Dependency – Pathway to Joy and Healing

Letting Go of Codependency

Article by Brooke Chang, Pathway to Joy and Healing

Leaving my Reiki practice was one of the more difficult decisions I’ve had to make, as I recently decided to retire from my practice. This decision came particularly difficult because I truly love and care about my clients. When I realized that my relationship with them had been based on codependency on my part and dependency on many of their parts, I felt that leaving my Reiki practice was the best solution in order to take ownership of this problem.

On a cool January day, I walked with some reservation and anxiety to my Reiki studio located in an older mall with a fountain in its center. As I entered the mall, the smell of disinfectant was strong, and the air was cool since the landlord never turned on the heat. I took the elevator to the second floor where I entered a shared suite and reception lounge. The couch and chairs in the reception lounge were modern with a tree of life sculpture hanging on the wall.

As I unlocked the door to my Reiki studio, the smell of a lavender candle lingered in the air which was used for a client from the previous day. In the Reiki studio, two original abstract landscape paintings by my husband hung on the wall along with my Reiki Therapy certificates. Several Himalayan salt lamps and wicker style furnishings were positioned around the small room. Muted light shone through the frosted windows and door. I felt calmer and less anxious as I prepared to tell my first client that we must conclude our time together and about my retirement from Reiki practice.

When my first client arrived, I greeted her cheerfully in the reception lounge and asked her how she was doing as we walked together to my Reiki studio. I took a deep breath and shared the difficult news about the codependency and dependency relationship that I have with my clients and our need to conclude our sessions due to my retirement. To my surprise, she seemed okay with our concluding. She asked a few questions about my retirement and wished me well. With each client thereafter, we had this discussion where I expressed what I needed to address with each of them.

Codependency defined by Merriam-Webster is a psychological condition or a relationship in which a person manifesting low self-esteem and a strong desire for approval has an unhealthy attachment to another person. It places the needs of that person before his or her own. In codependency, a person tries to satisfy the needs of another who may have an addictive or emotionally unstable personality.

My codependency began in my childhood with parents who had addictive and emotionally unstable personalities. I learned to be their emotional care taker, and that setting boundaries was unsafe. My family dynamics were full of abuse, violence, and violation of personal boundaries, as my refusal to comply resulted in more emotional and physical abuse. After I complied with their demands, I suppressed the subsequent rage, anger, sadness, and fear that I felt.

My failure to be able to set healthy personal boundaries plagued me for most of my adult life. I suffered from guilt, obligation, and over-responsibility. My conditioned behaviors continued as I simply gave into others’ demands and gave up my own health, safety, time and resources. This continued into my Reiki Therapy practice.

The dynamic of Reiki Therapy lends itself readily to a codependent practitioner and dependent client relationship. The client has a passive role in their healing as they lie on a Reiki table while the practitioner performs the energy work. The client participates little in this energy healing. The practitioner becomes the caretaker while the client becomes the dependent to this practitioner and her energy work. This dynamic also occurred with my Reiki practitioner, when I received Reiki Therapy earlier on my healing journey.

I further became aware of the lessons that my clients were teaching me. I learned that I can’t save everyone and only they can save themselves. I am only a guide to support their healing journey. I also recognized that I must, as the practitioner, take responsibility to change any unhealthy dynamics with them. I referred many clients to psychotherapy to help them become more independent in their own healing, and to begin to reduce their sessions with me in order to conclude our work together.

Shortly after these conversations with my clients, I experienced a massive energetic heart release. It felt like strong tremors emanating from my heart chakra while I slept; this experience felt like it lasted for hours although I believe it only occurred for several minutes. I had experienced this type of energetic release before after major shifts within my emotional landscape. I also felt a tremendous relief come over me and overall wellbeing. Sadness, loss, and even anger and resentment also came over me, as I re-experienced what I must have suppressed as a child.

The letting go of this codependency is essential for my emotional growth. Each time I let go, I begin to grow, change, and ultimately, heal the trauma that has been stored within my energy field for most of my life. Each growth and change I experience culminates in my spiritual transformation to become the person I am intended to be. Peace and love, Brooke (Copyright 2023 Brooke Chang with all rights reserved. May be reblogged in its entirety with credit to this author, but may not be copied or excerpted.)

