Soulshine

Many addicts, and many people in general, get caught up in paralyzing phrases, like “What if” or “If only.” We May get word at work that the upper management is planning lay-offs. Suddenly our brains leave reality and enter a dark fantasy land as we start thinking to ourselves “What if I get a pink slip?” Or “If only I’d done a better job on that last project, I wouldn’t have to worry about being layed-off!” Truth is, we don’t have to worry about being layed-off at all. If we stay in the present moment, we realize everything is OK. We have no pink slip in our hands. Life is good, except in our sick little minds, where we have wandered off into the terror-land of “What if?” “What if...” is not reality. It’s negative projection into the future. It is nothing more than a fear-invoking mind game. I’ve decided that “What if” is one of the most deadly and useless phrases on earth. It creates worthless fear and worry that often consumes us, robs us of happiness and stymies our person...

Attention all codependents/addicts! Stop being the person you THINK other people want or expect you to be. You no longer have to be whomever your mother, father, siblings, coworkers, friends, etc. told you that you SHOULD be. They were not assigned by a God or any Higher Power to dictate your life for you. When we allow other people to rule our lives with their approval/disapproval, we make them into false Higher Powers. Their opinions have no more power than what we CHOOSE to give them. Why do we need to care about what other people think about us? We don’t. Even the people who truly love us won’t always like what we say or do. But that lapse in approval won’t stop them from loving us. And if we truly love them, when they do or say something we don’t approve of, we have the right to dislike their behavior, but we don’t stop loving them. So let’s focus our attention on being our true selves. We can work everyday at being a little better as we strive to be the person GOD, or...