Codependency as My Mother Puts It

Please consider, if you read my blog, reading this post, Enacted Codependency, by my mother. It was started (or written) some years ago, so the events alluded to are in the past.

Both my mother and I are working on our codependency issues. For whatever reason, we're very similar, and no- 'like mother, like daughter' is not logical here; my sister is not the same, and I may have had less proximity to my mother than my sister did. I, being like I am, tried to learn from my mother's example, both in emulating, and not emulating, certain things. I felt bound to her fate, in a sense, and wanted to avoid that, though I felt it was inevitable (found out over the years that it's not, and I'm plenty different, too).

The codependency for many years seemed normal to me; thinking and behaving like that, so concerned with how I relate to others and worrying about it, was something I thought that everyone must go through. Of course, it was also evident from a distance that they don't. Some things other people do fly right in the face of codependency: what they do excludes the possibility of codependency. So I also tried to learn from them, to discover their secrets.

But it may be that my deepest problem is not codependency, but rather something that makes it far easier to be codependent. I already have the inclination towards enabling people with the mantra of 'love thy neighbour as thyself', and my deeper problems with relating to others make it so much easier to fall into codependency as a way to connect with people. But trust me: it is no connection. There is only alienation and distance in codependency, and it can never, ever even look like true friendship. It's a perfectly clever way for Satan to twist our goodness and godliness, and to create distance between us and others while all the time whispering to us that we are loving others, and will be loved in return. It is a false hope that consumes you; it has just enough truth that you don't realise it's all a sham (that's an interesting topic for another day, if I can ever write it well!) until you're so fully trapped in habits and ways of thinking that you can't see the light anymore.

The Spoiling of Good Things

[Edmund] had eaten his share of the dinner, but he hadn't really enjoyed it because he was thinking all the time about Turkish Delight--and there's nothing that spoils the taste of good ordinary food half so much as the memory of bad magic food.

 from the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

Joyful Stillness

And Lucy felt running through her that deep shiver of gladness which you only get if you are being solemn and still.

from the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

Is Reading Fiction Educational?

C.S. Lewis, Tolkien and others like them would have addressed this question before, I'm sure. I haven't yet read Tolkien's On Fairy-Stories, which should cause everyone to shake their heads in disappointment. But someday I'll get to that and other things, we hope.

I'm wondering how much I learned from my mother reading us a lot of stories, versus how much I formally learnt. I remember thinking (subconsciously) a great deal about what was read to me, but I don't know how much of what I thought about was merely from the stories, or was from other things told to me in the actual homeschooling we did. Since talking to my mother about the way I thought as a child, she's told me she actually taught us the principles I was applying to the things I (for lack of a better term) experienced.

But it does seem that a lot of what was written in the earliest stories I can remember having read to me had a big impact on me. I sifted through what was truly unrealistic and what was realistic. I seem to have tried to see what I could use and apply. I obsessively wanted to make sure I didn't miss things... though I wasn't ever very methodical about thinking. It's just that I never wanted to be found to have not picked something up that I could have. I did not want to be out of the loop (because I sometimes was and hated how it felt).

I am convinced, though, even though I don't know how much I learned being told and how much I figured out myself, that the stories we read have provided the foundation of my thinking today. We did precious little actual formal study of critical thinking or logic. I wish we had, because it would have allowed me to articulate all that I'm thinking now. I have really only scratched the surface of being able to articulate what I'm thinking. But because I'm so much older now, and feel I have so little time to do all the things I want to, I would like to know just what books I ought to read to start getting to being able to articulate Logic more clearly. I know, though, without someone to recommend good books, I'll have to just read some and figure it out for myself, but obviously, that takes time.

So we'll see. If I'd had more of a rigorous classical education, I would probably be a lot farther along now. But it's wonderful the lessons I learned which instilled themselves in my subconscious and help me today. I wish I could clearly see how much was due to the fiction we read, and how much was due to other things. It seems useful knowledge.

(Knowing this may be a little confusing or just stream-of-consciousness.)

Gimli: The Reluctant Christian

This is taken from another blog of mine, date of September 3, 2016, and edited somewhat.


A raw thought from watching Lord of the Rings just now-

Gimli reminds me of a person who is reluctant, due to misconceptions, to come to God, but in the end, becomes enamoured with Him.

He dislikes the Elves, and is very distrusting of them, and he believes Galadriel is basically a witch. Then he meets Galadriel and is transformed: he respects her, and sees her as the most beautiful and good (not requiring romantic affection, O Modern People). It is very like how we close-minded humans are skeptical of God- superstitiously suspicious of God’s goodness, looking at the good things of God as unrealistic (unlikely); even treacherous.

But then you know Him, and you see that, though in some ways you may have been right, He is good; the things you suspected really were true and good are His things, and He is Beauty Incarnate.

It is amusing how stubbornly Gimli defends Galadriel’s honour against Eomer in the Two Towers. An unlikely outcome, yet more realistic, because things are not always as they seem.

Against Our Ancient Foe

I have gone through a strange thing this weekend... all tied up in a packaging of conversation, Hurricane Florence, delicious food, and letting myself fall asleep without finishing a routine.

So much strangeness. But it is all perfect, the perfectest strangeness.

I won't go into what exactly happened. Maybe I will later.

Because of what has happened, I've been brought back to something that I've thought on intermittently in the past: the spiritual fight, against Satan, that C.S. Lewis delves into a bit in The Screwtape Letters. I have a great deal of anger, and I realised more concretely that my anger should be directed at Satan... that it is fitting to direct it at him. He is the one who has done that which I am angry at.

