Being Sober ~ It's Good to Be Acknowledged

Staying Sober IS an Accomplishment.  And as humans we desire to have our accomplishments be acknowledged. We want to know that we are on the right track and that our efforts are not in vain. As children we look up to our parents and teachers for praise. As adults we look to our bosses, peers, spouses, friends for that same praise.  Look, even Facebook has a "Like" button so I know I'm not off my rocker writing this.  

And it's not a bad thing.  It's why the AA program as well as Celebrate Recovery has a system for saying great job with their chips.  And so at recoveryBox, it was felt that we need to praise and support those who are using our app and perhaps not attending a traditional meeting of some sort.

We hope you understand how PROUD we are of each and every time you see that screen come up!!  Some will want to keep it private - say between you and your sponsor.  Others will want to share on a social media site like Facebook and Twitter.

Be proud of your hard work.  I know I am!

Spiritual Self-Care Part of Addiction Recovery

Spiritual Self-Care is one of those sticky subjects when it comes to Addiction Recovery.  However, for myself and the friend who recoveryBox was originally built, neither of us would be where we are today without our Spiritual lives.

In the app, Spiritual Self-Care is a G3.  It's the third "level" of the green lights. And the reason that it's the last green light is because you have to take care of yourself physically before you can even have anything left in you to cope with the next level - emotions.  And you have to work on emotions before you can even begin to think deeper about Spirituality.

Yes, these 3 levels of green lights WILL occur concurrently, however you will see a shift.  In the beginning when you are just starting to tackle your addiction, you will notice that you have a few G1's and not many G2's and maybe only one G3 (a quick prayer that goes like this "Oh God, please help me today").

But as time goes on you will notice that when you are really working hard at your recovery that your G3 numbers will increase.

Let's just start with the "how does it work with the app recoveryBox". Select the G3 Spiritual Self-Care from the list.

Next, you will see how it populates the screen.  When you want to record your spiritual self-care activities, select the comments field (where the stop sign is).

Then when you choose "Select From List", it will bring up the self-care items for this light that have been provided.  Remember, you can add whatever makes this work for you. recoveryBox just provides some ideas to get you thinking.  Remember, if you do devotions, twice a day then remember to record it as two G3 Spiritual Self-Care lights. Give yourself credit for all the healthy habit activities that you do each day.

This is just the how to record it in recoveryBox, later this week come back to see the why during the Random Resource ThuRsday post.

Thinking about using recoveryBox?  Check it out here.

Ready to download recoveryBox the iPhone app for Addiction Recovery, then Download it here.

Musical Monday Devotionals

If you are like me and music speaks volumes to you..check out the Daily Devotions in the recoveryBox app.  Monday's devotions are now Musical Monday's where we bring a song whose lyrics are to be pondered. The Holy Spirit works in us in many different ways.

Have you downloaded recoveryBox? Want to know more about how this app can help on your journey to Addiction Recovery?

Visit www.recoveryboxapp.com and download it today!

Serenity Prayer for Addiction Recovery

Many of the users of recoveryBox Asked for me to include the Serenity Prayer. And so it's now available in the Resources Section of the app.

I know I personally prayed it many times while attending Celebrate Recovery as I know it's part of the traditional twelve step program.

Remember, live ONE day at a time.

And don't forget to give yourself a Green Light each time you say this prayer.  You deserve that!

Want to know more about recoveryBox, the iPhone app for Addiction Recovery? Check out our site. You can download it from there as well if you think it's something that can help you during your recovery journey.

Protecting Your Eyes from Pornography

Last week's Random Resource ThuRsday was about pornography.  And I urged you to rid your house of physical items that are pornographic in nature.

This week I have 2 resources to use for the internet.  Now first, let me say that NOTHING is fail-safe.  And in all likely hood you will probably need a combination of plans in place if the addiction is strong enough.  But with proper treatment you can be victorious.



My first resource is opendns.com.

