Emotional dependency means getting ones good feelings from outside oneself. It means needing to get filled from outside rather than from within. Who or what do you believe is responsible for your emotional wellbeing?
There are numerous forms of emotional dependency:
* Dependence on substances, such as food, drugs, or alcohol, to fill emptiness and take away pain.
* Dependency on processes such as spending, gambling, or TV, also to fill emptiness and take away pain.
* Dependence on money to define ones worth and adequacy.
* Dependence on getting someones love, approval, or attention to feel worthy, adequate, lovable, and safe.
* Dependence on sex to fill emptiness and feel adequate.
When you do not take responsibility for defining your own adequacy and worth or for creating your own inner sense of safety, you will seek to feel adequate, worthy and safe externally. Whatever you do not give to yourself, you may seek from others or from substances or processes. Emotional dependency is the opposite of taking personal responsibility for ones emotional wellbeing. Yet many people have no idea that this is their...