Soulshine

“In the end all that matters is how well did you love, how well did you live, how well did you learn to let go.” Anonymous The addictive personality thrives on control. It is hypervigilant and aggressive about making sure that all is as it “should be.” The need to control never sleeps. When we’re in this control-life-at-all-costs mode, we run on adrenaline and fear 24 hours a day. We are constantly monitoring everyone and everything around us. We must make sure that all of life cooperates with our desires, expectations and assumptions. Whenever we discover a threat to our imagined serenity, we are quick to move into Terminator mode and stamp it out as quickly as possible. So we pull out our inner-arsenal of manipulative behaviors, like flattery, caretaking, people-pleasing and self-righteousness to beat down anyone who might be standing in the way of our perceived happiness. As a result, we “love” and “live” poorly. Notice I said “imagined” serenity and “perceived” ...

“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. Mary has chosen the better way and it will not be denied her.” Jesus Christ, Gospel of Luke Addictive personalities are gods unto themselves. Even those of us who may be regular church-goers still suffer from self-godliness. We’re control freaks. We rule the world and everyone in it who affects us in any way. We’re all Martha’s, the Christian Patron Saint of Control Freaks. Like Martha we profess faith in a Higher Power, but we rarely relinquish control to that Higher Power. Every time we meet Martha in the Christian Gospels, she’s working hard at telling God what God needs to do, or she’s telling God how to correct the mistakes God has made. The quote above is taken from a story about Jesus visiting the home of the two sisters, Martha and Mary. Martha is anxious about preparing dinner while Mary is entertaining Jesus. Martha gets mad that Mary isn’t helping her and she commands Jesus to tell Mary to get ...

“A nun I know once told me she kept begging God to take her character defects away from her. After years of this prayer, God finally got back to her: I’m not going to take anything away from you.  You have to give it to me.” Anne Lamont, Help-Thanks-Wow I’ve come to believe that prayer needs to be very simple and that it needs to be a partnership. Prayer, to me, is simply talking with a Higher Power; no need for rote prayers. The most honest prayer comes from the heart. I write it myself with my honesty and vulnerability. Prayer is a partnership in that I ask a Higher Power for help with the things I am powerless over, and in that I accept responsibility for the things I need to do to help myself. Prayer isn’t about asking a Higher Power to do everything while I sit back and wait. This partnership means I work hand-in-hand with a Higher Power to resolve life’s burdens, and it often leads to a partnership with others as well. I struggle with terrible bouts of sadne...

Want is the root of all the emotional evil we perpetrate against ourselves. Everything we want that is out of the scope of our having poisons our souls. Think about all of the people you have ever wanted to possess. Sometimes we meet someone and we immediately fall into infatuation with him or her. Or sometimes we have a good friend and we become too attached. We start depending on her more and we become increasingly clingy. Or we even start wanting him to become more than a friend and we begin fantasizing about being lovers. Sooner or later our emotional neediness takes us to new heights of want and despair when our friend begins to afford us less time, or it clearly becomes evident that this relationship is never going to enter the realm of romance. As reality shatters fantasy/denial, we find ourselves sinking deeper into self-loathing and depression. We feel unlovable and worthless. Why? Because we have pinned all of our hopes on having someone or something we want...