Twin Flame Traps

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As you ascend with your Twin Flames, there are some warnings I wanted to provide to those also in Twin Flame relationships. There are many pitfalls and traps involved in this relationship just as any other, but the intensity of Twin Flame relationships can result in obsessive and co-dependent behaviors.

Because Twin Flames are friendship and passion on fire, we are essentially playing with fire. Because we are so in tuned with our twin as we enjoy the same things, have similar professions, have similar missions, have similar hobbies, and have the same belief systems, we are completely in sync with our twins, and have great passion through tantra together, it is not unusual to fall into these traps and pitfalls.

The energy between Twin Flames feel so comfortable and comforting, you want to spend every hour together doing absolutely everything together because we are the same. The passion is through the roof with endless hours of tantric sexual connection. All this good vibes can easily result in obsessing about our twin every minute of every day when we have jobs to fulfill and other life obligations.

The co-dependency occurs when we are so connected energetically, emotionally, and spiritually with our twin that we lose where they end and where we begin in this relationship. We must be conscious and aware that we are still separate people with our own identity. Recently, I sat down with my Twin Flame to discuss these issues concerning me.

As Twin Flames, we communicate through unconditional love and compassion about these important issues. If we are to ascend with our twin, we must work together to resolve these issues that are even more pronounced due to the Twin Flame fire that fuel this intensity to a degree I have never experienced before with another. May you find your path back on track with your Twin Flame. (Copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved)

Fear of Loss

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I believe everyone has fears of loss and abandonment, and that is one of my emotional issues. My mother left me when I was one years old, and my father never met me until I was eight. During my formative years (1-6 years old), I experienced abandonment. After my mother and father left Taiwan for the U.S., I was left with my maternal grandparents, and when they left for the U.S., I remained with my paternal grandparents until I was eight years old. This left deep scars within me.

During my past life recollections, I remember my mother died when I was a young native American boy in another lifetime. Yet in another lifetime, I recall my father abandoning my mother, sister, and me as I watched him drive away in his truck from our family farm. These traumas involving abandonment remain with my soul to the present day.

I recently entered into a romantic relationship, I believe, finally with my twin flame/soul. These old memories and emotional wounds still haunt me. As I proceed with my love, I fear him leaving me or loving another. These fears still plaque me in my heart as I earlier attracted many other men who did leave me and love another. This time, I realize that I must live beyond my ego filled with fear and doubt.

I currently use Observing Ego Practice to cope with these fears, but something is different this time. As he has been away in China this last week, I am beginning to feel a shift within me. I am missing him less and less each day as the week progresses, and I know you will think, this is terrible. Quite the contrary, in my aloneness, I prove to myself that I am never alone and that I can be independent and care for myself. I am freeing myself of co-dependency or attachment.

It is through unconditional love that I am with this man, and not because I depend on him for my existence. When I am alone now, I know that my life can continue with or without him, and that all will be okay. We can’t control when others will leave us, love another, or die, but I know I will be fine even if that comes to fruition. Even if my twin abandons me, I know my soul will still move forward as I am never truly alone. (Copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved).

Relearning Love

During this phase of my spiritual journey, I am relearning love. In my family of origin, I associated love with abuse, violence, narcissism, and fear. The lessons I learned in the past five years taught me that love does not involve yearning, clinging, cravings, insecurity, possession, or jealousy. I have come to realize that I have never truly loved anyone and have never truly been loved by anyone.

I am relearning how to love now in my life. As I have recently learned how to love myself, I am learning how to love others unconditionally. Love is behavior we learn through our family of origin. As an adult now, I am having to relearn how to love others and myself.

Love, particular romantic love, feels very different for me than from my past. I realize now that love is peaceful and safe. It is not only the intensity of sexual attraction which I believe is temporary. Love feels very different for me now, because the yearning, craving, insecurity, and fear no longer exist in my relationships. Even my friendships, feel different than in my past because they involve mutual respect of our needs and boundaries.

As I progressed in my spiritual journey, I am relearning and experiencing my world completely differently. Sometimes, it feels like I am living another life as someone else. As I experienced my world now, my higher self is telling me that this is real love and that my life has changed forever. ( copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with all rights reserved.)

