Author: James Browning

No Longer in the Shadows

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

For over four years attending meetings of Codependence Anonymous ( http://www.coda.org/ or  http://coda-tulsa.org/ ) has been a consistent personal commitment. Going to these two weekly 12 step gatherings has been a big help in coming to understand Codependecy issues that created havoc in my life and working past them.  Here on this blog previously were listed all the afflictions I got into recovery for, but for the subject of today’s blog only one is being brought up: sexual compulsion.  While there are arguments going on today about whether people actually can use sex in the same manner an addict uses a substance, I can assure you from personal experience a person can.  I did.  I hated myself every step of the way, but that hatred did not stop me from “medicating with my habit of choice”.   

I wish there was a local chapter of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous, but am grateful local meetings for groups related to SCA are in town.  I have attended meetings of Sexual Addicts Anonymous (SAA) and Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (SLAA).  The former was down right scary to me and seemed to be populated by people whose dysfunction had growth way beyond anything I could imagine (my heart goes out to them).  The meetings of the latter group were helpful but not targeted to my needs.

Contemplating trying to start a local chapter of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous, I have been reading material from the organization on their website http://www.sca-recovery.org/compulsive.htm .  There I found:  Members of SCA have learned through sharing their experience, strength, and hope with each other that sexual compulsivity is a disease.  This disease has three dimensions: physical, emotional, and spiritual.  Physically, we engage in sexual behaviors that we know are not healthy for us or that place us in legal, physical, or spiritual jeopardy.  Emotionally, we experience a “high” in contemplating and engaging in the “acting out” behavior, followed by an emotional let-down after acting out has concluded.  Spiritually, we feel disconnected from others, especially from relationships we want to be “healthy” ones. 

Clearly I can relate to all three dimensions described and have been greatly disappointed in the past when people thought my behavior was a choice.  I assure one and all it is not something a person makes a conscious choice to do.  The compulsions were so strong resisting them seemed impossible until I got into recovery, understood the dysfunction, where it comes from and overtime developed healthy behaviors  Just like beating drugs or alcohol, it was difficult, especially at first.  Taking it one day at a time, one step at a time as the recovery programs suggest brought me in time to be a healthy being, sexually and otherwise.  Looking back my past behavior looks so insanely crazy, but that viewpoint today is from a point of healthfulness.  A person lost in craziness has a very difficult time focusing and seeing the amount of crazy they are practicing.  When I was lost in the storm I could not see outside of what swirled around me.

A substantial part of my recovery was to find a long period of sexual sobriety.  As an alcoholic gets the shakes without his drink, I got the mental shakes from my not giving in to my unhealthy desires.  However, once the moment arrived when I knew I HAD TO HAVE a different life, a normal life, I gained the strength to bear the “mental shakes” without giving in to them.  Those who doubt the presence of a Higher Power have never been to the low depths I was down to.  It took being broken down to the point of helpless for me to find a willingness to accept help beyond myself.  But I did, and with assistance from my Higher Power I began to move forward to where I am today.  If I try to define “God” I get lost in the attempt.  The simple knowing there is a power beyond me is enough.  

Where am I?  Love has come into my life and for the first time I don’t find myself feeling strongly about a woman and lusting after others in my mind at the same time.  She is all I need.  Being in recovery herself, she “gets me”.  There is no reason to hide anything.  The realization still amazes me of how wonderful love and sexual expression can be when focused on one person.  I have never known such peace before.  With 100% of me in the relationship while deeply in love, everything about my life has gained a sparkle never experienced previously.   

The paragraphs above were written to get to a single point of immense gratitude.  Last evening there was a Codependents Anonymous meeting attended by seven attractive women and me.  While there are other examples in recent times, none was as striking as last evening when the realization hit me of how far my recovery has come.  I was able to be at the meeting and completely comfortable with a room full of women while just being myself.  There were no inappropriate thoughts running through my head distracting me and focus on the meeting itself was easy.  To many my realization may seem like no big deal.  Well aware I am that one does not get awards for becoming a functional human being who can be called to some extent “normal”.  But I am giving myself a big pat on the back anyway, for to think of myself as somewhere near the realm of “normal” used to feel impossible.

Today I am grateful the storm within no longer rages.  I am very glad my life has ceased to be lived in part as a secret and my sexuality is no longer lost in the shadows.  There is much thankfulness for the peers who I have shared recovery with.  My gratefulness for the love in my life humbles me.  Yes, without a doubt… gratitude truly is one of the great secrets to a good life.   

That which does not kill us, makes us stronger.
Friedrich W. Nietzsche

What You Think of Me is None of My Business

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

When considered all together, getting older is a good balance of what I am glad about and what I sometimes wish were no so.  Of course, having more of the hair I used to have or a back that does not ache after working in the yard or to not need reading glasses are good examples of what’s on the “I wish were not so list”.  Moving to the “I’m glad about list” immediately I find gratitude for knowledge not possible in younger years that has come from a broad range of life experience.  I cherish the wisdom earned the hard way mostly from my mistakes. 

