Recovery Changing Views

Recovery: The Process of Changing Views Recovery, in this day and age, appears in the news almost every week, and thus society continually sees stories about survivors of tragic accidents—humanity celebrates the ability to cling to life—and the ever popular tales of celebrities struggling with devastating addictions, which the public praises even minimal improvements. Recovery, without the ill; the injured; and the celebrities, appears to the majority of society as an event only degenerates must experience. Many people assume that only ex-miscreants have the pleasure of claiming they are recovering or recovered. Furthermore, it seems to be human nature to imagine what recovered individuals were before entering recovery: equating the recovered drug addicts to the junkies with needles in their
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, recovery is: “the act or process of returning to a normal state after a period of difficulty”. One portion of this definition is fallacious, and thus recovery is currently is flawed. How can recovery mean “returning to normal”, when normality is subjective? Universally, there is no definite normal, since people independently decide their version of normal. Moreover, addiction becomes customary: the addict’s normal becomes using drugs, and the alcoholic views intoxication as acceptable. Furthermore, the experience leaves an individual altered because of the memories and the possible damage to the body and the mind. Thus, it is impossible to reclaim the pre-addiction normal. Therefore, recovery is not “returning to normal”. In my own experience, recovery focuses on changing what is acceptable behavior instead of ending the self-destructive problem, at least at the start. Because addiction becomes the victim's idea of natural behaviors, recovery should focus on altering an individual’s view of acceptable behavior instead of “returning to