Family Karma

This weekend, I spent time with my favorite cousin. She is a schizophrenic who has recovered amazingly well and is living a full and productive life. Our time together was learning about each other, since we have not spent much time together since childhood.

This was an important weekend together since it gave us the opportunity to set healthy boundaries now that we are both recovered from our illnesses. As we began our weekend, we reverted to our childhood behaviors that was very dysfunctional and unhealthy.

We share similar family dynamics, since we grew up together. Our family shared incest, narcissism, violence, mental illness, and abuse. I believe this is our family Karma. As the weekend progressed, we acknowledge many of these dysfunctions within our family.

On the last evening of our visit, I raised awareness of how we were behaving and acting toward each other. I addressed that we were reverting back to our old and dysfunctional behaviors. My cousin was able to recognize the same, and agreed that we needed to change our dynamics together.

I felt very encouraged that we are moving forward together, although none of the other members of our family has done so. She has been my only ally in my emotional recovery work and spiritual growth. I feel so blessed that I have another family member who is attempting to change her life for the better, and spiritually progress for her soul life. (Copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with all rights reserved.)

Creating Our Illusions

Through addiction, we create an illusion for our lives. Some are addicted to people called codependency, some to places called destination addiction, some to substances such as drugs or alcohol, and some to activities such as work, gambling or gaming.

Addiction is a form of self medication or negative coping skill we developed to deal with our trauma or loss. It is a way of escaping or suppressing the negative emotions that exist within us. We even find others or are attracted to others with the same addiction to validate our illusions.

I had destination addiction for a long time. The big difference in my life now is I no longer wish I am somewhere else to be happy. Every day, I recalled an exotic location to dream about my happiness there. These day dreams would be a romantizied memory of my past. This is called destination addiction, and truly is only an escape from my unhappy life.

I am learning to find happiness within myself wherever I am. True happiness does not exist in another place, even a beautiful place. True happiness is in the current moment in your present life. May you find happiness where you are! (Copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with all rights reserved.)

Building Trust

As many of my readers know about my history, my father was a philanderer who lied to my family to hide his philandering. As an adult, I became attracted to philanderers and liars. My resulting adult life was filled with angst of distrusting men and suspicious of their intentions and actions. In the recent past, a man I dated brought many of these fears to the surface. While dating me, he was involved with countless other women and passed a deadly sexually transmitted disease to me and other women. This relationship really shook me and caused me to shy away from sex all together.

On this phase of my journey, I am attempting to overcome my distrust of men. First, I am aware of my feelings of distrust caused by my past experiences. In my current relationship, I am dealing with these waves of fear of being hurt and lied to again in my life. As these waves come over me, I allow them to release without reacting to them. I realize that all men have women friends as long we have a solid relationship, those other women do not bother me.

With philandering men, I notice that their attention and time are frequently redirected to the interest of other women at the expense of passing up time with me. As I am an intuit, I know when someone is lying to me, or attempting to deceive me. I frequently have confronted them to their dismay.

Every man deserves a chance. However, once they stray then I move on as I believe I deserve so much better. I don’t need leftovers as there are many fish in the sea. If we don’t demand better treatment, then we will never receive better treatment. This is what I have learned the hard way. (Copyright 2017 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved)

Love: Living Beyond Dependency

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The truth is that most of our relationships are dependencies. Love is unconditional while dependency requires the condition that we are with the other person or that we serve certain conditions in each other’s lives. Dependency is a form of addiction. All my relationships until recently have been dependencies, either serving as a victim or an enabler.

As I move forward on my spiritual journey, I have very honest conversations with myself about who I still have dependency relationships in my current life. These are the signs I have come to realize that strongly indicate dependency relationships:

If either person fears doing or saying things as the other will become upset or angry.
If either person become upset or angry when they can’t control outcomes.
If either person is not happy for the other when one is successful and moving forward in their life.
If either person will not allow relationships with third-parties without jealousy, drama, or arguments.
If either person feel that their happiness is dependent on the other in this relationship, and can’t live without the other.
If either person needs to seek love outside of themselves.
If either person is waiting to be saved (victim), or is a care giver (enabler).
If either person blames the other for how they feel or their failures.

If these signs exhibit in your relationships, you have dependency relationships with others. Before I began my spiritual journey five years ago, I exhibited all these signs in all my relationships, and I was a difficult person to be with. I loathed myself, had little self esteem, and gave from a place of lack. When I raised my consciousness about who I was, it was difficult to see this darkness about myself.

