What would Jesus do? Codependency and Self-Care

by Don Smith

I have a dear friend who has been quite helpful to me in my recovery journey.
Every time I go off to do some teaching he will call me before I leave, and
ask, "So what are you going to teach about?" When I told him before this trip
that I was going to teach about self-care, he laughed and said, "You know the
old saying ‘You teach what you most need to learn.'"

Learning to do appropriate self-care has been a large part of my own journey
in recovery. He was right. This topic has been a difficult one for me
personally. Learning to do appropriate self-care has been a large part of my own
journey in recovery. I have come to believe that self-care is an absolutely
essential part of the recovery process. And yet we hear often in Christian
circles
that self-care is bad. Some Christians think of it as a kind of selfishness.
Others think it is sinful. So I think it's important to look at what the Bible
says about self-care.

The Bible and Self-Care

Some people are surprised that the Bible talks about self-care at all. It may
be difficult for us to see if we have been taught that self-care is selfish
and bad. But it is there.

Let's start by looking at Phillipians 2:4: "Each of you should look not only
to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." Notice that this
text assumes that you are going to look out for your own interests. And
knowing that is true, the text emphasizes that we should also be careful to
attend
to the needs of others. The text assumes that both are important. My interests
are important; other people's interests are important. The text does not say,
"Stop looking to your own interests, and pay attention only to the needs of
others." It acknowledges that we will look to our own interests, and it
encourages us to also look to the interests of others.

Another interesting text, which I often use when talking about boundaries, is
Galatians 6:2–5:

Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of
Christ. If anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives
himself.
Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself,
without comparing himself to somebody else, for each one should carry his own
load.

When I was a young and very codependent Christian all I could hear in this
text was, You should take care of other people. It felt like I should carry
everyone else's burdens and my own burdens as well. Sometimes that didn't seem
fair. Shouldn't there be someone to carry my burdens? Couldn't we all just trade
burdens? Or take turns?

If you look more closely at this text, however, you find something very
interesting. This same text says, "Each one should carry his own load." Now, how
can we carry each other's burdens if each of us is carrying our own load? The
answer is that there is a difference between the Greek words used here for
"burden" and for "load." Every person has a load that he or she is supposed to
carry. And sometimes there are burdens that are so large that we can't carry
them
on our own. That is when we are to help each other. There is some stuff that
God expects us to take care of because it is our stuff. It is our load.

I think it's like backpacking. Each person carries their own pack with their
own clothes, their own sleeping bag, their own cook kit. If I try to carry
everyone else's stuff in my pack there is no way it is going to work. My
thoughts
belong in my backpack. Your thoughts belong in yours. As a codependent person
it is really easy for me to get into carrying your thoughts around in my
backpack. All I have to do is ask myself, What are people going to think? If I
start down that path, I will have a pack full of other people's thoughts. I will
start owning them as if they were my thoughts or my responsibility, and I may
even start changing my behavior so that I can change what I think other people
might be thinking. It's insane when you think about it. We start to make up
what we think other people are thinking. And then we start changing our
behavior based on what we've made up. That's what codependent people do all the
time.
As soon as we do that, we are carrying loads we were never intended to carry.


It's okay for me to have my own thoughts. They are part of my load, and I
need to carry them myself. It's okay for me to have my own attitudes. Even if I
choose to have a bad attitude sometimes, it can still be my bad attitude. It's
okay for me to have my own opinions. My own beliefs. My choices. My feelings.
My values. My behavior. My body. My money. You could add a lot of things to
this list that legitimately belong in my backpack. When Paul says each one is
supposed to "carry his own load" he is talking about the stuff that we are
responsible for just because we are human beings. Sometimes we expect other
people
to carry our stuff; for example, we might expect someone else to be
responsible for how we're going to feel today. And sometimes we expect ourselves
to
carry stuff that is not part of our load; for example, we might expect ourselves
to be responsible for how someone else is feeling. Both are inappropriate. The
biblical principle is really quite simple: Each of us must carry our own load,
and when we run into those huge burdens in life that none of us can carry by
ourselves, we are to help each other out.

What Would Jesus Do?
Another set of biblical texts that have been important for me are those that
talk about Jesus' strategies for self-care. One of the things that Jesus is
consistent in doing is in taking care of himself. If you are not used to looking
for this kind of thing in the Scriptures, it is easy to miss. But now that
I've been in recovery from codependency for a while, I look at lots of texts and
am amazed to discover how well Jesus takes care of his own needs. As a
codependent I was not able to do the kinds of things you see Jesus doing all the
time. Remember the story about Jesus in the temple on Passover when he was
twelve
years old? His parents leave. He hangs out in the temple. You might think
this was being irresponsible. He should have told his parents what he was doing.
But when his parents return he says to them, "Didn't you know I needed to be
in my Father's house?" (Luke 2:49). He didn't apologize. And he didn't start to
carry any of their anxiety or issues about the situation. I think that is a
remarkable example of maintaining healthy boundaries and appropriate self-care.


