Sense2Love

Monica Berg replies:

Relationships are a topic I thoroughly enjoy researching and discussing, specifically one between a husband and wife. It is, in fact, one of the most significant connections we will ever have, one that can impact our lives for better or worse.

What helps sustain a relationship is continuing to put as much effort into nourishing it as we did finding it. Blind dating, online dating, double dating – we put ourselves through every imaginable uncomfortable situation, and once we get married, it is almost as if it’s another item crossed off our checklist. Married, check. Children, check. Career, check. Very often we have a romanticized idea in mind as to what our lives will be like after we get married, one that’s often not based in reality. Inevitably, the honeymoon ends and life goes on. We get busy at work, spending time with coworkers, becoming close with our girlfriends discussing our relationship woes, and taking the kids out together. We end up spending more time apart and confiding in those people with whom we share our day.

We need to create time where we can come back together with our significant other to reconnect and share. This is a fundamental aspect of any relationship. We must put the time in. This connection has the potential to be totally satisfying and complete, helping us grow to levels of emotional intimacy that we are not yet aware exist.

Unfortunately, too often couples do not consistently invest in nurturing their love and when challenges arise, there isn’t a strong base from which to work. That is why I think this idea of nurturing a relationship is probably one of the most important keys. It is the very foundation on which the outcome of future experiences and conflicts depend.

Therefore, I would like to share with you four keys that are important for nurturing relationships.

1. Consciously focus on the good in one another. We need to make a conscious effort to focus on the good because this is what allows us to appreciate our partner. This is something we do when we first start dating. We de-emphasize the negative and overemphasize the positive. Unfortunately, the scales shift to the opposite after we’re married. Only through a conscious effort can we create a consistent kindness, fondness and appreciation towards one another, where we actually want to honor “until death do us part.”

2. Cherish small moments of intimacy and laughter. Finding the opportunities in day-to-day experiences to engage and create beautiful moments and memories together is what it’s all about. Making a commitment to each other that no problem or obstacle will be bigger than your commitment to each other is so important.

3. Be vulnerable with one another. I know the word itself doesn’t sound appealing, but giving your heart to somebody you trust and love is a beautiful and necessary thing. Even if it is hard to do. We may be too proud or untrusting to become vulnerable, but so much love and connection can come from this type of openness.

4. Repair. This is so necessary because after two people argue, usually one leaves the room and doesn’t come back to say, “I regret what I said.” It gets buried. And then comes the next day with another fight, usually about something insignificant like the remote control or who is going to walk the dog. This cycle becomes the norm and soon it becomes the primary part of the marriage. Coming back together for repair is crucial and discussing what happened and how to grow from it.

“Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” – John F. Kennedy

There are no stable marriages. There may be happy ones, but not stable ones. Either we are growing forward or falling backwards. This is true in all areas of our life. There is no constant; there is only change and movement. This is “the law of life,” which is why I believe nurturing relationships is so important. We owe it to ourselves and those we love not to settle for mediocrity in any way, and instead to nurture and allow our relationships to become the source of joy, support and love that they were intended to be.

Monica Berg

Monica Berg is a spiritual teacher and guide. She is creative director at the Kabbalah Centre and leads a monthly forum in Los Angeles, Kabbalah for Women. She is also the co-founder of the charitable organization, Raising Malawi.

Found this article interesting coming from a male perspective.

Qustion “What does it take to sustain a happy and successful relationship/marriage?”

Deepak Chopra replies:

Relationship Is a Daily Rescue

Although the differences between men and women have been much emphasized, there’s one thing that both sexes must do in a relationship: rescue love. Relationships are happy where love is nurtured. They begin to fray around the edges when love is compromised, and they end when love is gone.

What causes love to go away?

Many answers have been offered — boredom, routine, various distractions, outside obligations, fixation on work, wandering libido, lack of trust.  But instead of dealing with such a long list item by item, there might be a simpler way. If you can rescue love every day, bringing yourself back to the place where love is, all the other problems don’t have a chance to grow.

To rescue love, you first must understand what it is. Love includes affection but is more than affection. It associates itself with sexual desire, kindness, compassion, altruism, and mutual regard.  With those things in mind, many couples turn love into loving acts and loving feelings.  But such efforts are the effect of love, not love itself. You cannot turn an effect into a cause. For example, if you find out that your partner has cheated, you have a reason not to love him or her.  Trying to be nice instead of nasty won’t revive your love.

If you can discover how love works as a cause, you can rescue it every day.

Love as a cause goes beyond the individual. It’s transpersonal or as spiritual teachers say, transcendent.  That’s not the same as mystical. To transcend means to go beyond.  In this case, we want to contact love that goes beyond the ego. The ego is often put in charge of love. When love becomes what “I” want, then relationship is a negotiation between two selfish points of view.  There’s nothing wrong with negotiating the everyday details of your relationship – who does the dishes, when to have sex, how to have sex, etc. — but love isn’t about trade-offs and what happens in bed.

