Return of the Virgin The Return of the Virgin A Work in Progress On the Relationship between Sex and Spirit by Martha diChristi copyright 1995, 1998 all rights reserved  Prologue The Kundalini and the Dungeon Master The Evolution of Human Sexuality The Demons Demon 1 Kill Desire: Demon 2 Reprogram Desire Demon 3 Sex Apart: Demon 4 Praise and Criticism, Outside Authority Demon 5 I am Flawed: Demon 6 - Monogamy: Demon 7 Happiness is not Goodness: Demon 8 Conflicting Will: Demon 9 Love Can Be Gained, Lost or Won: Demon 10 Marriage Sanctifies a Relationship: Demon 11 Working on Relationships: Demon 12 Avoid Fear, Face Pain: Demon 13 God is Dead: Demon 14 Hard work: Demon 15 Young and Slender: Demon 16 Ways, Means and Techniques: How the Inner Voice Works Pattern 1 Criticism Pattern 2 Unrequited Love Pattern 3 The Denial of Love Pattern 4 Recognizing the Time to Move On Pattern 5 Jealousy Pattern 6 It's for the Children Pattern 7 Soul Mates Pattern 8 On Being the Interloper A Woman's Path Life Ever After On Being Known Mystical Union Sacrament Benediction *********** dedicated to my daughter *********** And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, they say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou? This they said tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not. So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. And again he stooped and wrote on the ground. And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee? She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more. John 8:3-11 Prologue This little book was originally written for a close family member. Once it started gaining a wider audience, I felt a need to make explicit where I was coming from. I wrote it because I saw someone I loved struggling with things I too had struggled with and spent a lot of time thinking about. I wanted her to come into adulthood with a clear understanding of why I had divorced her father. I have seen so many people trapped in marriages, feeling morally obliged to provide physical intimacy to spouses who have spent many years at their side doing the best they could, feeling obliged not to lie with others for whom they do feel that mysterious and overwhelming tenderness. I didn't want my daughter to be caught in the very dilemma that caused me so much anguish simply because I failed to communicate honestly what went on. I wanted her to know that as far as I am concerned, she is free, that I honor her life whether she chooses a committed relationship or not. The discipline that this book is founded on is that of refusing sexual contact on any other basis than deep and heartfelt desire, that of being open to any contact however 'illegitimate' which flows naturally from the longings of the heart. Such contact is free, and for this reason the flip side of this discipline is that of abstaining from any effort to control, manipulate or convince, that of refusing to be controlled or manipulated. The discipline is rather one of relying entirely on the acknowledgement of love and allowing the Heavens to arrange the details. This discipline does not attempt in any way to deny human sexuality but leads one through it in its fullness to the restoration of the true Virginity, the Virginity which has nothing to do with form, the Virginity that maintains reverence in all it does, that is never violated, that is pure, that ultimately is the Source of all things. Much of what I write here is in my experience not right for most people. I write of a point to which I have been led. I believe that had I not at age 12 had an experience called Shaktipat Initiation, that the flowing of my energy would have been different. But I thought it helpful for those who have had such an experience and found that their inclinations in relationship and sexuality differ from those of society in general to describe my experience and try to make clear why I think a radically different way than that generally instituted in society is also legitimate for some people. When I was a little girl and first heard this quote from the book of John, it seemed obvious to me that when Jesus said, "Go forth and sin no more", he meant, "Go forth and be true to your passion," not "Go forth and deny it." He had after all stated as clearly as possible that he did not judge this woman's conduct. I felt in him a guardian angel over her willingness to be true to herself. I heard him saying, "I have protected you once, and I will protect you ever after from these ubiquitous forces of the church and society and state which would condemn you. For my power is greater than theirs." In freeing her from judgement, I understood him not to be saying, "I recognize what you did was evil, but I'm not going to punish you for it," but rather to be saying, "I do not recognize your conduct as evil." For what else could true forgiveness be? As I grew up, this interpretation was knocked out of me, and it has only been laboriously recovered over many confounding and difficult years. I have not written this for a large public audience. I originally wrote it for an audience of one or perhaps two, and it just coincidentally gained a wider audience. I don't feel inclined to rewrite it for public appeal. I don't believe in convincing skeptics. I think, in fact, that it would be dangerous for people to attempt this path unless it is happening by itself. I think for that reason that we shouldn't read what doesn't appeal to us. Some people who read it find it too categorical or even condescending. Others don't react to it in that way at all. They only hear in me a fellow traveller, which is, of course, what I am. Many people who have come to this book without knowing me question, for example, its Christian bias. To those who spend time with me, it is obvious that I belong to no church and consider all religions equally valid, indeed indispensible. And all of those that I have engaged which includes all the major ones have served me deeply. I have since early childhood had visitations by Jesus, and feel very strongly connected to him as a brother and a teacher. Emotionally, I am therefore more Judeo-Christian in orientation than Eastern, but that is just a side-effect of where I got plopped down in this lifetime. I use the word 'Christ' to refer to our true and only identity. The Christ, as I use the word, is not different from God, who is the Creator. I view 'Christ' as a Christian term for a reality that finds a correlate in all religions. I assume the reader is no longer preoccupied with political issues of this nature and easily reads into my words whatever alternative terminology best suits his or her inclinations. I assume the reader is no longer fooled by the distinction between the essence and the forms of religions. Another source of confusion stems from my understanding that anything which is limited by form can not properly be said to Exist. In my understanding, the cosmos is a giant dream. We think we're bodies, but we're not. This is not the place for me to defend this. I refer the reader to the mystical works of all the religious traditions. And in addition to what one may read and believe, it is something that can be directly verified in mystical vision. And many people feel I should write in a lot more, 'in my experience', 'in my opinion', and so forth. But most of it I do not experience as my opinion. I would say that I know it. I don't say, "In my experience, 72+82=154," even if it later turns out that I have made a miscalculation or seen only part of the truth. Emerson writes, "My brothers, there is a God." Those who wish he would write, "My brothers, in my opinion, there is a God," shouldn't read Emerson. The qualifications leave the phrase without much punch. And besides, he didn't think there was a God. He knew. Who wants to go through life constantly qualifying everything? I state my truth as I feel it. If you feel it's wrong, then state your own truth as unequivocally as I have stated mine. If we can treat one another's truths with respect, then we'll eventually be brought to terms, for God, after all, is One. That doesn't mean that the likes of Emerson never got ticked off when his kids dumped their oatmeal all over the dining room carpet. And so do I. But despite of my considerable capacity for error, I would be misrepresenting the process and presenting a much less hopeful picture than is in fact the case if I claimed to be opinion that which is in fact knowable by the ordinary citizen. Finally, I have seen this book used as inspiration to judge or rank a spouse, and subsequently to enter into a different, 'higher' and 'holier' special relationship with someone else. I struggle not to feel sad about this. If the reader is so inclined, I would say this manuscript is not for him or her. As far as I'm concerned, there's no point belittling one relationship to start the same pattern with someone 'better' no matter how profound the feeling and the feeling is always profound. I would like to state explicitly that replacing one special relationship with another is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a state of mind that places no person above another, that excludes no one and evaluates no one, that addresses each relationship with profound reverence, that places no special label on any relationship 'my wife', 'my boyfriend', 'my soul mate', 'my partner', that is content to see every relationship as it is and to allow it to unfold according to its own genius. The essence of the transition to this state is the capacity for reverence. We are all soul mates, every one of us. My experience is that the people that really feel moved to take on what I speak of are fairly few and far between. The majority of my readers agree with me only 'sort of', which is as it should be. Allah be praised for dissent. *********** Andrew: They commissioned me to write a high school textbook on the life of Chopin. I wrote it. They even paid me a little. They printed it and started using it, but then they stopped. Inko: I know why... You were too frank about his relationships with women. It was too real. Martha: But it's exactly 16-year-olds who need to hear it. It's not like they're not going to face those issues. There's a grand conspiracy to send people into the greatest battlefield of life completely unarmed. Danny: No... It's much worse than that.. We send them out armed with a sock and tell them their whole life that socks work great against machine guns, that all good people use socks. Only evil people use machine guns. We tell them to block the bullets with their face. 1997 The Kundalini and the Dungeon Master When I was 13, I looked for something which discussed my concerns about sex, and in all the years since, I never really found it. The culture we are brought up in has a very consumer-oriented approach to things, and this holds of our attitude to sex as well. To be sure, one can find lots and lots of books about sex human physiology, pregnancy and childbirth, contraceptives, venereal disease, sexual techniques, pornography, erotica, romances, but none of that seemed to really answer the questions that lay on my heart. Even the New Age books which talk of the more spiritual and loving aspects of sex, Tantra and Yoga never quite hit the mark for me. And so, like most of us who live in this culture of unhelpful advice, I have had to work a great many things out for myself. This is a summary of what I now see, what I wish I had been told at 13. At that age, besides becoming interested in sex, I also became very preoccupied with spirituality. I in fact had a mystical encounter which completely reoriented me, and which I kept to myself secretly and guiltily for many years. I know now that this is fairly common at that age and that sexuality is related directly to the life of the spirit. In fact, the energy which underlies sex also drives spiritual quickening, science, art and music. Mankind has known this for many ages. In India, this energy is called the Kundalini and is symbolized by a snake. If this energy is not flowing freely, these other higher aspects of our humanity are inaccessible to us. We become more dead than alive. When the energy is channeled wrongly, sex is ugly; relationship is painful, limiting and conflicted. When it flows smoothly, it fills us with grandeur, creativity and balance. Our contacts with other people are filled with gladness. Our terror is recognized as nothing less than our glad hymn to our Creator. Sexual desire has a function. This function is awakening, purification and understanding. Pain, guilt and ugliness in sex and relationship disappear when we have compassion and understanding, when sex is given over to the heart. And this is certainly one of the great tasks we must carry out as human beings. The means that Nature uses to teach us to turn this energy over to the heart is Feeling. Contrary to popular belief, it is feeling, not thinking, which aprises us directly of what is true. We have an inner voice that guides us moment to moment by feeling, and the place it leads us to is joy and purity of heart. When something feels good and holy, Nature is telling us that we are going in the right direction. When something feels nasty, ugly or painful, Nature is telling us we are going in the wrong direction. Nature plays this 'getting warmer, getting colder' game with us. It does not, however, force us to do what will make us joyful. It informs us by means of our inner voice, but it leaves us free to choose our own course of action. The guide which informs us of what feels right and what feels wrong does not lie outside us, but within. To learn to turn sex over to the heart, you must learn to listen within to your own inner voice. Whatever you learn from an outside authority, you