Holidays, Loneliness, Self Soothing - How Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years affect Addiction and Recovery

Imagine the holiday season not as a time of joy, but as an emotional labyrinth for those navigating addiction recovery. Feelings of isolation can intensify as Thanksgiving fades and the more intimate holidays of Christmas and New Year's approach, leaving many feeling stranded without close family ties or a partner to celebrate with. This episode explores these emotional complexities and offers strategies to connect with supportive communities, like the Recovery Freedom Circle, to help foster a sense of belonging. We discuss how spiritual activities can provide solace and connection during these challenging times, shifting the focus from loneliness to community and healing.

The holidays can be a minefield of temptations for those in recovery, from alcohol and gambling to more dangerous substances. We tackle the pitfalls of holiday excess and emphasize staying grounded in your emotions to enjoy life without overindulgence. Don't let the festive season derail your progress; we provide resources through our YouTube channel and podcasts, encouraging a transformative journey with our 18-week Recovery Freedom Circle program. Start the new year with a renewed sense of purpose and connection, working towards personal growth, recovery, and spreading unconditional love.

Chapters

• 0:02 Navigating Loneliness During the Holidays
• 10:00 Avoiding Holiday Excess for Recovery

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

How do the holidays play into addiction and recovery? Welcome again to another episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast, where we encourage you to laugh every day. Work hard every day. That means work hard in recovery, work hard in your relationships, work hard in your business or if you work for someone or in school. You need to work every day. That's how you live your best life. And also to love unconditionally. Just put more love out there, love without an agenda, and you will get multiple forms X back of love to you. Just put more love out in the universe and let the universe love you back. Remember, recovery is beautiful. Your EQ is your IQ and you cannot outthink an emotional issue, think and emotional issue. Today we encourage people to actually go to the Facebook group Recovery Freedom Circle. That's where you can actually input and be a part of a community where you can talk about your dreams, your goals. You can also talk about recovery, the steps, or you can have a question about something where I or somebody else can give you some insights on how to move your life forward, on how to really truly understand the steps of your character traits, your spiritual principles, on how they can get you to live your best life. So join the link within the show notes, recovery Freedom Circle, so then you can feel inspired, motivated to move forward.

Speaker 1: 1:49

Now let's jump into this week's episode of the podcast Holidays. We just came out of Thanksgiving here in 2024. We're about to move forward into Christmas and New Year. These are three big holidays which affect all of us in different ways. Now, thanksgiving, which we kind of came out of, is one that a lot of people can manage, because Thanksgiving can usually be included. You can always include someone else into Thanksgiving. It's not just about the immediate family, it's also the extended family, and there's also friends and there's also a big thing like Friendsgiving, so you can have multiple celebrations on multiple days. So, in terms of Thanksgiving itself, if you are with someone, you have some type of partner, or you have some family, let's say in the same city, or if you are single, it's the type of holiday that people kind of embrace.

Speaker 1: 3:00

Now there's still going to be a lot of drinking and gambling. There's football all day long, there's going to be alcohol all day long. So if you're somebody like me that was a drinker and a gambler, there's a lot going on. And if you're with and your family of origin is drinkers, there's always going to be alcohol and especially early on, there was always somebody asking me what do I want to drink? Do you want to drink? Can I get you a drink? The answer is no, no and no. But they cannot listen. A lot of times families do not listen to anybody's road of recovery, so they will constantly be annoying and feeling like you are invisible.

Speaker 1: 3:44

But in Thanksgiving but also, let's say, even with friends, because friends can also kind of put that peer pressure on you you can go to a Friendsgiving where everybody brings some type of dish, goes over to somebody's house and partake and usually with most Friendsgiving there's usually a lot of alcohol or weed and just a lot of also conversation, dancing. There's a lot of stuff kind of going on. But again it can put you into an environment where there's going to be a lot of alcohol, drugs or gambling. But it is the type of holiday where you can also feel included physically, even though you may not really have your immediate family or a partner, and you can feel a part of something because there's always someone that can always give you a plate. The difference is when we start to move into the other two holidays Christmas, which becomes much more of the immediate family with you, are there with your lover, your partner, girlfriend, boyfriend, husband, wife, and then your kids and possibly your parents. Because even if you have siblings, most of the times if each sibling has their own family, each family is doing their own thing. They may get together at the parent's house or some other locale for a dinner, but if you are really truly alone, either you don't talk to your family or your family lives far away. You can spend Christmas alone.

