How does sophrology help break free from addiction?
How does sophrology help break free from addiction?
Addictions can sometimes be linked to a psychic functioning configured in “survival” mode. Perhaps addiction to a product or behavior was necessary at some point to survive psychically. For example: using your addiction to succeed in reaching out to others, to avoid feeling difficult emotions, to anesthetize or even to feel strong … Addiction is considered a solution due to a lack of access to our inner resources and to the help that each person is entitled to receive “love, well-being and empathy”.
In this sense, addiction may have been necessary to avoid serious psychological problems or certain acts of violence. But there comes a time when this crutch becomes a handicap, one more problem to manage. And over time, these behaviors destroy the body, and the mind. Sometimes you have to “hit rock bottom” to get out of it: consuming becomes harder than abstinence.
To cut oneself off from one’s body is to cut oneself from one’s resources. We stop breathing without even being aware of it in order to stop the flow of emotions, which we have the illusion of controlling. Thanks to sophrology, we will gradually put in place a complete and natural breathing, which goes to the bottom of the lungs and opens the pelvis. A dialogue with the body will finally be established over the long term, which listens to our sensations, allowing us to discover this inner world so rich and exciting.
In sophrology we also reinvest our body diagram by working on the anchor to give us a solid base and build our foundations. The more the idea that our body is our “home” emerges from our consciousness, the more naturally the desire to take care of ourselves increases.
Of course, we have to give up our favorite addiction (legal and illicit drugs, cigarettes, emotional dependence, alcohol, sugar, bulimia, food restriction etc …), accept to be vulnerable, to go through physical but also mental and emotional, with sometimes more or less strong moments of depression.
It is by accepting these stages that joy, serenity, energy and confidence will also flourish in order to live fully.
Véronique Gabriel Dubourg