Or look at Jesus' example in Luke 5:15–16: "Yet the news about him spread all
the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their
sicknesses. But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed." What would
you do if God gave you the ability to heal every person on whom you laid your
hands? If you go into a town, the news spreads rapidly. You clean out the
hospitals and the nursing homes. Everybody gets healed. It's on the national
news. Thousands of people are seeking you out. What's your first response?

I know what mine would be. My first response would be to see this as a
big-time opportunity. This is a time when I can reach millions with the Good
News. I
can preach to my heart's content. Because people are suffering and I have the
ability to stop that suffering, I should do more. I would undoubtedly kick
into my work addiction mode. There were years when I could work for three months
without taking a day off. I could stay on that high for a long, long time. If
I could heal people, I would kick into that mode and heal more people, and do
God's work. It would be too important an opportunity to let it slip by. No
one could say that I hadn't given it my all. Withdrawing to lonely places where
I could pray was never an option for me. I could never have said, "I have a
lot of stuff to do, but maybe I should take some time off and just be by
myself."

But that is exactly what Jesus did. "Jesus often withdrew to lonely places
and prayed." In all my years of being in the Christian community I have never
heard a sermon about this kind of self-care. But it is obvious that Jesus knew
how to take care of himself.

There were times when the disciples returned from a mission and Jesus said,
"We need to go off by ourselves and rest." One time when Jesus and his
disciples were walking through a field the disciples were hungry, so they ate
some of
the grain in the field. The Pharisees got upset about this because it violated
some of their religious rules. Jesus reminded them of a time when King David
was hungry and he went into a holy place where only the priests were allowed
to go, and he ate some of the sacred bread that was on the altar. He took care
of himself and his men, even when it meant breaking some religious rules.
Jesus insisted that it was a good thing to take care of our own needs, even when
it might feel like we are breaking religious rules.

Jesus went off by himself one day, and the disciples were searching for him.
When they found him they asked him where he had been. Jesus responded by
saying, "Let us go somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach
there
also" (Mark 1:38). If somebody with needs had been searching for me and I had
been off by myself resting, I would have experienced overwhelming guilt. I would
have said, "Oh, I am so sorry. I should have been here for you. I shouldn't
have been away that long." Not Jesus. He knew that self-care was too important
to neglect, and he didn't apologize for it. He felt no need to explain why he
was taking care of his own needs. The need for and appropriateness of self-care
was so obvious that it required no explanation.

Over-the-Rainbow Spirituality
Another set of biblical texts that have been helpful to me are texts about
life. Over and over again Jesus talks about giving us life. "I have come that
they may have life, and have it to the full" (John 10:10). Texts like this may
lead us to conclude that God wants us to have a life that is not full of
busyness, schedules and burdens, but a life that is full of joy, hope and peace.

Paul describes it well in Romans 15:13: "May the God of hope fill you with
all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the
power of the Holy Spirit." One of the things I love about Paul is that he
doesn't say, "I hope that you have some hope." He says, "I hope you abound."
That
is, "I hope you overflow with hope," and "I hope you are so full of hope that
you can't even begin to contain the hope that is in you." In Ephesians Paul
talks about God's ability to do "exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or
think" (Eph. 3:20, King James Version).

For many years of my life that abundance was only a carrot on the end of a
stick. It was the promised but never quite achievable payoff. I could get to the
carrot only if I worked hard at being really good. Eventually I would have
the joy and peace. Someday. Over the rainbow. Somewhere. It was what I would get
if I prayed enough and went to church enough and read my Bible enough and had
a good enough attitude. If I did all that stuff enough, then I'd get the good
stuff.

But I was doing everything I was supposed to do. I got up at 5:30 in the
morning and had my prayer time. I sacrificed. I tithed. I did everything right.
I
was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, actually. Yet I still couldn't seem to do it
well enough to have any chance of reaching the carrot. There was no joy and no
peace. As a result, I went through a major depression.

Well, the bottom line is pretty obvious. There is no way to do enough to earn
joy, peace and serenity. The only way I could have the good stuff was to
abandon my performance-oriented lifestyle and learn to receive from God. It
wasn't
until I decided to take care of myself that I began to experience some of the
hope and joy and peace that God wants us to experience in abundance.

