POSITVE ADDICTIONS
In these trying economic times, when most of us struggle with our businesses and personal lives, there’s a tendency to lose our way and feel like a failure. When times are tough, “the tough get going” and I hope the following will give you insight into strategies used by many successful people. What is success? It can be defined in many ways as a level of social status, achievement of an objective/goal and the opposite of failure. Small successes build on each other by improving our self-esteem, giving us a sense of well being and motivating us to strive for other goals. No matter how small the achievement, the results are the same.
First, we all want to be loved and to feel worthwhile. When we don’t get what we want, we either have the strength to try again or we don’t. Thousands of us give up, by saying, “Why try? I’d just fail” or “It’s my ex-husband’s fault” or some other similar rationalization. When giving up and giving excuses don’t remove the pain (of not achieving love, worth, success), we may turn to psychiatric symptoms, such as depression, rebelling, going crazy, psychosomatic complaints, or addiction to drugs, alcohol, or food. Painful as these conditions are, they are less painful than facing the fact that we have failed and given up on obtaining love, self-worth and success.
There’s an amazing book, written by William Glasser, who believes there are other addictive activities that give us strength: jogging, meditating, writing a diary, exercising, relaxing, and so on. These are called positive addictions. I have his book “Positive Addictions” and refer to it often. The entire purpose of creating positive addictions is so you believe you have the power to direct and control your own life. I could write a book about the word control but in this context, it refers only to controlling our lives, rather than allowing life and excuses to control us.
There are thousands of joggers, bikers, meditators, relaxers, journal writers, exercisers, and other users of positive addictions, who claim great benefits. They claim to get more results than just feeling better and getting pleasure; they claim greater self-confidence, more energy, better imagination and ideas, more frustration tolerance and so on.
I suggest you start by dedicating one hour a day to stretching exercises, to pampering yourself and/or relaxing/meditating. Make this a routine that you stick to, no matter what activities you chose. It takes 21 days to create a habit or break a habit, so do this for 21 days without fail. For the full effect of positive addictions, it takes six months to a year of activity doing these things one hour every day to develop a strength-giving addiction. The activities should be done alone and you can’t make any demands of yourself. In other words, do it without judging yourself as being good or bad at the activities, just make them a part of your regular, daily routine.
Years ago, a psychologist explained a profound thought to me. “The best way to learn anything is to teach it to other people. The more often you share something with others, the more likely that information will be reinforced in your own life”. I’ve recently struggled with the same doubts and fears described above and hope by sharing the concept of positive addictions with you, I will reinforce it in my own life. I welcome your suggestions or comments on the subject. Please share with others, who may need support or solutions for coping with problems.
