The whole topic of codependency revolves around deficit.

And not only a deficit of love, but also a deficit of identity.

What happens to a codependent personality?

To put it as a metaphor:

you arrive at a new house, and apart from cold bare walls there is nothing there.

No furniture, no fridge, no microwave.

Nowhere to sleep, nowhere to put food, and if you want to eat, nowhere to heat it up.

And it turns out that wherever you look nothing is set up: it is cold and lonely.

And most importantly, you have no money (no resources) to furnish it.

But then you meet a person whose behaviour says:

I have everything: a sofa, a fridge, a microwave, money — and on top of that I am warm.

And is this Eureka? Is this the «rescue»?! Does everything look wonderful?

But the situation is that he knows exactly where the bed should stand, where the microwave and the fridge belong.

If you offer your own vision, this wonderful person starts to take offence or get angry.

And at your most frightening moments, to remind you that without him you are nobody, and that, after all, «I set this whole place up».

As if to say: now live by my rules.

And you have no rules of your own — there is an empty niche there.

And empty niches, as we know, are easily filled.

So it turns out that «who am I?» remains unknown, while who I must seem to be for others is known precisely.

To seem is to play the role that is expected of me.

Because that is how they want to see me.

I am ready to settle the question of love at the expense of myself (of my personality), because in essence there is no personality there.

There is emptiness and the unknown there.

There is pain and fear there.

It is anxious and bewildering there.

And most importantly: there is a clear way of interacting — I am told, and I do.

There is no need to enter that dark area of yourself, to face the pain and the fear.

After all, there is always someone who will «deliver» whatever is missing.

To be is to know yourself, your emotions and feelings, to understand your boundaries, to know your convictions: where I can yield and where I never will.

To feel supported by your inner «I», by your own resources.

Not to wait for outside judgement and approval, knowing that your inner compass is not failing you now.

And the greatest tragedy of codependency is that one so longs for another person’s love,

but one can only love the person who is there, not the role that person plays.

And for that you need to finish the renovation of your inner house, so that it becomes a safe support and a fortress.

Author: Oleksii Khodovskyi