot of the stories that they’re telling themselves are things they’ve been telling themselves since childhood, and we have to really identify what that is and just leave them on the side of the road and they will come back. However, with a mindfulness practice, we can say, “Hey, that’s my inner critic!” and we get people to name their inner critic and externalize it and really make it something that’s an external thing. And it’s not running the show anymore.
Mindfulness in Recovery: Opening Doors to Recovery
John Bruna, the co-founder of Mindfulness in Recovery®, teaches mindfulness curriculum that helps our clients discover deeper healing.
“What I do now with Mindfulness in Recovery® is try to open doors for people, to find a way of living that honors their values and helps them be the good person they want to be. So I’m all my years of recovery, I’ve never met another human being that deep down, didn’t want to be a good human being. But I haven’t met a lot just like me that didn’t know how just yet.”
Teaching You to Live a Mindful Life in Sobriety
At Renewal Lodge, we integrated mindfulness, the 12 Steps and clinical therapy. We are teaching clients how to live a mindful life in sobriety.