So throughout these past two or three days, I thought of the last part of the first verse of A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. Then, now, I looked it up, and I want to post it here, because all of it is rather pertinent to what I'm going through recently. It seems that one does not always realise what a hymn is saying until somehow things in one's life relate to the hymn.

A mighty fortress is our God,
A bulwark never failing:
Our helper He, amid the flood
Of mortal ills prevailing.
For still our ancient foe
Doth seek to work his woe;
His craft and power are great,
And armed with cruel hate,
On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide,
Our striving would be losing;
Were not the right Man on our side,
The Man of God's own choosing.
Dost ask who that may be?
Christ Jesus, it is he;
Lord Sabbaoth is his name,
From age to age the same,
And He must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled,
Should threaten to undo us,
We will not fear, for God hath willed
His truth to triumph through us.
The Prince of Darkness grim,—
We tremble not for him;
His rage we can endure,
For lo! His doom is sure,—
One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly powers—
No thanks to them—abideth;
The Spirit and the gifts are ours
Through him who with us sideth.
Let goods and kindred go,
This mortal life also:
The body they may kill:
God's truth abideth still,
His kingdom is for ever.

So right now, I have been thinking particularly about Satan's 'craft and power', how he keeps me from doing things, by keeping me from caring about anything. And when I was steeling myself to do what I intended to do this weekend, all the doubts and half-truths came creeping in, telling me why I should not do the thing, why it won't work, and revealing that (indeed) I had no idea how I was going to do it, and I couldn't even focus well enough to figure out how: my brain is a fog.

And so, I fought. Satan will not have me... I will try to fight the influence, to let God fill me with the intention to do what is right. I have not let God do that. I have not followed my conscience, and done what I knew I ought to do. May God's glory flow in, in richness.

'In your hearts enthrone him, there let him subdue 

all that is not holy, all that is not true'

(from the hymn At the Name of Jesus Every Knee Shall Bow)

From Niceness to Humility

(This may somewhat reiterate what has been said in a previous post. Bear with me if it does.)


It seems a bit of an obsession these days to equate being nice with moral goodness. What is seen as a good way to treat someone is whatever least encumbers or inconveniences someone, with the constant refrain of 'if it doesn't hurt anyone, it's fine.' What it ends up being, I think, is serving our wants and pleasures in the present with no true consideration of the bigger picture. The bigger picture to people is a matter of how someone feels. The premise for this, I think, might be the recent idea that it is most important to build up and maintain a healthy self-esteem. It could potentially destroy a student's self-esteem to tell them that they can't have an A for a paper they wrote very poorly. Especially when it is not a matter of an achievement not achieved, people still seem to find it more difficult to tell someone plainly that they need to put in more work; they did poorly.

We've been gradually losing the ability to tell the difference between what is right and what is wrong in the murky waters of being 'nice'. The constant refrain is to be tolerant to others, and true tolerance has been lost in the notion that if you disagree publicly with what someone else thinks or is doing, you are intolerant. You cannot disagree politely; you cannot disagree at all. Conflict of any sort, even healthy conflict with the possibility of problem-solving, is seen as wrong.

Firm parenting is also falling by the wayside. Even those of us who do believe in moral absolutes fall prey to this philosophy; it is creeping into many conservative circles, even. There is no defense against it, because most of us who still have a sense of truth have not learned why we should believe in truth.

A lot of people in the West have been turned into at least minor versions of codependents. Maybe it's going too far, and I certainly may focus a bit too much on the negative, but I think that our society is being transformed into a codependent society, out of the ashes of a society that believed in personal responsibility and true virtue and charity.

To some extent I think that the gravitation towards this 'being nice' is because it is much easier than standing against the flow for some conviction. There is social pressure to be 'tolerant', and most people have no energy nor time to consciously avoid that pressure (or at least one would not do it unless one thought it was worth it).

It's also a really convenient way to see things, as it allows one to validate one's selfish idea that one is the centre of the universe: that one deserves validation and boosting of self esteem.

It seems to me it's a vicious cycle of various ways in which our society and we ourselves reinforce this idea that viewing oneself positively is the way to go; it'll be psychologically better for us in the long run, because thinking positively about yourself is obviously what alleviates worry... or so we tell ourselves.

Wait a moment. Do we really need to boost ourselves up to be healthy? Does boosting ourselves really result in happiness?

Having to concern oneself with oneself is, I think, a result of our worry and need for control. Keeping up the façade of a perfect self by trying to have positive things to think about oneself is exhausting. It is keeping up the façade to ourselves that is most exhausting, and perhaps it is impossible not to do that if you are trying to keep a perfect exterior. Besides that secretly, we want to think well of ourselves, even those of us who self-deprecate as if our lives depended on it. But the solution is not for people to think any differently about themselves, for in ourselves we do not know ourselves better. We know ourselves by looking upward (to God), and thus also outward, engaging the world. If we stop concerning ourselves with ourselves, we will learn to see ourselves through our plain eyes, not through rose-coloured or mud-spattered glasses.

Here is C.S. Lewis, from Mere Christianity, painting a picture of humility-

'Do not imagine that if you meet a really humble man he will be what most people call "humble" nowadays: he will not be a sort of greasy, smarmy person, who is always telling you that, of course, he is nobody. Probably all you will think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He will not be thinking about humility: he will not be thinking about himself at all.
      If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.'

We should not boost each other up into any lies and vices of our human hearts (like the notion that we're sparkly, rainbow-maned unicorns). We must not feed each other the lie that what matters about a person is how normal or special they are. It is completely unnecessary. It's futile to mind your value in relation to others. Truth is much more important, and in the long term, more fruitful.