People who often talk about showing a ‘stiff upper lip’ are choosing to suffer in silence, isolating themselves from others and destroying a chance to be authentic and sincere. I have spent time with many male recovering addicts who have healed as a result of talking about their emotional pain and depression. Some of them fought in the first and second wars in Iraq; they are physically hard men and are certainly not ‘weak’.

Between the ages of 10 and 21, my thoughts were consumed with how to escape reality – how to mask my feelings of inadequacy, shame, guilt, fear, abandonment, rage and loneliness.

We are not going through an “economy crisis”; we are going through a “spiritual transition”. On a deeper level, the collective conscious of humanity is awakening.

Get rid of the idea that to own money or to be associated with it is “dirty” or “greedy” or “non-spiritual.

For many emotionally wounded addicts, the idea of grieving is a daunting prospect. To regularly grieve does require courage and a desire to heal – but rest assured; the resulting gains from these efforts are profound.

Compulsively saying “Sorry” is often a reflection of wanting to apologize for our very existence. I used to say the word ‘sorry’ when there was no need for me to do so. It became a habit and reflected my chronic toxic shame, low self-worth and low self-esteem.

Essentially, ‘mindfulness’ means having a deeper awareness of what is. Mindfulness entails being aware of our thoughts, feelings and body sensations as they arise in the present moment.

The human brain is incredible in its capacity to heal and rewire itself. The human brain can be shaped and trained to be more resilient, calm, compassionate and alert – we can condition ourselves to be successful. Through mindfulness meditation, we can literally re-wire our brains through new experiences, which modify our neural network and our neural chemistry. Mindfulness also enhances gamma synchrony and improves the function of the human brain.

In ‘Drug Addiction Recovery’ Christopher Dines elegantly teaches us a process for healing from paralysing grief, addiction and emotional wounds using a mindfulness-based approach.

Most people need to reach some sort of emotional rock bottom before they are willing to do their deep feeling work, let alone address an addiction. This is why, in my view, hitting rock bottom can be a springboard to an immeasurably better life.