Step 3 • With the help of our higher power and recovery community, we replaced our unhealthy compulsive habits with enjoyable activities. 

Life is a game. Play it.   

–– Mother Teresa

Many of us used a substance, activity, or person to feel good because we forgot how to play in a wholesome way.  Somehow we learned to neglect our need to laugh, play, and enjoy our life, and so we unconsciously attempted to get this valid need met in unhealthy ways.  

While lost in our compulsivity, it’s like we were in a bubble, as though the rest of the world did not exist.  We call this being in an oblivious bubble our Inner Circle Behavior. Doing these compulsive activities kept our lives unmanageable, and unhappy.  Even if our compulsive behavior seemed like medicine or gave us a temporary rush of energy, we knew deep inside we were not living our potential.  

Then, there were those activities that led us to “the bubble”. We call these activities, Middle Circle Behaviors. For example, if our compulsivity was over-eating sweets, middle circle behavior could mean stopping by a bakery “just to look.”  If it’s relationship  addiction, it’s fantasizing about an acquaintance being our lover.  If it’s porn addiction, it might be browsing sexy people on the internet. If it’s blaming and arguing, then middle circle behavior might be thinking negative thoughts about someone.  Middle circle behaviors seem to seduce us back into our compulsive escape. The 3rd Step asks you to list exactly what you inner circle and middle circle behaviors are so you can distinguish what you need to avoid to gain sobriety.  

Next, and most importantly, you are to know your Outer Circle Behaviors. These are all those activities that make you feel so good, you easily forget about your compulsion. Make a list of at least 20 activities, like hiking, calling a friend, inviting them for a picnic, taking a walk, a shower, reading a book, meditating, watching uplifting movie, eating a delicious and healthy meal, and doing anything fun and creative.

We realized, unless we consciously chose to be happy each day by doing something fun and wholesome, we would fall back into our compulsive behavior yet again.  

Many of us made our work our bubble. We worshipped our work as our pursuit of happiness. But we could never get there, because happiness is not a “there,”  It is only available here and now when we decide to have a good time here and now.  

As we formed a new habit of claiming our happiness now, often without knowing how, we discovered a deep joy within that wanted to be shared in our own unique way.  Some of us attended more social functions where we could recreate with others, like a hiking bicycling, swimming, or dancing.   Some of us revived our creativity or found new creativity in music, art, writing, photography, dance, or in another way. 

You are not your circumstances. You are the excitement of your creativity. 

When depressed, we felt overwhelmed by the world, and more accurately by our thoughts and feelings about our circumstances.  We had become too interested in what was wrong or missing in our lives, and this put a damper on ability to create.  

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used to create them”?

–– Albert Einstein

Instead of remaining interested in our problems, we became more interested in our joy.  While stuck in fear, many of us felt a bit cold and contracted.  Tired of feeling contracted and overwhelmed by the world, we needed to break-out of that bubble and experience our bigger life. We developed new habits of aerobic exercise that built the spiritual fire in our bodies to help us shift from feeling overwhelmed by the world, to overwhelming the world with our happiness. Once our inner fire was ignited, we had to expand. 

We decided to stop taking ourselves so seriously, to laugh at our quirks, and the unexpected twists of our life dance.  Maybe we hadn’t resolved our issues yet, but our energy freed up, and we began to feel more vibrantly alive. Our ego lost its tight grip on our concerns, about how others see us. Laughing at ourselves created a gap, an opening for our soul’s freedom to bless our lives,  so what we did came from the pure joy of being.  

To summarize, when we are fully breathing and having fun in a wholesome way, unhealthy behavior is usually the last thing we will turn to. For example its hard to feel depressed while walking in Nature. Most any kind of  creativity and recreation we enjoy has the same effect. 

3RD CHAKRA ACTIVITIES

The 3rd Step Calls us to become better breathers and work-out our issues with a kind of recreation. It could be working out at the health club, but ideally outdoor walking, hiking, jogging, biking, or swimming.  

You HRA coach is also a certified Conscious Breathing Coach who can educate you in a way of breathing called BreathPlay that fires up the life force in the body and gives one abundant relaxed energy.   BreathPlay is called the “secret weapon of the top athletes of the world. “  Practicing BreathPlay everyday has been known to heal many health issues because most pathogenic viruses and bacteria can not live in a high oxygen environment. Also most health issues are sourced in the gut. When a person practices brearhPlay, the spiritual fire is super activated I the gut and solar plexus, greatly aiding digestion.   To learn BreathPlay, ask your HRA coach to educate you. 

What is your play? What could you do differently to enjoy each day this week.  One example might be walk or ride a bike to work instead of drive.  We recommend that your new level of enjoyment include others as well as quality time in solitude.  Examples include, all forms of recreation, art, creativity and entertainment. The goal is to fill your life with so much fun and joy, you lose interest in compulsive behaviors.

What fun activities can you commit to do this week?  Some examples include: taking a friend to the mountains, beach, lake, park, movies, or museum? What does your inner child most excited to do? Whatever you decide to do, it is very important you do it, to restore trust in yourself and build your self esteem.  How can you insure your follow through? Instead of treating playtime as a less important secondary activity, those of us who recovered our happiness learned to make our playtime our top priority, because it feeds the rest of our lives.  When we can truly laugh and play, we bring joy into our relationships and workplace. Place your fun time on your calendar as super high priority appointments that are to be strictly kept.  If you are not sure if you will really follow through, ask someone (a HRA member perhaps) if they will call or text you to remind you, or offer to pay them an amount of money or a service if you do not follow through.

AFFIRMATION

“I breathe into my many possibilities,  and do what’s fun!”