Please read Part 1 , Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 for context. Thank you.
With my awareness I began to realize what I was doing to myself. Through my recovery process I began to realize that I was not responisble for matters that were out of my control. I began to realize that I needed to change the patterns in my behavior that reinforced and kept me stuck in a cycle of shame and a fear of abandonment.
Through my recovery process, I began to understand how my drive to people please and approval seek distorted my perceptions and kept me bewildered. I began to realize that my drive to people please and approval seek — in application — undermined all my relationships and kept me guessing at what was normal.
With my awareness, I began to realize that none of my relationships were functional — but rather dysfunctional. In the process, I began to realize that I could no longer “fix” the people in my world to “make” them “OK” with me, so that we could be “OK” before I could be “OK” with me — to be in a relationship” with “them” — individuals or groups.
I began to realize that my good had to be good enough — for me — and that I had to be “OK” with me. I had to be “OK” with me, regardless of whether anyone else was “OK” with me.
With my awareness, I began to realize that I was created to be a separate and autonomous individual — not to be an extension of another individual or group of people. I discovered that my drive to be “at peace at any cost” to avoid the cycle of shame and a fear of abandonment eroded my ability and capacity to be authentic and to trust.
Please read Part 3 for context. Thank you.
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