Thanks for cleaning this up, my awesome internet friend…
Faith
Or, perhaps you prefer the George Michael perspective…
Her husband also…
This is a different kind of Mother’s Day for me — my wife is in Rome today and today is a day of reflection without her around to do the traditional things of breakfast in bed, etc. There’s never been a time, though, where I’ve felt more in touch with all the things she is to our family. Yes, absence does…
Eye candy
Click image to enlarge…
Behind the Scenes
“They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Often times, we “behold” obvious beauty and neglect to look further. I try to see beyond the obvious and look at subjects from different angles. I can spend a lot of time photographing a small flower like this – shooting above it, below it, one side or the other, and in this case, behind it – just trying to catch just the right angle.
Out of half a dozen or so images of this particular bloom, the shot from behind turned out to be the most appealing to me. From behind, the sunlight falling on the front of the flower gives it an iridescent quality from the back. From this angle you also pick up the very fine strands of spider web that would go unnoticed from the front.” via Behind the Scenes.
Happy Mother’s Day
“Without mothers, there might be stars
but no one to wish upon them
No lips to kiss, no hands to hold
No eyes to gaze upon sunsets gold
Without mothers, there might be a moon
but no harvest for which to light
No songs to sing, no voices to raise
No flowers to soak up the sun’s gentle rays
Without mothers, there might be love
but no one to hold it, and it might just slip away”
Good stuff, Party Girl! I’m glad I found your blog…
Ponder this…
Nicholas Bate via Mmmm.
A tale of two boys
“Two young boys were raised by an alcoholic father. As they grew older, they moved away from that broken home, each going his own way in the world. Several years later, they happened to be interviewed separately by a psychologist who was analyzing the effects of drunkedness on children in broken homes. His research revealed that the two men were strikingly different from each other. One was a clean-living teetotaler, the other a hopeless drunk like his father. The psychologist asked each of them why he developed the way he did, and each gave an identical answer, ‘What would you expect when you have a father like mine.'” –Earl Nightingale, paraphrasing a story told by Hans Selye via Two boys……………….
Codepedence is not just an issue for partners of addicts
I don’t normally curate this much content in one ‘swell foop’ as I like to say but Melody Beattie’s perspective on owning your own stuff and Mark Brower’s comments on same were so good I couldn’t find anything to exclude. Mark starts out and then quotes my ‘Language of Letting Go’ reading for today…
Many of us struggle with codependency. When addiction is present in a relationship, the old model was that the addict was “dependent” and his or her spouse was “codependent.” But today we know that usually both the addict and spouse struggle with codependency in its various forms.
Codependency happens when we lose touch with our sense of self, and become over-dependent on how other people are doing, and/or how they perceive us. Since we are not “okay” with ourselves, we have to work overtime to ensure that other people around us are doing okay, and/or that they feel good about us.
So we wind up tolerating things we shouldn’t tolerate, feeling responsible for things we shouldn’t feel responsible for, and compromising what we want simply in order to please someone else. This inevitably leads to distress and frustration, which causes the addict to move deeper into their addiction, and for the addict’s spouse to cope in other ways.
The issue of codependence is complicated for Christians, because it gets mixed up with our desire to love and serve other people. The Bible tells us to “consider others better than ourselves.” But the same Bible also tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves, which presupposes some sort of healthy self-regard. The Bible also portrays Jesus himself taking time away from the crowds – not being “nice” and doing what they want him to do – in order to rest and reconnect with God the Father.
The trick to living a recovery life in relationships with others is to know how to separate healthy love with unhealthy codependence.
Melody Beattie has been a great help for me over the years with her many books on this topic. One of her best books on this topic is a daily meditation book called “The Language of Letting Go.”
In another article on this blog, I wrote about codependence, and quoted at length from her book. But it’s so good and helpful that I want to quote some more! What follows are some excerpts about the issue of “Property Lines”:
A helpful tool in our recovery, especially in the behavior we call detachment, is learning to identify who owns what. Then we let each person own and possess his or her rightful property.
