Have you ever looked at someone else who doesn’t appear to have the
problems you have and thought: “It’s alright for you”? I’ll admit I
have.

In fact, back in the bad old days of living with a Crazy-Maker,  that thought crossed my mind all too frequently.

Well-meaning
people would frequently tell me how to look at the world and manage my
life and my relationship. Sometimes they were wrong. Not uncommonly
they were right; although I rarely felt like thanking them for their
opinion.

Sometimes they were absolutely right, albeit for the
wrong reasons. (My parents loathed my ex-husband from Day 1, but only
because he didn’t kowtow to them.)

Either way, there is nothing more maddening than being told how you could manage your life better when you are foundering.

We’d
all like to be the ultimate authority on how best to live our own life.
All too often we’re not; either because we have no ‘surrogates’ – by
which I mean useful examples of people in successful relationships whom
we can learn from – or because we have moronic surrogates, like
Hollywood movies. It’s all too easy to get disoriented by feelings,
emotions and self-doubt. ‘Life’ can be complicated sometimes.

Most times when we find life too complicated it is because we overlook the obvious, unpalatable truths.

I remember an old joke that my brother used to tell with great glee.

Two
drunks were staggering home after a heavy night out, when one stopped,
knelt down and carefully examined something on the footpath. Turning to
his friend he said:

“Looks like s***”

His friend appeared quite unmoved.

Bending closer, the first drunk sniffed deeply and then said:

“Smells like s***”

Still his friend didn’t react.

He then poked his finger into it, tasted it and said:

“Tastes like s***”

After a thoughtful pause, he added: “Good thing I didn’t step in it.”

(Unfortunately, most of the people in an abusive relationship can’t say as much.)

However
annoying we may find it, if a relationship looks bad, feels bad and
leaves a bad taste in your mouth, it’s bad. That is one of nature’s
inescapable laws.

Another one is that you don’t have to do life
the hard way. Other people don’t and you don’t need to either. Because
you have, it doesn’t mean you have to.

All it means is that you:

a) didn’t know

b) have forgotten

how to do life without all the pain and the anguish.

The
one simple law that holds for everyone is this: it can be as easy for
you as it is for anyone else. You just have to believe it.

Your
circumstances as you read this may be complicated and difficult. That’s
what happens when you let a Crazy-Maker close to you. Still, that is
not how it is meant to be.

Some women struggle with recovery,
because they think that it has to be complicated. In fact the solution
is – almost irritatingly – simple. Discover how to trust and love
yourself and, as you clear the debris of the old damaging relationship,
life becomes easy.

The strategies to help you achieve it, which
figure in my ebook “The Woman You Want To Be” are almost
disappointingly simple. Simple but effective.

Going over the
past, focusing on what went wrong, what you could have done to prevent
it and how you would like to change it, will never bring recovery any
nearer.

But you can step out of that loop and declare yourself
subject to the same law as other people: it can be easy for them and it
can be easy for you. When you do that, emotional peace will follow.