by Galen M
One of the key ingredients to living a happy sober life is learning how to have fun in sobriety. For many of us at first this is a foreign concept. It almost seems impossible. Before any of us attained anything that looked like sobriety we had a twisted view on what it meant to have fun. I know that for me, fun was measured in little plastic baggies or in the size of the bottle I had. With that type of outlook on fun there was no limit on how much fun I could physically have or the amount I could have at one time. There was no balance, it was either I have my alcohol or I have my drugs, so therefore what I am doing is fun. I used to have no idea or concept of balance, I had to be had to either be having as much fun and excitement as possible or if not life sucked and was boring. At one point in my life of using the drugs were not enough to satisfy my need for “fun.” At that time fun meant drugs and wild behavior. I lived a life of extremes. I had to get extremely high and then to have fun I had to push whatever it was I was doing to the limit. That meant if I was driving I had to be dangerous, going at least 20 mph over the limit at all times weaving in and out of traffic. In order to get a laugh I had to be and say the grimiest things, degrade women, embarrass people around me, or lie cheat and steal just to get the rush I was looking for.
Today I am living a sober life and on a daily basis how to have fun in sobriety comes up. Because of the life of extremes I used to live finding a balance is a difficult thing to do. At first I thought that this was going to suck, life was going to be normal and boring. The only way I knew how to have fun was to be extreme and being extreme is being in appropriate. I would say nasty things, I would break rules on an hourly basis just to see if I could get away with them and I would try to be comical and funny at all times no matter what I was doing or where I was. This got me nowhere fast. What fun was to me and the way I knew how to have it just got me a bad reputation and a lot of consequences.
One of the keys to my new found success in sobriety is finding balance. I have fun everyday and I have learned how to make a lot of the things I do fun. In every activity I partake in I look for what there is to look forward to. There are things that I enjoy that make my life fun, such as cooking or art class and even life skills. I can find things to smile and laugh at and today I find myself grateful for the people I have in my life. My friends and I have fun together in art class. We cook together and we learn from each other and that is fun. Today I know that there is a time and a place for everything. There is a time to work and a time to play and just because I am working doesn’t mean that it can’t be fun. I am not perfect and I still screw this up sometimes, but its progress not perfection and today I am okay with that.
Galen M is a long term resident in addiction treatment at Gatehouse Academy. Click here for a Gatehouse Academy Review.
