This is for all our wonderful participants

Hi Everybody –
Here is another quote that I hope you will find helpful :
It’s from ‘The Five Step Exit’ by Amber Ault :
“ A pattern of inconsistent behavior psychologists call ‘ intermittent reinforcement ‘ makes leaving toxic relationships very difficult. Sometimes your partner’s behavior feels unkind, unpleasant, volatile, and abusive. At other times you find relief or delight in your partner’s charm, care, or sexual attention. If your partner were awful all the time, you would have left long ago. When your partner behaves like your dream mate, they give you hope that their lying, cheating, financial exploitation, yelling, and verbal or physical abuse represent some kind of bizarre anomaly that can be explained ….. Intermittent reinforcement keeps us hopeful and in denial, like the dog whose abusive human occasionally tosses out a treat to keep the pup ever hopeful that a happy life with kind rewards will grow from unjustified loyalty.”
Blessings

Thanks SG!
Here’s a quote from ( our wonderful ) Donna Andersen’s book – Red Flags of Love Fraud – “ Sociopaths do not care about love ….. In fact, the core of this personality disorder is an inability to love. “
Blessings

“ Create each day anew by clothing yourself with Heaven and Earth, bathing yourself with wisdom and love, and placing yourself in the heart of Mother Nature. “

– Morihei Ueshiba – The Art Of Peace –
( he was the founder of Aikido )
Blessings.

“ A narcissist’s main concern in life is to control the people around him – namely, us – so he gets what he wants, whatever that may be … Even when he or she is being as sweet as pie ( which is of course, a facade ), the narcissist is controlling us. “

Zari Ballard from “ Narcissist Free “
Blessings

I love reading everybody’s insightful quotes !
Here’s one from Wayne Dyer’s book, Pulling Your Own Strings –
“ When you are in the company of boorish people who you feel are abusing you with their stories, bragging or pushiness, practice excusing yourself, getting right up and leaving. “

Break open
A cherry tree
And there are no flowers,
But the spring breeze
Brings forth myriad blossoms !

from: Wild Ways – Zen Poems of Ikkyu

From ‘ Exposing Financial Abuse ‘ by Shannon Thomas –

” Financial abuse and exploitation is quietly happening all around us, hidden within our neighborhoods and communities…We all need to have the collective understanding of how money is being used to entrap, control and abuse the people around us. Hidden financial abuse. ”

“ Don’t ever delude yourself into thinking that you should have the ability to stay serene no matter how you are treated. Your serenity comes from the knowledge that you have a fundamental right to a nurturing environment and a fundamental right to affirm your boundaries “
– from ‘ The Verbally Abusive Relationship ‘ by Patricia Evans

“ I treat myself and others with tender kindness and I receive the benevolent support of the cosmos. “
– from ‘ The Book of Daily Mantras ‘ by Almine

“ Be the change you want to see in the world “
– Gandhi

Good one, SG! – light hearted and refreshing.
One from ‘ The Verbally Abusive Relationship ‘,
By Patricia Evans –
“ One of our greatest needs is to understand and to be understood. In a verbally abusive relationship, the partner’s need to understand and to be understood is not met. On the other hand, her belief that her mate is rational and that understanding can be reached keeps her in the relationship. The fact that she can’t come to an understanding with her mate simply because he is abusive and will defeat her through abusive power plays is almost incomprehensible to the partner. Not coming to this realization, however, leaves the partner living in an incomprehensible reality where she is blamed for the battering of her own spirit.”

“ All happy families resemble one another, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way “
– from ‘ Anna Karenina ‘ by Leo Tolstoy

“ The dance between an empath and an abuser is one of control, mind games and mockery. This is why education is such a critical step in the healing process. Tenderness from empaths will be used against them time and time again by psychological abusers. “
– From ‘ Healing From Hidden Abuse ‘ by Shannon Thomas

“ Turning negatives into positives became important for fully healing. Love is the most powerful force in the universe and I chose to move forward with love for my daughter rather than bitterness for my abusers. “
From ‘ PTSD: Time to Heal “ by Cathy O’Brien

“ Manipulative people are always “ telling “ because they have nothing good to show. Their inappropriate and dishonest actions never actually match up with their promising words, causing an overwhelming cognitive dissonance in the people who trust them. “
– Patrick Mac Kenzie, ‘ Psychopath Free ‘.

