Addiction is a life-altering disease that strips a person of their functionality in everyday life.
It impacts their health—both physical and mental—and it frequently disrupts relationships between family, friends, romantic partners, and others. Needless to say, addiction is devastating in life’s many facets, but there’s one fundamental area that is negatively impacted and often overlooked: life skills.
To those who don’t struggle with addiction, life skills such as developing a monthly budget or keeping a clean living space can be painless. However, for those who DO struggle with addiction, these necessary life skills often feel impossible to achieve, which is a mindset that increases the likelihood of a relapse. That is why a life skills training program is indispensable to an addiction recovery program.
Why Do Addicts Need a Life Skills Training Program?
Those who fall victim to addiction either never developed life skills to help them succeed or lost them in the process of becoming an addict. The purpose of a life skills training program is to help you uncover the innate tools you have within. These tools will aid in developing invaluable life skills to ensure you overcome addiction, avoid relapse, and remain sober.
Below are some life skills you may learn in a life skills training program:• Self-care
The ability to preserve your mental and physical health is often obsolete when you’re in active addiction. Instead of practicing healthy habits to maintain or improve your health, you may use substances to get an immediate boost, which worsens your addiction. Learning how to work in self-care on a frequent basis can help addicts feel mentally and physically sound, ideally preventing them from seeking their substance of choice as a quick solution. It should be noted that self-care is unique to the individual and can include regular health check-ups, taking a walk, lighting a candle, listening to calming music, or anything else that positively affects your health.• Financial Responsibility
When you’re using, financial stability means being able to get your next fix. Your financial priorities often shift in favor of your addictive substance over essentials such as clean water, a roof over your head, or nutritious meals. Furthermore, you may struggle to hold jobs due to behaviors stemming from addiction. Learning financial management in a life skills training program will help you land a job and budget your money, so you can use it towards your future—not towards a quick pick-me-up.
• Communication Skills
Oftentimes, addicts are misunderstood. This is partly due to how isolating addiction can be, as you may avoid others to hide your substance abuse issues. You may even surround yourself exclusively with other people in active addiction to feel understood, but this only helps enable you. Because of these factors, addicts in recovery report having social anxiety and a lack of self-confidence. A life skills training program will help you sharpen your communication abilities by utilizing speaking and confidence-building activities in a social setting that’s sober and safe.
• Time Management
Even for people who don’t struggle with addiction, time management can be challenging to master. If you’re an addict, it’s even more difficult as most of your time prior to recovery went towards getting or using substances. If you want to succeed in your recovery, you must know when and where to spend your time effectively. Life skills training will assist you in managing your time through daily planners, distraction prevention techniques, and solid routines.
• Emotion Regulation
Addictive substances are known to shift a person’s mood from one end to the other in an instant. For example, someone abusing alcohol may be overly friendly in a social setting for one minute, then immediately shift to aggression when faced with something triggering the next. If exposed to it frequently, this up-and-down pattern can alter a person’s ability to regulate emotions, even when sober. Fortunately, there are ways you can learn to control your mood. In life skills training, you will identify and ease triggers, tune into your current environment, and practice deep breathing to stabilize your mood.
Discover Our Life Skills Training Program at Genesis House
Genesis House is an addiction treatment center in South Florida that offers luxury rehabilitation services and programs—including life skills training. Our dedicated team consists of trained and compassionate professionals who can provide you with life skills training in Florida for addiction. In the life skills training program, you will regain control of your life by learning how to indulge in self-care, manage your finances, communicate effectively, spend your time wisely, tend to your emotional needs, and more.
The road to recovery can be long, but you don’t have to journey it alone. Help us help you by taking your first steps with Genesis House.
