Activities – such as sports, creative jobs, reading, work, TV, meditation – can be a wonderful way to relax, express yourself, or attach to yourself. Or they can be an addiction. Exactly how can you recognize the difference?
Keypoints
- Angie would browse the networks whenever she really felt worried or alone.
- Karen would lose herself in a publication when points really felt frustrating.
- Keith would meditate and pull away when his other half wished to speak.
- Patty’s work timetable left her little time in your home.
- Carl spent even more time in the garage repairing things than with his family members.
- Patrick’s love of running was disrupting his household time.
Whether or not an activity is an addiction depends upon your INTENT.
- When an activity intends to avoid the pain of aloneness as well as isolation, it is an addiction.
- Wheever an activity intends to stay clear of the discomfort of being rejected or the fear of supremacy, it is an addiction.
- When an activity intends to avoid doing something you don’t really want to do yet require to do, it is an addiction.
Unpleasent feelings
Whenever an activity is utilized to prevent something – unpleasant feelings, difficult or boring jobs – it ends up being an addiction. The issue with using addictions to avoid agonizing feelings is that the sensations don’t actually go away. As well as avoiding tasks indicates that the jobs load up, at some point causing the actual tension we desire to stay clear of.
When a task intends to take loving care of yourself by providing yourself with creative thinking, expression and enjoyment, leisure, personal development, spiritual growth, physical wellness, and well-being, it is a loving action rather than a dependency. All of it depends on your INTENT.

Do you desire to view and unwind TV, or are you preventing some difficult sensation or job? Do you discover yourself setting up even more jobs than you can actually deal with to prevent dealing with aloneness, solitude, or dispute with a friend, or are you really loving your work and feeling fulfilled by it?
When you become aware of using an activity to avoid, right here’s what you can do concerning it:
Invite the sensation you are trying so tough to stay clear of. Take notice of the sensation – anxiety, solitude, aloneness, anxiety, dullness, anxiety.
Decide to discover what YOU might be doing to cause this feeling rather than remaining to avoid it.
Discover what you may be doing to create this feeling. Exactly how are you not taking care of yourself that is causing your excruciating sensation? Exactly how are you preventing obligation for your very own wellness?
You are asking this question of your highest possible self or your spiritual advisor if you are connected with a resource of support. If you open up to discovering what is caring, suggestions will certainly pop right into your mind.
Now you need to take the caring action on your own part – complete a task, stand up for on your own, talk your reality with someone, and so on.
Re-evaluate how you are feeling. Are you feeling much calmer and extra powerful? You will feel more serene if you have actually taken the caring activity. Don’t just transform back to your addiction if you are not really feeling better. Try to find an additional loving action till you find what really makes you really feel risk-free on a deep level, not just the short-lived pacification of an addiction.
You will discover your addictions are fading away as you learn to take care of yourself.