One of the gems of wisdom I am grateful for is summed up in the words of Wayne Dyer:  What you think of me is none of my business.  No magic immunity from such thinking have I learned, but what others think of me plainly matters much less here in the fifth decade of my life than ever before.  Bosses I work for don’t make me nervous any more (does it have anything to do with the fact that most are younger and less experienced than me?)  Dressing nicely still matters, but comfort in what I have on is at the top of my list and matters ten times more than what others think of my wardrobe.       

A good deal of personal growth is evident to anyone who has long known me.  However, inwardly there remains speculation from time to time if I measure up in other people eyes.  An often successful method I use to combat such “stinking thinking” is to self-question with this thought:  How would I feel if I was literally unable to worry about another person’s opinion of me?  Getting some sort of silent mental answer in response to that quandary seems to banish the need to care what others think more often than not.  

Deep down I know I don’t need the approval of others. It is my ego, the fragile little pretend person within, that craves approval and fears disapproval. Even with the wisdom of years my mind will take things personally sometimes if I let it.  The need to attempt to gain power through approval and disapproval games will always be there. Here in middle age I am grateful to be able to separate myself from my ego more successfully and know approval and disapproval have no real value whatsoever.  In reality, another person’s thought or opinion about me is never personal, because it is never really about me in the first place. It’s about them. A person’s thoughts about anything and everything are only about them self. 

Writer Byron Katie has written several self-help books that have been insightful to me.  She says my business is what I think and what I feel.  If I get worried about how someone feels about me, I’m in their business. And if I’m busy living in their business, how am I present for my own business?  A helpful process Katie recommends to throw off untrue thoughts she calls “Inquiry”.  This process I have found helpful includes four questions to ask one’s self:
1. Is it true?
2. Can you absolutely know that it’s true?
3. How do you react when you think that thought?
4. Who would you be without the thought?

The most intimate relationship I have is the one with my own mind.  When that chatterbox in my head is stressing and screaming, I find that it will keep on doing it until I give it some attention.  That sort of thinking is like a toddler in a grocery store pitching a fit until it gets attention.  One way I give that attention is  putting my thoughts through Byron Katie’s four questions.  When I truly question their validity it’s common to find beliefs I have had for 5, 10, 30 years, even the worst, most stressful ones, disappear with regularity.  Then the “monkey mind chatterbox” (my brain) slows down and living becomes easier and life tastes better.  

When I can consider things objectively I see the most others can have of me is an opinion.  When thinking clearly I know to elevate another’s opinion of me to the status of a judgment is simply ridiculous. No one can judge me unless I grant him or her the power of being my judge.

When I let go of worry over other people’s opinions, I become free to reflect on my own opinion of myself. Living according to my own truth is an act of self-love and self-care. When I live according to my own beliefs and stay in my own  business (and out of other’s business), I find others usually will honor the truths I live by, whether they agree with me or not.  To know that tidbit of wisdom is a gift I’m grateful for.

I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody. Bill Cosby

But for the Grace of God

/ James Browning / 4 Comments

My memory of that afternoon awakens thoughts of a sunny fall day.  Back in time a dozen years it was one of those in-between days of not cold yet, but not warm either.  Balanced between extremes that Saturday was one of those cool fall days I love most. 
 
Gone are the details of where my then-wife and I were driving to, but clear is the mental image of the ramp she was exiting on.  It was one of those long, circular highway exits that causes you go twenty-five miles an hour around three-quarters of a circle to get to the other side of the road.  Once there I looked down on that side of the in-town freeway to see an old car with a much older man outside taking to someone sitting on the passenger side. 
 
After getting my wife to pull over over safely on the side of the ramp, I got out and yelled down to the stranded man “are you OK?”  A slow Oklahoma country drawl came from the old man’s mouth “No sir, we ain’t”.   He looked harmless enough and had some difficulty walking, so I felt safe headed down the bank of the ramp to get close enough to talk to him.  On my way down I saw he was at least seventy-five or so and his passenger was a woman near his age who I assumed was his wife, which he later confirmed. 
 
As I stopped about six feet away from him, the old man said “once upon a time I was rich, but not no more.  That’s been gone for a long time.  It’s OK, but it’s hard when I come up short sometimes like now”.  I asked what was going on and he answered “we’re trying to get to some family down in Tahlequah.  The gas gauge don’t work and I thought we had enough to get there.  I was wrong and we ain’t got no money.”
 
About that time I saw the head of a baby close to a year old pop up from the lap of the woman in the car.  The old man said “that’s my great grand baby!  My wife and I been takin’ care of her ‘cause her momma and daddy ain’t no good.  It’s hard on us, but church helps us some and we get by.  I try not to complain ‘cause it’s what the good Lord sent us.  When I hold that little baby I just know God’ll provide for us somehow”.   
 
I asked about credit cards and found they didn’t have any.  I knew what had to be done. Remembering a farm supply store a few miles away across from a mini-mart I told him we’d be back be back in fifteen or twenty minutes with some gas.  At that moment the first smile I’d seen on the old guy’s face lit up.  The smile was missing half the teeth it once had but was warm and genuine.  His relief was obvious.  As I walked back to our car above I heard his “thank you mister” followed by the old woman chiming in right after with “God bless you sir”.
 