I began to change my life for the better, once I was able to see the truth about myself. I began to learn self acceptance, self love, independence, self sufficiency, and ridding the negative patterns in my life one of which is leaving dependency relationships behind. Even if these relationships are virtual like on social media, I can still feel their anger and rage through their words and energy.

With each day, I leave more and more dependency relationships behind as I prefer being alone to dependency relationships in my life now. Sometimes, it takes great determination to leave these people, things, and situations that no longer serve our highest potential. (Copyright 2016 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved)

Healing the Trifecta

There are three other members of my immediate family, including my parents and my younger brother. Because of the abuse and dysfunctions within my family, which I believe is our family karma, I needed to overcome the abuse and dysfunctions of my family, including the roles I played with each member of my family.

About five years ago, I encountered a Kundalini active man who represented my father. He sexually assaulted me, gave me a sexually transmitted disease, and emotionally manipulated me for my money, although I was not the only woman in this situation. When I met him, I knew he represented my father, and I think he knew it too as I told him frequently.

Because I wanted to be near him, I applied for a job at the college where he works. When I arrived at this college, I worked for a supervisor who is very mentally ill, irrational, and emotionally unstable. When I began working for her, I realized that she represented my mother.

During these five years, I worked to overcome my fears of these two individuals as I was terrified, sad, and felt powerless around them. I learned to stand up for myself, learned that I am worthy and deserve good things, and stopped giving my power to them. Almost two years ago, I walked away from this man in March 2015, and during this same month, my supervisor was fired from her job although she was given the opportunity to retire.

Strangely, in March 2015, I hired a new staff member for my office who represents my brother. He is a codepedent who also suffered childhood abuse in his life, and we share a similar relationship like the one I have with my brother. During these nearly two years, I trained him for the job in my office. However, I also knew that as long as I was his supervisor, he would continue to stay as a codependent. My leaving this college will empower him to become independent.

Recently, I accepted another university job in California, and will be leaving my current college. I realized that I needed to leave this college, because my job is done here as I have overcome my role with my father, mother, and brother. My family lives in California, and I am finally ready to be with them as I already have practiced how to be with them.

I have gained self esteem, learned self love, and now am able to stand up for myself without needing their approval or acceptance of me. It is through these difficult interactions and healing my emotional wounds that will allow me to finally be with my family without becoming a victim again. Since I am different, my relationships with my family will be different too. (Copyright 2016 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved)

Breaking the Bonds of Codependency

This weekend is a great exercise in letting go, and breaking free from codependency. Codependency is the oppositve of love as it is our need to fill the void by another because we cannot love ourselves. Do not confused codependency with love. If you have not learned to love yourself first, your relationships are codependencies.

Two friends this week tried to pursuade me to stay in small rural conservative community where I currently live, and college where I work. I have always lived in large cities with very diverse progressive communities, and I will be moving next to such a place.

After explaining for hours my reasons for leaving and my need to move forward on my spiritual journey, I finaly told these people that I am sorry, but where my spiritual journey takes me is where my journey takes me. Regrettably, they cannot come on my journey as they must travel on their own path.

I realize that when I have been working feverishly nearly everyday on my emotional healing and spiritual work, they have stayed in the same emotional place as when I first met them four years ago. During these four years, they have become codependents while I have been striving to detached and become independent.

Breaking the patterns of codependency is very difficult as I have been a codependent in all my relationships for most of my life. For the first time, I am flying solo and finally feel free from the bondage of codependency.

Many do not understand why I need to break these patterns, because they still practice these negative patterns. They are confused as to why these patterns must change in order to have a healthier, happier, and more peaceful life. It is something they cannot fully understand, but must be experienced.

On some level, we all want the healthier, happier, and more peaceful life, but most are unwilling to give up the old patterns of negative behaviors. These patterns are difficult to break as many are unaware that they are practicing these negative patterns.

In the past, I tried to help others see this negative pattern, but now I do not try as they become extremely defensive and even combative. If a friend asks my opinion, I will share my thoughts, but each person must be ready to hear and face their own darkness on their own time and terms. (Copyright 2016 Awakening Journey with All Rights Reserved)