will be forever uncertain about. You can only know for certain that which you learn from within. If you do not listen within, you will doubt, and you will be enslaved by your outside authority. To hear your inner voice clearly, you must cultivate sensitivity, and sensitivity requires leisure. You can't feel properly if you're rushed. This all perhaps sounds very easy, but it is not. And the reason it is difficult to simply follow our joy is that in every culture that has ever existed, there is a demon, a force of illusion, which actively tries to thwart us from truth and happiness. It plays a game with us. It constantly hangs in front of our noses little carrots that say, "Choose me instead of joy." "Choose me instead of holiness." "Choose me instead of generosity, goodwill and peace of mind." The main hold the Dungeon Master has on us is fear. The only reason you ever choose a carrot rather than the heart is fear. These little carrots are held by the school principal, your girlfriend, your boss or your mother who threaten to fire you, shame you, abandon you, brand you as immoral or flunk you out of school unless you eat lots of carrots. The Dungeon Master wastes your time with carrots. You are kept in fearful and guilty distraction chasing after meaningless duties and obligations, so you don't have time for your rapture, your inner voice. And then you die. That's the Dungeon Master's agenda. To get through this game, you need to be aware about the nature of this demon of illusion, how it works. Indeed, the whole function of sexual desire is awareness. It forces you to choose between awareness and agony. To pass by carrots, you need awareness provided by the inner voice, and once you know what to do, you need courage to actually do it. What gives you courage to pass by the carrots in favor of joy is understanding who you are. All the threatening personalities that hold these carrots will in some form or another attack your body your reputation, your career, your job, your family, your financial situation. And the way you gain immunity from the threats is to be aware that you are not a body. Who you are in no way resembles a television set, a potato peeler, a human body or a woodstove. Therefore if your body breaks, you are not broken. Whatever they do can't hurt you. You are spirit. Spirit gives rise to matter, and not the other way around. Love cannot be threatened by anything at all. Again, it's of limited use to memorize this. To be free of fear, you must recognize directly, inwardly that this is really so, and it is this that the process forces us to recognize. We come to certain understandings through trials and reasoning, and to others through direct revelation. But no matter what you are given to see through the grace of God, the process never leads you to become less 'human'. You never become incapable of experiencing sorrow, doubt or anger, of falling in love. The range of experience widens rather than narrows as the process proceeds. You only become less and less identified with that which courses through you, better at steering your mind away from unhelpful patterns. So each new carrot that confronts you with a distraction will push you beyond yourself to a new level of understanding as to your identity. The Dungeon Master in this game is extremely ingenious, and will always put in your way a carrot and an accompanying personality guaranteed to push major buttons. But the test is never so difficult that you can't pass it if you really apply yourself. The more freely the Kundalini flows in us, the higher the level at which you are playing this game. The stakes become higher. The demons that confront you have more teeth, more subtlety and more wrath. Your own passion is greater, your feelings more refined and powerful. Specifically, the way that sexual desire leads to awareness is this. What keeps you in the game is your desire. You are attracted to something, and you seek to engage it. You are then at some point in some way not met. You experience separation. You stay separated until you distinguish the truth from what is not true, and in this recognition, you are set free. It is the pain of separation which keeps you from doing nothing, which forces you to go through the process of reflection and coming to awareness. That's how it works. What you are attracted to when you are dragged into a game by your desire is always truth. It is never anything else. Only truth has the power to hold us transfixed. But the truth is then wrapped in a very confusing package of lies and false concepts, and in the case of sex and religion, the truth is wrapped in confusing packaging indeed. The truth is always in the domain of feeling, and the packaging is always in the domain of thinking. It's perhaps easier to see the distinction between truth and packaging if you first look at how it works in religions. The truth at the center of Christianity which so attracts us can be found in statements like, "Love the Lord your God. Peace on earth. Goodwill toward men. Love does not rejoice in the wrong, but rejoices in the right." The packaging the lie which our thinking gets caught in includes ideas like, 'You must join the Church to be good. The man called Jesus who lived and died 2000 years ago is the only Son of God. If you don't believe this, you will burn in hell forever.' The packaging always involves a form, an institution or organization to which we are expected to make a commitment. When you become Christian, you are dragged into membership and held fast by this flame of truth. Then your pain forces you to distinguish the truth from the packaging, to keep the truth and reject the packaging. The same thing happens when you fall in love. You are drawn by the beauty you see in another human being. The rapture you experience drags you into the process whether you like it or not. And then you get caught in the packaging. You make a commitment to a form. You fall out of love. You try instead to own or limit this person. You try to improve or correct him or her. You try to use him or her for pleasure, security, income, labor. Or you get criticized and try to improve youself. You try to adapt yourself to another. You sacrifice and sacrifice for the 'relationship'. And until you see that you are doing all this, until you see that it is a mistake to do this, you are caught in the packaging. You are stuck in the form, the 'marriage', the 'relationship' and not the love itself. You are in pain. You are not in love. Once you see it, you recognize the love that is always there. You are set free relative to this person. *********** Martha: It's incredible to me that we can convince ourselves that we are monogamous. Danny: I can't imagine what you're talking about? I mean, the evidence is overwhelming. I can't think of a single instance of infidelity in the entire history of humanity. Martha: So what would it look like if we were monogamous? There would be only one person in the entire world that we felt desire for. Danny: We wouldn't have the slightest desire for another. Martha: None. Zero. Danny: Better hope your one and only is local. Martha: Like you live in Peking. Danny: And they live in Nairobi. 1997 The Evolution of Human Sexuality I believe I discern an evolution in the way nature has used human sexuality to return us to the heart. 1. In the first phase of this evolution, sexuality resembles what pornography represents. The pornography that sells does not portray two thoughtful people who are deeply in love meeting in private. What sells portrays a Playboy bunny who encounters in a public place a jock whom she does not know or have any spiritual feeling for. They fuck with no resulting emotional bond. This sexuality is obviously not monogamous. It is animal. It is authentic. Judging from the sales of pornography, we clearly respond to it deeply, but it lacks heart. 2. In the second phase, the family is brought into being. It is primarily a socio-economic arrangement. This is the phase of arranged marriage, and though it doesn't originate in the higher romantic feeling between husband and wife, it does reflect the presence of the heart in its concern for the family. At this phase there is a very clear hierarchy between man and woman. Woman is formally a possession. A man can in general have many wives, but a woman may not have many husbands. Adultery committed by a woman is punishable by death. The notion of adultery is introduced with such an intensity to prevent a fall-back into the first phase. The attractiveness of vulgar sexuality is so great that nothing short of the threat of death is strong enough to prevent it. In this manner, the path is made clear for the emergence of a society and a civilization. Unlike in the previous phase, the man is obliged to support his children financially. 3. The third major phase comes with the introduction of romantic love. The heart has entered much more deeply into the human psyche. In this phase, relationships are fully monogamous. Both partners are equal. Neither party is formally a possession, and in this respect, the notion of 'human-being as commodity' has fallen away. But we still treat one another as possessions in that adultery is still considered a crime, though not so severely punishable. At this phase, we are overwhelmed with passion of a new kind. And we willingly compromise our cravings to be most special to another person. People in this phase marry for love, and in this regard it is a personal and spiritual affair. But the ceremony is performed in public, and to this extent it remains also a socio-economic institution. This period began in the late middle ages and has continued through the 20th century. It of course predominates in Western societies and rightly so. 4. I am writing here of what seems to me a transition to a fourth phase that wants to happen in some fairly small portions of society, the reverberations of which can be felt everywhere. I don't think of the phase I discuss in this book as a final phase. Like monogamous marriage it must be a transition to something else. Intimations of what I call this fourth phase have also made themselves known throughout human history. Even Jesus blessed those who left their families for the Christ's sake. The reverberations of this transition is most clearly visible in the divorce rate. I see a divorce as a positive sign, a sign that someone is coming to a point of spiritual awareness in which they are no longer willing to let their love be pushed under by financial concerns and social institutions. It is a sign that someone has courage enough to follow the heart no matter what the cost. I'd like to offer here a way to freedom which doesn't involve the psychological abandonment implicit in divorce. The transition to this phase has been made possible by a number of factors. Technology and the higher status of women in society have wiped out the economic limitations that kept many marriages together. But more importantly, both men and women have come to demand more of relationship. We seek a profound experience of aliveness in our human interactions. This demand in us represents a yet higher presence of the Heart. We now think of our relationships much less in terms of society and children and economics, and much more as a spiritual encounter between one soul and another soul. In this phase, you are no longer suppressing desires to sleep around with people you have little feeling for... you don't want to lie with anyone other than those for whom you are experiencing a deep spiritual connection. You find, for example, that you no longer read or shun pornography; you just lose interest in it. The monogamous marriage which determines in advance who we will sleep with can no longer provide an outlet for our rapture moment by moment. At most periods of human history for most people, it takes an entire lifetime to assimilate into ourselves a single significant relationship. But once the kundalini rises to a certain point, one feels trapped within the very notions of romantic love which set humanity free. And to the extent that we find ourselves free of bondage to our lower cravings, we are able to reincorporate the Primitive within us, not as its slave nor as its master, but as its friend. For now desire is infused with heart. We need no longer resist giving ourselves up to our desire, because it is always accompanied by depth and tenderness. We are also in this transition gradually freed from jealousy, because we no longer have to be most special to anyone. We recognize ourselves as spirit enough that we don't depend on the structure of family and society to comfort us. We find a higher degree of comfort from within. Consider now the demons, the carrots, that confront one in the transition from the third stage to the fourth. *********** Alan (laughing): Martha, I love you so much, that I don't want you ever to feel any love for anyone else. No... Wait a minute. I love you much more than that. I love you so much, that I don't want you ever to enjoy yourself except when you're with me. I want you to be miserable when you're not with me. That's how much I love you... Wait! Here's one... I love you because you're thoughtful and independent. I love you so much, that I want you to give up your thoughtfulness and independence, and I want you to stay in my house for the rest of your life and wash my clothes and cook my meals. I love you so much that I want you to like it. 1995  The Demons Demons always tell lots of lies and reinforce them mightily by something we call 'morality'. Truth doesn't need morals to keep it in place. Truth is remarkably sturdy. Morality always masks a lie. All our childhood, we have been forced into a vast network of moralized lies, an entire thought system