One of my favorite things to do in the world is to read great books. Readers are said to be leaders. The more you read, the more you expand your worldview and perspective. One of the hallmarks of great men and women is that they are curious, lifelong learners with a beginner’s mindset.
The Frog and the Scorpion is a fable that teaches that most people cannot resist hurting others even though it is not in their own self-interest. The fable is one of my favorite stories of all time as it teaches about human nature. The human mind is dark and evil. We act in our best interest and sometimes we do act in ways that are not in our own best interest.
Books transform lives they are bridges from your current self to your best self.
The Book I’m Reading is a weekly cross-platform show where Nigerians hear their idols passionately discuss and read from the books they love. It is hosted by legendary actor, Richard Mofe-Damijo, popularly called RMD. The Book I’m Reading is sponsored by Sterling Bank and hosted on RadioNow 95.3 FM. The show is created by Kadaria Ahmed (Chief Executive Officer of RadioNow 95.3FM)
A codependent person is someone who has let another person’s behavior affect him or her, and who is obsessed with controlling that person’s behavior.
Melody Beattie is the foremost American author on Co-Dependency and codependent relationships. She is a survivor of sexual abuse, abandonment, kidnapping, drug and alcohol addiction, loss of a child, and divorce. I have read a couple of her books and I find her writings to be practical as she knows what she is talking about. She has gone through the journey of codependency and navigating the roller-coaster of entanglement, enmeshment, and drama inherent in codependent relationships.
Her books include Codependent No More (1985–86), Beyond Codependency (1988–89), The Language of Letting Go (1990), The Codependents’ Guide to the Twelve Steps (1990), The New Codependency (2009).
Did you hear about the codependent wife? Each morning, she wakes her husband and asks him how she’s going to feel that day.
In Beyond Codependency: And Getting Better All the Time, author and survivor Melody Beattie writes a follow-up to her best-selling book, Codependent No More. The theme of the book is dealing with the core issues of recovery, what to do when the pain has stopped and we’ve begun to suspect we have a life to live. It is about what happens next after becoming aware of your codependency. She writes about recovery, Relapse, family of origin, shame, setting healthy boundaries, intimacy, negotiating conflicts, self-care, support groups among other concepts.
“Codependency is about normal behaviors taken too far. It’s about crossing lines.“
We all started life by depending on our parents, caregivers, society, and peers. Codependency is not necessarily bad, there is a place and time for it. We started out life helpless, unable to walk, speak, feed, and do the basic things without the help of our caregivers but with time, we are supposed to figure out a lot of these life skills. For most of us, we still remain dependent on our parents, society, spouse, and peers for things; we ought to have figured out. Our family and friends, knowingly or unknowingly enable some of these behaviors such as chemical dependence, drug and alcohol addiction, financial irresponsibility, among other things.
Sure, this world is full of trouble
I ain’t said it ain’t.
Lord, I’ve had enough and double
Reason for complaint;
Rain and storm have come to fret me,
Skies are often gray;
Thorns and brambles have beset me
On the road — but say,
Ain’t it fine today?
Codependency is about normal behaviors taken too far. It’s about crossing lines.
In The New Codependency: Help and Guidance for Today’s Generation, the self-help writer and author of Codependent No More, Melody Beattie updates the concept of codependency with strategies such as self-care, detachment, letting go, setting boundaries, and building a healthy relationship in our ever-changing world. Me
Codependency is about normal behaviours taken too far. It’s about crossing lines. – Melody Beattie
We all started out life being codependent on our parent, caregivers, society and peers. Codependency is not necessarily bad, there is a place and time for it. The danger is becoming codependent beyond the normal point. It is not the same thing as care for a loved one who needs your help, it becomes codependence when you begin to enable self-destructive behaviours. Codependency shows up in our relationships through enabling and indulging people to abuse substances such as drugs and alcohol, enabling chemically dependent siblings, enmeshed and dysfunctional family units and toxic entaglements with our friends and peers.
Here are 30 top quotes on codependency:
Our compliance rewards the blackmailer, and every time we reward someone for a particular action, whether we realize it or not, we’re letting them know in the strongest possible terms that they can do it again. – Susan Forward, Emotional Blackmail
All the Best in your quest to get Better. Don’t Settle: Live with Passion.
I consider Jim Rohn to be one of the most influential motivational speakers of all time. One of his most influential teachings is The Season of Life: The Four Major Lessons in Life to Learn. In his book, Leading an Inspired Life, he dissects the seasons of life and shares parallels of lessons we can learn from the seasons in life and in business. He wrote:
“There are two phrases I’d like you to ponder for a moment.”
The Four Major Lessons in Life to Learn
The first lesson is this: learn how to handle the winters. They come regularly, right after autumn. Some are long, some are short, some are difficult, some are easy, but they always come right after autumn. That is never going to change.
There are all kinds of winters—the “winter” when you can’t figure it out, the “winter” when everything seems to go haywire. One writer called it “the winter of discontent.” There are economic winters, social winters, personal winters when your heart is smashed into a thousand pieces. Wintertime brings disappointment, and disappointment is common to all of us. So learn how to handle the winters.
