The Progress Mindset in Healing

This healing process can be a nonlinear mess at times. An absolute roller coaster of ups and downs.

It can be tiring, can’t it? That’s okay.

Just don’t forget that it is a productive and beneficial process in which you are engaged right now; and that you are always moving forward with each day survived, good or bad. As long as you are actively engaged in a process of trying to improve your mental health and overall wellness picture, you are making progress.

There is great value to each and every day that passes in this healing process, and the bad days are no different. In fact, those tougher days might be the ones that are contributing to your healing the most. They are difficult because important healing is happening. Healing can be messy, and the adjustments and awakenings that are happening in your body and brain mean that “symptoms” appear. The status quo is changing, in a good way, just be patient with any turbulence.

Also, remember that the tougher days are important because they are teaching you lessons and strengthening you. Even if this isn’t exactly how we’d choose to grow and be strengthened, it is nevertheless beneficial.

Here are a few important points to keep in mind this week:

1. In a nonlinear healing process it can be totally normal to have periods of intense symptoms, high anxiety, or burnout/fatigue after having felt great. That is the roller coaster of healing. Don’t become discouraged during such times that feel like “setbacks.”
2. Remember you are always moving forward. Difficult days don’t mean something has knocked you backward! You might have to pause to regroup in a difficult time, but you aren’t moving backward.
3. Stress and illness happen in life, and these things can contribute to feeling worse in a given week or month. Recognize this to put things in perspective and be patient with your situation. Being under stress or ill, and feeling worse because of it, doesn’t mean that withdrawal is getting worse or going backward. It just means you are dealing with multiple things at once. 4. Know that the “down times” never erase previous healing (i.e., at noted above, you aren’t going backward because you feel worse on a given day).
4. Continue to focus on the improvements you’ve seen and the better days you’ve had. This reminds you that healing is happening, and it gives you a vision of what you are coming back to when a bad period subsides, which it will.

This week I would like for you to focus on a few of the improvements you’ve seen since day one of your process, or maybe on a “window” period you’ve had recently. See these things in your mind’s eye, and maybe write them down. Really reflect on them and internalize their importance.

They are signs of your healing. They are real. They are blessings and miracles. They are the truth.

Just keep doing the right things for yourself, in times good or bad, and you will get back to better times no matter how bad you might be feeling in any given period.

Remember to tell yourself this: “I am always moving forward.”

No matter what stage of your journey you are at, if you continue to care for yourself and take simple steps in a positive direction, you are always moving forward and good things will happen this way.

Stay steady, stay encouraging with yourself, hold onto faith and stay close to God through it all.

Here’s to your healing this week!

Michael