Recovery: No One Can Do It But You

When I was depressed and in a bad place in my life, I wanted a quick fix to my issues. Living in a world of immediate gratification, I wanted my problems to go away quickly and simply. I looked to many people to help me with my problems.  I found things to distract me until I found someone else to help make me better. After years of getting nowhere, I turned to the one person that I was avoiding to take care of my issues…me.

I had many issues that I had to deal with when I was depressed. One issue was that I did not want to put in any hard work myself.  I always took the easy way out.  I always looked to someone else to do the hard work for me. I never gave myself a chance to deal with things on my own because it was just easier to have someone else deal with my issues.  I wanted them to make me feel better. I wanted someone to just reach inside of me, flip a switch and make things go back to how they use to be.

Finally, I turned to myself to begin the process of figuring out what I needed to figure out. For a long time I thought that this meant that I couldn’t talk to anyone. I thought I had to be by myself in order to do it all on my own. This only made things worse. But, when I shut myself off to the people in my life things just got worse.  Figuring things out for yourself doesn’t mean that you have to be alone, it means that you have to find a way to accept that you are the one who can make things different in your life.

I did not want to accept the fact that it was on me to make things different. To me that was such a huge responsibility.  I was struggling with confidence issues and fear of failure which made it all so much harder. Understanding that no one could help me but me was not an easy task. It was an uphill battle.  It took longer than I like to admit, but I was finally ready to accept that it was on me to figure my issues out.

By accepting that no one could do it but me, I gained a sense of control and stability in my life. Those two things gave me a solid base to start my journey to recovery. It was a huge accomplishment to accept that it was on me. We can’t ask for help with everything in life, but no one accomplishes anything alone. It is a balance between knowing what you need to do for yourself and what others can do for you.