The inner narrative I am having is exhausting:

I always mess up.
I’ll never be sober.
I just can’t stop.
Something is wrong with me.

The truth behind these words echo. Over and over.

I know the reason I used this time. To feel high. That’s it. To feel high. What kind of reason is that. I wasn’t even lonely. I wasn’t even depressed. I wasn’t even stressed. I used to feel something physically that makes me feel better. I used to feel warmth. I used to feel comfort. When will I stop letting my feelings dictate my actions? When will “feeing high” lose it’s appeal? When will relationships become more important? When will pleasing God become more important? When will my finances be more important? When will being whole be enough? When will respecting myself be enough? Will it ever?

I feel the need to punish myself. Give me what I deserve. Isolate me. Send me to my room to think about what I have done. Make me feel the pain that I cause others when I use.

But self-contempt does not produce transformation.

It usually produces more acting out, more using.

Because when a person believe they are a failure, they often return to what feels fitting.

This is why shame fuels addiction.

You cannot hate yourself into wholeness.

You cannot punish yourself into freedom.

Healing grows better in honesty. The moment you get honest with yourself, God and someone else, that’s when we recover.

I’m trying to learn to forgive myself, give grace and move on. But how? When you feel like such a failure. How do you move on?