The Mind and the Body: Obtaining a Drug Free Environment

For the drug abuser the statement that one must hit bottom in order for the individual to have a reasonable chance of becoming drug free seems to be an oversimplification to a dilemma that has torn and is tearing a person's life apart. The drug abuser who is enslaved does not want to be given advice nor be embedded with one sentence curative statements to address a destructive ailment that has taken complete controls over the mind and the body of the person but all the same this one is desperately looking for a quick fix to achieve personal freedom much in the same way as the individual seeks instant gratification by the use of whatever they're drug of choice happens to be, and yet even as the desire of the drug abuser is not in the hearing of this or any other like statements the facts of life bears this comment out to be absolutely true in the majority if not in all cases for those who are solidly entrapped by an addition.

So what is a person's bottom? Well that depends entirely upon the individual as to where and when he or she feels and believes that the extent of his or her personal limits has been reached. For some drug abusers it may be the financial strain that causes them to bottom out and for another it may be the betrayal of caring and trust that has been extended to them by another that causes the end to come. Whatever the methods and the means may be it clearly appears that there must occur a total mental collapse and surrender in the life of the drug abuser in order for that person to be on a level or platform where freedom and upward mobility can become the turning point in his or her life and when this personal bottom has been reached the very next step is for the person to bodily remove her or him self from around their using environment and any other such like pervasive influences because no matter how much she or he wants to convince themselves of it the mental strength of the drug abuser is much too weak at this initial point of abstinence to stand up against a strong craving that has draped and intertwined itself into a concrete habit of daily life.

Step by step the release for the drug abuser who is ensnared by self-imposed tentacles is direct and straightforward at least in stratagem whereas the actual practice takes dedication and purpose that is reinforced by being mindfulness of the recent and or past destructive behaviors that is or did shatter the vitality and the substance out of living life. The drug abuser needing to reach a personal bottom in order to make lifestyle changes for the better only applies to the drug abuser who really wants to regain the controls of person because it must be conceded that there are those individuals who do not want too and who will not stop abusing drugs and for individuals of this mindset the only personal bottom that can be reached by them is death and its quenching affect upon all mortal appetites, and this is to say that the main ingredient that a drug abuser must have in order to have a practical chance of becoming drug free is the sincere desire to transform her or his mind into a drug free environment and this desire can be somewhat halfhearted as long as it is embedded into the mind of the drug abuser which is to say that without roots no plant will have the substance to grow.

The most terrifying concern that is held by any long-term drug abuser is the contemplation of living life without the use of drugs, or at least this was my scary shadow that injected itself into the light of sobriety, but with each day of abstinence the mind and the body becomes less and less polluted of prolonged drug use and the scary shadow of living life drug free slowly becomes a habit that replaces self-abuse and self-imposed imprisonment. Living drug free does not produce a utopia because living life still comes with its ups and downs but it does break the chains of personal confinement and places a person onto the freeway of becoming personally and socially productive. A drug abuser is a dedicated escape artist who achieves his or her goal by altering reality but this altered existence has devastating consequences and by virtue of experience for any aspiring freedom fighter a possible helpful suggestion is to change your living habitat or redefine and refocus your living habitat because what you need now the most is time to cleanse your mind and your body of the chemical elements of your addictive substances and if this entails spending at least six months in a drug rehab facility, such as I did, then so be it.

The comment that at least six months in a good rehab program is preferable was made because for a drug abuser who have extended years of active substance abuse a twenty-eight or thirdly day rehab program only seems to skim the surface of the needed mind and body detoxification process and perhaps it is also better not to focus on what you are doing but live in freedom day by day and add no unneeded pressures to that which you are striving to obtain. Freedom does not come easy and to retain it requires vision and diligence and it goes without saying that the drug abuser makes the going extremely difficult for him or her self if she or he is making this commitment for self-emancipation for anyone or anything other than the disentanglement of self and this "For Me" approach to gaining freedom should in no way compromise a drug abuser as we who are or who have so saturated ourselves into this type of irregular patchwork are or have completely devoted ourselves into the sealed fabrics to total selfishness.