The Impermanence of Relationships

One of the key reasons relationships have problems that lead to the end of the relationship is that we sometimes live under the delusion that nothing in the relationship should change. As a matter of fact quite often when we first enter into a long term relationship we feel so good about the other person and they feel so good about us that we may even pledge to each other that things will never change, that we will remain in this state of bliss forever.  Well part of that is an absolute impossibility, can you remain in a state of bliss, yes! Will things never change, no way! Things will change, we will change, our environment will change, and everything will change. Change is a constant!

So why would someone look at their significant other ten years later and say “You are not the person I fell in love with”. Duh! Of course he/she is not the person you fell in love with, they changed. Guess what, you are not the same person you were 10 years ago either. You too have changed.

It is unrealistic to believe that things won’t change, that we won’t change, that our relationship won’t change over the years. It is impossible for these things not to change and it is relationship homicide to look at each other and base today on yesterday.  Lives are impermanent and therefore so are relationships. When we get caught up in thinking that our life is permanent or our relationship is permanent than we create a hamster wheel of aggravation, frustration and confusion. We become dissatisfied with our partner because they have changed and we do this with the illusion that we have not changed.

When we understand and accept that everything is impermanent we then open up to the realization that we all change and that change is good. Change is usually an indicator of growth; it is an indicator that we are truly living, evolving beings and not mindless beings that tromp through life, never changing.

One of the keys to a successful relationship is to recognize that the relationship will go through changes because we will go through changes and that by being aware of this, we can embrace the changes rather than try to prevent growth and create frustration.

When we attempt to keep a person or relationship from changing, we often choke the life right out of the relationship. The relationship falls into a rut and both people may start looking for ways outside of their relationship to get out of the rut.  This activity of getting out of the rut often leads one to start to view other opportunities outside of the relationship for stimulus.  This desire to be stimulated may manifest itself in becoming involved to an unhealthy level in a hobby, work, sports, excessive pornography. Etc. In the worst case scenario it may also lead a person to seek out other partners, partners who they have no history with and therefore have no point of comparison.

One of the healthiest things you can do for your self and your relationship is to understand, accept and embrace the magic of impermanence. By doing this, you will come to understand the changes in yourself, your partner and your relationship and you will learn that change and growth are good things and that impermanence is so much better that living in a plastic like permanent world where nothing ever changes.

 

BTW – I will be in the “Big Easy” aka New Orleans for the next week and I will be disconnected from the web. While I am gone, please go back and read the oldies but goodies in the archives.

How Old Are You?

How old are you? Simple question and for most we can answer this question fairly quickly, even though the older we get the less significance our age has and sometimes we have to stop and think about it for a moment. If you are like most, your answer was based on the amount of years since the time your physical body was birthed into this world by your mother. After all, this is how we as humans measure our age. One complete revolution around the Sun and we are chronologically one year older.

Now, let’s ask the question again with the thought in mind that we are eternal beings. How old are you now? Some of you may still count your years in this form and say that is how old you are, while others may reflect upon this question in a new light and come to the thought that if I am an eternal being, then I truly do not know how old I am, for I do not really know when I (my energy) was created or if there was a creation point..

Upon refection about how old I am, I have come to the conclusion that I don’t know, nor does it matter. In many ways this is an irreverent question. We know that age as we know it is irrelevant because we know there are very young people who have wisdom and talent beyond their years here on earth and we also know people who are older who in many ways don’t seem to have the wisdom we would expect a person in the later years of life would have. For instance, last night I was out running some errands and I caught a bit for an Oprah show on the radio where she was highlighting children who have remarkable music talents. There was a 3 year old who played the drums as if he had been playing for 40 plus years, there was an 11 year old who played the guitar as well, if not better then some of the greatest guitar players in this world.

When we come to understand that our earth age is probably not our true age and that age as we have come to understand it is not relevant to our true nature because we are eternal beings then we have a major shift in our perspective. Consider the freedom that you have when you don’t think of age in the traditional manner. We actually remove many limitations from our psyche when we disassociate ourselves with measuring our chronological years on earth.

There is no question that the body which we inhabit is a temporary form, one which changes by the minute as new cells replace old cells, not to mention the ravages of environmental factors and gravity which impact our body on a daily basis. This being said, much of how we think about age impacts even our physical form. Many become old in emotional, mental and physical ways because they believe that this is how a person of their age should be. Our limiting beliefs about aging in many ways accelerate the aging process. It is these same beliefs which cause a person who “retires” to often age very quickly, while others of the same or greater age seem to defy the “normal” aging process and serve in high pressure, intense thinking positions in Parliament, Senates and Congress, in higher education positions, etc.

