Showing posts with label Relationships. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Relationships. Show all posts

Sunday, February 12, 2012

What's Your Drama?

Ok, I'll go first.

My drama has been to allow my pain-body to take over my thinking in the context of a love relationship.

No, that's too abstract. Let's try again. My drama has been to take things personally in the context of a love relationship. There, now that's something people can relate to, I think. 

Things said and done by my significant other would be felt as intense "emotional pain."

[Ok, now I've said the same thing in three different ways. Take a moment and look at those three descriptions of my drama and try to understand how they're all saying exactly the same thing.]

This "emotional pain" would cause me to react against the supposed source of this pain, my significant other. But of course, she wasn't impacting my physical body in any way, so how could she have been the source of my pain? She couldn't. In fact, it was my own thoughts that were causing this "emotional pain," so called. I was doing it to myself.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Your Outer World is a Reflection of Your Inner State

Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in a marital relationship. It's one thing to believe that the person sitting across from you at the dinner table is mean, a jerk, exhibits all sorts of negative unconscious behavior. That very well may be true, and you can work very hard to try to "fix" that person. That effort is unlikely to succeed, but you can try.

 The more important question is why? Not, "Why is this person like this?" Most people in bad relationships spend the bulk of their time pondering this question, both in their heads and out loud. It's a futile inquiry. The better "why" questions is, "Why is this person part of my world?" For the answer to this one you have to look inside yourself. That's where the title to this post comes in.

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Daily Tolle #1

"If there are other people around, preferably your partner or a close family member, the pain-body will attempt to provoke them--push their buttons, as the expression goes--so it can feed on the ensuing drama. Pain-bodies love intimate relationships and families because that is where they get most of their food. It is hard to resist another person's pain-body that is determined to draw you into a reaction. Instinctively, it knows your weakest, most vulnerable points. If it doesn't succeed the first time, it will try again and again It is raw emotion looking for more emotion. The other person's pain-body wants to awaken yours so that both pain-bodies can mutually energize each other."
Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth, p. 148

Monday, July 4, 2011

In Relationships It Only Takes One to Tango

In a relationship, the job is non-reaction. Another word for non-reaction, according to spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle, is forgiveness. Forgiveness works wonders. As the Good Book says, "Love covers a multitude of sins." Forgiveness doesn't require participation from your significant other. It only requires your participation.

Tolle's first book, The Power of Now is in question-and-answer format. The question (in this case, actually, a comment): 
I suppose that it takes two to make a relationship into a spiritual practice, as you suggest. For example, my partner is still acting out his old patterns of jealousy and control. I have pointed this out many times but he is unable to see it. [Italics original]
Tolle's answer: "How many people does it take to make your life into a spiritual practice? Never mind if your partner will not cooperate. Sanity--consciousness--can only come into this world through you." If you wait for your partner to come around, Tolle says, you may be waiting forever.

Monday, June 27, 2011

The Human Addiction

Do you stay to long in relationships that are going nowhere? Is your girlfriend, boyfriend or spouse a negative influence in your life? Does he/she treat you badly (we might even ask simply, does he or she treat you in a way you don't prefer to be treated)? Does it seem like you can never quite get on the same sheet of music, so to speak? And to quote the song, "How long has this been going on?"

A long time, right?

Your significant other is not your problem. As with absolutely every aspect of life, if there's a problem, YOU are that problem. In this case, you may suffer from the human addiction.

Sunday, April 10, 2011

Dramaholic

I found a thought provoking blog post called Are You a Dramaholic? by Carolyn Shannon. In the article, Carolyn draws a distinction between negative and positive drama. She writes: "For years my life was filled with negative drama thriving on the attention it brought me." After many years, says Carolyn, she became wise to her own patterns. "As I stepped onto the path of self awareness I began to realize I was a Dramaholic! I was as addicted to drama as anyone hooked on cigarettes, alcohol, sex or food."

Carolyn gives hope to all the drama addicted people out there, telling them that they don't have to give it up. They simply have to shift focus from negative drama to positive drama, "the WOW moments," as she calls them. "How often a parking spot is right there when needed; how many kind or friendly people we come into contact with each day; unexpected gifts of time, love, money or compliments; all the beautiful pictures Mother Nature keeps creating to awe us" are all excellent examples.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Modern Male Dysfunction

This article was originally published by Technorati on 06 March 2010.

I check in on the female friendly world of Shine from Yahoo! from time to time, just so I can keep the rest of the male world up to date on what's being said over there. This week I've run across an excellent article from Brendan Tapley called 10 Things Men Wish Women Knew About Them.

While this article is meant for women, men should read it too. But please restrain the urge to tweet it to your significant other. Things like that only make them mad, like you're telling them how to think. They hate that.

Friday, March 26, 2010

Black Marriage Day A Celebration of Suffering

This article was originally published by Technorati on 26 March 2010. To see all my Technorati articles, click Lifestyle in the Contents listing on the sidebar.

Black Marriage Day is the 28th of March. What to wear? What to wear? Though I'm neither black nor married (with no prospects even), I'm pretty excited about it.

Some 300 communities across the country will celebrate the joys of marriage with various events, such as vow renewal ceremonies, marriage workshops, black tie galas and the premier of two marriage-related movies, You Saved Me and Why Did I Get Married Too?.

See the trailers . . .

Thursday, December 24, 2009

On Chaste-ness


I'm sitting alone on Christmas Eve writing my blog. So what subject should come to mind but Chaste-ness?

I use the term "Chaste-ness" because the correct term "chastity" is fraught with heavy baggage that includes medieval apparatus designed for its bodily enforcement (see photo; that doesn't look comfortable). But chaste-ness has nothing to do with the body. It's all about the mind.

For any of you who know me well (make that very well, and there are only a few), I will strike you as one of the least chaste people you've ever known. Well, things change.

Chaste-ness has not only to do with sexuality. It pertains to all aspects of life. But for the moment, let's stick with its most well-known benefactor. Believe it or not, your sex drive offers you a unique opportunity for transcendence, one you're wise not to pass up.

From the Archives

What's Your Drama?

Ok, I'll go first. My drama has been to allow my pain-body to take over my thinking in the context of a love relationship. No...

Popular Posts