One Day At A Time

The other day I got my hair trimmed; I'd been thinking about it for over a month and finally got it done.  It turned out nicely.  At least I was pleased with it.  

The new coiffure did wonders for my appearance.  At least, according to one source.  

And if it had ended there, that would have been a nice memory.  

But no - the person wouldn't let go, and went on to try to convince me to do a lot more to change my appearance, to the point of pushiness.  I warned that I often react badly (as in the opposite to what the intent is) to pressure like that; then, I found myself being psychoanalyzed.  

This was one occasion where I had laid out a boundary and it was ignored.  The person really thought this "advice" was helping.  It wasn't.  It was making me all the more determined to NOT do the strongly suggested /insisted-upon thing.  

So ... I deflected - purely a temporary psychological survival mechanism.  And I relied on my recovery skills to set an internal boundary, reminding myself that the person had all the zeal of a new convert, and that I didn't need to make a decision about this right away - if ever.  I got out of the uncomfortable situation without shedding blood (grin), and then was able to promise myself that I would process my feelings afterward, after I had had time to detach.  Breathe.  Unhook.  Ask myself what I was feeling, and why... whether this went far deeper than just someone's criticism advice.  

Once away from the situation, I realized that part of the reason why I felt so threatened was that the person was suggesting radical, wide-spread changes in my entire lifestyle, changes for which I was not yet ready.  I envisioned ahead of me an interminable life-sentence of misery because the advised changes would involve giving up something that I absolutely love doing ... and risking becoming like (or at least being accepted by) people I cannot stand to be around.  

Part of it, too, was the fact that I have always been a people-pleaser, and it bothers me when I feel like I don't measure up to someone's expectations of me. I don't even have to like the person very much for his or her opinion to eat away at me. I'm working on that; it's a great deal better than it was as my self-esteem improves.

Another - perhaps much larger - part was the same feeling I frequently got as a child when I was just getting up from the living room sofa to come and volunteer my help in the kitchen without being asked, and my mother would impatiently call out to me to come give her "a little help with these dishes."  I was already on my way to do it of my own free will, and she robbed me of the satisfaction of doing it on my own initiative by jumping all over me verbally before I even had the chance to let her know my intentions.  

My eventual reaction was to arrange to disappear when the dishes were being washed so that I wouldn't have to be reminded yet again what a (expletive deleted)-poor excuse for a daughter I was.  How I'd never amount to anything.  How I was lazy and useless.  How, even when I did help out, I always did it wrong (i.e., not the way she would do it).  So telling me to do something I had already wanted to do just made me not want to do it anymore.  I've done that with everything ever since, with everyone from passing acquaintances to preachers.

I was still rather upset about the whole current "advice / criticism" incident ... and knew I had to find some sort of closure, or it would keep me from sleeping well tonight.  

What came to me as I mulled this over ... was yet another recovery strategy that is so easy for me to forget:  practicing gratitude for the changes that I've already gone through, and taking one day at a time, not taking on tomorrow's tasks (or next year's) but focusing on today's.  I had felt, when this person was giving me advice, that the changes of the past were dismissed as being worth nothing ... and that I wasn't acceptable to this person the way I was.  (Might I say that this individual told me that this wasn't the case - yet - one can't turn off feelings like a faucet.) I also had to remember that the advice-giver is extremely attractive, appeared to have an extremely good self-image (though I may be wrong in that regard; I don't know), and also didn't know what it was like to struggle with any of the major abuse issues that I only started facing a short time ago.  

I had to remind myself of that which I say so often: "Real healing happens from the inside out.  If it doesn't, it will only be temporary. Only God can heal the heart."  And I want my transformation to happen at its own rate, as directed by God - and nobody else.  One day at a time.  It's already changed me in ways I can't begin to describe.  And it will continue to do that.  I don't need to let what someone else thinks I should do, dictate to me what I WILL do.  Or WON'T do!!  

I decide.  There is more to life than just the exterior; I choose the interior.
Today.

Cobwebs

I grew up hearing the following story.  I don't know if it's true, but it could have happened.  

It appears that there was this one fellow who used to stand up and pray these long, complaining-type prayers every Wednesday night at one church's prayer meeting. Every week, the faithful parishoners would have to endure this long tirade.  Some would roll their eyes when he started up, others would bow their heads and shake them slowly. Still others would keep checking their watches. But he would press on, unaware of - or not caring about - the reactions of those in the room. He would drone on interminably, and would always end his prayer with this sentence: "... and OH Lord, would You please clear the cobwebs out of my life?  Amen." And then he'd sit down.

This went on for years.  The same prayer, the same intonation, the same final request. Nothing changed.  One Wednesday night, one soft-spoken old woman who had listened to him every week for years without comment, finally stood to her feet after he finished his prayer one evening with (as usual), "... and OH Lord, would You please clear the cobwebs out of my life?  Amen...."  Immediately she blurted out with all the pent-up frustration of ten years, "OH Lord, please kill that awful spider!"

Source (via Google Images):
http://www.freeimageslive.co.uk/free_stock_image/spiderweb4051jpg

I remember praying blanket prayers when I was younger - things like that old man's "cobweb prayer."  It was never anything specific - just this nebulous sense that I'd done wrong and that God could make it right.  Which He could - and did - every time.  But the effects were short-lived.  They always came back... cobweb after cobweb. Time after time.

But when someone suggested to me that after asking God to take care of my life, I take pen in hand and make a fearless and searching moral inventory of myself - in specifics - that was when I started to understand the reasons why.  The spider was still alive and well and churning out web!  It needed to be exposed and disposed of... not just the by-products of its presence but the actual center of it.  Like the gentleman in the prayer meeting, I had only been focusing on the symptoms, the results of it.  

As I continued that inventory - which was exhaustive and took MONTHS and not minutes - I came to realize that the root of all of those things was not this one or that one who hurt me... or this or that event that happened... or this or that organization that didn't meet my needs.  

The problem was me.  I was the one making all the cobwebs.

I was the spider. 

It wasn't the devil using me.  He SO didn't need my help.  It was me - all by myself - making bad choices and suffering the consequences of those choices.  But as I - out of desperation to be free - brought these things out into the light and exposed them for what they were, something very strange started to happen.  The cobwebs started to dissolve and fall away. 

Some took longer than others.  Some were immediate; others? I'm still aware of their presence in my life.  But I know that it's me - MY choices, MY selfishness, MY pride, MY fear, MY obsessions fueling that critter.  The less fuel I give her, the less web she can make.  And the thing is, there is absolutely no way that I can do that by relying on my own will power.  But I know that God can and will give me the strength if I ask Him.  I am learning to pray, "God, I offer myself to You, to build with me and do with me what You want. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Your will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness (to those I want to help) of Your power, Your love, and Your way of life.  May I do what You want ... always!" 

The spider isn't dead yet, not by a long shot.  But it's spinning a little less web.

Blizzard Day

I'm looking out my window at what's supposed to be a blizzard.  It doesn't seem that bad out there!

Yet the local radio station has announced a few cancellations of events planned for today, from skating events at rinks to funerals.  

I guess I'm comparing this blizzard to some of the ones I've experienced here on this little jut of sand sticking up out of the Atlantic.  Most notable of these is White Juan, which happened slightly before this time in 2004.  

Source (with link):
http://digitaljournal.com/article/303179

We have power; we have snow tires on our car; our snowblower person was just here to blow out the driveway.  And we can see the road.  White Juan? wow. We were DAYS digging out of that one.  Seventy-six centimeters of snow fell across our province back then - that's about 26 inches for folks on the imperial system (like me), and that was after it had dumped 91 centimeters (34 inches) on the rest of our area before it got to us!  With all the wind causing massive drifting - it was one lulu of a storm... the snowbanks were that high that it was a danger to get to an intersection since they prevented people from seeing what was coming!  I felt worst, though, for the winter birds whose source of food was now three feet or more under the surface.  Or was it? 

As I write, the snowfall warning has been announced as having ended. (Chalk another fizzled blizzard up to El Niño.)  Well - I guess that plans can go forward pretty much as normal.  

I can't help thinking about those birds out there.  They have absolutely no control over the elements, and take one moment at a time, as it happens, without fretting about where the next grub is coming from.  They just survive - and thrive!  Yesterday I saw a family of bluejays in one of the trees next to our house.  They all seemed pretty well-fed.  I even heard what sounded like a cardinal the other day. The jays eat hibernating grubs from the pine and spruce that rim our property.  Cardinals are seed-eaters, and could eat the meat from the pine and spruce cones - those very same trees.  There is plenty of food for the birds - they don't have to dig through all that white stuff. And they endure (and survive - and sing through-) the cold... with far less warm clothing to wear than I have. And no roof over their head except the occasional branch.

