Codependency refers to finding one’s sense of identity and self-worth by trying to please and/or rescue another person who is perceived to be in need or all important to one’s sense of self. The codependent’s sense of “who I am” is defined by attending to others and how others see us. Most of us are either active codependents or codependents-in-recovery. Patterns of codependency start young and innocently. As kids, It’s natural to want to please adults. Most of us are trained to please others at a young age. We learn how to take care of other people’s needs to feel like a valued part of the family. We learn that the more we do this, the more positive strokes we get and the more loved and wanted we feel. In a dysfunctional family, we learn that the more we take care of the adults around us, we have a chance at lessening the neglect or abuse. As children, we want and need the attention of the adults around us and we will do whatever it takes to get it. We often develop a refined antenna that can accurately read other people’s needs and desires. The codependent becomes a master at trying to please others and take care of them. This rescuing behavior is encoded in the survival mechanism. “I know I exist because you need me. I know that I exist because I have made sure that you think I’m indispensable. By being so busy and full with your life, I avoid the pain and holes inside of me.” With this addictive wiring, the codependent person disappears and what’s worse, disappears to themselves. They do not know who they are or how to exist without being in relation to another person needing us. The codependent believes that in time, what is given to others will be given back. We are absolutely longing to fill that hole that didn't get met by one or both parents. We just want to be loved back, to be seen back, to be validated in one’s sense of worth — by the other person, and not to be left. Once again, it is natural for us as children to find identity in how others see us. Ideally, as we grow into young adults, we have internalized the external validation and it is now based within us. However, more often than not, there is a glitch, and the validation is not internalized and the seeking continues — with an intensity — right into our adult relationships. We are still seeking approval, love, and a sense of belonging by looking to be needed by others and therefore, validated by others, even when it dreadfully hurts ourselves. It has become part of the survival mechanism within us. The unconscious and subconscious undertow for the codependent would sound something like this —“By taking care of you first, I know who I am. I know myself by how I show up for you and how you respond to me. If I was not focused on what you need, I would feel lost and worthless.” We often get stuck in this child posture and we continue to identify with how others see us. We want to be the most important person to them. Making other people’s needs priority above our own becomes our insidious M.O. The codependent aims to be the expert of experts at attending to the other person. The underlying propelling belief is that if the other person feels loved like never before, taken care of better than ever, seen like no one else has ever seen them - then one day, this person will love you back the way you have always wanted to feel accepted and loved, meeting the unmet needs from your family of origin. And, certainly they won’t leave you, right? This is no easy thing to give up. We are propelled to keep doing it. Sometimes there is an unspeakable terror lurking underneath all those good deeds. This fear is not often consciously felt, but it’s often there. Because if we stopped focusing on someone else long enough, we would be confronted with a deep burning discomfort that we don’t really know who we are or what we want. With this comes a sense of emptiness, numbness, grief, and anger. Despite gallant attempts to avoid rejection and abandonment, we often run right into these feelings. Often when we are parenting another adult, that person ultimately feels a need to leave home and be on their own. We might not only be experiencing rejection and abandonment from another, but we also might discover that even worse, we abandoned ourselves. This experience of self-betrayal hurts like hell. It hurts enough to be the turning point that begins our recovery. It is the intensity of this hurt that breaks us out of the trance and undertow of codependency and launches us on the courageous path of self-honesty, discomfort in our own skins, and the willingness to be with the empty spaces.
Bottom line, codependency doesn’t work.
After all that effort of showing up for another, overextending, the time, money, and energy given, the self-sacrifice - well, it never works. Damn, what a wake up! The wake up comes from finding out the hard way that all that output toward another doesn’t bring the love back to us as we believed it would. The heart breaks and this pain of self-betrayal is actually the first step in recovery — being in touch with a self that has been betrayed! I think most people, at some point, come into the feeling of self-betrayal as their turning point in codependency. The recognition and pain of self-betrayal has the power to lead us back to ourselves because at some point in the codependency patterning, we can’t get away from our own pain. The pain demands for us to finally listen to what is inside of ourselves. We recognize that we didn't speak up for ourselves. We see how we might have stayed too long in relationships in which we allowed ourselves to be abused or neglected. We admit that we denied our own selves despite how self-destructive that was. The experience of self-betrayal begins the process of self-retrieval. It sounds something like: “I am lost. I need to find me. I need to know who I am. I need to know what I want. I need to learn how to listen to myself, voice what I need and want, stay true to myself as top priority, and set boundaries that support my growth.” I came back to myself and began my journey of recovery in codependency when I was in my thirties. I got engaged to myself and then later that year, I married myself. Since then, I have shared and offered the journey to others because it is life-changing and radical self-love. The Marrying Yourself Journey is a journey back home to yourself. It is a commitment to pay attention to yourself, know yourself, show up for yourself. It is about learning how to “re-route” your attention back to yourself as your number one beloved relationship. The Marrying Yourself Journey brings you into getting engaged to yourself so that self-care is your priority. It takes you through different modules as a step by step process, geared to help you to learn to anchor inside of yourself. From learning how to positively parent yourself, balance your feminine and masculine energies, and even be hot for yourself, the mission is that you feel beautiful and worthy from the inside out. Upon your wedding day when you make commitments to yourself, you will have filled out, from the inside out, so that you can be present with the power and substance of each vow you make to yourself. The Marrying Yourself Journey is not really a workshop or course. It is a passageway that changes your relationship with yourself for the rest of your life.
You go at your own pace with each module. You will have access to weekly interactive live support through a zoom meeting offered at the same time every week. And, you will be among a community of those currently on the journey via our facebook page, Marrying Yourself Journey, where you can also share your experiences as you go.
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