A half hour later we were back with a near full red plastic five gallon gas can.  My wife stayed in the car after we pulled up behind them on the shoulder of the road.  Not much spilled as I poured the gas into the tank of the old car without a funnel.  When done the old guy began trying to start his car.  It took a while and several false starts with the engine spitting and sputtering until it roared to life.  The motor was not running well, but seemed like it could get them to where they needed to go.
 
After buying the gas can and gas, I still had twenty-five dollars and some change left.  I kept a five and tried to give the remaining twenty to the old man sitting behind wheel of his old car.  He said “No sir, I ain’t gonna take your money.  You already been real too kind to us.  I’m much obliged God sent you.”  I insisted saying he didn’t have enough gas to finish his trip.  He continued to resist and shake his head side to side to say “no”.
 
Walking around to the passenger side of the car I made eye contact with the old lady and asked her if it would be ok if I gave her the money for the baby.  She looked at her husband and then at me… and repeated looking back and forth between us several times.  She never said a word, but ever so slightly he nodded his head “yes” to her.  I handed the money through the window and as she took it she held back tears and repeated the only four words I had heard her say earlier; “God bless you sir”.  Soon the car steered onto the highway and faded into the distance.
 
To this day I don’t know why I believed the old man.  He could have been a con artist, but if so he was damn good at it.  Even now I feel certain he was legit.  Real pain and fear are hard to make up.  The exact look in his face when he first looked into my eyes and began to speak saying “I used to be rich….” clearly showed the old man’s anguish. 

Even thought my now ex-wife was nervous enough to not get out of her truck, she was proud of what I did that day.  There will always be gladness within that we got to help someone in need, but to an even greater degree I am grateful for the gift I got that day.   Many times I have remembered the old man’s words “I used to be rich…” and how they touched me.  Thinking about those words and the situation I found him is a reminder that nothing on this Earth is permanent.  Tough times harder than we can even imagine are never far away from happening. The possessions I own, the money I have, the good health I enjoy: everything could all be gone in a blink!  I am grateful my memory of the encounter with the old couple is so vibrant yet today.  Each time I recall it my mind whispers softly to my soul, “There but for the grace of God, go I”.

Courage is as often the outcome of despair as of hope; in the one case we have nothing to lose, in the other, everything to gain.   Diane de Pointiers

When the Student is Ready…

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

Several times in the last ten years I have received a forwarded email titled “Bill Gates 11 Rules for Life” and while the list contains some relatively good advice, it has nothing to do with Bill Gates.  He never made a speech at a high school that contained the material being attributed to him.  The list most often sent around is actually incomplete in its length and who it is credited to.  The complete list includes 14 rules and comes from “Some Rules Kids Won’t Learn In School” by Charles J. Sykes.  It was originally printed in the San Diego Union Tribune on September 19, 1996.  Here’s the original text in complete and unedited form:

Unfortunately, there are some things that children should be learning in school, but don’t. Not all of them have to do with academics. As a modest back-to-school offering, here are some basic rules that may not have found their way into the standard curriculum.

Rule No. 1: Life is not fair. Get used to it. The average teen-ager uses the phrase, “It’s not fair” 8.6 times a day. You got it from your parents, who said it so often you decided they must be the most idealistic generation ever. When they started hearing it from their own kids, they realized Rule No. 1.

Rule No. 2: The real world won’t care as much about your self-esteem as much as your school does. It’ll expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself. This may come as a shock. Usually, when inflated self-esteem meets reality, kids complain it’s not fair. (See Rule No. 1)

Rule No. 3: Sorry, you won’t make $40,000 a year right out of high school. And you won’t be a vice president or have a car phone either. You may even have to wear a uniform that doesn’t have a Gap label.

Rule No. 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait ’til you get a boss. He doesn’t have tenure, so he tends to be a bit edgier. When you screw up, he’s not going to ask you how you feel about it.

Rule No. 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grand-parents had a different word of burger flipping. They called it opportunity. They weren’t embarrassed making minimum wage either. They would have been embarrassed to sit around talking about Kurt Cobain all weekend.

Rule No. 6: It’s not your parents’ fault. If you screw up, you are responsible. This is the flip side of “It’s my life,” and “You’re not the boss of me” and other eloquent proclamations of your generation. When you turn 18, it’s on your dime. Don’t whine about it, or you’ll sound like a baby boomer.

Rule No. 7: Before you were born your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way paying your bills, cleaning up your room and listening to you tell them how idealistic you are. And by the way, before you save the rain forest from the blood-sucking parasites of your parents’ generation, try delousing the closet in your bedroom.

