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Forgiving What You Can’t Forget: Chapters Five, Six & Seven
Chapters 5, 6 & 7: Collecting, Connecting & Correcting the Dots Collecting the dots is all about searching through our past to identify how our current belief system has formed: the good, the bad and the ugly. If we don’t identify what might be dysfunctional in our own belief systems (and the subsequent standards we hold others to) and we can’t backtrack to where those beliefs started to take root, then we can’t address the mental shift we need to make in our own lives. As I reflected back to my childhood, one thing was really clear: it was good. Compared to so many others, it was REALLY good. I…
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Forgiving What You Can’t Forget: Chapters Three & Four
Chapter Three: Is This Even Survivable? Unresolved grief, pain, unforgiveness, etc. can provoke us to react – behave and speak – in a way that leaves us unrecognizable. Even to ourselves. Suffice to say, it can bring out the absolute worst in us; perhaps even causing us to react in ways that we didn’t even know we were capable. Trying to regain control of an out of control situation, when we ourselves are out of control is a little like sprinkling fuel on the fire. Things just get more and more chaotic. My choice to disconnect and walk away from some people in my life has stemmed from my own…
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Boundaries: Painful & Powerful (Guest Post)
As a person in recovery from a loved one’s addiction, learning how to set boundaries was a brutal, but necessary, life lesson. I struggle with co-dependency, so it is in my nature to want to please people at all costs. Even when it costs me my own happiness, I have a very difficult time saying no. Loving an addict was a recipe for disaster. I couldn’t say no to him, and he knew it. If he pressed hard enough, long enough, he knew I’d cave. If I hid his alcohol or Ambien he could throw a big enough fit and I’d let him have it. If he begged enough, I…
