Recovering One Step At A Time

I am no stranger to the path of recovery. I have walked it, stepped away from it, stepped back on it, moonwalked on it, and attempted to leap through it. My path had the craziest display of footprints across it. There was no pattern or organization to it. It was sporadic, much like my mindset as I was recovering.

It was the perfect representation of my mental and emotional confusion, feeling lost and unsure about where I was going or how I could get there.

All I wanted to do was be at the end as quickly as possible. I wanted to bypass all the difficult parts and leap over the discomfort and run from the gradual change straight to the place of peace I hoped was waiting for me.

However, after many attempts at that way of recovery, I learned it wasn’t possible. There is no way to go through the recovery process without struggle and without a good deal of time invested in it.

Recovery will not sustain if you do not face each step and confront all of your fears head on. Recovery has to happen one step at a time.

I had to drop the all-or-nothing thinking in my recovery. The idea I had to do everything perfectly, all at once, and always had to succeed in all I attempted or I would be a failure and not worthy of recovery had to be relinquished.

This thinking was the same type that brought me to the mental illnesses I was trying to overcome. Problems cannot be solved with the same level of thinking that created them. What I discovered as I let go of this type of distorted thinking was there are beautiful shades of gray to explore. The gray allowed me to take recovery one step at a time.

I committed myself in my recovery to doing one thing a day that scared me.

Breaking free was going to come one challenge, one overcoming, one act of insane courage at a time.

So every night before I went to bed, I took a moment to choose my challenge for the next day. I would envision myself doing it and succeeding. I would think of the thoughts and the emotions that may arise and practiced how I would handle them. I mentally put myself in the situation to help me prepare for the real thing.

I am a firm believer that we create our tomorrows today.

What I put out in the world in this moment about the outcome of my tomorrow has the power to manifest exactly as I envision. If I create success today in my challenge for tomorrow, I have the empowerment within me to make it happen. If I believe I can’t and carry the negative mindset with me, I am setting myself up to fail. Believing I could do it already put me halfway there. The other half rested in me gathering up on my courage and taking the step forward.

Making simple changes every day made all the difference.

One encouraged another and with time and patience, I found myself further on my path of recovery than ever before. Every move was a fresh start. Every step was strengthening my legs to make another and empowered me to keep walking. Every accomplishment served as a reminder of the life waiting for me at the other end, a life I had forgotten could actually exist, as I was so focused on the disorders themselves.

It is not about where you are walking from.

We put so much emphasis on what we are recovering from, always looking back, and still connecting ourselves to our past. We need to redirect our focus to where we are walking to. What are we recovering to? What is it we are after and what will we become? Reframing it puts the emphasis on the beauty of why we are fighting and is our reminder of why we are enduring the hard times by walking this path every day, step by step.

To picture what is waiting for you at the end of the road is the motivation to take another movement forward.

You have the amazing ability to create with your life what you envision in your mind when you think of recovery. You have the power to be walking towards a life full of love, bliss, hope, and fulfilled dreams. That thought alone is what kept me putting one foot in front of the other, even in the most trying times.

We do not need to be trapped where we stand today.

If you want to change, it is in you to do so. One step forward at a time, you can be transformed and renewed. We all have the strength within us to change and the capability to use it. It is just our decision whether or not to harness our potential and do something different to change our current circumstances.

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing, and I wanted to be the proud owner of a bold life. That is why I vowed to face a fear every day that would move me forward. I am being changed by what is challenging me, and I love the woman I am transforming into.

I cannot wait to look back in another year and wonder what I was so afraid of as I am living a brave life.

I encourage you to join me in the challenge. Face a fear every day. Take one step towards recovery every day. The courageous heart already exists in you to do it. Let it guide you.

Jenna Laird

Jenna is a certified life coach at Amina Life Coaching specializing in helping young women step into authenticity and love who they are; a practice she knows about after going through her own journey to uncover her true self after a 15 year battle with anorexia, anxiety, OCD, and depression. Her mission in life is to turn her pain into purpose by sharing her story to give hope to others and be a light in the darkness of mental illness. Jenna is a firm believer that you are not what you have done or what labels people give you. You are what you choose to become from the trials. One act of letting go at a time, Jenna is choosing every day to transform into the woman she has envisioned in her heart that will carry her into a life of health, love, fulfilled dreams, and infinite hope.