Rule No. 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers. Life hasn’t. In some schools, they’ll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. Failing grades have been abolished and class valedictorians scrapped, lest anyone’s feelings be hurt. Effort is as important as results. This, of course, bears not the slightest resemblance to anything in real life. (See Rule No. 1, Rule No. 2 and Rule No. 4)

Rule No. 9: Life is not divided into semesters, and you don’t get summers off. Not even Easter break. They expect you to show up every day. For eight hours. And you don’t get a new life every 10 weeks. It just goes on and on. While we’re at it, very few jobs are interesting in fostering your self-expression or helping you find yourself. Fewer still lead to self-realization. (See Rule No. 1 and Rule No. 2.)

Rule No. 10: Television is not real life. Your life is not a sitcom. Your problems will not all be solved in 30 minutes, minus time for commercials. In real life, people actually have to leave the coffee shop to go to jobs. Your friends will not be as perky or pliable as Jennifer Aniston.

Rule No. 11: Be nice to nerds. You may end up working for them. We all could.

Rule No. 12: Smoking does not make you look cool. It makes you look moronic. Next time you’re out cruising, watch an 11-year-old with a butt in his mouth. That’s what you look like to anyone over 20. Ditto for “expressing yourself” with purple hair and/or pierced body parts.

Rule No. 13: You are not immortal. (See Rule No. 12.) If you are under the impression that living fast, dying young and leaving a beautiful corpse is romantic, you obviously haven’t seen one of your peers at room temperature lately.

Rule No. 14: Enjoy this while you can. Sure parents are a pain, school’s a bother, and life is depressing. But someday you’ll realize how wonderful it was to be a kid. Maybe you should start now.

You’re welcome.

Whether you’re six or sixty there is good practical advice for living contained within Mr. Sykes list.  Even for my peers who are “middle ager’s” all we have to do is substitute a few words here and there and apply a different context on a few rules to make the advice fully applicable.  I am grateful for the reminder this list brings to me and for it coming back into my life again today completely unexpected via email.

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Buddhist Proverb 

The Road Less Traveled

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

There is someone who lives about 200 miles away who has become a good friend over the last five years.  The common ground for us has been our struggles with life including depression, broken marriages, shame and regret.  When I hit my crisis point in 2007 she encouraged me, often emailed and sometimes called to see how I was and generally gave me support.  Now it is my turn.  Through the lessons of difficulty she is potentially at a new starting point.  Great discomfort can encourage a person to change and open the gateway to growth.  My pain was the catalyst for my growth and I hope hers can be turned into a positive force in a similar manner.   
   
In this current period of difficulty she has come face to face with herself and her past and truly wants to grow beyond it all.  She reached out for advice in an email last evening and what I sent her were some borrowed words below from the book “The Road less Traveled” written by psychiatrist, M. Scott Peck, M.D.

Life is difficult.  This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths.  It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it.  Once we truly know that life is difficult – once we truly understand and accept it – then life is not longer difficult.  Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters.
 
Most do not fully see this truth that life is difficult.  Instead they moan more or less incessantly, notably or subtly, about the enormity of their problems, their burdens, and their difficulties as if life were generally easy, as if life should be easy.  They voice their belief noisily or subtly that their difficulties represent a unique kind of affliction that should not be and that has somehow been especially visited upon them…
 
Yet it is in this whole process of meeting… problems that life has its meaning.  Problems call forth our courage and our wisdom; indeed, they create our courage and wisdom.  It is because of problems that we grow mentally and spiritually.  When we desire to encourage the growth of the human spirit, we challenge and encourage the human capacity to solve problems, just as in school we deliberately set problems for our children to solve.  It is through the pain of confronting and resolving problems that we learn.  As Benjamin Franklin said, “Those things that hurt, instruct”. 
 
…when we avoid the legitimate suffering that results from dealing with problems, we also avoid the growth that problems demand from us.  It is for this reason that in chronic mental illness we stop growing, we become stuck.  And without healing, the human spirit begins to shrivel.
 
 Problems do not go away.  They must be worked thorough or else they remain, forever a barrier to the growth and development of the spirit.  We must accept responsibility for a problem before we can solve it. 
 
Self-discipline is a self-enlarging process. 
 
What are these tools… these means of experiencing the pain of problems constructively that I call discipline?  There are four: delaying of gratification, acceptance of responsibly, dedication to truth and balancing.  

Delaying of gratification is a process of scheduling the pain and pleasure of life in such a way as to enhance the pleasure by meeting and experiencing the pain first and getting it over with.  It is the only decent way to live.  

We cannot solve life’s problems except by solving them.  …we must accept responsibility for a problem before we can solve it.  We cannot solve a problem by saying “It’s not my problem.”  We cannot solve a problem by hoping that someone else will solve it for us.  I can solve a problem only when I say “This is my problem and it’s up to me to solve it.” (You can only solve YOUR problems.  You can not solve a problem that belongs to someone else). 

Truth is reality.  Our view of reality is like a map with which to negotiate the terrain of life.  If the map is true and accurate, we will generally know where we are and if we have decided where we want to go, we will generally know how to get there.  If the way is false and inaccurate, we generally will be lost. 