which is completely wrong. This is not only true of our culture. It is true of any culture that has ever existed. It may seem that the universe is terribly evil in thus misleading innocent little children. But even as children, we can only be misled in the first place if we lack some awareness, if we are misidentified. To the extent that we are aware, we are immune from being misled, and even children at birth differ in awareness. By being dropped into this mess and now being called to extract ourselves, we gain awareness. We are in this way given eyes to see who we are, to see the glory of God. What do the demons which thwart us in following our heart look like in our particular day and age? In our culture? Demon 1 Kill Desire: Some people say that the way to get around this Kundalini is to stop desiring, but this is impossible and ridiculous. You cannot give sex to the heart by trying to kill it. The path leads directly to overwhelming passion. The only way not to desire is to die, and even that doesn't help. In my experience with people, the journey which starts in puberty always begins by, among other things, turning ourselves over to the undeniable pleasure of orgasm. Since orgasm can hold our attention, it must contain a seed of truth. It requires of us the virtues of surrender and relinquishment of judgement. In it you stand true to yourself, free of concepts in naked experience. You follow your bliss. At some point along the path, you must engage raw pleasure fully and non-judgementally in order that a more fulfilling path can open before you. You must sex yourself as long as you feel inclined to do so, but no longer. If you try to cut short or prolong that process in accordance with some ideal, you just delay the emergence of the awareness of love. In general, you might describe the process as the discipline of doing exactly what you feel like no matter what anyone thinks about it. Anyone who has tried this will testify that it is a much harder discipline than that of kowtowing to public opinion. You are led beyond simple pleasure and raw sexual attraction, not by denying them, not because they are immoral, but because they do not bring you joy. The reason pleasure does not give us joy is that of itself, it has nothing to do with the heart, and only the heart has the power to grant joy. Pleasure alone leaves us behind empty and lonely. It drains the energy of life from us and gives us nothing in return. If you would know joy, then the heart must lead, and every other aspect of life your mind, your pleasure, your actions, must follow. Demon 2 Reprogram Desire: You can't kill desire. Neither can you just decide in advance what you will desire, what would be convenient. Your desire leads the way, and you have to follow. It can't go the other way around. You can't decide what or who you will be in love with. You can't say, "Wouldn't it be great if I had a passion for medicine, because doctors make so much money. I'll try to have a passion for medicine." Or "I'll feel passion for my wife. Then I can be happily married. I'll change my passion so my life doesn't have to change." You can't do it. Your desire leads. If you deny it, you'll be in agony. If you follow it, your life will change, for the very purpose of desire is to increase your understanding such that your current circumstances are no longer tolerable to you. Demon 3 Sex Apart: We have a propensity to see sex as something apart, something with independent existence. Once we have a word for 'sex', we can talk in terms of needing it, wanting it, getting it, having it, selling it,... Sex apart from life, from simple unreflecting desire, from being in love has overtones of a commodity, of exchange of goods. In this, it is always a mild or not so mild version of rape or prostitution. There is a state of mind in which there is no word for 'sex'. In our holiness, there is no such thing. When you are in love, you know that you cannot want sex. Whatever it is that you want is always some form of Meeting. When you seem to want something else, you have merely confused means and end. "Ah ha!" says the 'Sex Apart' demon. "Sex doesn't exist, huh? Holy people must be celibate then." No. 'Not having sex. Not wanting sex. Not getting sex....' all see sex as separate as well. Wanting and not wanting are the same. When you are in love, you see clearly and you are free relative to what is commonly called sexual behavior. No activity of itself is right or wrong. The process always involves turning attention toward who you are, toward your relationship with your Creator. And attention is thereby withdrawn from what you should or should not do. Any limitation or attempt to force sexual behavior places attention on the wrong level, and this is suffering. Form must be permitted to flow freely from Content. Demon 4 Praise and Criticism, Outside Authority: The first thing that happens in relationships after you make a commitment and fall out of love is that you try to fix each other and yourselves so the relationship can be saved. All criticism is misguided. Whatever criticizes you, praises you or tries to improve you, evaluate you or scare you does not know what is true and in that moment is not loving you. You should therefore never ask what criticizes or praises you for advice. There are only two ways we respond to a situation control and love. What I control, I do not love. What I love, I do not control. My critics aren't loving me. They seek control. They have set themselves up as the 'authorities' outside me, which distract me from hearing the voice within. The same is true of those who praise. They seek favor, a form of control. Demon 5 I am Flawed: What holds this last demon in place is the idea that I can be flawed or that someone else can. I found that a big step toward getting out of the painful periods in relationships is discovering that there is nothing wrong with you, and that you do not need to be improved upon. Neither does anybody else. The path does not go through self-improvement, criticism or praise, but through understanding. I have spent significant portions of my life trying to do whatever people asked of me so that they'd stop being angry or critical. I acted out of fear. But the correct thing to do at that difficult moment when you are criticized is to withdraw and listen to the voice within, not to the criticism outside. It doesn't serve anyone to collapse into guilt. The truth always takes the form, "I am innocent and so are you. Therefore what is really going on is..." We are not called to be good little boys and girls, to adhere to laws, morals and regulations, but to freedom, joy and truth. We cannot become perfect. We are perfect already. Demon 6 - Monogamy: Our religious books and biology books tell us that man is a monogamous species. This view is strongly reinforced by morals. But 5-10 seconds reflection will inform you that this is simply false. Everyone who has fallen in love or desired at all has desired more than once. Yet marriage and our entire social structure is based on the assumption that man is monogamous, or at least can force himself to be monogamous, or at least would be better if he were monogamous. So we are pressured by prodigious social institutions and personal expectations to 'sanctify' every sexual encounter with some kind of a promise. Any vow other than the vow to be true to yourself is a vow to at some point be untrue to yourself. We can be put by this means in incredible conflict with ourselves. We can't not desire. Yet in fulfilling our desire, we are required to promise to deny ourselves in the future. Why do we do this to ourselves? The reason must be fear. "Being left for another" implies to most people that there's something wrong with them. We try to lock our lover in by force. If children result, the woman can easily fear the financial burden of handling it alone. She tries to force the man by moral judgement and shame into bearing half the responsibility. At some point in the process of coming to awareness, marriage must logically collapse and be unhappy, because it is based on the false premise that mankind is monogamous. And yet just because a cup or a pencil breaks or is used up does not mean it is evil or serves no function. It does not mean that all cups and pencils should be abolished. Marriage exists, because it reflects a certain stage in our developing awareness, and it falls away when our awareness changes. Demon 7 Happiness is not Goodness: The primary reason I have failed to follow the instructions of my inner voice and do what makes me happy is that I was taught by the authorities outside me that goodness and happiness are not always the same. I was told that sometimes what makes me happy makes other people angry or sad, and that I sometimes have to compromise my own happiness for someone else. I was confronted with a society that presupposed in all kinds of ways that following my desire is immoral, that following desire would make me promiscuous and preoccupied with sex, that it would make me irresponsible and self-absorbed. However, just the opposite must be true. You become preoccupied with air when it is unnaturally limited. If you try to lead rather than following your desire, you walk straight into a net of endless and meaningless and painful entanglements. You have to follow your joy, your desire, your rapture, your inner voice. You must not try to lead it. The truth is that what is good also makes us happy. The truth is that what I really want is good and will bring others joy. What makes me happy makes everyone happy. Pleasure is not everything, but gladness is. Gladness is worthy of our full attention. I find that this comes up in relationships a lot, because it very often seems like you want to be close to someone, but they do not want to be close to you, or vice versa. We are taught that we have to sacrifice what we want. We are taught compromise rather than standing by faith in uncompromised truth and workability. Demon 8 Conflicting Will: What holds the previous Demon in place is the idea that what I want can be different from what you want, and that one of us has to give way. It seems pretty obvious that this is the case, and perhaps crazy for me to suggest otherwise. Nonetheless, I do. When what I want seems to be in conflict with what somebody else wants, it is because I am not looking closely enough at what it is I really want, and neither are they. In truth, I only have to understand what it is I really want. Always when I am in conflict, it is because I am not observing what it is that I want directly. When I am in conflict, the thing I think I want is only a means to what it is that I really want. And I am at that moment mistaken about the correct means to what I want. I am in conflict with someone over the means and not the end. And the reason I insist on these particular unworkable means rather than giving myself over to my bliss to the end itself is because I am afraid. Getting what I really want always involves rearranging things. It involves rearranging things, because my current situation (assuming it's unhappy) is a reflection of my insistence on unworkable means. To overcome my unhappiness, the situation has to change usually in a much bigger way than you anticipate. Change always requires a return to a null point in which you have no control over you future, in which your fate is entirely in the Hands of God, and if you don't believe there is a God, then change is a real problem. You have to let go of form in favor of content. So the correct means to what you want will involve a loss. You might lose a marriage, a boyfriend, a job. Demon 9 Love Can Be Gained, Lost or Won: These things you lose when you give yourself over to your bliss, when you allow Nature to handle the means for you are never things you really want in themselves. They are always things that you are afraid not to have. You hold onto them like security blankets. But just as you cannot get love by marrying, so you cannot lose love by divorcing. Whatever is gained or lost in marriage or divorce, going steady or breaking up has nothing to do with love. What is real in your relationship with another cannot be threatened or gained by any rearranging of the circumstances. When you stop holding onto particular forms at all cost, the forms which arise are those which reflect the true psychological reality of the situation. If you let go of the idea that "I am married to George," and allow the form that your relationship to George takes to remain open, then it will take the form that reflects what is true between George and you. All marriages are eternal, and very often the best way to be married to someone is to be divorced... to let what is real between you play itself out within the worldly form of divorce. If you enjoy one another's company, you will continue to spend time together. If you do not, you will move apart. Happy marriages will remain, and unhappy ones will break up. Whether or not you feel moved to spend time with another has nothing to do with love. Love is not sex. Love is not staying together. Staying together is staying together and love is love. They're different, and only one of them matters. Love is not having the same views and interests. The process of sex and relationship teaches us what is real. It teaches us what love is. We fall in love. We marry. We have children. We fight. My God, how we fight. We betray one another. We separate. We divorce. We lose custody of the children. We get back together. We break up again. Yet something remains through it all, in spite of ourselves. Not only do we not have to do anything like getting married to keep it there. Even the worst treachery and betrayal fails to kill it. There is an undercurrent