We Can’t Heal Alone: 4 Tips to Break Any Addiction

“In order to find complete healing, we need relationship with another.”

By Abigail Cole Hardin, CLC; PNLP

By Abigail Cole Hardin, CLC; PNLP

We can all identify as an addict in some way, shape, or form when we look to the wiring of our brains. [New research on Addictive behaviors.]

We all have the potential to become addicted. And those who have struggled with visible addictions, know that they are always susceptible even after they stop the behavior. That’s why in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meetings, the introduction always includes stating your name and “I am an alcoholic.” For those that find this extreme or do not relate, let me put it this way. “Hello, my name is Abigail, and I am a sinner.” Hopefully, as Christians, we can all relate to that.

I think it is so crucial to first state your name. “Abigail”—that is who I am. I am not my behaviors, my feelings, my successes or failures. I am not my job, my past, or my future. I am not my compulsions, my words, or desires. I am me. It’s who I am being—not what I am doing.

However, what I am doing is what I must confess. I am sinning. I am a sinner.

“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed” (James 5:16).

In order to find healing, we need the relationship with another.  

It takes more than a private confession to find healing —we need to be transparent in a safe relationship. We must fully acknowledge what we are doing and say it out loud.

Only in relationship can we experience acceptance for who we are despite what we are doing.

I think some of the hardest things to confess are:

• “I know I need to stop this, but I am not ready to change.”

• “I have deeply hurt you, and I am afraid how I will continue to hurt you even when I don’t want to.”

• “I need help because I can’t stop this on my own.”

While these are all challenging confessions, they break the compulsion to isolate.

Addictions are isolating and usually begin in secret as an attempt to manage pain.

The pain could come from relationships, but instead of facing the pain in those relationships, we try to self-medicate or zone out to avoid feeling the pain. We must recognize that our avoidance or mismanagement of pain is what isolates us even more and keeps us from ever resolving and facing the hard stuff in our relationships.

Self-acceptance is important, however, from Scripture, we know we are not going to find true healing until we confess to one another and receive forgiveness.

When we invite another person into our struggle, there is accountability and acknowledgement that we don’t want to be controlled by our addictions. We take the first step in owning the fact that we need help and we cannot face our pain on our own. 

4 Tips to heal in real relationships:

1. You first must check-in and acknowledge you are mismanaging pain.

*Steps to “check in” here.

2. Assess who is a safe relationship that can help—whether a group* (AA), a counselor, a church member, a close friend or family member.

3. Get honest and confess what you are doing (even if that means over and over again) while being open to receiving help from others.

4. Confess to the Lord and cling to His forgiveness and truth—"we were loved while we were yet sinners!” (Romans 5:8). Talk about undeserving and limitless acceptance!

Our Hope

Breaking addictions are hard. Our brain loves to latch onto the quick, simple fixes that give us relief in the moment. But, lasting relief comes from the Lord. He is our hope and our ultimate healing relationship. And He gives us the body to support us.

“And if one can overpower him who is alone, two can resist him. A cord of three strands is not quickly torn apart” (Ecclesiastes  4:12). 

He is your third strand to hold you together as you face your deepest struggles. You need both the Lord and community to find healing. He calls you accepted, and frees you from your sins.

Start living free by getting out of isolation and into healing relationship!

*Hardin Life Resources offers a group setting through our workshops with Men’s Coaching Camps and Hardwired to Heal Workshop. Please refer to our Workshop Page, and get plugged in, or schedule a one-on-one session with Phil, Karla, Audrey, or me (Abigail)!

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Abigail Cole Hardin is a Certified Life Coach and a Neuro-Linguistic Programming Practitioner for Hardin Life Resources

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