Tag: 12-steps

May 26, 2021

What Will Life Be Like in Recovery?

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Insights, Recovery
man-hiking-happy

This is one of the most common questions we have as newcomers: what will life be like in recovery? We all want to know what’s going to change. Everything can change in recovery, but what changes is primarily up to us. Are we willing to do things differently? It’s going to be what we make of it, but it’s going to be better by default — as long as we’re willing to do the work and stay the course. So, what will life be like in recovery? It’s still going to be life. Some things aren’t going to change much. We’ll still need to work and have shelter, friends and family, and hobbies. Sometimes things will go well, and sometimes they’ll go differently than we’d like them to. There will be joy, heartache, surprise, chaos, routine, etc. Life will still be life. Recovery offers us a daily chance to be free of our…

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April 30, 2021

Taking It One Day at a Time

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Insights, Recovery, Treatment
man-performing-yoga-on-beach-jaywalker

Pretty much everyone has heard this phrase at one time or another: “Take it one day at a time.” It’s advice that we might get at a yoga class, from a therapist, or a sympathetic friend. When we come into the rooms of recovery, we are likely to hear it more than ever before. Everybody seems to be saying it. It’s probably even on a plaque or sign somewhere in the meeting room. When we hear something often, and from multiple sources, sometimes we actually end up understanding it less. We subconsciously tune it out and ignore it without even thinking. We certainly don’t think about it or try to understand or bother taking it to heart. When something is repeated often, we start to take it for granted. “I hear it all the time, so we must all be doing it and know what it means. Right?” Not exactly….

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April 29, 2021

How Can I Be on My Own Team?

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Mental Health, Recovery, Support, Treatment
men-talking-treatment-jaywalker

Many of us are blessed with a team of “cheerleaders” behind us. There are people in our corner, people who believe in and want the best for us, who will help us when we need it, and who trust us to learn our lessons and do our best. Strangely, so many of us take these people for granted, without even realizing it. Of course, there are people we feel the same way about. We’d do anything for them, and we love when they’re happy and successful and learning and growing. We might often fail to realize just how special this is, too. This is not a guilt trip, but it’s worth taking a minute to realize just what a stark difference this is from how life was in active alcoholism and addiction. If anybody were rooting for us, we’d long ago driven them away. People in our corner had to…

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April 23, 2021

Getting Your Life Back? Don’t Skip Meetings, Please!

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Recovery, Treatment
male-halds-sitting-in-a-chair-jaywalker

It can all seem a little strange at first for those of us who are new to the rooms of recovery. However, most of us are so destroyed by alcoholism and addiction when we get here that we don’t care if it’s weird — we just don’t want to die. Many of us recognize that we’d rather live in recovery than die in our disease, so we start to do the things people in recovery do, at least a little. Of course, we usually don’t mind the “fellowshipping.” It’s not hard to hang out with other people who are a lot like us, at least in terms of our common disease and common solution. Fellowshipping isn’t too bad. We can deal with it. Then we find out there’s more. Do we need to go to meetings? Sit around and talk about our lives and feelings? Listen to other people? Share…

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April 22, 2021

I Think It’s Too Late For Me. Can I Really Start Over?

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Lifestyle, Recovery
man-holding-head-in-hands-jaywalkerlodge

First things first — it’s never too late. If you’re still breathing, there is still time left. Don’t give up hope, and don’t give up on yourself. If you’re struggling with addiction, there is a solution — and it really works! Thousands of us have been where you are now, and we are happy and whole in our lives in recovery. As far as starting over goes, life is a series of restarts. The idea of having to “start over” paints a picture that beginning again is a bad thing. But the ebb and flow of life doesn’t work like that. Just look at nature: trees fall over and die, but from the collapsed trunk, a new tree grows. We’re lucky because we don’t have to fall over or die to start anew. We can do it right now, right from wherever we are. No, it’s not too late for…

