For a long time, science believed that the brain was hard wired and once encoded you had to deal with it or go to therapy or do whatever you could to overcome the code. But there is whole different school of thought that is all the rage and that is the plasticity of the brain. So you do hard wire experience, which then causes you to be attracted or repelled by the same things over again, BUT the good news is that you can change this hard wiring. The best method I’ve read about recently goes something like this – let’s say you are like me, the daughter of a charismatic rageaholic and a lovely alcoholic and so you develop these habits like being attracted to men who are dicks and always having a beautiful girlfriend who needs saving. What’s a codependent to do?
Well, the first thing is to start dating men who do not need taking care of and who are nice. Check – it led me to N, then to L, man of mystery, and so I am on the right track. What you do is you keep dating nice men who don’t need taking care of and you start rewiring your circuitry and pretty soon – WALA – you are ready for the whole enchalada because you get so used to nice self-sufficient men that you have no attraction for needy assholes whatsoever.
And with your girlfriends, you realize you can’t stop a train wreck, so you pull yourself off the tracks when you see one happening.