The way most think of aging is a very self limiting thought pattern which has significant impact on our aging process. Our thoughts are very powerful and have a direct impact on our overall health.

I suggest to you today that you consider how you view your age and what impact your current mindset on aging has on you. I ask you to consider the thought of your eternity and how disassociating your self with chronological age will impact your life and the way you interact with others. Consider the possibility that a four year old may in some way be the same age or older than you. If you truly believe that, would you give more intellectual consideration to the thoughts of that four year old?

You are eternal, this human form is one part of your journey and it may very well not be the first leg of your journey. Imagine the possibilities!

Relationships – Communication – It’s Rarely About the Words

What is one of the pivotal points of any relationship? The pivotal point is communication; quite often the better the communication the stronger the relationship. The weaker the communication the weaker the relationship is.

When we talk about communication in a relationship, communication is not limited to the words we use. As a matter of fact, how we communicate is rarely about the words we use! In a relationship we communicate with words, yes, however much more is communicated through things like our tone, our body language, our eyes, our facial expression and  our reactions after the exchange of words.

Words themselves are very powerful and can be used to invoke both positive and negative reactions from each other. How and when we use our words is even more powerful. In a long term relationship we learn when it is best to communicate certain things and when we choose to be less than nice, we know exactly what words and actions will push the other person’s buttons.

In some relationships it appears that pushing each others buttons becomes the game of choice, it becomes a somewhat dysfunctional way to keep each other entertained within the relationship. Some people even get to the point where they will use button pushing as a way to entertain their friends as in “Watch what she/he does when I say _____”.

When we are less then honest with our words, the tell is usually in our face, eyes, actions and reactions and usually the other person quickly picks up on our insincerity.

The simple phrase “I love you” can evoke many emotions or drop flat depending on how we say it and when we say it. When it is said in a perfucntionary manner it tends to fall flat and have little to no impact. When we say it in the place of an apology or because we know we have been less that we could be or because we want something then it loses its power. If the only time we say “I love you” is in the throws of passion, then it too may lose the desired impact.

The key is we must learn and re-learn how to communicate with each other in a way that is sincere, in a way that is caring. We must choose to listen which is much different from hearing. We must choose to speak from a place of love and not use our words, facial expressions, body language to invoke guilt, pain or any form of insincerity.

If you are in a long term relationship, think back to when the relationship was new and you were in the exploratory stage of the relationship where everything was new and exciting. Even the silent times you spent together were full of communication, flirting with the eyes, smiling at each other as you passed in the hall just to let the other person know that you loved them and felt happy that they were in your life.

As relationships mature, there doesn’t appear to be as much to explore about each other and some of the “cute” stories that you initially love become the very stories that take you over the edge when you hear them for the umpteenth time.

The truth is that this is all a point of perspective and a willingness of both people to keep their relationship new and exciting in a positive way. There is so much happening in the world on a daily basis, how could you possibly run out of things to talk about. I recall a long term relationship I was in many years ago, where I came home and read the paper every night while the other person made dinner. Now you may say, so what? The key is that I came home, stood in the kitchen while she cooked supper and read the paper out loud and we would discuss the things we found interesting in that day’s news. We never ran out of conversation, each night we had great fodder for conversation and we never knew where it was going to take us. This was a purposeful way to keep our conversations fresh and alive and it kept us close and knowing each other better through the thoughts we would share.

As in almost everything we discuss here, the first step is to increase awareness. In this case we must create awareness of every aspect of our communication with each other. Awareness and honest evaluation of all the ways which we communicate can be very enlightening.

For The Love of His Brother?

I

 grew up in a very typical 60’s suburb, where all the homes looked the same and everyone knew each other. All the neighborhood kids grew up with each other, played together and learned about life together. When tragedy hit a family on the street, everyone felt the reverberations of it. Across the street from us lived a family, a wife, father and two sons. Both of the sons were older than me, however I knew them to say hi or when they would visit with my older siblings. When I was about 8 years old, both of these boys were in the service. This was during the time of the Vietnam War. The one boy was stationed in Hawaii. One summer night his family received a call that there son had be killed in an auto accident, he was only nineteen years old. The family was devastated. We all mourned the lost of their son. I can remember how the neighborhood women gathered to help the family through this horrific time. Of course I was only eight and since I was not close with this neighbor boy the impact of his death on me was not a great one. Fast forward ten years, and the family is struck by another tragic event. The older, surviving brother of the same family parked his car atop a very high bridge which was less then a mile from the river, exited the car and plunged over the side of the bridge to his death. He jumped into the cold of the river in the dead of winter and his lifeless body was not found until the water warmed up that summer when my older brother found the body washed up along the river bank (my brother had been looking for the body on a regular basis since he jumped).