Speaker 1: 5:17

Like I said, if you don't have any type of partner relationship, christmas can get very, very lonely because everybody seems to be connected, and especially if you don't even want to show up at some type of religious service, because it seems like everybody at the church has a family and then you'd be like the only one there. But I would encourage you to do that, because at least you can kind of connect with your own higher power, god, and you can not let others dictate. And no, no one is actually paying attention because everyone's so busy with their own family they don't even notice if there is actually a single person. So I would encourage you to go to some type of religious service and then it flips, even becomes almost like a funnel these holidays. Thanksgiving, which is bigger, much more inclusive, christmas becomes much more family, kind of immediate family.

Speaker 1: 6:10

And then New Year's you either have a partner or you don't. So then when the New Year strikes, you have somebody to kiss but you are single. Or, if you have a distant relationship, you have nobody to kiss and you're just solo. You're either by yourself at your place or you are, maybe you're at a bar or some type of event, and New Year's comes around and you don't have any significant other. And then maybe later on someone may give you a hug, but it's not quite the same, it really isn't. A friendly hug is completely different than a romantic kiss, but you can really feel lonely, and so these are the two things that we want to kind of touch upon.

Speaker 1: 6:53

You know the loneliness that each holiday can bring about, because, you know, in December December's usually been a spike in suicides because people can feel very, very lonely, they can feel like they are going nowhere, they feel like they are overwhelmed and lost, and so we have to address the loneliness that can happen here in the month of December. That's why I encourage people to go to certain types of Christmas events, whether they're at work, whether they're from your school, or whether there's some type of organization that people do have Christmas parties. So at least you don't feel like in these next 31 days that you have no party, no one to celebrate with or even go out to some type of dinner. We have to connect with people because this is almost like the spirit of Christmas, which is almost about giving, it's almost about getting together that joy to the world, that holiday, that spirit, and if you are someone that feels very lonely during this time, have to really understand okay, how can I self-soothe? So now, this is a very important topic that can be with us throughout the whole year, especially if you're trying to stop an addiction and you have urges and you want to relapse. You have to learn how to self-soothe and, most importantly, that's why I invented this recovery growth scorecard. I will put another link to the scorecard here in the notes.

Speaker 1: 8:37

The scorecard was invented so people can feel less lonely. You have to figure out how to trigger all types of hormones in your brain the dopamine, the endorphins, the serotonin, the oxytocin. So then you know how to take care of yourself. You are fulfilling yourself, whether it's exercise, whether it's prayer, whether it's being out in nature, whether it's journaling, whether it's hugging someone, whether it's being with your pet, whether it's eating healthy food, you know, laughing. So many things are on this scorecard because I don't want anyone to feel extremely lonely. I don't want anyone to contemplate suicide or actually attempt suicide or actually complete some type of a suicide.

Speaker 1: 9:31

I want people to feel like they can take care of themselves if they're alone. See, alone doesn't mean you're lonely. Alone just means you're alone. You can go watch a movie. Whether you go to the movies, or you can watch it on Netflix, apple TV Prime however, you get your streaming now or you go to parts of organizations, family, friends, whoever. You've got to know how to be around people. You've got to know how to uplift yourself.

Speaker 1: 10:00

There's too many people that are then going to drink too much, gamble too much, watch too much porn, they're going to do too much weed, they're going to do too much coke and maybe even do harder stuff like meth, crack or heroin. You don't want to do that. You want to stay present. You want to be in your feelings, you want to be able to enjoy life. So I encourage everyone here in the holidays and if you need to. I have plenty of information out here in terms of the YouTube channel, in terms of the podcasts, and if you're willing and want to start your recovery journey, reach out to me. I can get you moving on the Recovery Freedom Circle 18 weeks and you have a totally new life, a way to start the year off right. So with that we are going to end this episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast.