Amber Hollingsworth says codependency isn't about helping others, it's about avoiding guilt and rejection. These patterns start in childhood when you learned to manage a parent's emotions. She recommends asking yourself hard questions like whether it's actually the end of the world if someone gets angry with you.
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This might be a bit of a hard pill to swallow for all of us out there who struggle with codependency. Yes, I'm including myself in this category. Most of the time when we're engaging in these people pleasing, codependent type behaviors, we're telling ourselves that it's because we don't want to upset someone else. We don't want them to feel rejected. We don't want them to feel abandoned. We don't want them to experience pain and suffering. Basically, we're telling ourselves that we're just looking out for this other person. But the truth of the matter is quite different. The real reason why we get stuck in these codependent people pleasing patterns is because we can't deal with the uncomfortableness. It's because we feel guilty for not doing something for someone else. It's because we feel like someone else will abandon us or reject us or get mad at us. It's actually not about the other person at all. It's always about us. And the reason why this is kind of like a heart truth is because we've been telling ourselves this whole time that we're kind and caring and empathetic, and we care about the other person. And there may be a little truth to that, but there's also a big truth that we're protecting ourselves. We're managing our own uncomfortableness. So the question you should be asking yourself is, why do you have such an intolerance to these particular feelings? Why are you hypersensitive to feeling guilty or feeling rejected or feeling like someone's mad at you? Why? Why does that work on you so much? Most likely, if these are things that you struggle with, it's because somewhere in your childhood, you learned either overtly or covertly that you are responsible for other people's emotions. So it's almost like it gets hardwired in on, like, this subconscious level that you have to manage other people's emotions, environment, feelings. Of course, this can happen for lots of different reasons. But for example, if you grew up with addicted parents, or maybe depressed parents or parents that were struggling with something else, maybe somewhere along the lines you decided that it was your job to try and help the situation or fix the situation, or at the very least, it was your job not to add to the situation. As you can see, this stuff goes really, really deep. The key to conquering codependency is to identify what false narrative have you been telling yourself probably for, like, your whole life that's keeping you stuck. Once you can identify that lie and Bring it from the unconscious to the conscious and you're going to be able to confront it, which means you're going to be able to confront it more effectively by asking yourself questions like, is it the end of the world if this person gets mad at me? Is it really my fault if they're uncomfortable or their life is difficult? Can I live with the fact that someone is disappointed in me? Are they really going to abandon me if I say no? And if they do, is it the most terrible, horrible thing ever? And this last little self confrontation is really difficult. You've got to ask yourself, am I really helping that other person or am I actually hurting that other person and only protecting myself? Because in a lot of cases, that is exactly what's happening. Once you get your head on straight about this, you're gonna be able to start stopping yourself and eventually codependency will not rule your life anymore. I would love to know what is the story you've been telling yourself? What is the lie, the narrative that's actually been holding you hostage? If you would put that in the comments below because it's really helpful when other people come along and they read those to say, my goodness, that's exactly what goes on with me. And up next, I've got two videos that are going to help you start to quickly unraveling these codependent behaviors. And I've put them in a small little playlist so they're even easier to access.
