WARRIORS PROMISE
Definition Warrior: “A person engaged or experienced in warfare.” “A person engaged in some struggle or conflict.”
Definition Promise: “A declaration that one will do or refrain from doing something specified.” especially “ground for the expectation of success, improvement, or excellence.”
The struggle of alcoholism and addiction and how it affects us as individuals, families, communities, and our country is rattling. The statistics of annual casualties from over 100,000 overdose deaths, 170,000 alcohol-related deaths, and more than 2,000,000 seeking rehabilitation for addiction and mental health (SAMHSA statistics) can seem impossible, but there it is.
Warriors Promise is a community of warriors in recovery sharing their experiences with alcoholism, addiction, and trauma and how we have recovered. Our recovery is based on our profound awareness of connection with others’ experiences (aka spiritual experiences) and positive impact on ourselves, our family, friends, and the community we serve.
We use the power of writing to express our recovery.
James Pennebaker, a social psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, studied the impact of a certain kind of writing on mental health in 1986. Since then, over 200 research studies have reported that “emotional writing” can improve people’s physical and emotional health. In classic studies, subjects who wrote about personal upheavals for 15 minutes a day over three or four days visited doctors for health concerns less frequently and reported greater psychological well-being. According to a 2019 study, a six-week writing intervention increases resilience and decreases depressive symptoms, perceived stress, and rumination among those reporting trauma in the past year. Thirty-five percent of the participants who began the program with indicators of likely clinical depression ended the program no longer meeting this criterion.
Written expression helps us process our experiences and envision a path forward. It can also lower blood pressure, strengthen our immune systems, and enhance our overall well-being. Engaging in expressive writing can reduce stress, anxiety, and depression, improve sleep and performance, and provide greater focus and clarity.
The Harvard Business Review posted that narrating the story of a past negative event or an ongoing anxiety “frees up” cognitive resources. Research suggests that trauma damages brain tissue, but that when people translate their emotional experience into words, they may be changing the way it is organized in the brain.
“Creativity is a basic human response to trauma and a natural emergency defense system,” writes Louise DeSalvo in Writing as a Way of Healing: How Telling Our Stories Transforms Our Lives. This book draws on scientific studies about the efficacy of using writing as a therapeutic tool. “The difference between a victim and a survivor is the meaning made of the trauma,” she writes.
While some who read this can state that they have engaged or have some experience in warfare, all can relate to being engaged in some struggle or conflict.
We have declared that we live a life of sobriety—warrior recovery—and through the power of writing, we inspire a legacy of experience, strength, and hope for others to follow.
