CoDA Weekly Reading 10/10/17

 
From: "CoDA Weekly Reading" <co-nnectionreadings@codependents.org>
Date: October 10th 2017

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Love is knowing when to walk away.
 

Love is finally understanding

that love isn’t putting someone in a box.

 

It’s choosing the ache of silence

over the regret of putting my own foot in my mouth.

 

It’s the nights I stay up making lists of pros and cons

To try decide

If it’s worth this risk for a simple, “Hey.”

It’s the relief I feel in the morning that I did NOT do that.

 

You see, love isn’t in the ache of wondering

But In the choice of not choosing impulse.

 

It’s in the patience for forgiveness—

That may never come.

 

It’s the knowledge that

when I repeatedly harm someone I love

The best way to fix it is to leave it alone.

It’s knowing that I can no longer justify reasons

That it’s okay for me to transmit my trauma

That love isn’t a return to the womb but instead

learning how to hold myself strong so that you can be you.

 

Love is recovery.

And recovery is knowing the difference between

breathing onto a fire to give it life

And dousing the whole bedroom with gasoline.

 

Love is remembering

that love isn’t the number of times you made me cry

But instead the number of times you held up a mirror

So that when I went looking for you, I was really getting to know myself better.

 

Love isn’t trying to get you back

but instead

it’s allowing myself to fall apart

So what is ready to die can fall away.

 

Love is bowing down to what I don’t understand.

It’s knowing that being powerless does not mean weak

And Controlling does not make me safe.

It’s being humble to all the ways in which I can’t see.

Love is stopping the impulse to go back and fix it.

Love is letting you be.

Love is being humble enough to ask

for something larger than me

To show me a map

so that I can find my way out.

So that I can stop blaming

And start changing.

 

Love is finally accepting

The things I can’t change.

Love is finally accepting

That I don’t know how to love you.

 

Love is knowing when to walk away.

 

- Madison 9/12/2017

 

 

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