which never gives up, even in the most horrible of situations. And that is Love. Demon 10 Marriage Sanctifies a Relationship: When you fall in love, you surrender yourself completely to another person. You withhold nothing. In the event of falling in love, all is accomplished. Nothing need be added. Nothing can be added. The surrender and union has occurred. Falling in love is a real event. Only the disposition of the heart has the power to truly sanctify an encounter with another. Marriage is a form. Of itself, it is nothing, but it begins to present a problem when the ideal "We're married" is not consistent with the psychological reality, and when you then side with the ideal and not the reality. If there is any doubt in you about love, you try to duplicate the real event, which was falling in love itself, with a statment in the physical world. The way we surrender ourselves completely to someone in the physical world is to marry them or go steady with them. The true act of surrender the event of falling in love sets you free. But exclusivity imprisons you. If you are exclusive with someone you can no longer freely express what you feel. Marriage is an attempt to express absolute surrender to another, but in fact, it expresses doubt in this surrender. It is an attempt to capture and freeze something which cannot be captured. We marry a person or go steady in order to try to touch them and know them perfectly, but such union cannot be won by any means, least of all a capture. Such union is a gift granted by the Grace of God. We can only receive what is given. But until we overcome a certain level of doubt and fear, we will cling to forms. We will marry, and that's okay. It's more than okay. It's in many cases the best way to go. But it is an institution created by man, not by God, and like all institutions, it will eventually be transcended. Demon 11 Working on Relationships: If you protest this idea that you should move toward painless relationships, it is undoubtedly because you believe in 'working on' relationships. I would say that the process does not involve improvement, only understanding. Relationships do not need to be worked on. They are whole, complete and perfect from the start. The only reason we often don't experience them that way is that we don't just let them be what they are. Rather than meeting Danny whenever I feel like meeting Danny, I marry Danny and insist that we meet every single night for dinner and every single morning for breakfast for the rest of my life. I cook Danny's meals and wash Danny's socks. I even insist that I spend every night in the same bed with Danny. More than that, I insist that my entire emotional life revolve around Danny. I sacrifice so much for Danny and he for me, that it's no wonder we start resenting one another. I do this, because I attach my sense of self worth to the idea that I am special to Danny, and in exchange I give Danny the assurance that to me, he is the best person in the world. I'm willing to prove that I think so by curtailing my freedom to an amazing degree for Danny's sake. We require this huge investment in reassurance from another because we feel cut off from our Source. If we could feel directly who we are to our Creator, we would need no other reassurances that we are needed or wanted. In truth I am not special to Danny nor is he in truth special to me. Or put another way, everyone is special to me and to Danny. And I can therefore come and go with Danny as I please, for he rests in God's Hand as do I. One could also say that we take on the idea of working on relationships as as a replacement for doing the real work... the spiritual work which gives us the strength to set our partner free. Demon 12 Avoid Fear, Face Pain: We are not called to compromise, but to learn. You learn to move toward what is blissful, and from this it follows that you end up staying away from what is painful. This is different from avoiding what you fear. As you begin to follow rapture, you avoid pain. But you also thereby face fear. You start living with terror at your shoulder. It becomes your travelling companion. Going through all kinds of convoluted manipulations in an attempt to avoid all possible future pain is also not avoidance of pain, but failure to follow rapture. The path to clarity does not avoid fear and pain first as a means to joy. You follow joy first. It is simple and immediate. It makes no sense to hold your hand on a stove and try not to scream. If your hand is on the stove, remove it. Those who fail to scream when their hand burns are not better people. They just have less sensitive nerve cells. The process of awareness makes you more sensitive, not less sensitive, less tolerant of pain, not more tolerant of pain. If someone holds a gun to your head and someone always does and tells you to put your hand on the stove, ask yourself, "What do I want?" Don't calculate, "How do I get out of this?". Your inner voice knows how. Just ask it and it will answer. It will talk to your heart, not your mind. That's what the process involves. The more broadly you can identify yourself to include your fellow man, the better you understand what rapture is rapture as distinct from mere pleasure. You will truly recognize his release from suffering as your own release and vice versa. Until then, all your attempts to be helpful will be misguided. You simply won't understand what to do, what will in fact be helpful. Demon 13 God is Dead: Consider our dilemma as creatures on this planet. We are plopped down here in little naked human bodies, completely at the mercy of whatever circumstance we land in. These bodies grow old and die. They are subject to disease. They get cold in winter. They are in conflict with all other bodies for limited supplies of food and everything else they need. Nor do they have an overview over the factors involved in their future. There may be a war, a plague. They might be hit by a truck. They may be beaten and enslaved. The stock market may crash. A despot may rise to power. It's terrifying. No wonder that most of us spend most of our time just trying to survive and not feel too terrible about the circumstances. On the other hand, we have a voice within that recognizes Good. This is the voice that rises joyfully within us when it hears, "Peace on Earth, Goodwill Toward Men", when it hears, "I have a dream." Something in us recognizes Truth by rejoicing at it. As human beings, we are really faced with one choice. We have the choice to follow that voice which recognizes truth or not to follow it. If we didn't fear for our bodies, the choice would be easy. Anyone chooses rapture when there's nothing to lose. You fail to follow your inner voice only because you literally fear for your life. When you fear, you choose to spend your time trying to devise means to protect your fragile body from cold, pain, hunger, loss, shame. The alternative is to spend your time responding to your rapture. It is scarey to respond to rapture, because then you are not protecting your body. You literally risk your lives in order to love. Any expression of love, however slight, is heroic in the true sense. When you respond to rapture, you love. When you respond to fear, you control. That is the choice. The extent to which you choose one or the other does not depend on how good you are. It depends on faith. And the extent of your faith depends on your understanding. You cannot respond to rapture unless you know that we are safe in doing so, unless you understand something about who you really are. It's not that some people are inherently better than others and respond to truth more readily. All people respond the same. The only difference is faith. If you have seen that there is a benign power greater than your limited self, then you can take the risk to love. Otherwise, try as you might, you cannot. All people are afraid when they think they're going to die. You don't overcome fear by doing scarey things. You overcome it by realizing that you're not going to die. Ultimately, it is this which sexual energy, the Kundalini, drives you to understand. You put it in the care of either your rapture or your fear, and you find joy and understanding or agony accordingly. Demon 14 Hard work: You are distracted from your rapture primarily by hard work which you are afraid not to do, by the Puritan work ethic, by fear for survival, by the notion that goodness or love requires enslaving yourself to a task for someone else's comfort. When you are doing the work of the heart, you work tirelessly at full attention. We are taught that we should do whatever work that is in front of us and learn to like it. Once we can like whatever we are asked to do, the argument goes, we will have become good. In this way, most of mankind has been held in abject servitude for millennia guiltily doing things they hate at the whim of another. We are distracted from our joy by this means. This approach is completely wrong. When you hate the work you are doing, it is because you are not supposed to be doing it. The question is not then how to start liking it, but rather, what it is that you do want to do. Surprisingly many people say they don't know what they want, but in fact, it's very easy to discover what you want to do if you don't eliminate any of your options in advance because they're scarey or embarrassing. The same principle holds of intimate relationships and any other activity whatsoever. If you hate it, don't do it. Then your primary difficulty in life shifts from that of stoically holding out in circumstances you hate to that of standing perpetually in the face of your terror. It shifts to that of demonstrating by your actions a trust in God and in your own inherent Worth and Innocence. Demon 15 Young and Slender: We are told that what we love are young, naked people with thin bodies. But as one grows older, it becomes clear that what one falls in love with is not a form. We fall in love with that in which we perceive a spark of divinity, with that from which we can learn. Falling in love is nature's show of respect for spiritual awakening. We are especially prone to fall in love with someone who seems to have some understanding or talent, that we don't think we have. We fall in love with that which is vigilant and attentive. We don't fall in love with that which we have understood thoroughly and moved beyond. If it is too short of us in understanding, we cannot fall in love with it. Or if it is too far beyond us, we are only terrified of it, and we do not fall in love with it. Falling in love is not love itself. Falling in love comes and goes with the changes in our awareness, but love itself does not. In earlier phases of the process, the Kundalini tends toward what is young and slender. It desires it, but it does not fall in love with it. The reason the light is generally so much more visible in a girl between the ages of 15 and 25 than in a middle-aged woman, is that the world is designed to get us to suppress our energy, and it generally succeeds within about 10 years of the natural rise of the Kundalini in puberty. A person must be very aware to keep the energy flowing and alive throughout their life. If a person does not learn how to fully engage and to share the energy, then it will be moralized or sexed out of them within a few years. We tend to make one of two mistakes. We either suppress the energy by morals, by telling ourselves we're no good. Or we try to capture other people with it. Both errors reflect replacing Relationship with an acquisition. It sees salvation as something outside itself which must be acquired, rather than as That which lies within. Demon 16 Ways, Means and Techniques: Culturally we are inundated with suggestions about tricks and techniques to get what we want how to experience the ultimate orgasm, how to have the perfect marriage. All means to an end are mistaken. If you would know joy, practice the end itself, which is not pleasure. It is joy. You need do nothing at all to find your joy. Just look around you at where it is now in this moment and engage it. The only sexual technique that is of any use is to feel clearly and from the heart, and be brave enough to trust and act freely with your feeling. All attention on positions and techniques only interferes with this. To feel clearly, you need to be attentive to the person you are with in that moment, rather than having your head off in some other place. You need to be relating to this person as heart and mind and spirit, not as a body, a thing which is to be aroused by some complicated arsenal of tricks. And in order to pull this off, you have to be with a person for whom the gods have given you what Rilke calls, that 'famous feeling'. The gods are very sly, and nearly always shoot their arrows to form for us a very inconvenient match, a match which forces us to overcome major barriers in our understanding. Romeo and Juliet are not the exception. They are the rule. But this feeling the gods send us is so joyful and so true that we do not walk around it easily. And rightly understood, the joy they entrust us with can accomplish anything. This same approach holds of any endeavor. The way to play the piano well is to listen to what you are playing. *********** Inko: When I was practicing for the competition, I locked myself in a basement for two months. I didn't even know what time of day it was. And I practiced only very slow scales. I sank extraordinarily deeply within. When I finally got on stage, the response was overwhelming. I literally became a national hero. I saw so many women in those days, and I was in love with every one of them. I really was. But I had decided to marry Lin. I came back to her whole and free with some real understanding of what love is. And then when she saw me so changed, she was terrified. She found an excuse and left. I should have given myself up back then to what wanted to happen. But no one had ever shown me how to make use of the moment. And then the moment passes. 