Denial of Self
Some of us have a problem with taking care of ourselves because it just
doesn't seem right for us. This is often because we have been taught to "deny"
ourselves. On the one hand it is clear that God wants us to have abundant life,
the kind of life that can come only when we pay attention to what we need and we
take appropriate steps to respond. But on the other hand, what about Jesus'
command to deny ourselves? What about taking up our cross? Dying to self? How
do those texts fit into this picture?

Paul says, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but
Christ lives in me" (Gal. 2:20). One of the things that strikes me about this
text
is that it includes two kinds of "I." There is the "I" that has been crucified
and is dead. And there is the "I" that lives. Why are there two Pauls here—
one dead, the other one living? This is a clear principle in Scripture. There is
an old self, and there is a new self.

I can tell you about my old self. I was raised in a family with a rage-aholic
mother and a workaholic father. Dad was gone. Our family owned a dairy farm
and a potato farm so that he could work seven days a week. For us kids the
question of the day was not if mom would explode, but when. When I got off the
bus
from school, it didn't matter what kind of day it had been. It didn't matter
if I had been beaten up on the playground. It didn't matter if I had done well
on a test. The only thing that mattered was where is Mom and how long will it
be before she explodes in rage. So I developed huge emotional antenna that
would pick up on what was happening emotionally in the house. My old self was
very aware of how other people feel. My old self was a people-pleasing person.
My old self was all about keeping people happy so they don't explode in rage. I
was very good at doing that. My old self was a good rescuer. When people got
into trouble they knew they could call me. My friends could get drunk and
wreck their cars, and they knew they could call me to come pick them up. I was
always available for everybody. My old self was a good manipulator. Once I knew
how other people were feeling I could play with that a bit and maybe get them
to do what I wanted them to do. My old self loved to control people. My old
self was also a wonderful worker; I got that from my father. But the old me was
a
miserable and hopeless person. I was very, very aware of what everyone else
wanted and needed but completely clueless about what I wanted and needed.

When I got saved I had a powerful experience with God. I knew that God loved
me. I knew that Jesus had died for me. I knew I could put my faith in God. But
I didn't really change. In fact, other than starting to keep all the rules—I
quit smoking and drinking and I started to listen to Christian radio and I
went to church five times a week—nothing really changed. Emotionally I was
still
the same old self. My "old man" had put on a Christian suit and had found a
lot of acceptance in doing so. But it was still my old self. I had not yet
experienced the kingdom of God in the way that God intended. It wasn't until I
went
through my depression—it wasn't until my burnout—that I began to realize
that when the Scriptures talk about denial of self or putting to death the old
self they are not adding another heavy weight to our to-do list. I see now that
"dying to self" means that God doesn't want me to be codependent anymore. It
means finding a different way of being in the world than the way I learned in
my dysfunctional family. God doesn't want me to be a workaholic anymore; that's
why he calls me to die to my old self. God doesn't want me to do all those
destructive things that I learned so well in order to survive in my family. God
doesn't even want me to do all those destructive things that I learned to do
so well to survive as a successful pastor. My old self is a raging codependent.
The more it dies, the better my life becomes. So "dying to self" may not be
such bad news after all.

What's my job?
When I was headed into my burnout phase, but before I really hit bottom, I
went to a pastors' retreat. During a worship time an image came to me of a huge
river. The river was the love and grace of God. It was deep and wide, and it
was flowing, so there was no way you could ever use it up. And the banks of the
river were full of people who were thirsty. In that image I saw myself
running down to the river, filling up cups with water, and then running back to
shore to give the cups to people who were thirsty. That was my job, but I knew
it
wasn't working. I was just getting tired. And the thirsty people were still
thirsty no matter how fast I ran back and forth to the river. However, I
resisted the idea that something was wrong. I even had a little argument with
God, in
which I insisted that those people were going to die of thirst if someone
didn't take them some water.

It was then that I had a revelation: If I waded out into the water and
started drinking because I was thirsty, then people who wanted to drink would
see
that and know where to get water themselves. Of course, it is so obvious now
that it seems silly to say it, but it was a completely radical concept to me.
You
mean I was just supposed to drink, myself? To get my own need for spiritual
refreshment filled? Was that my job?

