104 - The Four Promises and Addiction

Click here to read the episode highlights.    The "Living with Heart" Podcast is brought to you by Chip Dodd Resources (www.chipdodd.com) and The Voice of the Heart Center (vothcenter.com). You can connect with Dr. Chip Dodd at [email protected]. Contact Bryan Barley for coaching at [email protected].    You can also RSVP to Bryan for "Awaken the Heart" on Sunday, March 1 - more details here.   Be sure to subscribe to Dr Chip Dodd’s new Substack. He will be sharing two to three articles a week. The topics focus on healthy relationship, personal growth, and leadership.  What is Substack? It is a subscription-based platform that allows independent writers and other creators to publish content directly to their subscribers’ inboxes. The cost of the subscription is only $7 a month. Dr. Dodd shares content two to three times a week. The content focuses on healthy relationship, personal growth, and leadership. To subscribe, use the link above or go to chipdodd.com. FREE RESOURCE:   Four Realities and Four Promises  Ultimately, every person who becomes addicted to any substance or behavioral  process is running from knowing how to or being willing to contend with four  realities and four promises.   Because the four realities are in conflict with the experience of the four promises,  a person must find a way to integrate the conflict or avoid real life.   We are emotional and spiritual creatures, created to live fully. We are created to  only be able to find fulfillment in relationship with ourselves, others and God.  As emotional and spiritual creatures, if we run from feelings and needs, we cannot  resolve the conflict between reality and the truth of God.  Four Realties  The best we ever become is still clumsy.  We are all like “giraffes running on ice.” Perfection is not attainable.  We must live life on life’s terms. We don’t make the rules about how life  works. No one defeats death, pain, or the craving to connect in relationship.  To love always requires that we learn how to tolerate pain.  Everything in life is practice. Doctors practice medicine, lawyers practice law. Parents, likewise, are  practicing being parents, as are people practicing being human. Children are  working very hard practicing being children. No one has all the answers. We  are all works in progress, not works of perfection.  It takes a lifetime to learn how to live. Whether a person is eight or eighty-eight, we still have questions about  living and life, relationships, love, success, needs, and God.    Click here to continue reading the episode highlights.