Why he jumped to his death was a mystery to all of us. He was in his late twenties, he was happily married, two wonderful little children and he was doing what he loved to do for a living. There was a note left behind, however we never learned what it said. From all appearances this man had everything to live for.

What I didn’t know then is what I learned over the weekend was that he and his brother who had perished in the car accident were very close and that he took his brothers premature death very hard. In fact after the funeral, the older brother disappeared into New York City for a year, living off the streets, trying to come to terms with what had happened. He resurfaced a year later and began to pull his life back together and became very successful.

What I learned yesterday was that there was a witness the night that he jumped off the bridge. The witness related that this man stopped his car on the bridge, calmly exited his car, climbed onto the rail of the bridge and reach is arm out in front of him in a way that looked like he was hugging someone and as he reached out to hug this unseen someone he simply walked off the rail of the bridge. The speculation was that he was reaching out to hug his brother.

I am not attempting to draw any lesson from this story. I am simply relating it as it has been told to me. I felt compelled to share this with you. I cannot tell you how many times I have had chills run up and down my spine as I wrote this.

It does make you think.

I do believe life is eternal. I also believe that there is much that we do not yet see, however it is very real and present.

Beautiful Rainy Days

I sit here today looking out my office window at a very picturesque scene of a church, lush trees and mountains which are obscured by lazy low hanging clouds.

 

 As I sit here taking in this scene of a drizzly, overcast day and I remember how as a young child I use to adore these days. I loved these days as a child because there was no expectation that I should be outside playing. These were days when I could hole away in my room, listen to the radio and dive into a good book or play board games with friends. It was this type of day where dreams were hatched and worlds were created.  

I am one who is rarely concerned with the weather other than to know how to dress for the day. I don’t let rain dampen my day. I remember living in England for three years where it didn’t take long to figure out you could not plan around the weather. You simply planned what you were going to do and made adjustments because of the weather as needed.

Life in general is much like this isn’t it? We can’t afford to wait for the fair weather days of life to do all the things we need/want to do. We must plan and make adjustments as we go. We never know when a storm may hit our life. We can never truly predict how are day will go. Life is full of surprises that have the ability to throw us off track. The key is to understand that is how life is, there are very few absolutes in a given day and we must be able to roll with the punches as my mother used to tell me.

Life is wonderful, be it a sunny day or a day with clouds in it. There is joy to found in all facets of our life, if we are aware enough to notice.

Live your life full of love and you will love your life no matter what may come your way!

Dare to Think

 

Have you ever been told or heard someone say “You are not paid to think” or that “Curiosity killed the cat”, or some similar phrase which is designed to have you sit down and shut up and get in line with the rest of the world?

Society has forever attempted to suppress the thoughts of people, particularly thoughts which were not aligned with excepted cultural beliefs. Many people have burned at the stake or died some other horrible death because they dared to think and took it one step further and were bold enough to share their thoughts with the rest of the world. Jesus Christ was crucified for his thoughts, Socrates was forced to drink hemlock for his, and the list goes on and on. There are countless people whom share no fame who have died for daring to express their thoughts. Galileo was placed under house arrest for his thoughts. Even today, in our so called modern world, there are still people who are put to death or punished in some way because they have chosen to think for themselves.

Thinking people scare political parties and some religious organizations. The fear is that if you put too much thought into what they stand for that you might find the thread that unravels all that which they stand for.  In many relationships the dominant person often attempts to suppress the thinking of their mate. Why, because they want to control the other person and they fear that “thinking” may enable the person not to depend on them.

Free thinking is sometimes even suppressed within our schools which for many is the bedrock of knowledge. Free thinkers often frustrated their learned teachers with their question of why things are the way they are.

If history has taught us anything it’s that it’s the thinkers who change the world. It is those who think and act on their thoughts that enabled us to enjoy many things which we take for granted today, flight, space exploration, electricity, running water, medicine, etc.