Thinking that our job is to carry water for other people is a direct
reflection of the JOY mentality. Some of us were raised with this. The idea is
that
J-O-Y comes from putting Jesus first, Others second and Yourself last. That's
what I was doing. Because I loved Jesus I was committed to carrying water to the
thirsty. I didn't have time to notice whether I was thirsty. My job was to
carry water as fast as I could. I now have a completely different belief about
where joy comes from. The image I have is of a water fountain made of a stack
of bowls. At the top is a bowl that fills with water, which then spills out to
fill the bowls under it. The bowl at the top is me. God wants to fill that top
bowl until it overflows. And when it's full, it begins to overflow into other
people's lives. I can give out of abundance, but not out of need. I don't
need to deprive myself in order to give to others. The kingdom of God is not
about scarcity. Out of our abundance we can share with others. That's a whole
different approach to life.

Later in the process of recovery, when I was able to connect with the
little-boy part of me, I had flashbacks to what it felt like in the home of a
rage-aholic mother. My role in life was to take care of Mom so that she wouldn't
explode in rage. In many ways I was a surrogate spouse. I entertained her. I
played cards with her. I did things with her. All the things that Dad didn't do.
As
long as she was placated, she would not explode. When I was able to connect
with that little-boy part of me, I experienced a primitive feeling of I want
someone to take care of me. The foundation of all my drivenness, the foundation
of my need to take care of other people, was this fantasy: If I take care of
other people enough, maybe someday they will take care of me. If I make enough
trips into the river and bring back enough cups full of water to the thirsty
people, then maybe someone will say, "Why don't you sit down, and I'll bring
you some water." I was not aware of it at the time, but the root motivation of
much of what I did as a pastor was this very painful fantasy. I thought that if
I did enough, maybe "they" would take care of me. If I am good enough, maybe
somehow I will have an experience with a good, nurturing mother who will take
care of my needs, rather than the other way around.

Now, the painful truth that I needed to learn was that not even God was going
to take care of me in that way. God was not going to be the biggest
codependent of all—the one who can run back and forth to the river better than
any of
the rest of us. Instead, God was going to help me learn appropriate self-care.
There was room in the river for me. If I take the time to experience my own
thirst, if I have the courage to wade out into the water because it is what I
need, there will be refreshment for me.

It's sort of like this: If I'm responsible for a vehicle, I can't just say,
"I'm going to drive this vehicle to the glory of God and trust God to change
the oil." That doesn't make any sense. But that is exactly what Christian
codependents do with their lives. We don't take care of ourselves. We live our
lives
and trust God to change the oil. God is a very healthy individual. Just
because we are dysfunctional doesn't mean that God is going to rescue us the way
we
want to be rescued. Just because I have an unrealistic expectation that God
is going to change the oil in my car doesn't mean that God is going to do that
for me. Sometimes the only way that my needs are going to get met is for me to
take the responsibility for meeting them. If the need is in my backpack—if it
is my load—then part of being the new person that God is helping me become is
to carry that load.

Hearing God
The first steps toward taking better care of myself were very difficult. I
was so full of anxiety and so driven that I did three or four things at a time.
I remember when my therapist suggested that I do one thing at a time—like not
trying to get something else done while I'm talking on the phone. It was a new
concept to me. He also gave me the assignment of taking one day a week off.
Most normal people take two days off each week, but I guess he knew there was
no way I could start at that advanced level. As it turned out I was miserable
taking one day off. I used to get angry because it felt like such a waste of
time. I had no room for Sabbath in my life. It just made me miserable and angry.
After all, I was doing God's work. That's what I was supposed to do. Not
rest. So at first I made excuses. I weaseled my way out of it for a while. I'd
take half a day off. I'd make excuses about emergencies. I remember going to the
beach and being miserable because I wasn't getting anything done. I was
wasting time. But finally there came a day when I enjoyed it.

It's been a long time since that first effort. Now I take two days off a
week, and I spend them doing things I love. I love to canoe, and I love to hike.
Five years ago things like that would have seemed selfish. At the beginning,
taking care of ourselves can feel incredibly selfish and can seem like a waste
of time. But later on we find that it is okay to have a life. I can enjoy life
now. I can respect the desires and needs that God has put into me.

Recently I climbed to the top of a mountain. By myself. The view from the top
was spectacular. I was moved by the wonder of God's creation. And I just
stood there for a while. Eventually I heard a quiet voice saying, "When I
created
it, I had you in mind." I am able to receive that now. But only because I went
through a lot of difficult days when it seemed like a waste of time. I had to
struggle with those inner voices that insisted, "You should be working hard."
Slowly, with a lot of help, I was able to quiet those voices enough to begin
again to hear the gentle, loving voice of God. And that has made all the hard
work more than worth the effort.



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