“You must learn how to handle the nights; they come right after days. You must learn how to handle difficulty; it always comes after opportunity. You must learn to handle recessions; they come right after expansions. That isn’t going to change.
The big question is, what do you do about winters? You can’t get rid of January simply by tearing it off the calendar. But here is what you can do: you can get stronger; you can get wiser; and you can get better. Make a note of that trio of words: stronger, wiser, better. The winters won’t change, but you can.”
“The winters won’t change, but you can.”
“Before I understood this, I used to wish it were summer when it was winter. When things were difficult, I used to wish they were easy. I didn’t know any better. “Then Mr. Shoaff gave me the answer from a part of his very unique philosophy when he said,
“Don’t wish it were easier, wish you were better. Don’t wish for fewer problems, wish for more skills. Don’t wish for less challenge, wish for more wisdom.”
Here is the second major lesson in life: learn how to take advantage of the spring. Spring is opportunity. And spring always follows winter.
What a great place for spring—right after winter. If you were going to put it some where, that would be the place to put it. God is a genius.
Days follow nights. Opportunity follows difficulty. Expansion follows recession. And this all happens with regularity. You can count on it.
However, the mere arrival of spring is no sign that things are going to look good in the fall. You must do something with the spring. In fact, everyone has to get good at one of two things: planting in the spring or begging in the fall. So take advantage of the day, take advantage of the opportunity, and read every book you can get your hands on to learn how to take advantage of the spring.
Get busy quickly on your springs, your opportunities. There are just a handful of springs that have been handed to each of us. Life is brief, even at its longest. Whatever you are going to do with your life, get at it. Don’t just let the seasons pass by.
Days follow nights. Opportunity follows difficulty. Expansion follows recession. And this all happens with regularity. You can count on it.
The third major lesson in life is this: learn how to nourish and protect your crops all summer. Sure enough, as soon as you’ve planted, the busy bugs and noxious weeds are out to take things over. And here is the next bit of truth: they will take it unless you prevent it.
There are two key phrases to consider with the third major lesson. The first is “all good will be attacked.” Don’t press me for a reason. I was not in on some of the early decisions, so I don’t know why. I just know that it’s true. Let reality be your best beginning. Every garden will be invaded.
The second phrase is “all values must be defended.” Social values, political values, friendship values, business values—all must be defended. Every garden must be tended all summer. If you don’t develop this skill, you’ll never wind up with anything of value.
learn how to nourish and protect your crops all summer.
The fourth major lesson in life is this: learn how to reap in the fall without complaint. Take full responsibility for what happens to you. One of the highest forms of human maturity is accepting full responsibility.
Learn how to reap in the fall without apology if you have done well and without complaint, if you have not. That’s being mature. I’m not saying it’s easy. I’m saying it’s the best way to be.
Learn how to reap in the fall without apology if you have done well and without complaint, if you have not. That’s being mature.
The seasons don’t work for you or against you. They just are what they are. They are guaranteed to come every year, bringing both the positive and the negative. So it’s up to you to remember the four major lessons in life, prepare for them, and make the most of everything they offer.
All the Best in your quest to get Better. Don’t Settle: Live with Passion.
Everybody has theories. The dangerous people are those who are not aware of their own theories. That is, the theories on which they operate are largely unconscious. – John Cleese
In Rebel Ideas:: The Power of Diverse Thinking, British Journalist and former table tennis player, Matthew Syed examines the power of ‘cognitive diversity’ – the ability to think differently about the world around us. The book focuses not upon demographic diversity but cognitive diversity (differences in perspective, insights, experiences and thinking styles). People from different backgrounds, with different experiences, often think about problems in different ways.
If you can project yourself out to age 80 and sort of think, “What will I think at that time?
We all struggle with making tough and somewhat difficult decisions that can be life changing or altering. Decisions such as leaving a high paying job to start a business, leaving a toxic and abusive marriage for the unknown, setting boundaries with our parents, relocating to a foreign land, reducing time spent with draining and fair weather friends. All of these decisions are tough and that is why most of us never make them, hence we stay stuck in abusive relationships, toxic work environments, get enmeshed in our dysfunctional family units, get entangled with friends that are not adding value to us anymore. As American novelist and playwright James Baldwin once said “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” – James Baldwin
In You’re Not Crazy – You’re Codependent.: What Everyone Affected by Addiction, Abuse, Trauma or Toxic Shaming Must know to have peace in their lives, writer and survivor Jeanette Elisabeth Menter writes about co-dependency based on her own life experiences. She is a survivor of a childhood filled with addiction, abuse, ongoing shame as a way of control, and more. Jeanette describes how codependency sabotages us through the lies we tell ourselves and exposes the truth that can lead to liberation.
Once you understand you are not crazy, just coping with the deep-seated effects of codependency, you will be free to create the life you were always meant to have.
when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.
if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.
Fear not that thy life shall come to an end, but rather that it shall never have a beginning. – John Henry Newman
Regret is the emotion of wishing one had made a different decision in the past because the consequences of the decision were unfavorable. Regret is a negative emotion predicated on an upward, self-focus, counterfactual inference. (Gilovich and Medec 1995). Regret can also be defined as a negative, cognitively based emotion that we experience when realizing or imagining that our present situation would have been better had we acted differently (Zeelenberg 2010).
