#interdependent

[the-ephemeral-ethereal]

Everything is related and interdependent.

from The Three Pillars of Zen by Philip Kapleau

[craigtowens]

Codependent?

Modern psychologists have coined the term codependent to mean someone who allows their life to be controlled by another person, much like the moon controls the tides on the earth’s oceans. Almost always this relationship ends up being a lose-lose relationship: both the person being controlled and the person doing the controlling are headed the wrong way.

Codependent is not a biblical term.

But there is a concept in Scripture that is the anti-codependent. I would call it interdependent. Here’s a few verses to back it up…

Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. Share each other’s burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:1-2)

Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses. (Proverbs 27:6)

It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that’s how freedom grows. (Galatians 5:13)

God has given each of you a gift from His great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another. (1 Peter 4:10)

This isn’t excusing bad behavior, or winking at poor choices, or rescuing someone from the consequences of sin. Excusing, winking, and rescuing are symptoms of codependency.

Interdependency is saying, “I need you to be stronger—to be healthy—because I may need to lean on you someday.”

Christians try to get stronger and develop their own spiritual gifts so that they can help a friend-in-need get stronger and develop his/her spiritual gifts.

The Body of Christ needs you to be interdependent, which completely trumps codependent.

[dk-thrive]

Everyone is interdependent. Everyone is vulnerable. Everyone is penetrable.

Everyone is interdependent. Everyone is vulnerable. Everyone is penetrable, and everyone is penetrated incessantly by the vibrations of sound traveling into the inner ear, by the light shining in our eyes and on the surface of our bodies, by the air we must never stop breathing, by the food and water we take in, by the contacts that generate sensations that run from the surface of our skin to our brains, by the pheromones and bacteria we transmit imperceptibly to each other by air and contact, by the smells that are tiny particles we have inhaled, by the myriad species of beneficial bacteria in our gut and elsewhere that constitute so vast a portion of a human body that self is something of a misnomer or at least a crowd and maybe a party. If you were truly impenetrable you’d be dead in minutes, and there was a kind of deadening inertness that was part of the equation of imagining you could be so.

— Rebecca Solnit, Recollections of My Nonexistence: A Memoir (Viking, March 10, 2020) 

[thechaosmage]

[theemotionmachine]

Reality is where the physical world and mental world collide.

Steven Handel, The Emotion Machine

[ekeneriksson]

Jesper

[robertogreco]

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.”

John Muir (I like to pair this quote with one from Ta-Nehisi Coates.)

[venomous-elegance-2]

"These people who take these valiant actions to help the Earth, they call to me at the center of my soul. They are the cutting edge of human evolution. They have broken free from being captives of the hyper-individualism of our culture. They are no longer held captive by their lonely ego winning out over other people. They are no longer held captive by a shrunken ego.

And to me, there is nothing more beautiful. I see beauty in them. Such great moral beauty. They are aflame with meaning. They are like beacons. They are saying, "Don't let it get the best of you. This is just hardware! This is just cement and steel! Don't let this cow you. See, watch! I'm not afraid. I'm going to do it. I'm going to lock myself down…. But see! See how it is to be free!"

That's what I hear them saying to the psyche. I think there is nothing more beautiful. They are showing us what we can be. That we can spring free, and walk out of the prison cell of the separate ego and find our true nature in our inter-woven-ness in the web of life."

-Joanna macy