All my friends who are married, who are getting married, or are in a committed relationship, should definitely listen to this perspective.
http://www.goop.com/journal/be/
The authors’ points on the role of relationship in one’s psycho-spiritual journey are profound. And as is well known by many the prospective object of death is quite a clarifying one.
The death of our own lives and the death of the emergent life that exists between two ephemerally intertwined individuals.
This view point definitely resonates with my own philosophy.
Here are a few of my favorite quotes. I wish this list were shorter. But there are so many delectably noteworthy insights:
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Divorce is a traumatic and difficult decision for all parties involved—and there’s arguably no salve besides time to take that pain away. However, when the whole concept of marriage and divorce is reexamined, there’s actually something far more powerful—and positive—at play.
Modern society adheres to the concept that marriage should be lifelong; but when we’re living three lifetimes compared to early humans, perhaps we need to redefine the construct.
Everyone enters into a marriage with the good intention to go all the way, but this sort of longevity is the exception, rather than the rule.
To that end, living happily ever after for the length of a 21st century lifetime should not be the yardstick by which we define a successful intimate relationship: This is an important consideration as we reform the concept of divorce.
When we idealize our partners, things initially go very well as we project positive qualities onto them. This is called the honeymoon phase.
Sooner or later, the honeymoon ends and reality sets in. This is usually when we stop projecting positive things onto our partners and begin to project our negative issue onto them instead. Unfortunately, this creates a boomerang effect as these negative issues always come right back to us, triggering our unconscious and long-buried negative internal objects, which are our deepest hurts, betrayals, and traumas.
Because we believed so strongly in the “until death do us part” concept, we see the demise of our marriage as a failure, bringing with it shame, guilt, or regret.
When we examine our intimate relationships from this perspective, we realize that they aren’t for finding static, lifelong bliss like we see in the movies. They’re for helping us evolve a psycho-spiritual spine, a divine endoskeleton made from conscious self-awareness so that we can evolve into a better life without recreating the same problems for ourselves again and again.
When we learn to find our emotional and spiritual support from inside ourselves, nothing that changes our environment or relationships can unsettle us.
The truth is, the only thing any of us have is today. Beyond that, there are no guarantees.
The idea of being married to one person for life is too much pressure for anyone.
In fact, it would be interesting to see how much easier couples might commit to each other by thinking of their relationship in terms of daily renewal instead of a lifetime investment.
This is probably the reason why so many people say their long-term relationships changed overnight, once they got married. The people didn’t change, but the expectation did.
We can recognize that our partners in our intimate relationships are our teachers, helping us evolve our internal, spiritual support structure, we can avoid the drama of divorce and experience what we call a conscious uncoupling.
A conscious uncoupling is the ability to understand that every irritation and argument was a signal to look inside ourselves and identify a negative internal object that needed healing.
Because present events always trigger pain from a past event, it’s never the current situation that needs the real fixing. It’s just the echo of an older emotional injury.
If we can remain conscious of this during our uncoupling, we will understand it’s how we relate to ourselves internally as we go through an experience that’s the real issue, not what’s actually happening.
From this perspective, there are no bad guys, just two people, each playing teacher and student respectively.
When we understand that both are actually partners in each other’s spiritual progress, animosity dissolves much quicker and a new paradigm for conscious uncoupling emerges, replacing the traditional, contentious divorce.
Conscious uncoupling brings wholeness to the spirits of both people who choose to recognize each other as their teacher.
If we can allow ourselves this gift, our exoskeleton of protection and imprisonment will fall away and offer us the opportunity to begin constructing an endoskeleton, an internal cathedral, with spiritual trace minerals like self-love, self-acceptance, and self-forgiveness.
By choosing to handle your uncoupling in a conscious way, regardless of what’s happening with your spouse, you’ll see that although it looks like everything is coming apart; it’s actually all coming back together. “
