Download And Enjoy Bonds That Make Us Free: Healing Our Relationships, Coming To Ourselves Drafted By C. Terry Warner Supplied As Print

easier to click with some authors than others, I don't love this writer's writing style or all his word choices, I don't love the "IIt vs, IYou" way of expressing his ideas, I don't really prefer his choices of stories, Even so, I learned some very helpful and important things from this book,

In particular, I've had a reoccurring problem with blaming others and the occasional extreme self pity.
I have felt plenty justification for those emotions, That doesn't make them true or desirable, The first half of the book focuses on all the problems, I felt an enormous weight and sorrow for my negative patterns, I might have quit reading, but I was hopeful I'd learn more of how to solve my problems.
I'm glad I stuck with it,

When encountering trouble with others, this author basically suggests asking oneself of what's happening, "Is my perception true" and adds in the importance of forgiving and loving others.
Byron Katie also talks about turning the blaming words around to oneself, such as instead of saying, "He isn't compassionate toward me," saying, "I'm not compassionate toward him," or "I'm not compassionate toward me," and that is often more true!

He advocates doing the "right" thing for the right reasons.


I have realized that praying for the gift of charity needs to be a big part of the solution for me.
I want to

quit blaming take more responsibility for myself, my emotions, and my life and to be filled with charity.
I want to do the right things for the right reasons, This book has helped see the difference that will make in my life, It feels like an important piece of the puzzle to my problems, Along with Brooke Castillo's model thoughts lead to feelings, which lead to actions, which lead to results I feel like I now have the tools I need to move past a lot of my lifelong troubles.


I copied down some things I want to remember along with their page numbers in the edition I read.


p."By our selfvictimization, we exaggerate others' destructiveness and our own helplessness, "

p."We acquire a taste for the momentary relief from responsibility and accountability it seems to provide we don't have to face what we suspect might be awful truths about ourselves.
"

p."To admit our errors or weaknesses in this fashion can bring us liberation and strength, It will seem ironic to say this, for facing up to the truth is usually what we most fear to do.
"

p."The same thing happens to any of us who acknowledge the truth as straightforwardly as she did, The emotion we experience in the presence of the truth is love, "

p."We learned in the preceding section that when we confess that we have been wrong not just on an isolated point of argument but in the way we have lived our lives we no longer feel a need to blame others and to defend ourselves against them.
We become free of the accusing, anguished thoughts and feelings with which we have afflicted ourselves, free to let ourselves be touched by others' concerns and aspirations and joys, and free to stop worrying about protecting or polishing our selfimage.
"
"So it is blame that we must let go of, Blame is the lie by which we convince ourselves that we are victims, It is the lie that robs us of our serenity, our generosity, our confidence, and our delight in life.
"

p."For it's the act of blaming that 'can't coexist with self responsibility' or with freedom from inner agitation and strained relationships.
Abandon the practice of blaming, and we see the fear melt away that we have associated with being honest about ourselves and taking the full measure of responsibility for our emotional and spiritual condition.
"

p."How profoundly fascinating it is to realize that the way forward is simply to consider whether we might be in the wrong!
"This realization distills for us a significant truth about what I've called a change of heart.
"

p."So focused are accusing feelings that they obliterate or shunt into irrelevance all other facts except those that support them.
" "But with that change came a revival of her memory of what he had given her, and she found it fully sufficient for her happiness.
"

p."So, strictly speaking, what actually happened way back then is of no significance now what is significant now are our present accusations against them.
Our emotional problems are the accusations we make of others now, They are not scars from the past but actions in the present, "

p."If we are not victims but instead producers of our emotional problems, and if it is right now that we reproducing them, then we can eliminate the problems at their source.
"

p."Genuine forgiveness includes a desire to be forgiven and, if it is fitting, to seek that forgiveness, "

p."We cannot do it by denying or repressing our feelings or by willing ourselves to feel differently feelings are subject to our indirect but not our direct control.
"

I don't entirely agree with the above idea, I believe we ultimately have direct control over our feelings, If our feelings come from our thoughts, we are in charge of those feelings, We create them. Feelings need to be accepted and understood, Once we do that we can change the thoughts and create new feelings, We do have control and should take responsibility for our feelings,

p."Abusers suffer quite independently of being resented, " "Our resentment cannot increase their torment it harms only ourselves, And besides, it may give them an excuse to believe that we deserved whatever they did to us.
"

p."So it is with love, says Kierkegaard, Love is the expression of the one who loves, not of the one who is loved, Those who think they can love only the people they prefer do not love at all, Love discovers truths about individuals any individualthat others cannot see, "

p."The point is neither to accept the falsely threatening world nor to escape it, but to change it or in other words, change the meaning it has for us.
And that is done by undergoing a change in how we see the world, which is a change in ourselves.
"

p."The dependency of faith, on the other hand, . . is a linkage to others by means of love, "

p."Fact: The quality of lifethe success we hope for depends upon the choices we make, moment by moment, to do exactly what we sense is right toward all living things, including God.
To distinguish this from pursuing the good life, I would like to call it pursuing a life of goodness.
This means a life of practical faith, "

p."The key personal characteristic is a consistent readiness to yield to the truth in all circumstances, no matter what the apparent cost.
"

Despite its problems, I recommend this book, The truths it contains are worth learning, Yes, there are other sources of this information, but it helps to look at truth in multiple ways with unique emphases.
If you love this book, you might be codependent, The basic message I took from it was: "If you're having relationship problems, don't confront, don't complain just try harder.
You might be the real source of the problem, and if you try harder, miracles will happen, " I recommend this book to anyone who has ever been in any relationship, It will change the way you view the world, yourself, and every one of your relationships, It's genius. .