Whenever we become overly dependent upon anything, be it money, status, a stimulant, another person, etc, with the thought that we need this thing to be okay or happy, we surrender our power to it. We voluntarily give-up and give-away our innate power.
Overtime, we may start believing we can't live without this particular vice. We must have it to feel whole, comfortable, safe, alive or as confirmation that we are valuable. This can lead to obsession, competition, jealousy, deception, co-dependency, domination, even violence and a whole heck-of-a-lot of suffering.
What happened that made us stop believing that who we are is enough? What is it that makes us reach outside ourselves to feel better?
Our pain.
We will do our very best to avoid it at all costs, for surrounding this inner pain is a tremendous amount of fear. So we shove it down, numb it and reach for things outside ourselves that will help us evade it. We may even tell ourselves we are victims and blame others for our circumstances, all in an effort to shirk the responsibility of dealing with it. Some of us pretend we're okay, putting on a happy face so others won't discover we're hurting. Maybe like children that believe if they shut their eyes the scary monster will disappear, we believe if we shut off our feelings, the pain will go away. Perhaps we were taught that showing our feelings is inappropriate or a sign of weakness, so we've become award winning performers.
It may help to know that ALL of us have insecurities and the depth of these insecurities is directly proportional to our pain. In order to stand fully in our individual power again, we must find the courage to go within and face that fear and feel the pain we've buried. Once we allow ourselves to fully feel and express it, it dissolves. We do this by opening up and letting the uncomfortable feelings move through us and out. By feeling what we feel, when we feel it, we reclaim the power we previously gave away and reaching for things to feel better will no longer be of interest. Because if truth be told, it's never been about feeling better, it's about getting better at feeling. Facing old wounds and taking back our power fortifies us, which naturally makes us better equipped to deal with whatever life throws in our path down the road.