Balancing is the discipline that gives us flexibility.  The essence of this discipline of balance is “giving up”.  …as we negotiate the curves and corners of our lives, we must continually give up parts of ourselves. …personality traits, well-established patterns of behavior, ideologies and even whole life styles. 

Dr. Peck’s book was good reading when I first got through it a decade ago.  Now down the road in my growth his words speak to me much more strongly now.  I am grateful for the help I received from Dr. Peck through his book and thankful now I can offer a little of its wisdom to someone I care about.

You can’t run away from trouble.  There ain’t no place that far.  Uncle Remus

And Then the Day Came….

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

Be moderate in order to taste the joys of life in abundance.
Epicurus

Looking back I can see lacking moderation burned brightly through the majority of my life.  Only a few years ago I began to see how out of control my behavior was.  That awareness was a shock at first but over time became my personal catalyst for growth and evolution.  
 
Gone are the days of believing I was earning some sort of merit badge to be one of the very last people to leave work each day.  In hindsight what I was trying to prove with that behavior escapes me.  Was I trying to make others think more highly of me because of my hardcore work ethic?  Was I attempting to prove worth to myself?  Was I avoiding things outside of work?  Correct answer:  all three!
 
Once upon a time the home life I cultivated contained even more mania.  Always there was a consuming interest that filled my time away from work.  Learning to fly and owning an airplane filled my spare time for around a decade.  Then came my photography studio for ten years where I worked on average of two nights per week and a day and a half each weekend in addition to my very demanding full-time job.  These and other “interests” were “blocking tools” to avoid dealing with things that needed attention.  Each was a sort of madness I used as something to run away into.  As long as I kept running away I did not have to deal with things. Oh, did I say I was married and had a son in school while I was lost in this craziness?

From the book “Now Is the Time” by Patrick Lindsay
Life rushes between the mundane and madness.
Contentment is often found in moderation.
Balance is elusive.
But simply seeking it allows you to avoid excesses.
Don’t make it a contest:
Allow things to happen naturally.
You’ll be surprised how often they center themselves
And open up vast possibilities.

Running away and living a relentlessly manic life eventually became tiring.  Under the weight of accumulated regret and sheer exhaustion what I was running away from caught up with me.  My junk from childhood tackled and took me down.  My only escape was to finally deal with it all.  And then the day came when the desire to remain the same was more painful than the risk to evolve.
 
Last evening I spent time looking carefully through a notebook and other materials I saved from the five weeks I voluntarily choose to spend at The Meadows http://www.themeadows.com/.  In 2007, it was there I sought treatment for depression, compulsion and childhood trauma.  Until last night my notes from that time had not been touched for over 4 years.   There is no way to have known in advance what an emotional experience reading and looking back would be.
 
Looking through the materials, readily apparent was how far I had come in the fifty months since my recovery began in earnest.  It did my self-image good to see all those baby steps taken day by day since then had accumulated into great positive personal growth.  It was also clear how screwed up I was before my work began in earnest to have a better life. 
 
In a notebook I found there is this I wrote about sexual compulsion:  I came to the Meadows to learn how to learn to manage my addiction; to find a way to keep from damaging my life.  I have been celibate for almost eight months, but I know it was just a matter of time like it has always been in my adult life before eventually I got triggered again.  Most of all my addiction has hurt me, damaged me and caused me to carry a pile of unnecessary shame.  I am tired of it, sick to my bones of the addiction.  There is no peace in my life that I need so badly. 
 
Hand written a few pages later was: By giving in I already have found some relief to my chronic pain from my addiction.  It gives me joy to know that with my Higher Power I can move forward with my life:  one life, not two.  Not one in the open and one secret like before.  I just need to use what I have learned, accept help and stop trying to do it all by myself.  I need to remember I am enough, to love myself and keep my faith in my Higher Power. 
 
Just below I wrote:  I’m 54 years old and I want peace, I need it and will do whatever I can to attain it. 
 
That is exactly what happened.  In the four years since those passages were written a good measure of peace and balance has come into my life.  Truthfully the words “I am happy” can come from my mouth.  And for the first time I have fallen in love without all the noise and dysfunction within me.  I am  very grateful for how far I have come.

Healing may not be so much about getting better, as about letting go of everything that isn’t you – all of the expectations, all of the beliefs – and becoming who you are.  Rachel Naomi Remen

The Problem is not the Problem….

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

Professionally my job is to manage a small business.  On Wednesday’s I have a “first thing in the morning” meeting with seven department heads and I try to leave them with something positive and thought-provoking.  This week it was a two-minute video from the “In Search of Excellence” guy, Tom Peters: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFZA2rWUjxI

In the video Mr. Peters says:
1) The problem is never the problem.  The response to the problem is almost always the problem. 
2) The way you deal with a problem is frankly so much more important on many dimensions than the problem itself.  
2) Perception is all there is.  There is no reality.  There is only perception.
 
Out of the blue while I was eating lunch yesterday the line “The problem is never the problem…” came up in my mind.  In that moment I realized the statement was just as true for personal life as it was in Mr. Peter’s frame of reference regarding commerce, trade and industry.  Clearly I was able to see the majority of my troubled life experiences did not come from the “codependence” I learned as a child.  My problems came from my response to “codependence”.

