Maintaining sobriety is hard work, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have fun during addiction recovery. Recreating your sober life after addiction treatment can be difficult. You can take a break from the hard work by having some healthy fun. Here are a few ideas to get you started having fun during addiction recovery.
1. Make New Sober Friends
Drugs and alcohol aren’t necessary to have a good time with friends. Sobriety can be fun too.1 It’s quite possible that, in the past, most of the people you socialized with were also abusing substances.
But that’s not who you are now. You’re sober, and it’s time to find new, sober friends you can have fun with. An ideal place to meet like-minded friends is your recovery group meetings.
2. Start a Hobby
You’re never too old to start new adventures. Give it some thought; there’s probably one or two things that you’ve always wanted to do. Maybe it’s painting, playing an instrument or learning to swing dance.
Recovery is an ideal time to focus on your personal development.2 Don’t believe that you’re too old or can’t learn something new. You’re continually growing and progressing throughout your life, so redesign your lifestyle around picking up a hobby or two.
3. Go to Classes or a Workshop
In your quest for personal enrichment, as well as for another way to have fun during addiction recovery, take some classes or attend a workshop. When it’s simply for the purpose of gaining knowledge, there’s no pressure, which makes learning relaxing and enjoyable. Think of the interests you had before addiction became a major focus in your life, and pursue those interests now.
4. Join a Book Club
A great way to make new friends and have fun during addiction recovery is by joining a book club. Most book clubs usually don’t meet in bars or restaurants—coffee houses, bookstores and libraries are more popular meeting places, so relax with your favorite coffee and have stimulating discussions with new friends. Also, reading to keep up with the club helps to occupy your time at home.
How to Create Ideas by Redefining Fun During Addiction Recovery
We’ve detailed just a few of the possibilities there are for you to explore for fun during addiction recovery. If you’re having difficulty thinking up fun activities on your own, re-examine what you believe fun is now that you’re sober.
You’re no longer taking drugs or drinking alcohol, but that doesn’t mean you can no longer have fun. Think back to what fun meant to you before you entered recovery, and then rethink it. There was nothing enjoyable about dealing with a hangover, throwing up or not remembering what you did while under the influence.
Now that you’re abstinent, rethink what’s enjoyable in order to create fun things to do. By doing so, you can open up a whole new and rewarding life for yourself in recovery. Your options are unlimited, so create a list of fun things to try—and then start doing them.