Whether you have a mental illness or an addiction, triggers are relevant to your recovery. Triggers can be anything – a person, place, object, or situation – that causes you to want to relapse. For mental illness, relapse could mean reverting back to self-harm, self-medication through use of substances or drugs, reckless behavior, and more. For addiction, relapse is often referred to as reverting back to behaviors enacted when the addiction was active (which, for many, is using substances again). Identifying your triggers is a critical component to your recovery. It often includes trial and error, because you learn what affects you over time. Amidst discovering and understanding your triggers, however, it’s important to stay motivated in your recovery. Music therapy is a source of inspiration and motivation for many people in their recovery.
Music therapy can involve singing, creating, moving to, analyzing, and/or listening to music. The American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) states that music therapy can help individuals to become more engaged in treatment, to experience added emotional support, to strengthen certain aspects of themselves, and much more. A 2015 study published in the Korean Journal of Music Therapy sought to explore how music therapy assisted individuals on coping skills, motivation, and treatment eagerness in patients undergoing detoxification. Participants were randomly assigned one of three treatment groups: educational music therapy, education without music, or recreational music therapy. Researchers found that those in the educational music therapy program experienced higher motivation towards treatment afterward compared to the other two groups.
If you’ve been struggling with triggers lately, music therapy can provide you with a number of benefits:
- Serves as an outlet for your emotions
- Allows you to process suppressed emotions or emotions that haven’t been properly dealt with yet
- Provides you with a safe space to connect with others, potentially building your social support system
- Gives you an opportunity to be creative and explore a side of you that may otherwise go unnoticed
- Boosts your motivation in recovery
Music Therapy is just one of many therapies available to help you navigate the journey of trauma recovery. At The Guest House Ocala, every single guest is given a completely unique treatment plan, designed with concierge-style customization to meet their every unique need. For information on our residential treatment programs for recovery from traumas, addictions, and related mental health issues, call us today: 855-483-7800