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The need to restrict your behavior and expectations within narrow borders, underestimating your potential and living an inconspicuous life
Codependents can cry and rage but aren’t able to name a feeling or know why they’re upset.
People who are overwhelmed with feelings need to contain and understand them.
Practicing nonattachment and minding your own business
Codependents have adapted and reacted to others’ behavior in order to cope, instead of referring back to the internal impulses of the Self.
“To thine own self be true,
When you can’t connect to your Self, you find it hard to identify feelings, make decisions, and set boundaries. You react to people and situations and look to others for answers, validation, and approval. Sometimes, you may feel resentful, lost, and confused, which leads to depression.
Shame is a painful feeling of unworthiness, inadequacy, and alienation.
Because they’re disconnected from themselves, codependents typically have difficulty with self-trust and following their inner guidance. You may be confused or unable to make up your mind, always asking someone else’s opinion. You may not know what you really want and defer to others in order to be liked and loved.
Feelings are part of our humanity, but codependents feel guilty and ashamed about them. You wonder what’s normal and judge your feelings. You might tell yourself you shouldn’t feel the way you do and feel guilty when you’re angry, or you may think there’s something wrong with you when you’re sad or depressed.
Codependents also feel guilt and shame about their needs, making it difficult to ask for help or what they want. They judge themselves as weak, indulgent, needy, or selfish.
Codependents feel guilty not only for their own feelings, but also about other people’s feelings. They mistakenly feel responsible for them. You may feel guilty if your spouse didn’t like the movie you chose, even though he or she agreed to see it.
You have the impulse to do something when someone else is upset. Their problems and responsibilities become yours.
Your thoughts repeat themselves in circles and sometimes race out of control, worrying, searching for answers, and going over conversations. They grip your mind in an inescapable preoccupation that takes possession of you. Obsessions are driven by fear and pain. It can be fear of being abandoned or rejected, fear of being unlovable, or fear that your loved one will either destroy you or him- or herself. Bottled up emotion steals you away from the present — minutes and hours add up to days. Your life disappears. The consequences can be devastating.
People who are happiest, healthiest, and the most successful have an internal locus of control, meaning they feel they control outcomes in their lives. They take responsibility for themselves and effect changes to create their happiness, whereas dependent men and women find self-responsibility and self-efficacy difficult.
Talking about problems can feel as if you’re in a life-threatening situation — that your only option is to blame, hide or shade the truth, or apologize and agree in order to please, appease, or control someone else’s feelings. This is defensive manipulation because it’s motivated by fear to avoid conflict. Codependents both manipulate and are easily manipulated with criticism and guilt trips. Manipulating focuses on someone else whose reaction becomes the measure of your self-esteem.
Codependents react. This means your actions are predominantly determined by outside influences. A few words in a text message can hit you like a cyclone and blow you off course from what you’re doing, feeling, or thinking. It destroys your mood and what you think of yourself. It can ruin your day or even your week. You take personally what others say as a reflection of you. This instantly surrenders your self-esteem and emotions to whatever or whoever has triggered them. You lose your center because your Self is other-defined, and your locus of control is others. This makes you easy to
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Covert aggressive manipulation: This is distinguished from defensive manipulation. Here the motive is aggression, albeit hidden. It’s an indirect power play to get someone to act or feel the way the manipulator wants, using charm, implied rewards, compliments, veiled suggestions of punishment, helplessness, guilt, shaming, self-deprecation, or playing a victim role. On the outside, a manipulator doesn’t appear aggressive and may act like the aggrieved party, so the person being manipulated feels guilty, defensive, or confused.
Opposing: The abuser treats you as an adversary and argues against whatever you say, challenging perceptions, opinions, and thoughts, without listening or volunteering thoughts or feelings, in effect saying no to everything, so a constructive conversation is impossible.
Lying and denying: Whatever the motive, conscious lying is manipulative. Codependents often do this to avoid confrontations or to control their partners. Some addicts and abusers deny that agreements or promises were made or that a conversation or event took place, including prior abuse, and instead declare love and caring. This is crazy-making and makes the victim gradually doubt his or her memory and perceptions.
If you grew up in that environment or in an authoritarian or high-conflict family, fear of upsetting a parent meant staying in control. You learned to control your feelings and behavior to feel safe. You’d never again want to be at someone’s mercy.
Codependents don’t know how to meet their needs and believe that others can’t take care of themselves.
