Understanding Spiritual Development During Addiction Treatment
Spiritual development is often one of those things that is often scoffed at, particularly when people are new to recovery. However, it doesn’t stop most of the rehabilitation programs across the nation from having a heavy emphasis on spiritual connection, development, and intrapersonal growth. Even rehabilitation centers and programs that aren’t faith-based will call spiritual recovery in development into focus.
So why is it so important to form a type of spiritual connection or recovery while you’re in addiction treatment? Many people cite that on a psychological level, addiction makes a person unable to be spiritual or feel connected with the world around them. What that stems from is the selfishness of addiction and the disassociation of the needs of the people around them and their local community, even if that community is just their close family. Contact our Carolina rehabilitation experts today.
Understanding Spiritual Development
Addicts are master manipulators because they need to feel in control, have intense cravings, and often are stuck in a perpetuated state of desperation. Those factors work together to turn wonderful people into those who would manipulate their spouse, sibling, parent, and close friends. Desperation takes over, and people lose a sense of morality or a need to assess their own actions.
Whereas almost every form of spiritualism calls upon the person to be responsible for their impact on the people around them. Most forms of religion bring the focus of a person’s actions impacting not just those closest to them but their community and the world as a whole.
Although spiritualism and religion in various forms both call attention to what the individual owes to the greater whole, spiritual development is also largely selfish. However, it’s selfish in a way that enables the individual to develop skills and values that perpetuate them into a greater sense of self.
It is important to note that spiritual development, whether it is secular or otherwise, is a lifelong process which brings it hand in hand with sobriety. There is no fast track to enlightenment or connection with a higher power, just like there’s not a fast track to living a sober life.
Assessing Spirituality in AA and Similar Groups
Is AA a religious group? A Journal entitled Addiction looked carefully at whether Alcoholics Anonymous identified as a religious or spiritual group. Alcoholics Anonymous and other Anon groups largely depend on what is called the Big Book. The Big Book Has many references to Christianity and urges members to cultivate a connection with God. But AA started in 1951 when Christianity was still extraordinarily prominent across the country.
Now, if you attend Al-Anon or other Anon groups, you may have realized that there’s a heavier emphasis on connecting with “something bigger than yourself.” That idea that you can connect with something or a network larger than your individual person is largely the foundation for spiritual or religious beliefs. However, modern Anon groups leave this open to developing connections within a community or your family and not explicitly about devoting yourself to a religion.
But scientific research has shown that people who report having a connection to something bigger, a spiritual element to their lives, or religious beliefs lead happier lives. People may be skeptical about the prevalence of spirituality in addiction recovery, but science backs up that happy people feel connected to something.
Explore Your Core and Values
After months or years in addiction, many recovering addicts report that they don’t even know who they are anymore. This may sound familiar. You and many others who have suffered addiction may have spent large amounts of time living under a label that did not match your identity. The result is that you have lost sight of your values and the core of your personality.
Exploring and understanding what matters to you can be the determining factor in whether you can continue to lead a sober life or not.
Build a Stronger Life with Rehab Carolinas
At Rehab Carolinas, we focus on helping our patients build a stronger life for themselves. Often are individual rehabilitation plans focus on therapy, building skills to handle triggers and addiction, and personal development. That personal development can include spiritual development, or even developing a religious connection, but we put that decision into your hands.
Working with Rehab Carolinas is about developing the tools to lead a sober life. Through therapy and working within a community, you can understand how your personal core and your values shape how you interact and engage with the world around you. That understanding and that level of control can help you devote your life to sobriety rather than living under the chains of addiction for years or decades into the future.