Hope

How does hope affect recovery?

When you were in active addiction, it’s likely you often felt sick, tired, and hopeless. In early recovery, many of the emotions flooding into your life may seem painful or challenging. Remember that your capacity for hope, joy, serenity, and peace will grow as you gain more experience in recovery. It takes courage to do the work of recovery. It’s likely that you’ve started working the Steps and/or gained the support of a sponsor. Give yourself a lot of credit for the hard work you’ve done so far. You deserve it!

In Step One you identified that you had a problem. You realized that alone, you are powerless over the mind- and mood-altering substances you trusted with your life. You learned that you’re not a bad person and that you don’t have to be alone anymore. This is where the miracle of recovery begins.

In Step Two you learned to define that problem, to see addiction as the by- product of a spiritual problem that requires a spiritual solution. Step Two gives you new hope based on willingness and faith that a Power greater than yourself can restore you to sanity.

How do you know if you’ve got Step Two?

You have a sliver of hope.
Diligently working Step Two and all your other recovery efforts should bring more hope over time. If you continue to feel hopeless after working your program for several months, you may want to talk to a counselor or mental health professional about the possibility of an underlying depression. Depression is a very treatable condition, if help is sought.