What is DNS.  Think of DNS as the map of getting to where you want to go on the internet.  Regular DNS does not distinguish between sites.  It's just takes you where you need to be based on what you type (and some stuff in the background).  OpenDNS has a filtering mechanism.  Think of it as a firewall to keep out unwanted visitors as well as unwanted sites.

OpenDNS is EASY to implement and I think by far one of the best systems out there.  You might think it's going to be slow because if you ever tried a filter piece of software..well it does bog down your machine.  I am not going to explain how it does it (but I do know if you are interested).  It is very fast!

We have young children here at our house that use their iDevices all the time.  And with TV's being able to access internet sites directly from your remote control, the scenarios of pornography being accessible is so much more complex than adding a piece of software as was done in days past.  Well, OpenDNS fixes some of that.  When implemented it will make all of your devices go through this filtering.

For home solutions, check out their site.  And the best part is that it is FREE!  Actually what I love best is that if one of my kids tries to access an inappropriate website, they will see a message with a picture I uploaded letting them know that Mom and Dad think it's inappropriate.

NOTE:: with any search engines, visuals are so HARD to block.  So you might want to think about blocking search engine use or using Safe Searches using Google. I could get into why it's almost impossible to block these images, but in reality it's a Google thing (and I truly wish they would take a stronger look at this).

But for a HUGE number of these sites, OPENDNS will block it.


My next resource is CovenentEyes.com

Now this is a different solution as it requires adding a piece of software onto your machine.  It currently works for Windows, iDevices, Android (sorry no Blackberry or Windows Phone 7..at least not as of this writing). As of this writing the Mac only allows for accountability and not filtering..

What makes this different if that you can have time controls as well as sensitivity levels. but more importantly it sends a report to your accountability partner of all the sites that you have visited.  

Yesterday's daily devotion was a video from IamSecond.com. It featured Brian's life and his decision to give up his Meth addiction.  It is so powerful as are so many of the videos on the site that I thought I would share it as well here on my the app's main blog.

Here is a small video but to see/read more PLEASE visit the IamSecond.com site.

For daily devotions from recoveryBox, visit http://recoveryboxdevos.blogspot.com

Y3 Yellow Light :: Intentionally Possess Object of Risk

Having an object that is contrary to staying sober seems to be an obvious yellow.  Some would argue a Red Light, But I say it's just  a Yellow.

Just because you possess the item doesn't mean that you are going to use the item! It's a choice! And because it's a choice, it's why I have it as a Yellow Light!!

Y3 : Intentionally Possess and Item of Risk.

But let's be clear here.  It's a recipe for disaster.  I mean why do you even have it?  You know that by using the item or looking at it then you will be having to start your sobriety from square one, feel ashamed besides other emotions and all that goes along with using again.

So, it's a no brainer.  Get rid of it!

• Get rid of the alcohol in your house!
• Get rid of that pornographic video in the attic!
• Drugs lingering around the house? Trash them now!

Clean out!

And yes we live in a fallen world and there are temptations everywhere, but (and I feel like a cliche when I write this), but Just Say No!

Don't make it possible so that when the urge is there and you need that rush to easily grab that magazine or drink and fulfill that need.  Fill that need with something else - go for a walk. For visit a friend. Do something other than grab that item.

Yes, I understand that "things" don't do bad things.  It's when people use those things.  But why have the temptation? Why allow a trigger cause you to run to the very vice you are trying to cut off.

I really don't have much to say on this topic except GET RID OF IT ALL!

I completely understand that this doesn't apply to all addictions.  I mean you can't get rid of food.  But you can get rid of junk food. And you can't get of the internet (OK I couldn't) but you can use something like opendns.com or Covenant Eyes.  There are always things you can do to help yourself.  It's about making a choice.

Have a great day!  Now go clean out!


PS. If you need help cleaning out but just can't seem to get started - perhaps it's time to talk with your counselor or accountability partner on what is making it so hard to let go.


Wanting to download recoveryBox and see how it can help you?  Visit the Apple App store.