Contents
- 1) Body and mind are inseparable.
- 2) Exercise decreases substance cravings.
- 3) Exercise is effective regardless of the substance of choice.
- 4) Exercise addiction is WAY overblown, and being dependent on exercise isn’t always a bad thing.
- 5) Intense exercise provides emotional release, catharsis, and a sense of being reborn.
- 6) With perseverance, fitness becomes a reliable and rewarding ritual.
- 7) Exercise produces endorphins and endocannabinoids, helping you “stop fighting” and start living.
- 8) Exercise produces galanin, a brain chemical responsible for enabling enabling neuroplasticity (brain rewiring) and lowering stress.
- 9) Fitness buddies and networks help you stay on track.
- 10) Exercise works at least as well as meds in treating depression, which is a huge risk factor in relapse.
- 11) Whereas alcoholism can lead to insulin resistance and diabetes, exercise improves insulin sensitivity and reduces diabetes risk.
- 12) Exercise may reverse substance-induced brain damage.
- The Bottom Line
- Author
1) Body and mind are inseparable.
2) Exercise decreases substance cravings.
3) Exercise is effective regardless of the substance of choice.
4) Exercise addiction is WAY overblown, and being dependent on exercise isn’t always a bad thing.
5) Intense exercise provides emotional release, catharsis, and a sense of being reborn.
(Emphasis added by me. The quote above is from Shane Niemeyer, who wrote a raw and hugely motivational book on the subject.)
6) With perseverance, fitness becomes a reliable and rewarding ritual.
7) Exercise produces endorphins and endocannabinoids, helping you “stop fighting” and start living.
8) Exercise produces galanin, a brain chemical responsible for enabling enabling neuroplasticity (brain rewiring) and lowering stress.
9) Fitness buddies and networks help you stay on track.
10) Exercise works at least as well as meds in treating depression, which is a huge risk factor in relapse.
11) Whereas alcoholism can lead to insulin resistance and diabetes, exercise improves insulin sensitivity and reduces diabetes risk.
12) Exercise may reverse substance-induced brain damage.
The Bottom Line
As you can see, there’s no shortage of evidence that fitness can help you kick addiction.
To all of the above, I would add this: People who have had addictions tend to be particularly intense. We’re stubborn, we go all in on everything that we do, and we don’t half-ass anything. We don’t like giving up, and ironically this leads many of us to never give up our substance of choice.
Our brains are wired differently, and we crave a kind of intensity that other people don’t seem to need. We can’t float through life and feel fine. We need a constant to block out the ambient noise that tortures us with its mundane dullness. We have difficulty coping in the absence of intense emotion, whether pain or pleasure.
If any of this resonates with you, I strongly recommend you draw up a fitness plan. I don’t tout fitness in recovery just because I got my trainer certification.
Exercise in itself is not my purpose in life. I’m still discovering the nature and extent of my purpose, but I would concur with Shane’s observation (see #5 above) in that fitness has allowed me to come to terms with the idea that I’ll never drink again.
Because it has liberated me in this way, fitness is a catalyst in my ongoing quest for my life’s purpose.
I lift weights and do HIIT cardio because I love doing them. If I liked cycling more, I would cycle. But pushing iron and sprinting is my therapy, and this combo allows me to build the kind of physique I want to have. I feel most alive and competent when I’m strong, solid and muscular.
Look good, feel better. Good luck to anyone reading this and feel free to ask me questions.
Author
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Chris Scott founded Fit Recovery in 2014 to help people from around the world dominate alcohol dependence and rebuild their lives from scratch. A former investment banker, he recovered from alcohol dependence using cutting-edge methods that integrate nutrition, physiology, and behavioral change. Today, Chris is an Alcohol Recovery Coach with dozens of private clients, the author of a short book called Drinking Sucks!, and the creator of an online course called Total Alcohol Recovery 2.0.