Create and Maintain a Conscious Love Relationship
Create and Maintain a Conscious Love Relationship
Robert Elias Najemy
Part 1 of a 3 part series
We present you with a brief outline of some basic points
necessary to tend to in order to create a harmonious and loving
relationship.
INNER PREPARATION
Internal preparation is prerequisite for developing the maturity
necessary to succeed in creating a conscious loving union with
our love partner. (Although we are discussing here specifically
romantic love relationships, most of what is being said is also
useful for other relationships.)
a. Clarify Values, Needs, Life Style:
The more mature we are when we enter a relationship, the more
likely we are to succeed in finding the harmony we desire. In
general, we attract persons who correspond to our present stage
of interests, motives, values, goals, etc. This occurs through
the attraction of similars and also opposites. As we ourselves
mature and become more aligned to our true selves, we will
attract people who are aligned to our true needs and goals.
We would do best to begin a process of self-knowledge and
determine what we really want out of life. We need to clarify
our values, needs and preferred life style. Having done so, we
will then attract a partner with whom we can share whatever is
important to us.
b. Learn to love yourself:
If we do not believe we are lovable, it is unlikely we will
attract a mate who will abundantly express love to us. We
attract those who will reflect to us the very same feelings we
harbor for ourselves. Even if the other does not reject us, we
will frequently project or imagine that he or she is doing so.
We exhaust our partners with our need for continuous
reaffirmation of their love. When we doubt our self-worth, we
easily fear losing the other?s respect, admiration and love. We
fear losing the other to someone else. We then become negative,
possessive, jealous and often so overbearing that we suffocate
the other until he or she does actually leave or develops
various protective mechanisms, such as aloofness or
aggressiveness.
When we doubt our self-worth, our need to be accepted and
affirmed by our partner often causes us to deny our own
feelings, needs, beliefs and values. We try to become who we
believe the other wants us to be. We cannot bear for the other
to be dissatisfied or angry with us. We are afraid we are at
fault or that the other will leave us.
c. Develop Inner security.
If we believe that we are not safe alone in the world without
our partner, we are denying our real selves, our real power, and
our spiritual nature.
I have heard a number of women confess that they have stayed
with their husbands, who were cheating on them for years, not
because they loved them, or believed they would ever change, but
because they feared being alone, especially economically. These
women are bartering their self-respect and happiness for a false
sense of security.
It is essential that we build our feelings of self-worth and
inner security so we can love the other without becoming
dependent upon him or her. In this way, we will be more alive
and truer to ourselves in the relationship. Only in this way can
we be with the other because we love him or her and not because
we fear being alone.
CLARIFYING RESPONSIBILITY FOR REALITY
a. The other is to blame.
We are each responsible for the reality we create within and
around us. If we are not happy, it is because we are allowing
our attachments, aversions, expectations and to obstruct our
happiness.
A main problem in our relationships is that we often blame the
other when we are not happy or secure. When something goes
wrong, we seek to pass the blame because we find it difficult to
accept our own mistakes and weaknesses.
We also expect the other to fill our emptiness in ways that he
or she cannot. The other cannot create our happiness, security
or feelings of self-worth. When we do not get what we need from
the other, we feel hurt and angry, and usually resort to blaming
the other.
Because of this, we can get locked into power games, in which
each tries to control, change and correct the other, neither
wanting to be corrected. A bitter battle of wills ensues which
defies real, sincere communication, as each blames without
listening to what the other is saying.
If we expect that the other is going to supply what we are
missing in ourselves, we are in for an unpleasant surprise. We
must take responsibility for our health, happiness, harmony,
fulfillment and the general state of affairs in our lives. The
key to finding the happiness and harmony we seek is to stop
trying to change others and change ourselves from within.
b. I am to blame...
The opposite side to this belief system is that we are
responsible for the others. If they are not happy, healthy,
successful, and most of all, not satisfied with us, we feel we
are to blame. We feel we have failed in the role of love
partner, child, parent or sibling, and are susceptible to
feelings of self-rejection, guilt and shame.
When we feel this way, we often turn on the others and blame
them for not doing what they should have done to be healthy,
happy, successful, so that we can feel okay in our role of
"being responsible for their reality."
The responsibility problem has two sides: "They are responsible
for my reality" and "I am responsible for their reality." Both
are illusions that lead to conflicts and unhappiness. We will
dedicate another article to this matter.
This article will be continued in two more parts, which will
cover the following aspects of creating a conscious love
relationship: Communication Common Activities Keep Learning and
Growing Spiritual Activities Distinguish Between the Other and
His Behavior. See the Other as Your Teacher. Keeping Promises
Unconditional Love Reaching Out Beyond the Relationship Develop
Your Own Relationship with the Divine.
(Adapted from the forthcoming "Relationships of Conscious Love"
by Robert Elias Najemy. His book "The Psychology of Happiness"
(ISBN 0-9710116-0-5) is available at http://www.amazon.com and
http://www.HolisticHarmony.com. His writings can be viewed at
http://www.HolisticHarmony.com where you can also download FREE
articles and e-books.