1993 How the Inner Voice Works When our inner voice which guides us shows us joy, the situation is fairly easy. What happens when you do not feel joy? Let me consider the nature of feeling bad. When I see the equation '2+3=7', I know that it is incorrect. Knowing this requires a certain kind of sensitivity. My inner voice has informed me of the incorrectness by some little signal which I feel. In this case, the voice is not responding to something I see or hear, but to something which I am thinking. I do not feel bad about '2+3=7'. I just know it is incorrect. If someone now builds a bridge using '2+3=7' instead of '2+3=5', the bridge will probably fall down. If I have to drive over the bridge, then I feel bad. That is the only reason I ever feel bad. I never feel bad because I am guilty or evil or because someone else is guilty or evil. I always feel bad because I try to act as if something that's untrue is true. My inner voice makes me feel bad as a kind of warning, "Attention! Attention!" it says. "Do not drive over this bridge." The way to resolve this problem of the bridge is not to ignore the warning and say, "Okay. I agree. 2+3=7," because that is incorrect. If I do that, then when I get half way over, the bridge will fall and I will land in the water and drown. The solution is also not to say, "The engineer is a big fat sadistic idiot," because the fact is that she just made a miscalculation, and you are only wasting your time in empty recriminations. The solution is not to say, "I am just not brave enough. I'll be brave and cross the bridge and maybe that way I'll learn to face my fears," because everybody who thinks they're going to die feels fear. You fear not because there's something wrong with you, but because you're looking at the situation wrong. The solution is simply not to drive over the bridge. The reason we have trouble not driving over bridges is that it makes us late for work. We maybe offend the engineer. We might lose our job. Our family might get mad at us. And there is another compounding factor. Very often we are not aware of the lie, the '2+3=7' which underlies our 'bad' feelings. The lie is often subconscious. We tell obvious lies, and we hold these lies in place with morality, so that it's scarey and embarrassing to tell the truth. For example, one lie we hold in place by morality is that human beings are monogamous. Marriage is like the bridge, and monogamy is like the '2+3=7'. You cannot know how to act relative to the bridge until you know what is true and what is not. You will either drive over the bridge and possibly land in the water and discover that way what is true, or if you're lucky, you'll stop before we cross and think to yourself, "Why do I feel so bad?" *********** Danny: This guy tells me he wants to kill this other guy for sleeping with his wife. Now think about this. This person has never had a mystical experience, so he thinks sex is the ultimate human experience. So it should make perfect sense to him that his wife and this guy would want to do this 'most fun thing'. Yet he wants to kill him for it... And this is within the context that he has no memory of an encounter with God, so he thinks death is the absolute end. Killing this guy is annihilating him utterly. So he wants to inflict on this guy the ultimate punishment imaginable for the most understandable transgression imaginable. Now try to tell me that that isn't insane. But as a culture, we don't see it as insane. It seems like a perfectly normal reaction to us. 1997  Pattern 1 Criticism Let me now go through some common concrete patterns in relationship, how they are normally dealt with, and offer a different perspective on them. Imagine that your boyfriend tells you, "You are sexually inhibited." Clearly if you are called sexually inhibited, you will in the moment be sexually inhibited. Nature responds to love with desire. It does not respond to criticism with desire. There is no such thing as an inhibited person. The laws of nature treat us all the same. But suppose you don'tis completely disruptive. There may be no attempt to capture by force that which is given freely. That which is the case must be left in perfect peace. I stand calmly in myself. This experience intensifies within me as I rest increasingly in full attention on Man, his broad shoulder, his beard, his chin, his calm essence, his capacity to penetrate. The experience is anonymous. I see him with perfect clarity, his particular inner form, but the experience is not personal. My individuality is not acknowledged. As I fall ever more deeply in love, the polarity intensifies. When I have focussed into his manhood entirely, the gap between Man and Woman is somehow strangely bridged. The gap is no longer between him and me, for our persons have been relinquished. I am in a remarkable instant reidentified. I know myself as androgynous. He has looked on me and I am Known. But the event is not about my relationship with a particular man. It is about my relationship with the Creator, which is not different from his relationship with the Creator. The process begins by going inward, answering cleanly to desire, not by going outward. There's no issue of 'caring', for example, no preoccupation with who wants what. Through the Presence of Man, I focus profoundly into my Source. There has been a consent that these bodies and minds would be surrendered to this process. Because he is reverent, he is free to give himself over fully to his desire. My consent is implicit in this. I am fulfilled in his reverence. But if he is irreverent, nothing can save it. I can only withdraw until clarity returns. Neither Man nor Woman collapses in this. The energy within them increases livingly, ecstatically, but they are not two. That which I Am is not different from that which He Is. All manifestation lives within me as potential. My attention rests in the Source. Although the event ind on the stove while practicing not screaming, you're to some degree incapacitated. You have little attention left over for anything else. However, when I say that this is the solution, I do not mean that it is right for most marriages to break up the moment one person makes one critical remark. I do mean that past a certain point in the process, no criticism is tolerated at all. One critical remark is indeed sufficient to place a person at a certain distance. You have to do this as the process evolves, because you become more and more vulnerable. Things hit home much harder. But if this were taken as a principle on which to build a society, it would collapse immediately, if not sooner. Fortunately, one doesn't have to worry about that. The process takes care of itself. Those who have thick enough skins for a certain amount of criticism will live in those relationships and thrive. In this case, the impossible situation is monogamy, the special relationship. You can never be in love with someone who holds you captive. So from the outset, I can never provide my boyfriend with the love he seeks, exactly because I am required to provide it. Since he can go nowhere else to find real love, he tries to change me into something which can fill this artificially created lack of love that he experiences. The monogamous relationship results from seeing love as something outside you that needs to be acquired by means of a form of ownership, and love simply doesn't work that way. That's all. So here we go. Now that I have bought into the impossible monogamous situation, I get the entire package of demons to go along with it. I believe that I am faulted for being inhibited, and so I try to counteract my feeling of guilt by responding to the outside authority in the form of my boyfriend, and make efforts to reprogram my desire to fit his needs. I say to myself, "I want to be good. I'll try to be more open and creative in sex." Rather than following joy, I calculate to avoid pain. I buy into the notion that there is a conflict of will and that I should compromise my happiness for his. He thinks he needs something from me. I become a means to an end for him. He sees sex in isolation from relationship and wants me to provide it. What he sees is therefore unholy. He is trying to save the packaging, the 'relationship' and has lost sight of the original affection that got us together in the first place. We hide all this from ourselves with pained smiles and lies concerning how we really feel and with many further efforts at self-improvement. And we are both paying for this lovely array of stuff ever so much more dearly than we realize. We pay with the only thing that matters at all, with our capacity to experience love, with our happiness. There is a way to return to peace. It is to be sensitive, to reflect, and through reflection to realize what is really going on, and then to proceed to tell one another the truth about what you want and feel, to set one another free. It's wrong for me to try to reorganize myself to fit someone else's needs. For one thing, it's impossible. I can never do it no matter how hard I try. For another thing, the attempt to do it completely enslaves me. To the extent that the relationship was based on ownership and fulfillment of needs, therefore, telling the truth will cause us to separate. To the extent that we enjoyed one another's company, we will stay together. This tends to be very scarey, especially as you grow older, get married, have children, and we may not dare to do it the moment we see it. But as long as you are diligent about leisure and sensitivity and seeking awareness, then the truth will eventually roll around in a form that all involved can swallow. The trick is not to get distracted into fear, guilt, shame, the work ethic, but to keep your head clear, aware of your innocence. You have not improved yourself in the process. You have not changed yourself so that you are no longer sexually inhibited. You have merely removed the conditions that give rise to the array of demons in this moment. You have simply understood something. I find that the key to getting out of these criticism traps quickly is to recognize that you are innocent and do not require improvement, only understanding. Only if you see yourself as innocent, can you see others as innocent. And only when you are thus freed of judgement, can you admit that your boyfriend made a mistake. If you do not recognize your fundamental innocence, then the only options left are that you are inherently faulted/inhibited, or that he is evil in telling you lies and trying to control you. It's important to recognize that he did in fact make an error, because otherwise you must entertain the possibility that you are inherently inhibited like he claims, and that is agony. It is agony, because it's not true. It's just as important to recognize that it was not inherent evil on his part, but only an error, a reflection of lack of faith, a lower state of awareness. Notice that criticism is really a cheap shot. With this one little critical sentence, the boyfriend has made me feel completely tied up in mental and emotional knots. It's easy for a relatively unreflective person to throw statements like "You're inhibited" around. They can work remarkably well. It can take forever before a reflective person gets to the bottom of such a statement and recognizes what is true and what is untrue, what is really going on. By tossing out these quick judgements at regulated intervals, an unreflective person can hold a person who is trying to be 'good' in servitude for decades. Neither of them is particularly happy with it, but the pattern has a sort of inner stability. These critical sentences are like the viruses which attack a much superior host cell. Viruses are relatively dumb. All they know is to attack the host cell's DNA, reproduce and break the cell. They're not evil. They're just short-sighted. And the host cell will be killed if it only has the awareness to run its own affairs, but does not have the awareness to recognize a virus for what it is. One need be neither hospitable nor inhospitable to a virus. One need be merely honest. Dishonesty is never compassionate. The body protects itself from a virus by learning its exact code. The body says, "I know you. You have exactly this sequence... Sorry. I can't let you in." And we need to do the same. We need to become aware of the exact nature of every untruth that comes our way so that when we see it again, we recognize it and say, "I know you. You are like this." Once you see an attack for what it is, you disarm it. You need do nothing more than recognize it. You don't need to kill it, for it doesn't Exist. It has no real Power. The devil need only be named. Whereas God in principle cannot be named. That's the difference between them. *********** Kostya: She was such a grand lady. I was overwhelmed with feeling for her. I would have taken her right then, but she would never have consented. Her husband was still alive, though he was very ill, maybe even comatose. Martha: How old was this lady? Kostya: I'd say about 78. Maybe even over 80. I'm not sure. 1992 Pattern 2 Unrequited Love Now let me address the other end of the problem. I said that we would do best to follow our desire, that our desire leads to good. What about my boyfriend? Didn't he desire? Wasn't he thwarted in his desire? How is he to get what he wants if I refuse him? The function of sexual desire is purification or awareness. In truth, there is no such thing as unrequited love. Love by its very nature is that