Lost and Found
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:20:01+11:00...Or the Day My Co-dependency Ended The day that my co-dependency ended was the day that I decided that it was okay to be me. It was the day that I decided that who I was was good enough. That
Some Days Are Roses…
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:22:14+11:00Some days are roses and other days are stink-weeds. I refer of course to the ups and downs of our day-to-day existences. Some people call them the vicissitudes of life. While intellectually we might get that life, by its very
Who Do You Trust?
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:37:57+11:00“The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.” Michel de Montaigne We so often do not feel safe in this world. We perceive threats coming from every direction. The news media, like our
Fire and Ice
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:40:02+11:00"She's fire and ice. You fear the cold and crave the burn" J.M. Storm I'm talking, of course, about the Fire and Ice Lover. You are captivated by their enthusiastic loving in one moment and devastated by their cold distance
Obsessing Less & Loving More
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:43:10+11:00"Obsession is not love." Chintan Changole So, you are preoccupied with your lover. Your thoughts constantly revolve around this person -- their wishes, their wants. You place their needs before your own, if you even think about your own needs
The Seductive Past
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T15:49:05+11:00It’s so often said that it’s almost a platitude: “There is only one reality and that is one you are living in the present moment”. And it is factually hard to refute, isn’t it? Yet, we tend to resist being
Toxic Shame Remedies
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T18:13:06+11:00In another blog piece I address the issue of Good Shame vs Bad Shame. The “good” shame affect (or emotion) is hardwired into us. It’s an evolutionary survival mechanism that keeps us connected to the group that we rely on
Good Shame / Bad Shame
Mary Rizk2021-11-05T07:57:37+11:00Not all shame is bad, though many rail against it. Certainly shame is painful. The psychotherapist Silvan Tompkins, developer of Affect Theory, defined shame as an “interruption to pleasure” after all. Tompkins also pointed out that, in an evolutionary sense,
Codependency – Disengaging from the Dance
Mary Rizk2021-10-26T21:23:15+11:00“Many of us live in denial of who we truly are because we fear losing someone or something-and there are times that if we don't rock the boat, too often the one we lose is ourselves...It feels good to be
Breaking Open to a New Beginning
Mary Rizk2021-10-27T09:26:56+11:00"When you are broken open you get to discover for the first time what is inside of you." Bryant McGill Traumatic things happen. Life-changing events that are so painful that we feel we are physically broken open from the inside