The well-known words come back to me afresh - "Look at the birds... they don't sow or gather into barns but God feeds them.  If God feeds the birds of the air, how much more will He feed you, who have such little faith?"

Owning Your Power

One of the most difficult concepts I have had to understand and accept over the last three years has been what Melody Beattie, a well-known author in recovery circles, calls "owning your power."  

It did not make any sense to me.  I was painfully aware, having been desperate enough to ask for help, that I was powerLESS over others, even over my own addiction to being needed.  How could anyone - no, how could I - own any power that I was sure I didn't have?  

So I set the idea aside and concentrated on the tasks ahead - which were all about learning that people - all people, including myself - have boundaries.  Those boundaries must be respected.  Learning to let go of other people, to see and respect their boundaries, to stop manipulating, intimidating, and controlling, led me to the understanding that I, too, had boundaries.  That it was okay to say no - if no was what I felt. That certain things that people had done to me or were trying to do to me (such as intimidation, manipulation, and control) were wrong.

It was then that I started to understand what it meant to "own my power."  

It didn't mean that I had or could exert power over others.  It meant that I had a choice as to whether to allow others to exert power over me or not.  It meant that I could choose to take responsibility for my own actions, and to let others assume responsibility for theirs.  And that included their expectations of me!! I didn't need to allow them to make me feel guilty for something they expected me to do which I decided not to do.  Or to for something that they expected me NOT to do which I decided to go ahead and do.  

Owning my power has come to mean placing value on myself, the value that God places on me.  It involves making my own decisions and bearing my own consequences - and allowing others the same courtesy.  It also has a lot to do with not letting other people, their demands or expectations of me control my actions or reactions.  They have the right to their own feelings and opinions - but those feelings and opinions do not have to determine what I do or don't do - or how I feel or don't feel.  

For someone who spent her whole life trying to please people out of a sense of insecurity - that is a huge step.  I still have a tendency to not want people to be mad at me ... but when someone doesn't agree with my choices now, it doesn't bother me nearly as much as it would have - because my sense of self-worth doesn't come from them anymore. 

It's amazing how much energy that frees up to devote to other, more important things that I actually WANT to do.

Honour and Fame

This week, the music world and millions of fans were dismayed (myself among them) at the untimely death of the Queen of Pop, Whitney Houston.  I've always loved her voice - one of my favorite singers of all time - and her death hit me hard. For a few days running I watched a show I usually detest (E-Talk) to hear news of how and why it happened.  

In one interview with David Foster, he revealed that there wasn't a moment that went by when someone, somewhere didn't want something from Ms. Houston. Fame had placed a burden on her that no human was meant to carry, and she apparently tried to escape from it in drugs ... most recently prescription drugs.  

I blame our society's tendency to put people up on pedestals and let individuals within that society want to own a little piece of someone famous.  We do it with celebrities of all stripes - from sports heroes to singers to the royal family.  We forget that they are real people.  Real people whose noses run sometimes, who sometimes aren't at their best, who occasionally do stupid things, and who deserve to have a little privacy.  (By the way, the fact that Ms. Houston's family has requested a private ceremony by invitation only is a testament to that need - that incredible need for dignity, for respect, for decency, and [for once in her public life] privacy.  I applaud them for it.)  

Source:
www.ctv.ca/

Fans worldwide are grieving.  

But after all, Whitney Houston was someone's daughter, someone's sister, someone's niece, someone's mother, someone's wife ... and more, so much more than her fans can comprehend.  May she rest in peace.  May her family find solace. 

But her death - at the young age of 48 - has sparked some comments on the incongruity of the death of a celebrity versus the sacrifice of someone who (aside from family and friends) is virtually unknown, but who has perhaps given his or her life to save another's.  Or like the guy who goes to a job he hates every day, and in so doing dies just a little more every moment of every day ... just to put food on the table for his family.  Or people like our service men and women who brave untold dangers and see unthinkable sights in the line of military duty in foreign lands.  

Whose life has more merit?  Whose death is more tragic? whose sacrifice is greater? that which relinquishes privacy and possibly health for a life of fame ... or that which gives up family and home for the grueling and dangerous task of protecting people who may not want to be protected? or that which sacrifices stardust-filled dreams to meet the needs of those he or she loves?  these are questions that cannot be answered ... but they make us think.  

Perhaps those self-sacrificing heroes are all the more honourable because they are unsung.  Perhaps if their accomplishments were to be noised abroad, they might forget their unique calling and fall into the Venus Flytrap of fame. We need them to keep on with their mission.  That guy's kids still need their dad to keep them from going hungry.  And they are no less heroes ... than the person whose face (and life in every possible unflattering detail) is plastered across every newspaper in the country - or the world.