Love beyond the ego has to be on a new basis. It’s not about quid pro quo, giving as long as you get to take. It’s mutual. It exists in a space between two people. The only way to be deeply happy in a relationship is to find that space every time you lose it.  In this way, love goes beyond affection and being nice.  Loving acts blossom naturally once you find the place in your own awareness that is love. Needless to say, becoming aware is a process, in love as in everything.

Consider how relationships develop. We get along well with someone else who agrees with our point of view. We feel an intimate connection; we feel validated in their presence. Then the spell is broken. The other person turns out to have many opinions and beliefs where we don’t agree at all. At this point, the war between right and wrong starts and the road to unhappiness unwinds.

The very fact that you are intimately related makes it even more painful to find areas of disagreement. At the subtle emotional level you feel abandoned. The beautiful sense of merging with someone you love is shattered.  At this point love is compromised. Both people feel the return of the ego, which says, “I am right. My way of doing things is the only way. If you really loved me, you’d give in.”

When the need to be right fades, we stop having so many grievances and resentments, which are the fallout of making someone else wrong. Instead of wasting time with the ego’s version of love, return to the place of love.   To detach yourself from anger, resentment, and the sense of being a victim happens only in the space beyond ego.  You can only find this space by devoting yourself to knowing who you really are. Leaving the ego behind is the same as the spiritual quest for the true self.

When two people are on this quest, they are on the journey to a kind of love that can never be taken away.  The differences between a man and a woman fade in the light of a shared goal that is bigger than any ego need or desire.  Every day becomes both a rescue and a surrender. Not a surrender to another person’s ego, which can only feel like defeat. Rather, both partners surrender to the larger goal.

The ego’s path is much easier to walk and far more familiar.   I know that someone is on the path of love when they ask the following kinds of questions about their relationship every day:

• Which choice is more loving?
• What will bring peace between us?
• How awake am I?
• What kind of energy am I creating?
• Am I acting out of trust or distrust?
• Do I feel what my partner is feeling?
• Can I give without expecting anything in return?

These questions don’t have automatic answers. They serve instead to wake you up spiritually.  They attune you to a process that is more than “me” and “you.”   When you become devoted to that process together, you and your partner will accomplish what seems impossible: your happiness will be as full for each of you as it is for the two of you together.

Deepak Chopra is President of the Alliance for New Humanity (www.deepakchopra.com and www.anhglobal.org). Deepak Chopra’s new book, Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment is available at Amazon.com. Follow Deepak on Twitter: twitter.com/Deepak_Chopra.

Dr. Karen Binder-Brynes replies:

If any of us had the true answer to the exact and “true” ingredients that make for a happy and healthy long-term relationship/marriage, we would probably win a Nobel Prize for helping humanity. However, since this is an age-old question with no one definitive answer, we can only use our past experiences in the helping professions, as well as drawing on the wisdom of seers and sages from a variety of disciplines, to attempt to address this issue. Kahlil Gibran in his essay on marriage states, “Love one another, but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other’s cup, but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping; For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together yet not too near together; For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.”

Over the years, I have worked with many couples before, during and even after their relationships have ended. One of the most valuable lessons I have learned from my work and my own relationships is that “what you see is what you get.” People often fall in love and continue relationships into marriage believing that they will be able to change the other. This is interesting because we are often drawn to our mates initially because they are different from us, only to find that once we are embedded, we want the other to change to be more like us. Respect for who your partner is in the beginning of your connection is essential. A professor of mine in college once stated, “there is no such thing as potential.” I agree in terms of picking partners.

Once in a relationship or marriage, respect, empathy and giving to the other is paramount. If each partner in a relationship is dedicated to helping their mate grow, evolve and flourish without trying to control, limit or damper the other’s spirit, the couple will thrive and expand in their love.

Trust is essential. I don’t just mean physical fidelity, but rather trust in all realms of life. One should feel that they can fall backwards and have loving, nonjudgmental arms to catch them. This also includes dependability, responsibility and accountability to each other.

The sexual connection in a relationship is a beautiful gift, which should never be taken for granted. Although the sexuality in a long relationship may ebb and flow throughout the lifespan of the connection, a couple should work on the dance of their physicality in whatever form it takes at each stage.

Wherever possible, finding mutual experiences to share and enjoy is essential. Finding time to nurture and water the relationship will always cause the garden of love to flourish.

A relationship or marriage should be a safe harbor in life’s ocean, a place to find one’s bliss. Joseph Campbell, in discussing marriage states, “That is the sense of the marriage vow – I take you in health and sickness, in wealth or poverty; going up and going down. But I take you as my center, and you are my bliss, not the wealth you may bring me, not the social prestige, but you. That is following your bliss.”

Thank you.

Dr. Karen Binder-Brynes

Dr. Karen Binder-Brynes is a leading psychologist with a private practice in New York City for the past 15 years. See her website, DrKarennyc.com, for more information.