If another person has an addiction, a problem, a feeling, or a self-defeating behavior, that is their property, not ours. If someone is a martyr, immersed in negativity, controlling, or manipulative, that is their issue, not ours.
If someone has acted and experienced a particular consequence, both the behavior and the consequence belong to that person.
People’s lies, deceptions, tricks, manipulations, abusive behaviors, inappropriate behaviors, cheating behaviors, and tacky behaviors belong to them, too. Not us.
People’s hopes and dreams are their property. Their guilt belongs to them too. Their happiness or misery is also theirs. So are their beliefs and messages.
If some people don’t like themselves, that is their choice. Their choices are their property, not ours. What people choose to say and do is their business.
What is our property? Our property includes our behaviors, problems, feelings, happiness, misery, choices, and messages; our ability to love, care, and nurture; our thoughts, our denial, our hopes and dreams for ourselves. Whether we allow ourselves to be controlled, manipulated, deceived, or mistreated is our business.
In recovery, we learn an appropriate sense of ownership. If something isn’t ours, we don’t take it. If we take it, we learn to give it back. Let other people have their property, and learn to own and take good care of what’s ours.
Today, I will work at developing a clear sense of what belongs to me, and what doesn’t. If it’s not mine, I won’t keep it. I will deal with myself, my issues, and my responsibilities.
If you want to learn more about codependence, consider signing up for the Recovery Journey, an e-course for people in recovery from sexual struggles. If you are the partner of someone who struggles, note that we have a special module with materials just for the partners. You can learn more about this program at the website: http://recoveryjourney.com
Source: Codepedence is not just an issue for partners of addicts | sexualsanity.com
Codependence is a constant battle for me and it has made made my wife’s vacation in Italy even more difficult than the simple logistics of trying to run a business and hold down the fort with 4 boys while she’s gone but by the grace of God, with the help of Celebrate Recovery, my good friends Sandy and Steve and Melody Beattie’s good thoughts. we are winning on this trip! If these issues resonate with you, drop me a note below. I’ll be happy to share with you what I have…
Related articles
- Fear & Codependency (toddlohenry.com)
- …on Control (toddlohenry.com)
- …on feeling good (toddlohenry.com)
- The Reality of Recovery, Part 2 (carolynswords.wordpress.com)
- When to stop enabling and start disabling (spreadinformation.wordpress.com)
My Boo!
Before my wife went away on vacation, she hid little cards and gifts all around the house. Today’s gift was a collar for my kitty Boo…
Click image to enlarge…
I used to be a dog guy but this kitty turned me into a cat fan and it was really sweet of my wife to leave me something for Boo — especially when she thinks that sometimes I love Boo more than her…
Facts about women
The Meta Picture via Facts about women.
Make up your mind
The Meta Picture via Make up your mind.
I was a German major. This is the only poem I know by heart. :-D
Über allen Gipfeln
Ist ruh,
In allem Wipfeln
Spürest du
Kaum einen Hauch
Die Vögelein schweigen im Walde
Warte nur, balde
Ruhest du auch
-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The road led nowhere. Well, that’s not entirely true. It certainly led somewhere, just to a somewhere that was so inconsequential or so far off that it could essentially be classified as nowhere. Like Wyoming, for instance. The road led to Wyoming. Either way, it was of little use to me now. I had been following it for hours in the vain hope that it might lead to some small mountain hamlet, or perhaps to a vehicle that I could hitch a ride on or hijack, but it didn’t. It led to nowhere.
I had found the road by pure happenstance. I was taking a stroll through the woods on a rather lovely Sunday morning, as I am want to do at times, when the mood…
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A whole bunch of ‘I miss you’ songs…
…only 5 more days until my wife returns. Sigh… :-/
Bright, shiny objects! 
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