We are thinkers; it is our natural state of grace, to think. Want proof, hang around a small child for a few hours. Their favorite question is “Why?”. They are inherently curious; they love to think and to express their thoughts.

As we grow older, (notice I don’t use the word mature) we tend to get beaten down by the adults in our life and we learn not to be so curious and not to think too much. We learn that despite what we have been told, there does seem to be stupid questions, other wise why would we get the reactions we do from people. We learn to suppress our natural inclination to think and to ask questions to the point where we forget how to really think and how to ask questions.

Many must re-learn how to think for themselves. We must learn to look through the eyes of a child and ask questions and not blindly except what is presented to us.

Can you over think something, yes, I do believe that we can get so caught up in thinking about something that it is not effective for us.

Balance in everything, sometimes there are times where not thinking is the most appropriate thing we can do at the moment.

Free yourself to think. Give yourself permission to think beyond that which you know and give yourself permission to question the status quo. There is great freedom and great courage to be found in free thinking.

Dare to think!

Dissatisfied With Your Life? Not Me!

Are you dissatisfied with your life? I was reading a book over the weekend and one of the main premises is that everyone is dissatisfied with their life. It went on to state that this is proven by the fact that everyone wants more of something, more money, more love, more happiness, more wisdom, more something.  I personally don’t believe this is true of all people. I think there is a distinct difference between wanting more and being dissatisfied with one’s current life situation. Of course most people would like to have more of something in their life, however, having the desire to grow in abundance in any way is not a direct indictment that one is not satisfied with their current life.

Marketers and many authors would like us to think that just because we desire something more in our life that we must then be dissatisfied with our current life situation. This is kind of like saying that because I desire dessert after a meal that  I am not satisfied with my meal. Of course one has nothing to do with the other. I could be perfectly satisfied by my meal and yet still have a desire to eat dessert and if I  don’t get dessert I would not be any less satisfied with my meal.

I personally have to say that I live a very blessed life, one which I am satisfied with in the “now”.  Do I want more abundance in my life, more wisdom, more growth, more love, of course I do, however I am in no way dissatisfied with the life I live in this moment, nor am I dissatisfied with what I have in my life. If I die today, my last thoughts will not be of what I wish I had more of and this is because I am satisfied, I am happy and I know that nothing that I don’t currently have will make me any happier.

The key is to tune into your self and to understand what marketing people do, they build their industry on FUD, which is an acronym for Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. If the marketing teams of this world can instill enough FUD into your brain you can easily believe that you are dissatisfied with your life.

Create your own level of awareness of your satisfaction of life. Do not compare it to what your culture is telling you and do not compare your self to others. Your satisfaction with your life should be solely based on you and not what others think or direct.

Remember wanting more does not always mean that you are not satisfied. You can be satisfied and have your dessert too!

Disease to Please

 

It feels good when we please other people doesn’t it? It gives us great joy to know that we have pleased another. We are often rewarded with kind words, a smile or with some other token of appreciation. We often make efforts to “please” our spouse, our children the people or company that we work for. We even make efforts to please people we do not even know. It is wonderful to be able to please people!

Pleasing people can be an addictive behavior. Sometimes our need to please others overrides our need to please ourselves. Many people get to a point where pleasing others is not enough, they need to please everyone and  We may even get to a point where we fool ourselves by saying that even though I do not have the time/energy to please myself that I am okay because I am pleasing others. This becomes our story, and for most it works for awhile, however often times at some point, we come to realize that our desire to please overrides our need to please ourselves and we become lost in a disease to please.

When our story becomes so focused that we compute our value on how we please others we become devastated when we feel we are not pleasing someone/everyone. We become very sensitive to how others respond to us or don’t respond to us. We may even create problems in our relationships with others that don’t even exist. We tend to believe it is our inherent responsibility to make everyone else happy.

Our perception of others reactions becomes skewed and our desire to please becomes a liability rather than the natural gift that it should be.  When this happens we lose touch with ours self and our relationship with the world at large.

As in most things, the first step is awareness. We must be able to stop and really look at what we are doing and what our motives are. We must also ask are we neglecting our self in any way? Do we feel that we are sacrificing to please others?

We must love and embrace our self; we must take care of our needs. When we do this first and make this our priority, we are then in a better position to help others for all of the right reasons and to feel the satisfaction of pleasing others and also accept ourselves when our actions do not please others or create the reaction that we expected.

Live from your heart and soul, give freely to your self and of your self to others and know a joyful life.