How To Overcome Addiction

Overcoming addiction is first and foremost about understanding addiction and then doing something about it. Read up about it, even find out how the brain changes – become very prepared to overcome.

Addictions can be overwhelming for certain people and actually rewire parts of the brain. The brain areas that regulate instinctive behaviors called the hypothalamus, and the amygdale which regulates emotion and anxiety, can both show neuron and connection alterations through addictions.

Once you fully understand some of the major traps that the mind and brain fall into, you are then educated, aware and ready to take concrete action. Some of the best actions are:

• Replace negative or addictive thoughts with pleasant ones.
• Don’t rely on sheer will power, set a goal to break a habit for 90 days and it will get easier as each day passes.
• Learn to stay in the present moment instead of worrying about the future or past.
• Let go of the ego.
• Keep on reading up on addictive behaviour. Read up on human evolution and conditioning. Seek out a few good experts and avoid instant fixes. Here are a few great resources.

The Brain That Changes Itself – Norman Doidge MD

The Mandala Of Being – Richard Moss

The Evolving Self – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Positivity – Barbara Fredrickson

How To Break A Bad Habit

What I have found works best for me is taken from the saying – out of sight, out of mind. I also find it important to remember that a good habit (or ridding an old habit) usually takes about thirty days to take hold. So don’t fret so much about using sheer willpower, concentrate on the thirty day time period and take pride in your accomplishments as each day passes.

It is also important not to try and break too many bad habits at the same time. Pick a couple of habits, set some goals, write them down and track them.

Breaking bad eating habits

The simplest way to avoid eating unhealthy foods is to not keep unhealthy foods in the house. Next time you go grocery shopping don’t buy those cookies, cakes or whatever food which adds unhealthy calories to you. I usually zip down the cookie isle, ignoring them as they call my name.

Breaking bad money habits.

There are plenty of people who have no willpower if money is readily available. These days it’s far too easy to extract money from an ATM machine. So what do you do? Hide it. What I mean is lock it away in a 401K plan or RRSP. That way it is much harder to get at it and you will pay penalties for early withdrawal. Once again like the unhealthy foods – out of sight out of mind. Just make your money extremely difficult to access. You will also find that you end up paying yourself first instead of everyone else.

Breaking the worry habit

Worrying about something usually take us away from the present moment. And the present moment is always the most important moment in our lives. Once we lose the present moment we stop experiencing life at its best. Living in the now means enjoying life to its fullest, letting go of the past, letting go of past conditioning and being our most authentic self. So bring yourself to experience the immediacy of each moment in life and let go of your worries. Come back to the now of yourself as much as possible. You will discover a whole new world around you.

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