Warning: Don't waste your time reading this if you aren't addicted to something!

We all understand addictions like alcoholism, drugs, sex, gambling, food - too much too little. Those are the ones that are shameful and hit the head lines and we all sit back with our noses in the air and our lips curled up under out nose. Those are the addictions that make us sit back and think, thank goodness I am not like that! Well I have some sad news, those are the ones that people go to rehab for but there are so many other addictions that we receive PRAISE for. Adrenaline junkies who get a high on speed, racing cars, jumping off mountains, running distances that animals don't, making so much money that in 10 life times both they and their children couldn't spend it. Plastic surgery that makes people look so plastic that even Barbie would suffer with jealousy and depression and more than likely ask her manufacturers to add some more botox.
Surgery that tells the world, this is not really me.

I could go on and on. But CD is to me even worse, it is so subtle, manipulative and under heavy disguise of being, the kindest sweetest, most gently, spiritual, caring, generous - do you want anymore superlatives? Trust me, it has more to do with PLEASE JUST LOVE ME. That is not to say that these people aren't nice kind caring people, they are, but they just don't believe it themselves.
But this sick disease is as harmful to those who suffer with it, as it is to those who are in relationship with someone who is CD. You see these people, myself included ARE CONTROLLING. They will do anything, to be accepted and avoid being rejected. They want everyone else to be as kind and caring as they are. But what they struggle to deal with is that other people have their own lives, make their own choices, right or wrong, and they have the freedom to live with those choices.

Some amazing books are written by people that have had such huge problems that if they were our family members or friends we would more than likely have disowned them years ago. But they are people who speak from experience, they know what it is like to fail, to be destitute and on the verge of suicide. But some of these people are able to express themselves and are willing to put themselves out there, and tell me and you how rotten their lives had become, so that perhaps we can learn from them and find happier healthier ways of living in this beautiful world.

The churches are full of addicts, divorcee's, prostitutes, drug lords, murderers. liars and thieves and people that Jesus died for. Surely that is why He came and did die for us? There are Prophets and teachers of all religions all teaching us their wisdom for a more PEACEFUL existence. Yet there are still people who don't get it. Those are the people we don't give up on, they are the ones we pray for.

Is someone going to hurt you in your life? That is a given. Will you hurt people  - absolutely. I read something last night that was expressed so well. I am reading the book Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts. As you know my mother was born in India, so I am fascinated to know more. But the writer was sharing an experience that made him feel ashamed that he 'did not do something to stop it'. He asks a question 'how hard does a man's heart have to become to ignore the pain of others?' and then he says (I can't find it now, or I would quote him) but he says, sometimes we want to do the right thing, for the right reasons but to do so would get the wrong result, and so we walk away. Is that having a hardened heart, perhaps the victims would say yes but perhaps ultimately not.

With all addicts, the friends and families will have to struggle at some point with this very dilemma. How much does one have to do? So much and NO MORE. For those who have healthy boundaries they will say enough, far sooner than those who don't. Does that mean that those who say NO have hearts of stone, perhaps some of them yes, but most of them no. But we get sucked in by Compassion, Sympathy, or our own feelings of needing that other person. Maybe we need them financially, or we need them because they provide a roof over our heads, or they are our children and we need them because we love them and want them to love us back.

What ever the reason, we are not God and there comes a time when if we do not step back we do not allow that person to find their own strength in God. Yes some people will die.