which is requited. Once everything that is not love has been cleared away, you are requited. You desire. You are refused or in some way not met. In this you are forced to become aware. This purification therefore happens most effectively when the people involved stay true to themselves, when they say truthfully, 'yes I want' or 'no I do not'. The voice within you feels whether or not what it sees is love. If you are dishonest or do something you hate, you are not following the voice, and you delay the manifestations of love. Unrequited love is a call to stop trying to own or change or limit another person. It is a call to stop trying to use them to fill your needs. Instead you are called to see them and enjoy them as they are in truth. It is a call to find within yourself that which you thought you could only get from another person. It is a call to replace your judgements and criticisms with a willingness to learn. When you desire and then experiences some form of separation, and yet do not collapse into any form of effort to control or judge, you can feel a fire which burns within you. It's difficult, sometimes very difficult. It persists as long as you are mentally engaging an effort to seek fulfillment outside yourself, as long as you are acquisitive, out of accord with the Spirit. Once you stop thinking acquisitively, you are left with passion in a purer and more potent form, a passion which is not bound to any object in the world. And this passion is always requited. If you truly want peace, you do have to let go. But very few people are prepared to accept all that is involved in true peace. In doing this, you only let go of a clinging that caused you suffering in the first place. The pain is a kind of temper tantrum, a protest, a reflection of lack of faith. But you cannot win love back this way. It is a completely ineffectual means to the end you seek. And letting go is also not an easy trick to learn, because the first thing you confront after letting go of efforts to control your circumstances is the pain caused by the vestiges in you of a tendency to acquire or control, a tendency which you can now only sit with and stare at while it eats away at you. Freedom does not come from holding on to this acquisitiveness and seeking ever to appease its ravenous hunger. It comes from letting go of acquisitiveness altogether. It comes from recognizing that the Kingdom of Heaven lies within. This is not at all the same as trying to suppress passion. To the contrary, as you release the mood of acquisition, you come ever more in the Presence of God, and passion flares up ever more brightly. At the same time as letting go and setting another free is difficult for most people, it is also an easy trick. Once the mechanism has been seen clearly, you just have to drop it. It's like turning off a light switch. It can be done in two seconds or less. We resist it, because we have learned over many years that what we can own is valuable. It's like a drowning man near the shore who clings to a treasure chest. If he would have his life, he better drop his 'treasure'. You are made capable of setting your lovers free by recourse to the Heart, which will inform you that love and life have value, and acquisitions do not, and secondarily by recourse to reason, which figures that if you dropped the chest, you could swim to shore, and if you don't you'll lose both your life and the treasure. In relationship, however, letting go is not a one-time affair. Rather, it's a matter of practicing right attention moment to moment all day every day, of keeping your mind off the treasure and in reverence, off the ills done you, the losses suffered in the past, and in the gifts offered you in the present. So my boyfriend wants spicier sex and I'm not quite comfortable with it. When I'm uncomfortable, my inner voice is raising a warning flag telling me that what he wants is not conducive to the awareness of love. He thinks he wants spicier sex. Since there is a conflict of interest, he is insisting on the wrong means to what he really wants. What does he really want? He wants what we all want. He wants to be Known. He wants love. He senses that if I were profoundly in love with him, my body would respond a certain way, so he tries to evoke the physical response that he knows accompanies this surrender. This is his idea of the means to the experience of union and joy. But his means are mistaken, and are therefore in conflict with my will. I experience his efforts as preemptive. My nature withholds itself from him. Something in me is insisting, quite rightly, that he get rid of false means, of packaging, of semblances and acquisitions, and that he set me free and see what is true before I give in. My desire will await awareness. It will wait until the Kundalini has been turned over to rapture rather than to fear. *********** Martha: We've just moved out of that initial, naive phase that begins a relationship. We're coming now to an understanding of the true and mature love, to the point where we are brought up against our weaknesses and challenged to overcome them. John: I don't know... That initial naive phase is good enough for me. Actually, now that I think about it, probably being in love is where it's at. What have you experienced that's so much better than being in love? 1987 Pattern 3 The Denial of Love I find that there are two important ingredients to handling a separation in relationship. One step is learning to let go of any form of ownership, any efforts to limit another's liberty, to find strength from within. But another equally important step is to stand by love. You must insist with what Emerson calls 'cheerful inflexibility' that your love lived, lives, that it mattered and matters still a great deal. The source of neediness is that you see a light and a life which is possible and is being rejected in favor of something which seems to you less whole. You have been deeply in love, and have seen your lover's eyes glaze over, heard them proclaim that your love is less than good or wasn't important or didn't serve or didn't even exist. One feels a shadow fall across one's path. One feels the presence of evil, the smell of death. The pain is an attempt to court this death. It is your attempt to believe in this supposed 'reality' that is set before you. To be free from pain you must refuse to acknowledge the denial of love as reality; to stand instead by the reality and value of love; to stand by faith in its incorruptibility and inherent goodness; to stand by faith in your own inherent goodness. And you are inherently good. The denial of love takes many forms. But its flavor is always the same. It is always a withdrawal; it is always dutiful and programmatic and 'safe' and lifeless. It always devalues and belittles the heart. It always promotes an ideal. It always speaks in favor of a deeper, more brilliant, more wonderful future. It speaks of serving the whole by surrendering the longings of the heart. It recommends sacrifice. It reacts to fear. It is authoritative, serious. It is proud and important. It's terribly certain about everything. And it's wrong about everything. It never has red lips or ruddy cheeks. It has no sense of humor whatsoever. It is pressed for time and resources. In a milder form, it is superficial, 'nice', polite, tame. It chit-chats. It wastes time. It is the evil that we all face. We all make this withdrawal. Your lover will, and so will you. I think we are here to learn to resist the denial of love. We have to come to the point where an little flag comes up in us automatically saying "Not true" whenever it is confronted with the authoritative school teacher, the shocked neighbor, the dutiful employee, the uninspired academic, the harried parent, the critical spouse, the peeved employer, the terribly helpful world-saver, and anything else that is trapped or just too brilliant for words. But this is no small trick, because we think our lives and our goodness depend on kowtowing to these forms that live both within us and without. When love is denied and true Relationship is withdrawn, there is always an attempt to replace it with something of this world. Reverence is replaced by 'partnership', by some great ideal, by some workaday chatter. You'll feel in your bones that it's no longer about being deeply in love. He'll ask you to drive him to an appointment. He'll take you under his arm and talk of you as 'his girl'. He'll tell you a new, deeper, more real phase of the relationship is beginning. If your cup runneth over, love is near at hand. Otherwise you're dealing with concepts. It seems to me that we are here to learn to distinguish life from concepts of life, love from concepts of love. If you would have your life, you must be shamed, and yet say, "I am good." If you would stand by life, all the forces of intelligence and emotional manipulation will be against you. You will usually feel alone. You will lose your self control. You will appear a fool at best, a menace at worst. But the rewards are great indeed if you can simply stand out there alone in that field amidst all the praise and protest, no matter how weak and stupid you feel. There are invisible and vast forces at your back whenever you risk this, for in this lies the Hope of the world. Love is asking us for an act of heroism. That light that arises between two people is a reflection of the light of God. And, like any holy act, it is terribly inconvenient. Inconvenience is its essence. It lowers your productivity in the working world. It is only consistent with freedom, and it is therefore inconsistent with commitments. By its very nature, it demands to be treated with reverence, and as a result, everything which is joyless and inattentive to reverence is displaced by it. Standing by it will therefore be branded as immoral, slothful, inconsiderate, and self-centered by all the forces in the world that want to go about their business and not think too much. Those forces are considerable. The level of insanity in the world is considerable. *********** Martha: I wasn't a faithful wife. Vladimir: Yes you were. You were the most faithful wife. You may love me and Danny and Thomas and Michael and Inko and Kostya, but you're still faithful to Samuel. You're true to yourself. And you've never denied love. You love him still. 1994  Pattern 4 Recognizing the Time to Move On We equate living together with an expression of love, and see physical separation as a sign that we no longer love. To the contrary, I begin to think that any adult who really wants to be happy would do well to keep his or her own quarters. Nature certainly brings people together because they have something they need to learn. And there comes a time in absolutely every relationship when two people must separate physically. A child does not leave its parents because it hates them or because the relationship has become trivial, but because life calls it outward to other experiences. And the same holds of lovers. In general, when that moment arrives, one person is seeking greater depth or breathing room, while the other just wants a cozy, homey partnership. The person who wants this greater experience of freedom tries to drag the other into wanting or being something different and greater. This person then feels unloved and unappreciated. He or she doesn't understand what the problem is, why his or her significant other can't ever compromise on concrete issues that make living together possible. Both people feel they have so much to give and for some reason are unable to give it. There is no way to 'fix' such a relationship. God is calling one or the other person to transcend its present boundaries, just as people transcend the confines of their childhood home without thereby rejecting their parents. A delay in responding to the call only causes pain. We tell ourselves that we don't want to hurt our spouse or children. But we're kidding ourselves. People who feel 'trapped' usually delay in saying freely and forthrightly what they really want, because they fear loss. Once they speak their mind, and stop trying to make themselves palatable to their partner, usually both parties recognize that they want more time apart. Their paths are different. A time comes when you can't compromise any more, because you hear a voice, however silent, which is too compelling to deny, and explanations get nowhere. You realize that your call to freedom is real and legitimate, that you cannot but follow it without suffering. You also realize that people move at their own pace in their own way, that you don't even want the process to flow along any other course than the one that Nature dictates. Marriage or committed relationship is possible and helpful within a certain psychological domain. But as soon as the monster of the Deep rises from the waters, and one person or the other begins to feel a longing to fall to their knees or to cry to the winds for the Face of God, then committed relationship is in trouble. Reverence demands utter freedom and utter reliance on God. A cozy partnership demands boundaries and compromises and agreements: what do we eat and where do we live and how do we spend our money. All these arrangements are inconsistent with passion. Passion is a certain use of attention, and these preoccupations are a different and inconsistent use of attention. You can only truly serve one of these two masters. The process will fill you with the love of family, and eventually lead you to freely and gladly give up seeking for a significant other. Like a very small child you find yourself then no longer making special inclusions or exclusions, no longer acknowledging beginnings or endings. Everyone is family. *********** Martha: I'm not sure how Samuel would react if he knew what I am feeling now. Michael: I'm more interested in how Thomas would react. Martha: What do you mean? Michael: I think Thomas loves you. I think he loves you so much, he doesn't want to spend a single day without you. Martha: Oh, no... It's that obvious? Michael: Oh, yes... Martha: Well then... So how do you suppose your Anna would feel about this? Michael: That I can tell you very simply... She would dismember you... physically. 