You anticipate others’ feelings and needs and offer unsolicited aid and suggestions without being asked. You may not even be deterred if the person you want to help doesn’t believe he or she has a problem. When your advice isn’t taken or your help isn’t appreciated, you get frustrated, annoyed, hurt, or resentful, but you continue to help whether or not you’re able to change the other person. Some people may take advantage of your inability to say no. Even though you’re volunteering help, by not taking responsibility for your behavior, you may in the end, feel used or resentful and
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It’s a misconception that you have to vent or rage at someone to express your anger. The most effective path is to be assertive without blame or accusations (see Chapter 13). Rather than scold someone or stuff your anger, journal, discuss it with someone, and then express it. Channel rage into physical or creative activity. You can also observe anger in meditation or analyze the contributing factors, including your part.
What addicts have in common is that they’re less present in personal interactions, and with greater dependency, drug use interferes with work and relationships.
Alexis had been cutting herself, but didn’t know why. She gave monosyllable answers and was shut down and depressed. Her husband was her opposite — a controlling, passionate, and angry man. She had to ask him for household spending money and justify each expense. She denied her rage at him. Yet he expressed the anger that she wouldn’t allow herself to feel. Alexandra’s expression of her fury would have prevented her self-mutilation.
Both therapy and meetings have different advantages and shouldn’t be thought of as mutually exclusive options, where you can engage in one in lieu of the other. Instead, think of them as additional forms of help. Your recovery will be easier and faster with greater support. Both psychotherapy and Twelve Step meetings address issues regarding relationships, spirituality, addiction, behavior modification, and boundaries.
In an open environment, you’re free to express your authentic Self. You can talk about what you see, hear, feel, and think. There aren’t forbidden topics, like sex or money. A parent’s shortcoming or failure isn’t hidden, but instead teaches human frailty — that parents aren’t perfect. Dissent isn’t silenced, and family decisions and values may be questioned and debated. Although all feelings are allowed expression, verbal abuse isn’t tolerated, and not all actions are permissible.
Codependency usually starts when you feel emotionally abandoned. In response, you repress feelings, needs, observations, and thoughts. You learn to numb your hurt, distrust your parents, and become self-sufficient. To cope and be accepted, you hide behind a false personality and/or develop compulsive behaviors to cope.
List all the ways that your child expresses itself in your feelings and at play, such as wearing bright colors; gardening; dancing; playing music, a sport, or with a pet; cooking; taking bubble baths; or any other activity that you fully enjoy.
Your child can be readily accessed through the emotional and intuitive right side of your brain by way of movement, creative expression, meditation, and writing with your nondominant hand.
Make a habit of dialoguing with your child on a daily basis to discover your wants, feelings, and needs. Ask your child’s opinion about plans, decisions, which friends feel safe, and which don’t. Getting to know your child includes happy and play times, too. Ask your child about its early favorites — favorite playmate, discovery, food, place, pastime, teacher, TV show, book, fairy tale, song, and so on.
Feelings aren’t signs of weakness; they just are. Whatever you feel is legitimate, and you’re entitled to feel it just because you do. The danger lies in ignoring feelings, which can lead to poor decisions and health problems. Although feelings without reason shouldn’t control decisions, they often do when unacknowledged. Finally, honoring your feelings also means taking responsibility for them. No one makes you feel something — only you do.
I have a right to my feelings. I don’t have to defend them. All my feelings are okay, even anger and painful ones. No one can tell me what I “should” feel, even me. What I’m feeling will pass. My feelings have value and intelligence. Allowing myself to feel my emotions is healthy.
Take a mini-vacation Close your eyes and imagine that you’re on a vacation, reclining and relaxing in your favorite environment. Pretend that there are neon letters on your forehead that spell out RELAX. They light up every time you exhale. Take ten slow exhales. Breathe in the fresh air at your vacation spot. Smell it and feel it on your skin. Listen to the sounds around you — possibly water, birds, or a breeze. Feel the ground under you. Are you on grass, forest leaves, or a sandy beach? You no longer have to support yourself. Let yourself sink into the earth beneath you. Exhale and see the
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There’s a saying in Alcoholics Anonymous: “Take the action, and the feelings will follow.”
Make a list of things you’d like to do, and do them — don’t wait for a friend to go along with you. Make a list of things you’re afraid to do. Talk to a supportive, encouraging friend or sponsor to help you challenge your fears and take more risks.
