Soulshine

“The purpose of your life isn’t to arrive safely at your death.” Anonymous Codependents usually don’t like to take risks. If we did, we wouldn’t need to rely on manipulation as much as we do before recovery. We would instead ask for what we want and need. We would take the risk of facing a “No” from someone. But many of us believe we aren’t worthy of what we want or need and we are too afraid of rejection to ask. So we avoid risk-taking by relying on manipulation. As a result, life becomes a series of playing it safe day after day. And playing it safe often means continual reliance on ourselves to meet our every want and need without the help of anyone. Some of us become fortresses made of flesh. We become so self-reliant that it no longer even occurs to us to ask for help from anyone. Total self-reliance is a problem with many facets, however. For one thing, we are in a state of denial when we believe we can march through life without being vulnerable or relying on...

Now that song comes again and I still remember you saying ”Young boy afraid to risk for love to take a chance No light, no love will ever grow Inside your house of stone.” Now that song comes again (Oh, no, no) I still remember you saying ”Young boy who could not ask for love Your chance has passed No light, no love will ever grow.” I will build a house of stone. House of Stone by Roaring Boys I remember first hearing the song House of Stone back in the early 1980s. The melody wrapped its way around my stony little heart and tugged me down to my knees as the lyrics hit me like a brick upside my head. I knew I had built a house of stone around my heart, but I didn’t know what to do about it. On the one hand, my house of stone protected me-- to some degree-- from the pain of the outside world. But, on the other hand, it kept me from being vulnerable and from connecting with other people. It’s stealth protection meant that I couldn’t let any love in—not even ...

“Don’t fight it. Life is a rollercoaster, just gotta ride it… Stop hidin.’ Love is a mystery. Let’s get excited.” Ronan Keating Rollercoasters evoke a great deal of fear in many people, but then, so does life itself. Fear is humanity’s second greatest enemy and it often works hand-in-hand with humanity’s Public Enemy No. 1: Shame. Fear and shame are the great cripplers of human life. They paralyze people in their tracks and rob them of their lives. If you’ve spent much of your life being too fearful to stick your neck out into the real world and say “Life’s a fact, so face it” then you know what I’m talking about. Fear can keep us from climbing aboard a rollercoaster and having the thrill of our day. It can also keep us from stepping out into the real world and having the thrill of our lives. We all know that shit happens. We’ve been hit in the face with it time and again. Some of us wipe the residue of life from our faces and move forward, while others of us flee an...