1991 Pattern 5 Jealousy When two people are in love, they share a unique, silent and holy inner space which is held between them alone. Freedom from monogamy does not mean that other people are brought into this intimate space. Such an inclusion is impossible in principle. You simply become able to hold several of these intimate spaces within you simultaneously. Freedom from monogamy does cause jealousy to crop up around you much more frequently/ You are not bad because you experience jealousy. We are all constructed such that we experience jealousy in certain circumstances, and it is right that we are constructed this way. You are freed from jealousy by understanding the circumstances which give rise to it and staying away from them. You feel jealousy when you have shared a sacred space with another, and that other ceases to value what is holy in the encounter with you. Often he or she enters into some exclusive or at least 'more special' relationship with another. In the process, all your lover's relationships become ranked, and holiness is lost. If you have been left out in this way, your system will quite accurately register this violation with a signal that says that what was done was not true. The extent to which you experience this signal as painful will depend on your faith, on the extent to which you are free of specialness yourself. We have no claim to another human being. The question is not whether to let go, but how to let go. To be able to withdraw, you have to have a place to withdraw to. You must have some capacity to center yourself, It is also very important not to deny love, not to say, "I'm tough and enlightened and hermetically sealed. I never really had any feelings, and I certainly don't give a damn now." A denial of love really does gives rise to agony, because it is the ultimate untruth. A human being can bear almost any separation as long as love is acknowledged and honored. This is very important for a person who is pulling out of the mindset of 'special relationships' to remain aware of if they want to minimize fear among their loved ones. The essence of this transition is the refusal to be owned. You are insisting on your uncompromised right to your liberty. The more solidly you stand by this, the more fully and freely you can pass out warmth and reassurance to your spouse and children, to those who fear that you are rejecting them in order to go to someone else. Once you truly recognize that you are subject to no laws or limitations or obligations whatsoever, warmth carries no risk. You are limited in your expressions of love toward people to the extent that you buy into the idea that because you have let warmth flow from you, someone has a right to expect something from you. The mindset, "You have expressed great tenderness toward me. Therefore you should wash my dishes, earn me an income, make love to me, prove you still feel the same way, walk the dog, shun other women..." is not the clearest possible, and after a certain point, it appears to you downright insane. After that point, you must ignore this demand. Confront your loved ones rather with a reassurance of your unconditional love, not your availability to be owned or limited or directed. Then go do what you want. What you want to do is good. Since God has placed the desire in your breast, you can trust that it will serve everyone. Our gifts must be freely given, or not at all. *********** My daughter: My soccer ball is at home. Christopher: I didn't see it there with your other toys. My daughter: No, at my other home. I have two homes... three actually... maybe four. Christopher: I would hate that. My daughter: You shouldn't. Really it's great. That way you have a choice, and you can compare how different people live and decide better how you like it. And you have lots of parents. And they never argue with each other, because if they don't want to be together, they just go somewhere else for awhile. And if one of them won't buy you bubble gum, you can ask the other six. 1996  Pattern 6 It's for the Children Once a marriage has been acknowledged as having failed in its function as perfect spiritual union, it is often held together by children. 'It's for the children' is by far and away the biggest reason I have heard to deny one's own inner truth. And this section is by far and away the one on which most people take issue with me. So there are many misconceptions about children that must be overcome along the path as well. I am a divorced mother very much struggling with parenthood, and though I don't always have the foresight to follow my own advice, this is as close as I can come to the truth at the moment: Children do not need nuclear families. In most cultures during most periods of history, man has not operated with nuclear families. Children need their parents to respect one another and to be true to themselves. Children need to be surrounded by that which reflects love. Children never need discipline, punishment or criticism. Children do not need an authority figure. Children do not need to be taught right from wrong. Children already know right from wrong in the very ground of their being. They recognize it instantly. Anything they do not recognize cannot in principle be taught. Everything we teach them without exception is by example. All discipline, punishment, criticism and the vast majority of 'education' that we lay on children is directed at physical survival. It is our view that these things will help them succeed and be healthy, wealthy and even wise. In directing them with criticism and praise, we are consistently impressing on their minds that they cannot and should not follow their joy, and that they do not depend on God, and cannot rely on Him, but they depend on me, their parent, and on the goodwill of a society to which they must conform. We are impressing on their minds in this way that they are not spirit, but that they are bodies which are endangered and which can die. When we discipline or control, we are not teaching them to speak and act from themselves in response to God's voice within them. We are teaching them instead to listen to outside authority in the form of me, who knows everything so much better. A child is already a full, autonomous, and free human being at birth. We need to release them to walk their way, not at age 13 or 18 or 21, but like Samuel, they should be given up to God the day they are born. Children do not need to be controlled. If you love, you do not control. And you cannot be responsible for what you cannot control. So either you love your children, or you are responsible for them. You cannot do both. And that is that. But you are responsible to your children by being responsible to your own inner voice. Then they will learn the same from you by example. We place children in a special class and treat them in a special way, just as women were once in a special class with special rules. We always tell ourselves that we are 'caring' for special classes of citizens. But ultimately, it is not caring; it is merely disrespectful. We secretly believe that children left to their own devices would create chaos and spread discord. I would like to put in a case against these spoken and unspoken claims. True, a child is more likely to say, "Mommy's stupid" 50 times in a row when I fix beef stew instead of macaroni. But she's less likely to tell me 50 times in a row to go get a real job. Children have not in general developed skill and subtlety in their control tactics, but on average, they employ those tactics no more or less frequently than adults. They don't pull all the books out of the shelves. They don't break my stereo equipment any more frequently than I break it myself. They do put their feet on the table; it's true, but almost never during meals, and they really never walk on it. They never voluntarily freeze or starve themselves. They do in fact eat when they're hungry, sleep when they're tired and put on a sweater when they're cold. They are capable of compassion, which they have not 'learned' from anywhere but their own hearts. The claims against them are exaggerated. So, as I see it, we are safe giving them much more leeway than we generally do. The reason we don't is that we can get away with the disrespect. I think we underestimate the extent to which we take unfair advantage of children because their bodies are smaller, the extent to which we justify ourselves in doing this by thinking of them as less than they are, the extent to which we act wrongly toward them because of what the neighbors might say. Society cries, "You can't be serious? You're saying that we should make no provision for our children? Not teach them?" To this I would respond that if we are true to ourselves, listening within moment to moment, if we do not act out of fear and shame and tradition and unexamined assumptions, but out of Feeling and understanding, things work out. People who listen within do not abuse or abandon children. There is no danger that my children will go hungry or unclothed. I feed and clothe them gladly. And if I do die tomorrow, I have now not one husband, but many friends who would see to it that my children are cared for. Besides that, feeding and clothing them is relatively easy. What's time consuming and difficult emotionally is feeling the critical and watchful eye of society evaluating my unorthodox practices. What's difficult is thinking that I'm responsible for their morals and behavior, thinking I have to raise them. I don't have to raise them any more than I have to raise the fish in the sea. God created them. Let Him be responsible for their souls. And I'd like to point out that if I'm completely honest, I really have no idea how to raise a child. It comes from my womb, and I see in it the face of God. I have not a clue what to do with it, and ten years of parenthood have in fact not made me one dot wiser. I can only ask myself who I think I am to be so certain that I see and that this child does not? Who am I to insist that it listen to me rather than to itself? I can share my experience, as I do in this book, as I would with another adult. But it's quite another matter to shove my wisdom forcibly down their little throats. Who am I to try to plan for this being that stands before me? I have not even a beginning of an oversight over all the factors involved. I do not own this child or comprehend it. What can I sensibly do other than stand before it in awe and thanksgiving? I can offer it a bed, a warm meal, share a laugh, a good story, tell it what I think if it wants my opinion. Maybe I can slip it an ice cream sandwich on a rainy day. As I see it, that's all there is to parenthood. As a woman who is unwilling to enter into a 'committed relationship', I ask myself what happens if I get pregnant again? The prophylactic has been invented, so the chance of a surprise pregnancy is much smaller than it once was. And as you grow in awareness, the men who are drawn to you and who consequently spend time with your children tend not to be the type who need to be forced at gunpoint to care for their fellow man, much less their children. I also find myself less and less dependent on having my children at home with me all the time. But you take the plunge regardless of considerations like these. The transition to this way of life is a transition to the philosophy, "Do what is right, and let be what will be." I'm increasingly willing to release concern as to how exactly something will be taken care of and to trust simply that it will. It is a major act of faith. It is a transition to reliance on the forces one cannot see, on the Miracle. I have found this to be a very great challenge as a woman, and I think it accounts for much of the imbalance between men and women historically. A woman must be seeing very clearly if she is to be true to her own will in the face of these dependent beings that emerge from her womb. To the extent that she thinks in terms of ownership of other human beings or of feeling responsible for how someone turns out, she will be saddled and imprisoned. I find as a matter of practice, that as my sphere of intimate relations widens, so does my child's 'family'. They have many fathers and many mothers. They have also acquired many ready-made siblings over the last years, none of whom I had to suffer a pregnancy for. Each of us adults, of course, goes about things quite differently, and a parent who is no longer monogamous consequently needs to think less in terms of guiding their children along a straight and narrow path, and more in terms of being glad for the exposure they get to different influences and ways of life. This transition comes from recognizing that you yourself don't know the right path anyway. Indeed there is no right path. You attempt to improve them less and simply enjoy their company more. I find that the work load gets lighter, because I care less what the neighbors think and have more human resources in my environment which pick up slack. We aren't honest with our children about how we really feel within our marriages. We tell ourselves that we are trying to give them a happy childhood by not burdening them with our concerns. But this is not the whole truth. We do not preserve for them a happy childhood if we are unhappy with our spouse. Furthermore, in living out an unhappy relationship before their eyes, we teach them by example to do the same. And we predispose them to an unhappy marriage as well. We offer them no truthful foundation from which to face these challenges which they certainly will also face. We can be completely open and honest with our children from the first day. There is no fact that we need to shelter them from, for there is no evil in us. If we hide something from them, we imply there is evil in us and teach them to view this as evil in themselves. For whatever abides in us abides in them as well. *********** Martha: I'm sorry. It's best, I think, if I'm up front with you. He sees everything so deeply. I can't stay on with you. Do you understand? E: I understand well enough. Martha: So what do you think? E: What do I think? I think that if he has prophetic powers and understands all mysteries and all knowledge, and has all faith so as to remove mountains, but has not love, he is nothing. That's what I think. I think love isn't arrogant. I think it's patient and kind and bears all things and believes all things and hopes all things, and doesn't humiliate anyone or use its astounding depth and brilliance to cut anyone off from anyone else. That's what I think. 