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April 6, 2021

The 4th-Step Blues: Separating Myth From Reality

Posted by Jaywalker Lodge Staff in Recovery
man-climing-trail-jaywalker

Any alcoholic or addict who has been to a few meetings or spent any time in the rooms of recovery has likely heard about the 4th-Step. The problem is, we’ve likely heard a lot about it. Not necessarily everything we hear is accurate or even the truth. Much of it gets said in meetings, is overheard during fellowshipping, or misunderstood in passing. It’s one of the most talked-about of the 12-Steps, but sometimes the messages can get mixed, and this step gets placed in a bad light. It’s not uncommon for newcomers to dread, neglect, or avoid the 4th-Step altogether, just based on things they’ve heard about it. This is a real problem. Alcoholics and addicts like us need the 12-Steps to find recovery and live our best lives. Having hearsay and misinformation potentially keep people from joining us on the road of happy destiny just won’t do. So let’s get…

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March 26, 2021

Jaywalker Programs: The Landing and the Lodge

Posted by Jaywalker in Lifestyle, Recovery
Jaywalker Lodge

Jaywalker Lodge is a special place. Perhaps we’re a little biased, but years of experience and personal understanding of recovery have helped us grow into a place that’s different in a lot of really helpful ways. At Jaywalker Lodge, our passion and sole purpose are to help men find lasting, long-term recovery. It’s a cause that we believe in with all our hearts. This may be due in part to the fact that many of us know about recovery first-hand from our own lives. We aren’t just here to help you find recovery, we’ve found it ourselves. So beyond the knowledge and expertise of addiction recovery and treatment from a professional perspective, we have a personal understanding of it as well. Now, of course, we have a multi-disciplinary staff of professionals and we have our years of hands-on experience in recovery. This all comes together to guide everything about Jaywalker…

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March 15, 2021

How Can I Be Fearless?

Posted by Jaywalker in Insights, Lifestyle
facing your fears

In pretty much every action movie ever made, the hero is somebody fearless. Sometimes the world can seem like a pretty scary place, so of course we want to be fearless. It sounds great. To never be scared of anything ever again? Sign me up! But this is real life, not an action movie. The fearlessness of, say, Wolverine isn’t really achievable. The guy is practically immortal, so there’s nothing for him to be afraid of. Do you remember the scene where Indiana Jones had to walk across the invisible bridge? That’s the kind of fearlessness we’re after. Indy was visibly frightened, but he did it anyway. He showed bravery and courage. He took a leap of faith. Sometimes we have to be fearless about taking leaps of faith in our own life, especially when it comes to our recovery and our spiritual growth. There are going to be a…

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March 12, 2021

Perfecting and Enlarging Our Spiritual Life

Posted by Jaywalker in Lifestyle, Recovery
spirituality

For many of us, our spiritual life is set on autopilot. We accept or reject a spiritual creed at some time in our youth and just leave it at that. Even for those of us who embrace spirituality, we often let it become a blank routine, like coffee every morning. We participate in it, but we’ve long since entered a headspace where we take it for granted. Here is one way in which alcoholics and addicts become lucky — we are implored to keep our spiritual life alive and thriving. Whether we embrace a spiritual or religious code or simply acknowledge a power greater than ourselves, alcoholics and addicts must jump into the waters of a rich inner life with both feet. The book Alcoholics Anonymous makes no bones about the importance of working to perfect and enlarge our spiritual life. It says, “For if an alcoholic failed to perfect and…

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March 11, 2021

What Can the 12-Steps Really Do for Me?

Posted by Jaywalker in Insights, Recovery
12-Steps

This is a really big question, and it’s got a pretty big answer. We’ll get to that shortly. This big question is probably the most common, and the truth behind the answer has to be experienced firsthand to really understand. But if you’re dying to know what the 12-Steps and the program of recovery can really do for you, look around in a meeting. You will see alcoholics and addicts who have been restored to life, who have had their attitudes and outlooks transformed, and who now enjoy freedom and recovery in a way of life that is ever-increasing in amounts of joy, purpose, and love. For many of us who come to the rooms of recovery with little to no awareness of what goes on in them, the 12-Steps can seem unrelated to our problems. We’re dying of alcoholism and addiction, our lives are in shambles, our relationships are…

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