And the problem is...?

Someone asked me a question today that set me back on my heels.  

Just what's so wrong about codependency?  After all, isn't being unselfish and giving, helping and rescuing people from their sad state, putting others' needs ahead of your own, isn't that encouraged? the Christian thing to do? the right thing to do?  

Wow.  You know, I might have asked that same question up until 3 years ago.  I would have felt perfectly justified in asking just what the big deal was.  If I even knew there was a big deal.  It was just the accepted thing to do: looking after others to the exclusion of myself, being the guardian of my family, holding up the standard of holiness.  

I lived in denial.  I only saw what I wanted to see: I only saw what would make me the hero, the victim, the only one who was right.  Until, that is, I was shown that the way I was living was isolating me, driving away the people I cared about, placing a burden on my soul that wasn't meant to be there, and leaving me resentful and bitter.

Image source (via Google):
http://www.nofenders.net/2010/05/
its-not-my-fault-honest.html

My version of Christianity more closely resembled codependency (see my page on what that is, above) than faith in God.  I didn't trust God to look after me or to look after my loved ones.  

Oh, I SAID I did.  But in practice, I didn't.  I behaved like it was my responsibility how other people turned out, that I was their protector, their rescuer, their conscience, their watchdog.  In essence, I had taken on the role of God in the lives of those I cared about.  That is a burden that no human was designed to carry!! I was exhausted : emotionally, spiritually, mentally, financially, physically. And I was so incredibly lonely: a state which, truth be told, I had created by my obsession with being right, with being needed, with being in charge. Fear was a way of life for me.  Like Job at the beginning of his story, when he sacrificed animals to God every day in case his children sinned that day, I was so afraid that my husband or kids would mess up that I would go out of my way to protect them and would assume that they were GOING to mess up.  I spied on them, jumped on every little thing they did that went against what I wanted for them, over-reacted when they dared question me or my beliefs, ... at the end of the day, they were either too scared of me to confide in me, or they had just tuned me out, saying that Mom was going all Christianazi on them again.  

The single biggest revelation I had when, overwhelmed by the circumstances, I first asked for help - which I only did so that I could figure out how to make my husband stop drinking and my kids to stop treating me like I was some sort of ogre - was that I might have the problem, not them.  That I actually might BE the problem.  

It was quite an epiphany for me when I realized that the way I had been acting was not the right way - that all my attempts at rescuing, controlling, manipulating, intimidating, and care-taking had created the reactions I was seeing in my loved ones.  It was a hard truth to face.  My life was totally about them, enmeshed in their lives, their reactions, their opinions.  I felt responsible for their bad choices.  Every decision they made - "good" or "bad" - was automatically a reflection on my abilities as a wife, mother, Christian.  I had lost myself, a sense of who I was ... if I ever even had it in the first place.  

That was when I reached, as people in recovery say, "my bottom."  I finally realized that what I'd been doing was insanity - doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results - and it was causing the very problem from which I was suffering.  I'm so glad that God placed the people in my path to be able to walk me out of that dark and rocky ravine.  People who helped me let go of my iron-fisted grip on other people's lives.  People who helped me to discover who I was, who accepted me, who loved me, who were patient with me. 

My relationships changed.  I had damaged the people I loved... SO much!!  Slowly I learned who I was, who they were.  Slowly I realized that it was okay that I was me and that they were them, that it was okay for them to be different from me.  Such basic concepts I had missed - they were new to me.  And as I learned them, and this made a change in the way I viewed myself and the people in my life, that heavy self-imposed burden of 'being God' for them, just slipped away from me. 

Peace has replaced perfectionism. Serenity has replaced suspicion. I can still very easily slip back into that old fearful and obsessive mind-set at times.  But I am able to catch myself at it, and when I do, I can more easily unhook from it and let go.  It's not perfect - but that's not my goal.  My goal is progress.

I know that God was in charge of this whole thing: He was the One who sent those people who walked with me as I put one foot in front of the other and stepped further and further into the light.  And to Him - and to them - I will always be thankful.

My Little Trooper

Over the last few days, I've been watching my youngest child go through a lot of pain and sickness.  

It's hard to watch someone you love be in pain and not be able to do anything to help.  It's harder to know that it could be serious; you just don't know, and you have to wait to get answers.  