1978 Pattern 7 Soul Mates What lies at the heart of the monogamous relationship is the notion of a soul mate. Most marriages in the West start that way, and usually when we pull out of them, it's because we have fallen into hopeless and painful patterns with our spouse. And then one day we come upon someone who beholds us, who doesn't judge us, and with whom the window is open. We see a road that it makes sense to follow. Such a calling is divine, and we are invited by the gods to follow. The temptation in that moment is to see salvation as lying outside oneself in the form of this other person, rather than as lying with the God, who is found Within. The essence of the transition away from special relationships can be described as one of carrying this holy encounter in a different way. You are not brought to this relationship because it is better or more important than other relationships. If you place some relationship above all other relationships, and especially if you give it a label husband or girlfriend or soul mate the holiness falls from it; you exclude others and you break their hearts. You will inevitably fall out of love and experience pain, because you are trying to depend on this other person. You will eventually attempt to imprison this person into some form which you believe fills your needs. So I would say, if you would be free, then follow your heart in this Meeting. Enjoy it fully. But don't label it. Don't make any promises: how you will feel tomorrow, who you will spend time with, where you will live. Don't agree to any form of exclusivity. Rather leave yourself open to any experience with anyone at any moment. Don't demand anything of anyone. Don't attempt to control anyone. Don't let yourself be controlled. Don't try to improve anyone or let yourself be improved upon. Don't try to teach anyone anything. Don't play psychoanalyst, patient, teacher, pupil, leader or follower. Don't do or say anything suggestive of a hierarchy. You are friends. You are not with a person out of some dutiful effort to become better. Your purpose in sharing time with another is to taste life, to enjoy them as they are, to dance the tender dance which is unique to you. And when you fall in love again, don't belittle any of your other relationships. You are free to act as you feel inclined, but hold all your relationships with the deepest respect you can muster. Honor them all. Never rank relationships. And come to your friends unfettered. What you share with each person lives between the two of you and belongs to no one. Bring the fruits of your love for this person to everyone, but don't attempt to share its essence in words, for you cannot. It is a secret which the gods will keep even if you try to tell it. If you feel you need to be 'honest' with someone and tell them what passes between you and another, or similarly, if you feel inclined to lie to someone about someone else, you are on some level 'owned'. You must not feel answerable to anyone in this way. You must be free to say, "I can't answer that, for that lies between the two of us." And when you feel that famous violation of sacredness, that pain, articulate clearly what gave rise to it and then withdraw lovingly until the source of the violation is cleared away. Don't try to push your way through Puritanically. This is the mighty discipline. *********** Sinclair: What are you so concerned about? All we've done is share a dance. 1997 Pattern 8 On Being the Interloper Some portions of society are in transition away from the traditional marriage, and as a result, there are many instances in which the mindset of marriage, and mindsets like those expressed here collide. Most frequently this shows up when one falls in love with a married person. There is a danger in saying , "Do this and do not do that," because every situation is unique, and there is no such thing as a right course of action. Because you are at the point of transition between two paradigms, you have entered the no-man's land where there are no longer any rules, the risk is high and the stakes are high. The ultimate guide must be your own inner voice. Indeed the function of the encounter can be thought of as that of strengthening your reliance on your inner voice. Still, it seems to me that one can make some guidelines for this turbulent period of transition. · Every marriage is legitimate. If someone is married, it is because part of them needs to hold fast to what they can see in front of them. If you seek to overpower that, you can do untold damage. There are situations in which one person will draw another out of a marriage an into a steady, monogamous relationship with themselves. That has nothing to do with what I am talking about here. You may feel an energy with a married person. They are married. That means they have chosen that state and their energy keeps them there. They have to do all the work. The energy will provide the force to do whatever is right for them. You must not act to 'save' someone from a terrible situation unless they are literally physically threatened and require sanctuary. They must save themselves. · Don't lie, which is not the same as feeling obliged to tell the spouse everything that you think and feel. One must also protect the sacred domain which those who share a great love abide within. The spouse does not own the person you have Met. The person has rather freely given themselves up to this. That's why they are still married. It's important to find a space within yourself that is neither deceitful and secretive nor feeling perpetually obliged to 'confess' every encounter, thought, feeling. You are not responsible to their relationship. You are asked neither to break it nor to try to keep it together. You are asked to serve them both only by staying true to yourself. · Do not deny love. If you love, then stand by it. In loving, you are completely innocent. A denial of love most often takes the form of a certain kind of emotional withdrawal. This is not the same as a physical withdrawal, which is not nearly as threatening. It is this emotional withdrawal that is demanded of a spouse. You will very likely experience pain. You are trying to believe in the denial of the importance and reality of love. You are being asked to conceptualize love and to buy an image of the Thing for the Thing itself. Never accept anything but the genuine article. The spouses have been trying to feel passion where there was none, for God only grants passion to those who are free. You, on the other hand, may very well be asked to try not to experience passion that is granted by God, asked to believe that your longing to hold your lover to your naked breast proves that your feeling is not holy. Don't buy it. You are called in your pain to center extraordinarily deeply. Only from the space of true prayer or meditation can you know that love cannot be threatened. You need merely stand by it. · Honor the decisions that your lover makes, whether you see them as mistaken or not. Make no attempt to control, convince or manipulate. Rely completely on the power of your refusal to deny love. Offer your thoughts and feelings only when they are wanted. · You come as an instrument of God, not to collect and possess, but in order that the truth may be told, in order that all involved may be healed and set free. You are in this so that you may learn, and in learning, you teach. Everyone has been living in half-truths, and it can take some time for the truth to come out, because the stakes are very high. · If you feel one thing and are told another, trust what you feel, not what you are told. This advice applies to all of life. In relationship, we often get trapped in unhappy situations by trying to act from an ideal which is not consistent with what is really going on. To know what is really going on, you have to close out all the conversation around you, and feel clearly so you can pick up the subtle messages that flit through your consciousness. And then you have to learn to trust fully in what you feel. · Don't look for people to change their basic beliefs or character. Beliefs and character have already changed in someone. Until now, people have been trying to suppress the changes in themselves at all cost so they can adapt to the circumstances. A threshold may have been reached which makes this no longer possible. It seems to express itself in a longing on someone's part to violate the marriage vow, but that is just a reflection on the surface of a much deeper process. Circumstances are changing to reflect the psychological reality of the situation, rather than the other way around. It is the desire, the Kundalini, which drives the change. Once love is recognized, everything that stands in the way of its unfettered expression makes itself obvious. Then there is typically a withdrawal, a period of waiting for everyone involved to muster the courage to allow the circumstances to shift in deference to this Encounter or not, depending on the level and nature of the energies involved. The more cleanly you insist that encounters occur on terms that you are really comfortable with, the more quickly the things become aligned in accordance with the truth of the situation. The conflict is between those who have a higher investment in form, who impose more boundaries and labels, and those with a lower investment in form, and who would impose fewer boundaries. It is between that which tries to rely on something limited in the world, and that which tries to rely on the powers of Heaven. It is between that which begins with the mind and tries to control the surroundings to achieve some aim which it believes in, and that which begins with the heart, surrenders itself, and uses the mind not to control, but only to understand. Your beloved is married because s/he has an investment in specialness, in satisfaction within this world... a belief that there is such a thing as monogamy. The less powerful your feelings and/or the less your lover's investment in bondage, the less you will suffer. You are called to become ever more flexible and true to the moment, faithful that love will prevail, skillful at calm insistence on what is true, free of investment in outcomes, inwardly attentive, certain of your innocence, courageous in your trust that love will set all aright. You are called to live out from that place in yourself which is not constantly monitored and controlled, the place that is not trying to achieve some aim. It's a pretty safe bet that you will be tested in all of these. I have found that most of a Meeting between two people happens in the periods of some level of physical separation. As a culture, in our Puritanism and sex revolutionizing, we've forgotten many of the pleasures of the dance between Man and Woman... the bounty that arises when we prayerfuly behold one another at a bit of a distance. *********** Martha: Are these feelings for Susan and Linda real? I'm totally confused about you. Thomas: It's that problematic? Martha: Of course it's problematic. Thomas: Yes, they're real... In fact, in the moments when I open fully in my feeling toward you, I find myself feeling more deeply for everyone, drawn to everyone... Love must be like that. Why can't you let me love as I love? Martha: But you feel different to me. I can't reach you when your head is full of someone else. I don't feel met. I'm terrified. I've risked everything to be with you, and now your head is somewhere else. I don't even know who you are. 1988  A Woman's Path I only feel qualified to speak to the practice which I have been led through as a woman, which may or may not be equivalent to what a man experiences. The process began for me with the issue of sexuality. Marriage became impossible, because I found myself giving in again and again to sexual encounters that my innermost being had not sanctioned. What was I to do? Render my husband celibate for life? At some point I experienced the violation of holiness as so severe that I couldn't compromise any more. I went through periods of celibacy and eventually fell in love and 'committed adultery'. And I finally fully shared my inner world with my husband, knowing that in so doing, I risked everything. He did indeed ask me to leave. I then resisted the temptation to simply replace him with another man and start the process over again. I rethought the whole thing as honestly as I could, and arrived at what I have shared here. The process begins by being true to your desire. It there | |