That moment of crystal clear thought resonated to be a universal truth I will carry forward.  I’ll remember “the problem for me is not my dysfunction.  The problem is my response to that dysfunction: codependence’.

“Codependence” was originally used to describe one in a relationship with a substance abuser, and is co-dependent with the addict. In that context, the codependent is the person who counts drinks, makes excuses, and is hyper vigilant of the addict’s moods in an attempt to gain some control over something they have no control over….the substance abuser’s behavior.

“Codependence” today has come to mean any person who focuses on another person in order to gain some kind of control. For example, a codependent who lives with a violent man watches him to assess his moods, walks on eggshells to keep from upsetting him, is cautious about what she says so he won’t get mad, etc.  A codependent boyfriend might keep his needs to himself. He doesn’t voice an opinion until he sees what his girlfriend believes, so he won’t come into conflict with her.

The basis of codependence is about having a dysfunctional relationship with my self.  Because I had a dysfunctional relationship internally with myself, I choose dysfunctional relationships externally. The impetus was to take care of others with all I had and to love them without boundaries so they would do the same in return to me.  It was crazy thinking to believe by saving someone I would get saved.  Such action is how a person trying save someone drowning ends up getting pulled under by the drowning person.

In reference to Mr. Peters train of thought “the problem is not the problem, the response is the problem” it is clear to see now my response to codependence was to follow without questioning the conditioning of childhood.  It never occurred to me a big part of the problem was me by choosing those who were not able to have a healthy relationship. Things began to improve when I became aware of my codependence which over time drastically altered my behavior and greatly improved my life.

Examples of “OLD Reactions”
Examples of “NEW Reactions”

Find needy people to take care of
Find healthy people good at self-care
Try to please others instead of myself
Try to please me first instead of others
Feel victimized by the “selfishness” of others
Don’t associate with “victim” players
Try to be all things to all people all the time
Realize I am just me & that is enough
Have difficulty saying “no”/setting boundaries
Set good boundaries and say “no”
Try to prove I am good enough to be loved
I’m good enough to be loved just as I am
Try to be perfect and expect others to be perfect
I am ‘perfectly imperfect’
Have self-blame and put myself down
Rarely put myself down & spot it when I do

My natural and previous reaction to codependence was a tangle of dysfunctional relationships that did not meet my needs.  Romantic relationships, family relationships, work relationships: all my relationships were affected.  But life is different now.  The old behavior is not gone completely.  Decades of habitual response is not eradicated by a few years of awareness.  Every day that I side step my codependent tendencies, the less volume the noise of codependence booms within my life.  I am HUGELY grateful for my improved perception and awareness that guide me to react to my problems in ways that ARE NOT the problem.

Most of the problems in life are because of two reasons:
we act without thinking
we keep on thinking without acting.
Anonymous

Uniquely Myself

/ James Browning / 4 Comments

A long-standing friend I communicate with on a semi-regular basis passes along little gems of wisdom.  Like me, she has known substantial life struggles and is a spiritual seeker trying to find her place in the universe.  For all the time we have known each other, searching for elusive happiness has been her pathway.  My prayer is she finds the peace that has long played ‘hide and go seek’ with her.  Last week she shared a parable about a pencil that touched me.

A pencil maker told a pencil five important lessons before packaging the pencil for sale.
* Everything you do will always leave a mark.
* You can always correct the mistakes you make.
* What is important is inside of you.
* In life, you will undergo painful sharpening’s which will only make you better.
* To be the best pencil, you must allow yourself to be held and guided by the Hand that holds you.

We all need to be constantly sharpened. This parable intends to encourage you to know you are a special person, with unique God-given talents and abilities.  Only you can fulfill the purpose which you were born to accomplish. Never allow yourself to get discouraged and think that your life is insignificant and cannot be changed and, like the pencil, always remember that the most important part of who you are is what’s inside of you.

Some days the subject matter I leave here daily comes quickly.  At times I have enough ideas stored up for days.  On other occasions I wake up with a general sense of gratitude, but lacking focus of thought to pick a single one to write about.  Checking my email this morning I read again the pencil parable from my friend.  And then it hit me what I am most grateful for this morning.  I am grateful for “ME”!

Having spent most of my days having difficulty accepting a compliment, it should be no surprise that I suffered (and still do to an extent) from low self esteem.  While intellectually I know such thinking is illogical and unhealthy, it continues even now, but thankfully to a lesser degree than ever before.

I fear my ego getting the best of me.  I don’t want to appear as full of myself or conceited.  Nor do I want the delusion of “I have arrived” for then I would cease to apply myself to growth with the dedication I have had.  Yet, I know I need to try; I need to try to see the good in me, the talent and ability I have and give credit to self for what has been accomplished.  As I finished that line my fingers froze on the keyboard.  I honestly don’t know what to say about myself.  So I will follow the track of the pencil in the parable to help me find a few qualities to write about.

