Quotes from Melody Beattie

The only person you can now or ever change is yourself. The only person that it is your business to control is yourself.

We do not lead others into the Light by stepping into the darkness with them.

Rest when you're tired. Take a break when life stales. Take time to recharge your battery. Energy isn't something you have—it's something you are. To give and give and give, to put out without taking in, depletes your battery. It drains you, runs you down.

I want to thank each person who has the courage to push through and past the set of coping behaviors we've come to label as codependency—who learn what it means to take care of themselves. "Nobody taught me how to take care of myself," a fifty-year-old woman told me recently. "I didn't have enough money to go to therapy, but I had enough to buy a book.

If you did not have that person or problem in your life, what would you be doing with your life that is different from what you are doing now? How would you be feeling and behaving? Spend a few minutes visualizing yourself living your life, feeling and behaving that way—in spite of your unsolved problem.

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.1 —II TIMOTHY 1:7

Today, I will let things happen without worrying about the significance of each event. I will trust that this will bring about my growth faster than running around with a microscope. I will trust my lessons to reveal themselves in their own time.

Recovery is not only fun, it is simple. It is not always easy, but it is simple. It is based on a premise many of us have forgotten or never learned: Each person is responsible for him- or herself. It involves learning one new behavior that we will devote ourselves to: taking care of ourselves.

Many of us react as though everything is a crisis because we have lived with so many crises for so long that crisis reaction has become a habit.

You are not responsible for making other people "see the light," and you do not need to "set them straight." You are responsible for helping yourself see the light and for setting yourself straight.

Today, I will know that I don't have to worry about anything. If I do worry, I will do it with the understanding that I am choosing to worry, and it is not necessary.

We work it out, or live it out.