When Healing Becomes an Addiction: My Journey Through Recovery, Sobriety, and Spiritual Healing
- Stacey Sellars
- Mar 14
- 3 min read
Yesterday marked four years of being clean and sober for me. If I’m honest, I didn’t even remember. It’s only that I saw it on my calendar. I’ve gone four years abstinent before so that’s probably why I wasn’t too phased about the occasion. I’ll probably feel more excited next year knowing that it’s a brand new milestone.
Four years clean isn’t actually a very long time in the world of addiction recovery. However, my healing journey really started a good twenty-five years ago. Even during the peak of my addiction I was working on healing myself. Healing and the world of self-help became an obsession, or rather, an addiction, very quickly for me…
The Obsession With Healing and Self-Help
I knew deep down that there was an underlying reason for my inherent misery. I just didn’t know what it was, but I vowed to spend my life finding out. And realistically, I have spent most of my life on this quest for healing and self-discovery.
So when I finally got to the root cause of my pain four years ago it left me feeling completely lost. I kept thinking, “Well what in the hell am I meant to do with my life now?” I looked at a huge pile of unread self-help books on my shelf and realised there was no longer any point in reading them.
In fact, everything I spent my life obsessing over — like trying new and different healing modalities — was now pointless. It left me feeling completely hollow.
The Ayahuasca Message: There Is Nothing Left to Fix
When I went on the ayahuasca retreat in Peru about 12 months after discovering the root cause of my pain, the message was loud and clear from Mother Aya: “There’s nothing left to do but just enjoy your life now.”
But I was addicted to healing, so when I came home I found myself still continuing to search for peace, still continuing to try and prove my worth to the world.
Realising That Healing Itself Can Become an Addiction
It’s only been in the last month that I’ve finally understood the message — there’s nothing left to do but just be. I finally get that all of the hard work is done. There’s nothing left to “fix”. Now that doesn’t mean that I won’t continue to do energetic maintenance like kinesiology and homeopathy, or that I won’t continue to grow, but it does mean that the quest to heal is over.
I realised that healing had become an unhealthy addiction for me.
When the Search for Peace Keeps You Trapped
For most of my life it was actually a very healthy addiction to have — an addiction that saved my life from being addicted to drugs and alcohol.
But in the last four years it was actually keeping me trapped in this place of constantly searching for peace.
It prevented me from seeing that peace is already here within me.
I was so busy trying to get to a destination in the future that I was actually missing all of the blessings that already surround me in the now.
The Healing Industry and the Trap of Constant Self-Improvement
I do actually see this a lot in the healing space. People lose sight of all of the blessings that are already in reach for them. I guess it’s a by-product of living in a society that promotes always wanting more — consumerism — in body, mind, and spirit.
It’s actually a trap that is designed to keep people in a constant state of misery. A constant state of never being satisfied. Always looking for outside sources, people, healing modalities, or possessions to make us feel whole.
The Freedom of Finally Letting Yourself Just Be
I’ve wasted years being trapped in this cycle — years being addicted to healing, years searching for peace. So it feels absolutely blissful to see that peace is already within me. To know that the search is over.
It’s like a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders knowing that all I have to do to be free is just be.
If you find yourself constantly searching for what is next — for the thing that will make you happy — then maybe it’s time to stop, look around, and smell the roses that already live within your garden.
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