An Exploration of Unconditional Love cont....
The man had a predictable built-in reaction to this, which was "Oh shit! Here we go again. Why can't I ever have a relationship work out? Just when I was thinking about us moving in together, she wants to back away. This is how it always goes. I am never quite good enough. I am good, but not good enough." As you see, the condition by this time had become two minds relating to each other as "Its", coming out of the same mouths that used to be used by their beings for love. They are both right about each other when they say "you changed" because, of course, both have changed. In just six weeks, they have changed from beings out of their mind with love into minded beings.
Half of these wonderful beginnings split up. If they are "like-minded" beings, they stay together in boredom the rest of their lives. If they escape their minds' beliefs about each other repeatedly, they have a successful relationship.
I talked to this particular man alone, and then to his lover and him together. I suggested that the way they had been telling the truth to each other in the beginning, and even in the moment of our speaking together, was what a powerful relationship is made of. I recalled to him and to myself how badly some of our previous relationships based on romantic love had worked out. I said, "Soap operas are full of people who are in love and start withholding from each other. The nostalgia for what used to be, combined with resentment and hope for renewal, produces what we call romantic love. Romantic love is highly overrated. Romantic love is not as strong as a new friendship based on telling the truth. Romantic love is still fun, though not as romantic, without the tragic overtones of soap opera that come from withholding and being secretive. Romantic love recurs, every now and then, rather than dying after the honeymoon is over, if people have open-to-each-other relationships. Keep working on telling the truth about everything that goes on with each of you and you can work your way through to a powerful relationship." That was my stand, and the place I listened to them from, and though I did my best and so did they, they didn't succeed. Those guys didn't make it. They parted, having learned another increment of information about relationships, but not a sufficient one to allow them to make that one work.
Half of these wonderful beginnings split up. If they are "like-minded" beings, they stay together in boredom the rest of their lives. If they escape their minds' beliefs about each other repeatedly, they have a successful relationship.
I talked to this particular man alone, and then to his lover and him together. I suggested that the way they had been telling the truth to each other in the beginning, and even in the moment of our speaking together, was what a powerful relationship is made of. I recalled to him and to myself how badly some of our previous relationships based on romantic love had worked out. I said, "Soap operas are full of people who are in love and start withholding from each other. The nostalgia for what used to be, combined with resentment and hope for renewal, produces what we call romantic love. Romantic love is highly overrated. Romantic love is not as strong as a new friendship based on telling the truth. Romantic love is still fun, though not as romantic, without the tragic overtones of soap opera that come from withholding and being secretive. Romantic love recurs, every now and then, rather than dying after the honeymoon is over, if people have open-to-each-other relationships. Keep working on telling the truth about everything that goes on with each of you and you can work your way through to a powerful relationship." That was my stand, and the place I listened to them from, and though I did my best and so did they, they didn't succeed. Those guys didn't make it. They parted, having learned another increment of information about relationships, but not a sufficient one to allow them to make that one work.