Everything you do will always leave a mark.  My first reaction is to think of the negative ways I have marked others, but will resist that shackle.  Instead I will write about the people who have attended the 12 step chapter of Codependents Anonymous I helped get going here.  There is no doubt many have benefited by attending the group, including me.  My commitment to the group is a “mark” made which I am proud of.

You can always correct the mistakes you make.  This one is problematic for me as I don’t accept as true that mistakes can be “corrected”.  What I can do is recognize my errors and learn from them.  Amends can be made with people and in some instances peace can be attained.  Recognition of my wrongs done and willingness to try to make things right is life work that will continue as long as I beathe.

What is important is inside of you.  Once upon a time introspection would have been a daunting task because of the awful trepidation I harbored about looking inward.  It took emptying out the poison I fermented from the mistreatment in my childhood before I could begin to see inward.  Once the toxic waste was emptied there became open space within me.  Then slowly through months and years I learned to fill in those spaces with what makes for a good life and to practice a new way of being.

In life, you will undergo painful sharpenings which will only make you better.  Absolutely!  It has been what I did wrong and what was wrongly done to me, the pain I have encountered and the lessons learned that have “sharpened” me.  As a rock can be smoothed in a river by the friction of moving water, the friction of my life has smoothed me.  It has been an honest statement in recent years to say, “I like me now for the first time”.

To be the best pencil, you must allow yourself to be held and guided by the Hand that holds you.  There are few things that have been more difficult than finding acceptance of God/Higher Power/Universal Intelligence.  My unanswered prayers for abuse to stop as a child brought the belief there was nothing beyond me.  Moring into adulthood I came to be my own god with a simple certainty of “if it is to be, it is up to me”.

My recovery from depression and compulsion brought me around to a new view. There came a realization it was not just my work and those aiding my efforts causing my healing.  When opened to whatever it took to have a better life… something unexpected showed up to help.  I can’t identify it exactly and to even try would distance me from it. But with all my being, I know a Higher Power rides along with me for every step of my journey.

I am “perfectly imperfect”.  I am a unique creation of my Higher Power, the intelligence of the universe.  There never has been another exactly like me and there never will again be.  I am uniquely myself.  I am significant and I matter.  And with those few lines my gratitude swells within and brings moisture to my eyes.

Be what you are.  This is the first step toward becoming better than you are.  Julius Charles Hare

To Laugh Often and Much..

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

I found a used copy of the book pictured above a few weeks ago:  “Bedside Prayers, Prayers and Poems for When You Rise and Go to Sleep” collected by June Cotner.  It has found a convenient home on my night stand.  With decent regularity it finds its way into my hands just before lights out at night to put some meaningful thoughts to put into my head before sleep. 
 
“Bedside Prayers” has these words of description on its dust cover:  a marvelous collection of prayers, meditations, sentiments, and quiet celebrations.  Drawing from a rich spectrum of traditions and writers – from Rainer Maria Rilke to Robert Louis Stevenson, and from Buddha to contemporary writers with fresh insights… for spiritual seekers of any tradition… a charming companion that encourages us to recognize the divine gifts all around us each day.  I find something meaningful every time I pick the book up and read a random page.  
 
Among my favorites found in “Bedside Prayers” is thirteen lines by George Eliot that encourage me to be grateful for each day and to live with courage and intent to leave the world a little better than I find it.

May every soul that touches mine—
Be it the slightest contact—
Get from there some good;
Some little grace; one kindly thought;
One aspiration yet unfelt;
One bit of courage
For the darkening sky;
One gleam of faith
To brave the thickening ills of life;
One glimpse of brighter skies
Beyond the gathering mists—
To make this life worthwhile,
And heaven a surer heritage. 

In a poem written almost a hundred years ago Ranier Maria Rilke described the power of being in the moment long before it was a popular notion.  Being aware of one’s “aliveness” is the message he left to be printed in “Bedside Prayers”.

You see, I want a lot.
Maybe I want it all:
The darkness of each endless fall,
The shimmering light of each ascent.
So many are alive who don’t seem to care.
Casual, easy, they move in the world
As though untouched.
But you take pleasure in the faces
Of those who know they thirst.
You cherish those
Who grip you for survival.
You are not dead yet, it’s not too late
To open your depths by plunging into them
And drink in the life
That reveals itself quietly there.

First time through the following eight lines by Joseph Byron seemed to be only be a play on words.  Then as I read them a second and third time it became apparent that simply changing the order of words added great meaning. I get the most from Byron when I read his forty-five word poem slowly and savor each line before moving to the next.  

Feeling strong and strongly feeling.
Being glad and glad of being.
Care for need and needing caring.
Sharing self and selfless sharing.
Full of spirit spirit filling.
Will is warm and warmly willing.
Give joy enjoy the giving
Life is love and love is living. 

Those eight lines really touch me! 

There is nothing new or original in what I offer gratitude for today.  What is stated, I have written about before.  Here again is my thankfulness expressed for the work of others that touch my heart and spirit and make me think.  The canvas of an artist can have that effect on me and so can the notes of a musician.  A script well acted can move me deeply as can the words of a writer, but few things touch me as quickly or as profoundly as a well written poem.

