When I Look at Relationships

When I look at relationships, my own and others, I see a wide range of reasons for people to be together and ways in which they are together. I see ways in which relationship -- which means something that exists between two or more people -- for the most part reinforces people's separateness, as individual entities. And as those individual entities the people in the relationship treat the separateness as a reality rather than simply honoring the differences.

When I used to perform weddings the image I always had was the image of a triangle, in which there are two partners and then there is this third force, this third being, that emerges out of the interaction of these two. The third one is the one that is the shared awareness that lies behind the two of them. And the two people in the yoga of relationship come together in order to find that shared awareness that exists behind them in order to then dance as one. The twoness brings them into one, and the oneness dances as two, and that's a kind of a vibrating relationship between the one and the two. People are both separate, and yet they are not separate. And they are experiencing that the relationship is feeding both their uniqueness as individuals and their unit of consciousness.

Now, that is extremely delicate because it is so easy to get entrenched in your own "I need this," "I want this," "You are not fulfilling this for me" and seeing the other as object. But the delight, which all of you have experienced, of being with somebody, where you are sharing an awareness of the predicament you are both in is poignant. And you are sharing an awareness of the predicament even when you are having an argument with each other; there is an awareness that you are both almost delighting in the horrible beauty of it. I don't know whether any of you have had that. I have had it quite often. You know, we have differences. But we are enjoying -- we're hating it and enjoying it both -- because there are these levels we are playing at all the time.

We come into relationships often very much identified with our needs. I need this, I need security, I need refuge, I need friendship. And all of relationships are symbiotic in that sense. We come together because we fulfill each others' needs at some level or other.

The problem is that when you identify with those needs, you always stay at the level where the other person is her or him -- it is satisfying that need. And it really only gets extraordinarily beautiful when it becomes us, and then when it goes behind us and becomes I.

This Sunday OWN will be airing an all-new interview with spiritual teacher and best-selling author Ram Dass on "Super Soul Sunday" at 11 a.m. ET/PT and will be airing his powerful film "Ram Dass: Fierce Grace."

 

 

 

Comments

[Christopher Bowen]

04:06 PM on 04/24/2012

For years, I would quote Dass and had no idea I was doing it. "Hold on tightly, let go lightly." I use it all the time with the kids I teach as they begin to form their own world views. I recently told a kid that at their age, "I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now." Reference obviously lost, but they made the connection. Maybe the same can be said of relationships. Hold on tightly to those differences that help us celebrate who we are. But maybe we let go lightly when such a focus serves less to celebrate and more to break us apart.

Chris Bowen
http://teacher2teacher.lacoe.edu/christopher-bowen.aspx

[livingbettertherapy]

12:41 PM on 04/23/2012

Wherever you go, people are usually there. It’s probably easy to get along with the people, who are just like you, hold the same kinds of opinions you have and do things the way that you do them. Life might be easier if everyone was just like you but the reality is that you probably have to work with all kinds of people- some of them very different than you and many of them actual polar opposites. Getting along with the people at work, school, your business and your community who are different than you are will greatly impact the quality of your life. Life isn’t just about you and what you want and like. Find out what those around you want, what they like and are passionate about. That will enable you to appreciate them and their point of view better, insuring that you will really hear what others have to say. Appreciating others who are different than you are not only gives you the capability to work better and live better, that appreciation contains your potential to create a new service or product that a lot of other people need. When you begin to really appreciate and respect those who are different than you are, team members that you never realized you had will begin to almost magically appear. Those team members were there all the time, sitting on the bench, waiting to be called into the game to help you win.

[ignacio sanabria]

09:48 AM on 04/22/2012

Half of the time we are in a relationship, the other half we are not.

[rewith85man]

09:58 PM on 04/22/2012

So, you're saying that we are with other people sometimes and we are alone in other times?

[Deanna Lund]

05:27 AM on 04/22/2012

I agree, but I think we all get lost in having the relationship. I think so many of us need a relationship to validate ourselves. Many forget what a good or satisfying relationship should be. In my opinion, respect for the other person is paramount. The idea of respect is different for different people and cultures. But if you do not admire the person you are with, for whatever reasons, think twice about committing yourself permanently.

[stilllearning2b]

02:14 PM on 04/21/2012

I like to look at a healthy relationship as a "union" in set theory where two circles overlap and the union is the entire region, the separate parts of the circles as well as the area where they overlap. They maintain their own identities, yet are deeper and richer in the area where they coexist.
http://lessonsfromtheendofamarriage.com

[Dr. Cara Barker]

11:54 PM on 04/21/2012

Beautiful, clear, touching, stilllearning2b. Even your screen name speaks of Wisdom. The moment we stop learning, everything rich with meaning goes out the window. Please keep speaking up. We are the wiser for it.

gratitude your way,
Cara