Sickness unto death, or precarious angst, or abandoning ship when the ship is the self

I was emailing with a recovery friend of mine, a woman with whom I share a lot of the same maladjusted or at least misery-causing patterns and behaviors, and I recalled one of the hexagrams of the I Ching telling me, a long time ago, that my main sickness was that I took on the sickness of others. At the time, I had no idea what that meant. It seemed inscrutable and odd to me. 

It's from the Wilhelm translation of hexagram 25, Innocence or The Unexpected, line 5 (this from James DeKorne's online I Ching):

Wilhelm observes: "That he appears ill comes from his way of taking the illnesses of others upon himself.” This can refer to both other people in the outer world, or to "others" in the inner world of the psyche -- our autonomous drives, appetites, emotions, etc. The psychological concept of "co- dependence” often applies to this line.

I have reflected a great deal upon the magical powers of the soul of man, and I have discovered a great many secrets in Nature, and I will tell you that he only can be a true physician who has acquired this power. If our physicians did possess it, their books might be burnt and their medicines be thrown into the ocean, and the world would be all the more benefited by it. Paracelsus

A. Do nothing and things will improve by themselves.
B. You bear the illusions of others as if they were your own. Co-dependence helps nobody.
C. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

I have more insight into it now. 

It's a way I have of avoiding paying attention to myself. If you have an issue going on, I'll get wrapped up in it. It may seem to you and me and everyone involved that I am being helpful, and sometimes I guess I actually am. But usually it is just another form of abandoning myself. Of locating the center of who I am outside who I am. 

There are some shapes where the center of gravity is not on the shape itself, but out in space, away from the material from which the shape is made. 

This is often how it feels for me. The locus of control for me is external. Most often, it is centered in another person. I continue to exist, but only relative to the other person. 

Everyone is sick in some way. This seems to be the state of our species at this time. So if my center of gravity is located outside of me, in another person, the ways that person is dysfunctional, maladjusted, incapable of intimacy, emotionally damaged, in denial, suffering from post-traumatic symptoms or otherwise fucked up in all the standard human ways will become the ways I allow myself to be yanked around. 

Another way to think of it is my compass is turned toward a magnetic north that is not within myself, but in other people. This also provides a situation that is constantly disorienting of course because I can only get my bearings by checking with the other person. 

In CoDA, codependency is sometimes described as "taking someone else's temperature to see how you feel." This is a great metaphor. "How are you Percy?" "Well I don't know, how are you?" "I am really sad and upset." "Oh well then so am I!" 

The word "precarious" has a fascinating etymology. The contemporary definition: "not securely held or in position, dangerously likely to fall or collapse," with the secondary definition of "dependent on chance, uncertain." But the etymology shows the root of this idea of lack of security, liable to collapse or fall, shot through with constant uncertainty.

"precarious (adj.)

1640s, a legal word, "held through the favor of another," from Latin precarius "obtained by asking or praying," from prex (genitive precis) "entreaty, prayer" (from PIE root *prek- "to ask, entreat"). Notion of "dependent on the will of another" led to extended sense "risky, dangerous, uncertain" (1680s). "No word is more unskillfully used than this with its derivatives. It is used for uncertain in all its senses; but it only means uncertain, as dependent on others ..." [Johnson]. Related: Precariously; precariousness."

So according to Johnson, the unskillful use of the word of course won out for good. It figures. 

At any rate, the old-school and contemporary precariousness of my relationship life is based on this metaphor of the external locus of control. My happiness hinges on the decisions and choices of others. But, it turns out, my sickness or dysfunctionality or unhappiness or whatever you want to call hinges on the same thing. 

Another definition of codependency could be "a relationship life constituted by precarious reliance on the will, favor, attitudes, opinions or choices of others."

Of course, you can image the consequences of this dynamic, fairly easily. 

I recall realizing, early in sobriety, that my motto while actively drinking, using or otherwise being an addict was: "Anywhere but here, anytime but now, anyone but me." Nihilistic in the extreme, rooted in a kind of fear that was constantly bordering on terror. Obliterate me, any way you can. Blot me out. I hate myself and the only way to end that self-hatred is oblivion or death. It sounds melodramatic, but it is the basic principle by which I lived for 30 years.  

Now that I have been sober nearly 14 years, and now that I am facing the thermonuclear core of all addiction and compulsion for me, which is codependency, I realize I have continued to abandon ship at every opportunity. How do I feel? Well it depends on how you are acting. Do I feel lovable or loved? Well it depends on whether or not you are reassuring me (especially verbally) that I am lovable and loved. What do I want to do? Whatever makes you happy (that is, whatever seems like I could manipulate you into not abandoning me). 

This uncovers why I would repeatedly get intimately involved with unavailable women. Note that unavailable is a simple plain fact. I do not mean it in any judgmental way. On a geospatial level, distant. On an emotional level, either unable to respond to my emotions out of their own traumatic past or due to some urgent preoccupation that they have that is totally legit. Nevertheless, unavailable. Sometimes also, so deeply entangled in a network of other relationships that I'm de facto way at the bottom of the list. It's not personal, it's just business. 

Obviously, I am attracted to women in these categories because they provide the perfect opportunity for me to abandon ship, when the ship is myself. Look, I'm fucked up and on fire and sinking anyway, so I need some excuse to get the hell off. A perfect excuse is to re-enact the lack of love in my primal relationships over and over again, by trying to get unavailable women to show up for me. The other payoff is I get to feel abandoned all the time, since, in fact, I am abandoned. It's just that it is not the other person who is abandoning me, but me. Abandoning me. Ah, the comfort of the old familiar misery. 

Having been ghosted by A and now feeling caspered a lot of the time by the loml, I'm beginning to get weary of the old pattern. (By the way, it was the loml herself who provided the term "caspering" which is new to me. Basically, it's friendly ghosting-- never having time, replying to communication with hardly anything, almost always making it so I have to make contact first, disappearing for long stretches but not with any malice, etc.) I'm in that weird zone of still doing it to myself but sincerely wanting to stop. The repeated inability to stop always, with addiction, leads to "pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization," to use Bill W's piercing phrase. So, since I am continuing to struggle with this pattern, I can only guess it is a harbinger that I am at least closer to recovery than not. 

I like the thought of that. Most of the time, I am still in the position of just feeling pain. Loneliness, abandonment anxiety, self loathing, self judgment of being weak and pathetic, angry, furious even, at being gaslighted and caspered and ignored and held at arm's length. I keep saying to myself, well, just let go. Stop it. Try that Al-Anon thing:

"Get off of their backs, get out of their way, get on with your life."

Or this kind of flat out clear truth:

Even if that someone is me.