Write each day the discrepancies between what you say and what you actually think and feel. What would it be like to go through your day, your week, your life, and express your true Self? Write a paragraph about the consequence if You didn’t worry about hurting people’s feelings You didn’t just go along with other people’s decisions You didn’t give up your time or listen when you didn’t want to You said no when you wanted to You told people when they disappointed you or hurt your feelings You were more honest about your opinions You weren’t afraid to show your anger You admitted when you
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Being more authentic helps grow your self-esteem. If you are hiding secrets in your relationships, there’s a good chance you’re repeating the rules in the family you grew up in. Usually the fear that the truth harms or destroys someone is really a camouflage for your fear that someone will withdraw or reject you. However, the effect of withholding the truth is what actually creates damage, hurt, and walls between you and others. Revealing facts is one level of truth. It’s more difficult to be open and honest with your feelings in the present (see Chapter 15 on intimacy). When you’re not, you
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Get into the good habit of listing three positive traits or behaviors about yourself each day. List ten if you can; even small things, like holding the door for someone or saying good morning to coworkers to whom you don’t ordinarily speak.
Go over your list of self-criticisms and write encouraging statements to counteract each criticism. Think of what you would say to a toddler learning a new skill. Be gentle and patient with yourself. Tell yourself, “I love and accept you,” “You’re doing great,” and “I’m so proud of your progress.”
Confidence isn’t conceit or arrogance. Confidence is feeling secure in yourself based upon real knowledge of your strengths and limitations. On the other hand, conceit is unfounded self-flattery or an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and arrogance is a false sense of superiority over others. Both compensate for low self-esteem.
Try always to choose in your highest self-interest — which may not give you immediate gratification but will result in long-term benefits and improved self-esteem. This is the way you nourish your garden and keep it healthy.
When you start accepting yourself, you stop struggling to present yourself as smart, strong, kind, sexy, or any other pretense. Self-acceptance allows you to be authentic. You can finally relax, and more of the inner real you comes forward. You have no shame or fear of revealing yourself when you accept yourself unconditionally. This attitude spills over onto others for whom you have more compassion and acceptance. You won’t feel the need to control or change them or even convince them to agree with you.
Love for your Self is healthy. The Bible says, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” You’re a human being as worthy of love as anyone else. Contrary to the idea that self-love is selfish and takes away from your ability to love others, the opposite is true. The greater is your love for yourself, the greater will be your ability to love others. Moreover, you only allow yourself to receive as much love as you give to yourself.
Self-love is very different from self-pity, which is a blend of fear, judgment, and anger about troubles that have befallen you. With self-compassion and empathy, you’re present to your raw feeling experience and are able to allow it and comfort yourself with understanding and care. Self-pity implies, “It shouldn’t be this way,” but with self-love, there’s compassion for and acceptance of what is, with no attempt to resist or fix it.
The faith required in self-love is what enables you to allow your feelings, without lapsing into anxiety or judgment. Centeredness and calmness contain and support your emotions and afford you some objectivity. You know that despite this, “I’ll survive.” This objectivity permits you to comfort yourself. Naturally, there are times when you have no objectivity and no faith, but you continue to strive for it. Spending time alone with yourself is essential, and a meditation practice is helpful in developing the ability to witness and contain your emotions.
Imagine a little kitten sitting on your chest. You’re stroking, cuddling, and speaking lovingly to it. Allow your heart to open. Hear it purring and feel the warmth of its body next to yours, as your chest rises with each breath. Listen to your heartbeat. Now imagine the kitten inside your heart, and continue stroking and speaking lovingly to yourself about all that you’ve suffered and all your burdens, conflicts, and worries. Let everything just be for a few minutes. You don’t have to solve or do anything. Tell yourself, “At this moment, I’m safe.” Ask yourself, “What is the most loving thing
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Loving yourself is a life journey and goal that starts with self-knowledge (see Chapter 9). It’s the core of recovery and rewards you with enormous benefits — increased self-esteem, peace, well-being, health, and loving relationships with others. You can consider it a spiritual practice because it requires awareness, reverence, and kindness toward yourself as one of God’s creations. Loving yourself for ten minutes a day is a good start, but it’s an ongoing process. You have opportunities to do so throughout the day — often moment to moment — in your actions and the way you listen and speak to
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Ask yourself several times a day, “What am I feeling?” What do I need and want?” and “What is the most loving choice I can make right now?” Wait for answers, and give yourself what you need, including rest, healthy food, joy, compassion, and socializing. Choices made out of fear, anxiety, or guilt are usually not in your highest interest.