I've caught myself struggling with control issues and boundaries the last couple of days.  That is, me wanting to control, to supervise, to protect.  It's difficult to know where the line is, because I was so used to there not "being" a line - and I didn't want to cross it now that there was one.  

But I've come to understand that sometimes people who are vulnerable need to be protected, and that it's the decision of the person being "protected" whether or not it's appropriate  (big revelation!!)  

As it happened, my daughter was grateful for my advocacy for her with the medical staff, when often she didn't know what to answer them because of 'jargon' they used, or procedures they were trying to explain.  

And this whole ordeal (which is ongoing) has repaired / is repairing a lot of bridges that had been in sad disrepair with all the damage I did to the relationship in my active codependency.  

This photo was taken less than 2 months
ago, on Christmas Day 2011.
It's one of my favorite Christmas memories.
Unknown to me, she was suffering
even then.

More than anything, though, I've been so impressed by my daughter's strength of character throughout this ordeal.  

She's still in a lot of pain.  The Tylenol 3 that she has been taking religiously on time (they only gave her enough for 5 days) takes the edge off the pain for a couple of hours at most, and then she is in pain for the rest of the time until the next dose, which takes about an hour to kick in.  

But her attitude has been amazing - her unwillingness to complain or to give up is so incredible.  

She has such an indomitable spirit.  She's been struggling with this pain for months and not complaining, and her optimistic attitude is refreshing - and contagious - and inspirational.  I feel so privileged to know her, to be a part of her life again.  And I don't want to mess it up!  So I keep reminding myself that she is her own person, that I need to respect her boundaries - and at the same time she needs to know that I care. 

The last few days have been hard for both of us - but helpful in letting her know that I care, that I'm there for her.  And they've given me such insight into my little trooper. 


I'm so very proud of her.

Fellow Ship

It's a funny word, isn't it, fellowship?  It can mean different things to different people.  To some it's just an excuse to get together, talk about the weather and the color scheme of the living room, and oh yes, to eat.  We can't forget that.  ;) 

To others, it means congregating on a regular basis to do a set number of rituals and then go home.  I'd look at that as two ships (fellow ships?) passing in the night, no real connection except they're there ... temporarily.  

There are any number of definitions depending on whether a person is outgoing or not, involved in community events or not, athletic or not, and so forth.  

I consider fellowship to go a little - okay, a lot - deeper than that.  It's people of like mind, perhaps with a common belief - or a common problem - preferably (for my own comfort zone) in small groups of no larger than four people - coming together to talk about things that really matter: relationship with God, relationships with ourselves and each other. There's a connection there, it's a safe place to be: no judgment, only acceptance.  Everyone is allowed to feel what he/she feels. The gathering could be in each others' homes, at a coffee shop, at another public, agreed-upon place, and it could be regularly scheduled or impromptu.  There is nothing superficial about it.  

Nobody is excluded on the basis of gender, belief, or other differences (whether visible or not.) And it doesn't have to be in person either.  It can be virtual - whether in social media, over the phone, or via Skype or chat room.

There was a time when I didn't think that such a thing (fellowship as I define it, that is) existed.  I know different now - it just took me a while to find it.  And finding it meant something risky.  I had to become vulnerable - open - willing to be honest about myself, to ask for help.  Time and again I have found in the last three years that when I trust people who are trustworthy, I am surrounded by the love and fellowship for which I so longed when I thought it didn't exist.

Rather than ships passing in the night, I've discovered people who are in the same boat as I am.  The Fellow Ship.

I am so very thankful for my fellow crew-members.  They are there for me, and I am there for them.  After all, we're all in this together.

Slippage

Today I tackled a job I've been putting off for a while.  I used to do it every month, but in the last few months ... not so much. I needed to balance my checkbook.

I can hear the collective groans.  The thing is, I used to be really good at recording every expense.  Treated every debit card transaction like a check, recorded it right away.  Then my habits changed and I started saving receipts when making a debit card purchase, (this to avoid perfect strangers behind me in line from being upset at having to wait while I write down the amount! wow.  Reality check: how codependent is that??) intending to record them later.  Most times I do.  Sometimes - and this is usually the case especially with those pesky  automatic payments - I forget.  This results in what some call "slippage."  A missed transaction or two doesn't seem like much.  But it can be dangerous!

To my surprise, when I finally dug my check register out today, I discovered I had not reconciled it to my bank account in about six months.  Ouch!!  This wasn't going to be good.  

