Codependency steals the ability to be an adult. To make adult decisions. To be free to exercise free will. Which leads to a lack of trust, because others hurt us if they are in control of us. And they are only in control of us because we let them. Making the choice to NOT be codependent, then, is the first choice we must make as an adult, so that we may become free, so that we may then trust ourselves and can trust others because they no longer have control over us.

Unless someone is holding a gun to our head, they don’t have control over us. We just think they do. We feel that they do, so they do. And it’s too hard, too scary, too painful to make the decision to not allow it anymore, to take the steps, say what has to be said, put up boundaries, because someone might get angry at us or feel differently than we do, or try to fight what we decide, so we just continue to be controlled, then we feel like a victim, like we have no choices because someone took them away from us.

God gave us free will. No one has the right to take away what God has given us. No. One. But they don’t really take it away from us. They ask for control with their behavior and because we don’t know how to stand up to it, we hand it over. Willingly. When we finally choose to grow up, to stop being the child in every relationship we have, to make our own decisions, to exercise the free will He gave us, we start to have trust again. We can trust ourselves to take care of us, so then we are able to trust others because we know that if someone treats us badly, or feels differently than we do about something, or gets angry, it’s okay. It’s their issue, not ours. It’s their responsibility to deal with and work through their feelings not ours.

When we learn we can be adults and say no, then a miraculous thing happens. People fight us, but when they see we’re now an adult, that it won’t change, they either begin to deal with us as equals, or they move on to the next person who will hand over control to them. When we learn how to say no, we can begin to choose to say yes, to love, to sacrifice, to submission, to serve, to accept others as they are, to cherish others, to take care of them, to do, say, be… anything we want.

This is how we become more Christlike. We grow up. And we choose.