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Are You Codependent?
by: Royane Real
One of the greatest benefits of having close friendships is that our friends can support and help us when things get rough in our lives.

In exchange for the support our friends give us during a crisis, most of us also help our friends when they need it.

In a relationship between two emotionally healthy adults, the roles of giving and receiving help are balanced. Both people offer help and receive help from each other in approximately equal amounts.

However, there are some people who always take on the role of being the helper, no matter what relationship they are in.

These people have friendships that focus exclusively on trying to solve the problems of their friends. We sometimes call this quality “co-dependency”, and we may label people who are obsessed with helping others “co-dependent”.

A person who is co-dependent will tend to have relationships with people who have a lot of problems – emotional, social, familial and financial. The co-dependent person may spend much of their own time, money, and energy helping other people who have problems, while ignoring the problems in their own life.

Why would somebody be co-dependent?

A person who is co-dependent often suffers from a deep sense of worthlessness and anxiety, and tries to derive a sense of self-worth by helping or rescuing others. A person who is co-dependent may not know how to relax and feel comfortable in a friendship where both people are equals and the relationship is based on enjoying each other’s company.

Co-dependent people may even feel anxious if someone they have been helping gets their life in order and no longer wants their help. The co-dependent person may immediately look around for someone else they can “save”.

If you frequently take on the role of helping the people who are your friends, how can you tell if you are acting out of genuine kindness and concern, or whether your behavior is in fact co-dependency? There aren’t really any hard and fast lines between the two.

Here are some questions you can ask yourself to see whether your “helping” behavior may actually be co-dependency:

- Do you have a hard time saying no to others, even when you are very busy, financially broke, or completely exhausted?

- Are you always sacrificing your own needs for everyone else?

- Do you feel more worthy as a human being because you have taken on a helping role?

- If you stopped helping your friends, would you feel guilty or worthless?

- Would you know how to be in a friendship that doesn’t revolve around you being the “helper”?

- If your friends eventually didn’t need your help, would you still be friends with them? Or would you look around for someone else to help?

- Do you feel resentful when others are not grateful enough to you for your efforts at rescuing them or fixing their lives?

- Do you sometimes feel like more of a social worker than a friend in your relationships?

- Do you feel uncomfortable receiving help from other people? Is the role of helping others a much more natural role for you to play in your relationships?

- Does it seem as if many of your friends have particularly chaotic lives, with one crisis after another?

- Did you grow up in a family that had a lot of emotional chaos or addiction problems?

- Are many of your friends addicts, or do they have serious emotional and social problems?

- As you were growing up, did you think it was up to you to keep the family functioning?

- As an adult, is it important for you to be thought of as the “dependable one”?

If you answered “yes” to a lot of these questions, you may indeed have a problem with co-dependency.

This does not mean that you are a flawed person.

It means that you are spending a lot of energy on other people and very little on yourself.

If it seems that a lot of your friendships are based on co-dependent rescuing behaviors, rather than on mutual liking and respect between equals, you may wish to step back and rethink your role in relationships.

If you suspect that your helping behavior is a form of co-dependency, a good therapist or counselor can help you gain perspective on your actions and learn a more balanced way of relating to others.

There are many excellent books available on the subject of co-dependency. Support groups such as Al-Anon can also help.

This article is written by Royane Real, author of “How You Can Have All the Friends You Want – Your Complete Guide to Finding Friends, Making Friends, and Keeping Friends:” If you want to improve your friendships, download it today to http://www.royanereal.com

This article is free for republishing
Royane Real is the author of several self help books including “How You Can Have All the Friends You Want” If you want to improve your social life, download it today at http://www.royanereal.com

 



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7 Myths About Creating A Better Relationship
 by: Cecil McIntosh

In my private practice for over 14 years no matter what my clients have come to see me about, there has always been an issue about a better relationship.

Here are 7 of the most common misconceptions my clients have related to me about having a better relationship. These misconceptions are followed by my perspective on each one of them.

Myth 1 I have to love everything about my partner

Reality Check 1

You were born pure and pristine. You then learnt behaviors from your parents, teacher, coaches, church etc. (who did their best to teach you about a better relationship). These behaviors have become the backbone for your way of living and having a better relationship.

Perhaps a common behavior that irritates having a better relationship would be leaving the toilet seat up after use. This is merely a behavior and not the essence of the person. However, when you may consider this behavior to be the person, this destroys the concept of a better relationship, creating all kinds of conflict in your need for a better relationship.

Myth 2 Love means that I can fix your partner

Reality Check 2

You met your partner because of some special quality or charteristic that you admired. You need to accept and allow that quality to flourish in order to allow you and your partner to grow into a better relationship.

You may be unaware that you do not even like yourself. Yet by allowing your partner to grow and expand, you will experience the quality of your partner and the beauty within you, as you begin to enjoy a better relationship.

Myth 3

I am supposed to give up the things I like in order to be in a better relationship.

Reality Check 3

Giving up the things you like to be in a better relationship is like take a knife and cutting away a part of yourself.

Your better relationship is based on the uniqueness of you and your partner.

When you give up your uniqueness you rob yourself of a better relationship, your passion and your partner of your creativity.

Myth 4 I will be rescued by a knight in shining armour

Reality Check 4

You may have been conditioned to live your life expecting someone to take care of you. What happens if that person becomes ill? and is no longer able to take care of you.

Your responsibility in creating a better relationship, is to bring your passion to the table of your relationship. Some days you will be the knight in shining armour and another day your partner will be the knight in shining armour of a better relationship.

You will each get a chance to shine like star in a better relationship because of your strengths and weaknesses.

Myth 5 It cost a lot to be in a relationship

Reality Check 5

In a material context, a better relationship can be expensive if you think that love is based on the bigger house, car or boat. Although some of these material assets are necessary, they should not be at the expense of creating a better relationship.

Love is creating a better relationship by building a relationship that is based on the simple things in life, like walking and holding hands, going on a picnic (just the two of you), or sharing an ice cream.

Love in a better relationship is not about what you show on the outside but what you express in you heart. Love is not about money or materialism, love just is.

Myth 6 Love in a relationship is or is not a feeling

Reality Check 6

It is not what you say, it is what you do. You can say, "I love you" which may be merely words and no feelings (action). Love is the action of doing.

If you make a cup of tea for yourself, (the water is boiled), make a cup of tea for your partner. Whether your partner wants the tea or not is irrelevant, it is the thought that counts and the action that cements a better relationship.

Myth 7 I don't have to work at my relationship

Reality Check 7

As a child, you learned to creep before you walked. Then you learned the letters of the alphabet. In order to write, you had to learn how to put those letters together to make words and sentences.

These sentences then become the way in which you communicated.

When you and your partner stop communicating after learning how to use the letters of the alphabet in sentences, it's like 2 tape recorders talking to each other - Nobody is at home to enjoy a better relationship.

In summary:

1. Your partner's behavior in a better relationship is not your partner's true essence.

2. There is no need to have a clone of yourself. A better relationship requires some variety.

3. Giving up of your uniqueness to be in a better relationship is like throwing out the baby with the bath water.

4. In a better relationship there are no superior partners, just equal partners.

5. Love in creating a better relationship is not about money and the material assets (although there are important) but the simple things in life.

6. Love in a better relationship is active not passive.

7. Lack of communication crushes your desire for a better relationship.



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