Source of this image:
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-
775368-checkbook-register.php

After carefully verifying every transaction the bank said I put through, I ended up having a few hundred dollars less in my bank account than I thought. (Talk about slippage!!)  Not a nice feeling to be sure.  A little unsettling (pun not intended) as a matter of fact.  But, I bit the bullet ... made the change in my check register, and now everything balances, although the balance is less than I would have wanted.  Before I sat down with my wallet today, I thought I was doing pretty well.  That's the trouble with slippage.  It adds up.

It's sort of a relief to know where I stand, though.  To know that I'm square - that I won't be caught short of funds when I have to make a payment in future.  But lessons learned:  the arrival of the bank statement is the perfect signal for me to make time to make sure I've been scrupulously honest with myself.  And speaking of honesty - this putting the recording off until that evening or the next day ... has not been working for me: with all my other daily duties, I easily forget about the paperwork, and before I know it, I have a whole whack of receipts falling out of my wallet.  So - perhaps it's time to get a little more meticulous about my record-keeping - to take the time to do it at the checkout as I used to do.  It's another way of looking after myself, of reminding myself that I have the right to take up space in the world.  Even if I have to slip around to the far end of the checkout after paying, for the twenty extra seconds it would take to record my purchase.

It's just that easy to fall behind, to not be as diligent as I once was - not only in my paperwork, but also in my inner life.  I once heard someone say, "Keep short accounts with God."  I'd say that applies to all relationships including the vertical one.  I talk about it ... but when all is said and done, I do tend to let things slip.  I "coast."  I don't live intentionally - and that results in spiritual slippage.  Fortunately, I don't have to wonder if my Record-keeper made a mistake.  If there's a discrepancy, I know I'm the one who goofed.  And although it's humbling, it's better for me to reconcile with God ... and with anyone else for whom I have not been "present" ... so that my life is balanced.

Balanced is good.

To the Care of God

Step three of any 12-step program you can name says, "Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God ..." 

In fact, all the "steps" are about beginning and developing a relationship with God.  They are a blueprint for living life as He directs.  

I wanted to mention that today, because I have heard of 12-step programs being mistakenly called "self-help" programs.  Those who refer to such programs as "self-help" in nature really do NOT understand the basis on which these programs are founded.  God is at the centre of them, God is all the way through them, and God is the One who empowers the weary traveler to do them.  I know.  I'm one of those travelers - and I thank God for that.  

I've often been known to say in the last couple of years, that everyone in the world (or at least in Western society) needs a twelve-step program - without exception.  The longer I am with people "in recovery", the more I realize that this is true.  Those 12 steps that are so mocked in some circles, are the ONLY way to recover from any addiction: from alcohol to codependency to selfishness.  Some in the church have used them without even realizing it (whether instantaneously or not); others deliberately embark upon them and have found an intimate, daily relationship with God in the process.  

Honesty, Openness and Willingness are the only requirements needed.  They are the "HOW" of the program. 

When I got to step three, part of which is quoted above, it was tempting to gloss over it. Been there, done that.  (Oh really?)  I was encouraged to go through the words in the step carefully.  Was there any one that stuck out for me?  And then it hit me.  The word "CARE."  To give my will and my life over to the CARE of God. Was that the real way that I saw God?  did I see Him as caring about me?  or did I believe Him to be uncaring, unfeeling, unconcerned with my life? I had to admit that much of the way I related to God was based on the latter and not the former.  Oh I knew the doctrines - I could spout them as well as the next evangelical believer.  But in practicalities - in the everyday - my behavior didn't line up with what I said I believed.  And that's because there's a difference between the kind of belief that's a "hope-so" and the kind that's a "know-so".   

I spent all my life in the church.  But my relationship with God was stilted and my conversations with Him were fraught with shame, doubt and fear.  And then, after life had beaten me down and I was ready to accept help, someone introduced me to the 12 steps of CoDependents Anonymous - of which step 3 is a crucial part.  There, in the steps and in the fellowship of CoDA, I found what I'd been missing - the HOW of the Christian life I'd been trying so very hard - and failing - to live.  I found people who accepted me for who I was and didn't judge me for not being who I was "supposed" to be - who shared their experience, strength and hope freely with me, who focused on "progress, not perfection."  I believe that God led me to that place, for the express purpose of being able to find what I'd been missing all my life - that central part of the puzzle that I always knew, deep down, was lacking.  In that atmosphere of acceptance and love, I was - and am - able to grow and become everything that God intended, one day at a time.  

Best of all, I don't just believe He loves and cares about me.  I know it.