This is a pretty miraculous little article about relationships but moreso, about love, and about the limits of intimacy. It blew me away. She starts at a place that most people would consider pessimistic, but the older I get, and the more couples I have known, the more I feel that she is just stating the obvious.
So let’s take a hard look at why relationships never seem to pan out. I mean, really—have you ever seen a functional relationship? There are some that seem to be functional, or possibly even very good, but we never really get to know too much about them. Then later, we discover the seedy underbelly—often when the couple splits—and are disillusioned all over again.
This one had domestic violence in it. That one has been a sexless marriage for the past 10 years. This one had one partner lying and cheating on the other. That one was more of a business arrangement, waiting patiently until the kids were out of the house. The list goes on and on.
So, um, yeah. There’s that.
Then she talks more about the why, and here’s it’s not hard to tell I found this in a buddhist journal:
Relationships are based on the fallacy that I exist, you exist, and that my happiness, connection and fulfillment can be met by something from the outside—that there even is an outside.
That might sound esoteric, but stick with me.
When we look at our experience we can’t actually find a “person,” or even a “self.” In any experience we can find what we call color, the sound of a voice, the experience of a touch, etc. Without a belief in a self, other or time—which are all just thoughts and images in the mind and have no substance—all we have is this moment.
& What I was thinking when I got to this point was something along the lines of “Ugh, new age bullshit where no one actually gets to HAVE or KEEP anything. Feh.” Maybe you were thinking that too.
Then she gets ridiculously miraculous about locating the bullshit:
Herein lies the solution: Recognize that relationships are not primarily based on love, they are based on fear. Once we know this, we can work directly with the fear itself instead of on the other person or “the relationship.” We may discover that relating with another is not about our pleasure or comfort at all (although that’s sometimes a by-product), but about discarding every confusion we are still trapped in.
. . .
There is nothing wrong or bad about wanting something from someone. In fact, without the thought that we shouldn’t want something in a relationship, we can simply get honest and admit that we do! We might also notice that our partners do too. So, if you think that your partner is manipulating you to get what they want, it’s probably because they are.They are not bad, just like we are not bad. They are motivated by fear, just as we are.
Fear. I have a friend who, a long time ago, got that word tattooed on her body to remind herself that it was the thing between her and life.
And, it turns out, between her and love, maybe, too.
Read the whole thing. I think this piece is just as useful – maybe more useful – to anyone who is single as well as to anyone in a relationship.