When Dependence Follows Us into Adulthood
Our First Taste of Independence……..
As we begin to grow older and progress through childhood there are many milestones along the way which give us more and different kinds of independence. We get that first paycheck, that first car, leave home for college, the service, or a new job. Maybe we will get our own apartment, make our first career decision, start paying our own bills, decide what we want to do, with whom, and where. We decide who we want to date, who we will marry, whether we’ll have children, and if so, how many? If we do, we get to make our own decisions about how to parent.
Independence and autonomy grow rapidly and all these choices, decisions, and paths we get to choose give us a great sense of independence. That sense becomes cemented in the fact that suddenly our choices have consequences!
Freedom is not free, as they say. It comes with responsibility. As children, other people make many of our decisions for us, but they absorb the consequences for us as well. Adulthood changes this little arrangement. We assume the power to choose, but we also get the bill! Not just financially, but emotionally, relationally, and spiritually.
Independence isn't simply gaining the freedom to make our own choices. It's accepting responsibility for the consequences of those choices.
When Dependence Follows Us into Adulthood……..
Time, age, nor circumstance guarantees psychological independence. Oftentimes we have a difficult time not only breaking dependencies on others, but also with developing new ones. Some people may remain dependent upon a parent well into adulthood, or develop a new dependency on a spouse, employer, money, status, substances, institutions, other relationships and the approval of others.
Others may think they’ve broken an unhealthy dependency upon a parent only to replace it with dependency on someone or something else. Some may say they have no dependence on money, yet without the financial support of a family member or government program would be lost.
But Dependency isn’t always financial. A person earning $500,00/year can be extraordinarily dependent on other things, like recognition, status, titles, the approval of others, or the needed affirmation before being becoming able to trust their own judgement. More frightening, many, me included, can become dependent upon drugs and alcohol to manage uncomfortable emotions or situations.
When we do become dependent on any one or more of these things, what’s really happening is that we’ve been forced to surrender a part of our own agency. We’ve lost the power of choice and often, we allow someone else to control us. When this happens, we lose the ability to take actions that can shape our lives, and the lives of others, in ways we choose. Our dependency gives someone or something else power over us. The borrower is always slave to the lender! Proverbs 22:7
If your parents are still paying for your all or a part of your mortgage, your rent, your car, your insurance, your taxes, your vacations, or your cell phone, then they have some measure of power and control over you. If you’ve become dependent upon alcohol or some other substance to survive in social situations, then those substances now have their restrictive grips over you.
Do you think you’re an independent person? Or has dependence followed you into adulthood in some way? Think about it, especially around the notion of “who or what” has some form of control over you. If they do, or it does, then you might have a dependency you need to break before you can truly grow!
Michael