Wayne Dyer said that he studied the words, “ Success is a journey, not a destination “, and said this about the quote: “ Don’t evaluate your life in terms of achievements, trivial or monumental, along the way. If you do, you will be destined to the frustration of always seeking out other destinations, and never allowing yourself actually to be fulfilled. “ – From ‘ Pulling Your Own Strings ‘

“ … verbal violence all too often goes unrecognized, except at a level that you cannot even understand yourself. You know you are suffering, and you vaguely know where the pain is coming from; but because the aggression is so well hidden, you are likely to blame yourself instead of the aggressor. “ “ Your problem is that you are the victim of verbal violence and you don’t have the least idea of how to defend yourself against it.”
– From ‘ The gentle Art of Verbal Self Defense ‘ by Suzette Haden Elgin

“ The wise don’t need to ask, the fools ask in vain. “
– ‘ A Wizard Of Earthsea ‘ by Ursula Le Guin

“ Life is nothing but a dream, and if we are artists, then we can create our dream with love and our dream becomes a masterpiece of art. “
– from ‘ The Mastery of Love ‘ by Don Miguel Ruiz

“ It is a sad state of affairs, but the fact of the matter is that the healthiest people – the most honest, whose patterns of thinking are the least distorted – are the ones easiest to treat with psychotherapy and the most likely to benefit from it. Conversely, the sicker the patients – the most dishonest in their behavior and distorted in their thinking – the less able we are to help them with any degree of success. When they are very distorted and dishonest, it seems impossible. “ – Scott Peck from ‘ People of the Lie ‘.

“ Ho Ho Ho …. Merry Christmas! “ – Santa Claus

Great one ! Especially the “ it was all your fault “ part. But then again, the “ that didn’t happen “ line nailed it too !

Pizza is a cure all !!!

… writing out memory. The very act of moving a pen uses the logic function of the brain whereby shifting your “ emotionally incomprehensible “ trauma over to logic where it can be consciously dealt with. You already survived it once, and remembering it and writing it out will only free you from it. – PTSD: Time To Heal by Carly O’Brien

“ Yes, you CAN communicate successfully and end verbal violence in your life “ – Suzette Haden Elgin from the book called : You Can’t Say That To Me – Stopping the pain of verbal abuse, an 8 Step Program

“ The tongue has the power of life and death “ – Proverbs 18:21

Hi SG – Great response ! I enjoyed it.
Blessings

Aikido is the way of nonresistance and is therefore undefeatable from the start …. merely by having the intention to fight with one who embodies the universal law, they have fixed their mind on violating the harmony of nature itself. The person with evil or malicious feeling is defeated before he makes the first move. The contest has already been decided.
– Morihei Ushiba-sensei ( the founder of Aikido )

SG – congrats on your new computer ( these days they are so essential! ).
Blessings

You’re funny !!!

PS – I though that you were kidding because of all the typos in your second sentence. But in case you weren’t – glad you’ll be getting stickers !
Blessings !

Yeayh – we love reading your posts !

Courage means flying in the face of criticism, relying on yourself, being willing to accept and learn from the consequences of all your choices. It means believing enough in yourself and in living your life as you choose so that you can cut the strings whose ends other people hold and use to pull you in contrary directions.
– Wayne Dyer, “ Pulling Your Own Strings “

Hi SG and everyone – It’s been a truly wonderful experience participating in the forum here at Love Fraud. I have recently realized that the reason that I was vulnerable to psychological abuse was because I had become a co-dependent person due to having narcissists in my early life. I really don’t know all the reasons that people become entangled and often remain too long in toxic relationships, but for me, I think it was due to my co-dependency issues. I don’t mean to insinuate that this is the case for all targets. In any case, I have decided to put my energy and attention into my recovery in that area -and so I will not be reading nor posting on this site henceforth. I know that everyone will be able to heal from the abuse they have endured if they have the willingness and put forth the effort required because of the plethora of information now available in so many forms. Everyone can definitely extricate themselves from people and situations that are unhealthy. I hold all of you in my heart and am greatly appreciative of all the goodwill and many kindnesses we have shared together.
Blessings to all.

Hi SG and Redwald – Thanks for your kind responses. I very much appreciated your understanding about codependency, Redwald. I think the main issue for me is my rescuing habit. I have gotten into so much trouble by that – innumerable times. I have noticed by your posts and SGs and Donna’s that you all are able to support without rescuing, and I admire that. I, on the other hand become over concerned about the participants and will drive down the mountain in order to get internet access, to be able to respond in case they have replied to my post, often only to find that they have disappeared. I believe strongly in supporting others and it is a topic of concern about how to balance what is healthy towards others and towards oneself. I’ve been gaining a lot by from Les Carter’s book about people pleasers, and it has been an eye opener to see how much work I need to do to overcome that. I’ve been working hard at that and also trying to do a codependency program through books. I do believe that this problem is healable and perhaps when I am more recovered, I will be able to respond to posts here without getting overly emotionally involved. Anyway, your post really touched my heart.
Blessings