Maybe I am old-fashioned. Maybe my soul has remnants within of the Victorian Era.  Or maybe I feel deeply which allows my sensitive self to receive in great dimension the feelings, thoughts and sentiments in poetry.  Whatever the reason may be, my gratitude is deep for the writers who put pieces of themself into measured word for me to discover, for my ability to feel what the poets left behind and for books like June Cotner’s “Bedside Prayers” that bring poetry into my life.

To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people
And the affection of children;
Earn the appreciation of honest critics
And endure the betrayal of false friends;
To appreciate beauty,
To find the best in others;
To leave the world a bit better,
Whether by a healthy child,
A garden patch,
Or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier
Because you have lived.
This is to have succeeded.
This old favorite by Ralph Waldo Emerson is included in “Bedside Prayers”

I am Nobody but Myself

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

I am all the ages I’ve ever been.
Anne Lamott

I love that quote!  It is insightful and true.

I am still the little 3 1/2 year-old boy who sneaked his father’s pocket knife and when no one was looking busied himself poking holes in the bottom of a metal Band-Aid can, at least until I jammed the whole blade deep into the side of my left hand I was holding the box with.  The moment I saw the blood is my first real memory of knowing fear.  I remember vividly being scared and then seeing how afraid my twenty-two year old mother was when she couldn’t get the bleeding stopped.  Wrapping my hand that wept blood with each of my heartbeats in a towel she took me to her mother’s house about a quarter of a mile away.  How we got there I have no memory of.

My grandmother was the daughter of a man known in his time as an “herb doctor”.  Country folk depended on such healers for every day medical needs as the closest doctor was ten to twenty miles away.  She knew from watching her father that turpentine and sugar would stop bleeding.  Generous amounts of both were poured on my hand, held in place by a towel and the bleeding did slowly stop.  Except it burned like hell, that’s all I have clear memory of.  I do know my hand healed and when making a face with the side of my hand using my thumb as the bottom of a mouth, one eye is already there; a scar from that old wound.

Still today I am the little boy who entered first grade when I was two months past my 6th birthday.  In the rural south there was no kindergarten except a private one in town the “rich kids” got to go to.  I was not one of those.  Being dropped into the first year of school with basically no preparation it remains abundantly clear today howfearful I was initially.  The whole place intimidated me and I struggled at first.  Gradually being sad and wanting to go home went away.  I caught up, was able to keep up and in time grew to love school.

The seven-year old boy in his second year in grade school is still within me.  I had Mrs. Betty Levie as my teacher.  She was young and liked us kids.  We liked her.  Years later she would be my science teacher in junior high and encouraged me to enter projects into several science fairs.  She even drove me to a regional fair forty miles away that my family had no interest in getting me to.  Without Mrs. Levie’s help I would never have won the regional junior high first place trophy for Zoology when I was thirteen.

A boy of ten’s memory is alive and recalls sitting at the kitchen table with his mother and brother eating dinner when she made her big announcement.  She was going to marry the guy she had been seeing which my brother and I did not like at all.  My mind screamed “don’t do it”, but the words were never spoken aloud.  I knew it would do no good to open my mouth.  Within two years this man we were made to call “dad” showed himself to be mentally twisted and down right evil.  Even if it would have done no good, I wish I had spoken up when my mother asked how we felt about her marrying the turkey!

I am still the young man who moved to Colorado at eighteen who struggled to make ends meet.  Having my car repossessed was an embarrassment I can still feel today.  I stuck it out in Colorado Springs and in time was able to support myself working a full-time and two part-time jobs.  While other young twenty-something’s were partying and having a good time, I was working three jobs.  I don’t regret it though.  That determination I managed to muster served me well then and what I learned from the experience has been a good reference point ever since.

The young man of twenty-three who took a bride of twenty-two is still within. We were both just “kids”.  Outwardly so sure of where I was going while internally scared with no idea what the future held, my young wife was the stability I needed to begin to make some sense of life.  Ultimately the marriage ended up being a mess, but it lasted for two decades, produced a son I love dearly and contained my first lessons of what love was.

And so on… I am the same person I was at 30 when my son arrived, at 40 when my first marriage stated to fall apart and at 50 when I was fired from a job of eighteen years.  All the ages I have been created a life cut into facets like a diamond that sparkles in the light when looked at it from an appreciating angle.  Some detail has faded into the background, but key events and periods that shaped me are vividly within. During the near fifty-eight and a half years I have been blessed with so far, I am thankful to have the ability to remember so much. Gratitude runs deep for it all; the joy, the pain, the happiness, the heartache and the love that shaped and guided me to be the man I am today.

All my life I had been looking for something, and everywhere I turned someone tried to tell me what it was.  I accepted their answers too, though they were often in contradiction and even self-contradictory.  I was naïve.  I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which I, and only I, could answer.  It took me a long time and much painful boomeranging of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with:  that I am nobody but myself.  Ralph Ellison