Time, Something We All Need in Recovery

"All great achievements require time." – Maya Angelou, Pulitzer Prize nominated poet, historian, author, actress, playwright, civil rights activist, producer and director, best-known as the author of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (born 1928)

Do we ever have enough time to do all the things we want or need to do? If we’re like most of us in recovery, the answer is probably not. Time is, however, something we spend a great deal of, you guessed it, time thinking about. We worry that we don’t have enough of it, that we’ll waste it, that it comes and goes too quickly.

Here’s a little secret. Time is what’s happening right now. That’s all we can really do anything about, anyway. What we worry most about is, generally speaking, something that already happened, something that’s in the past. Frankly, we can’t change the past, so taking our precious time to worry about it really isn’t anything that we should indulge in.

Of course, that’s certainly easier said than done. Just try to remember the recommendation when we’re deep in the maelstrom of nagging memories that continue to plague us. It’s really tough to put into practice what we know we should do, in this case, stop worrying about the past.

But time is also something we all need in recovery. For one thing, it takes time to heal. That much we learned during rehab, but it’s a concept that some of us still grapple with. We’re impatient, eager to put all this pain and uncertainty behind us. While it’s normal to feel anxious about how our new lives in sobriety will turn out, wondering if we have what it takes or even if we will be able to withstand the cravings and urges that may linger on, if we listen to what the old-timers in the rooms have to say, it does get better the longer we stick with it.

We are breaking old self-destructive patterns and beginning to adopt new and healthier behaviors. Sure, it feels a little strange at first. When we begin anything new, it’s the same thing. We have to become more practiced in doing something for it to actually sink in and start to feel automatic. We knew what automatic felt like when we used to reach for that drink or use to get ourselves numbed out or able to tolerate whatever situation we were in. That kind of automatic we’re familiar with. Well, this is a new kind of automatic that we’re after, one that is beneficial to our overall sobriety, our productiveness and happiness in recovery. And that takes time and practice to achieve.

But it does happen, or it can. The key is to remain vigilant, to be proactive, to keep constantly learning and growing. Of this we can be sure. If we’re worried about time or the lack thereof, we simply have to acknowledge our efforts and then commit anew to doing the hard work of recovery. It is all worth it.

Granted, we’re all about learning shortcuts. That’s another little holdover from our past days of addiction. But there are shortcuts that work in our favor in recovery, like finding how to combine different tips and techniques to suit our own situation and there are shortcuts that take the legs out from under our progress, like going back to old haunts or hanging out with people associated with our past drug and alcohol abuse. Some shortcuts aren’t ever worth it, while others definitely are. What we need to do now is keep our focus on our recovery and maximize our efforts on doing whatever it takes to not only maintain it but help it grow stronger.

Certainly recovery is a great achievement. And, as we all know, great achievements take time. So, isn’t it time that we acknowledge our time is well-spent doing the work of recovery? Every day, every hour that we are clean and sober counts. Every minute counts. And we have all the time in the world ahead of us, minute by minute, day by day. It all adds up to a time that’s available to us for great accomplishments.