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attachment to a relationship
frequency86
Explorer
My girlfriend said she needed space about five weeks ago. During this break my selfish and thoughtless acts and words drove her further away from me, more then likely to point that a relationship is no longer conceivable.
Even after having limited to no contact with her for weeks, and keeping very busy with my children, my job, reading, and meditation, I still think of her and suffer regularly.
It is a painful distraction while meditating making it extremely difficult to make any real progress.
Any advice on coping with impermanence and craving? I know these are basic principals, but I am struggling and could use some practical advice.
Even after having limited to no contact with her for weeks, and keeping very busy with my children, my job, reading, and meditation, I still think of her and suffer regularly.
It is a painful distraction while meditating making it extremely difficult to make any real progress.
Any advice on coping with impermanence and craving? I know these are basic principals, but I am struggling and could use some practical advice.
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Comments
I delt with the same issue. Watch such energies with utter awareness. Watch it in your body and watch your thoughts. IT ALL COMES IN WAVES. It comes and goes. Just be with it all.
In being with it you allow it. You accept it. Acceptance is surrender. Learning to be okay with hell is true freedom.
There really isn't much for you to do. There is no step a to b. There is just this. Just sitting with it. It all will pass.
Isn't it natural to try to find answers to why things didn't work out and how to improve things for the next relationship? To me, it would make a lot of sense to be looking for step A (analysis) and drawing conclusions in step B.
Don't you ever do that when you "just sit"?
It is amazing to me how even just sitting and meditating on the breath, I get up and suddenly intractable problems seem solvable, even though I have not been consciously thinking of them. Sometimes I suspect, we think too much.
A number of years ago, a friend of mine, Dave, and I would meet once a week at either his apartment or mine in New York. We would do zazen (Zen meditation) for about an hour and then go out to dinner.
One evening after we had gotten up from sitting, I said to him, "Did you ever notice that whether it's a good sitting or a shitty sitting, still, there is something good in it?" He looked at me and replied shortly, "Yeah." And since neither of us could think of anything worthwhile to add, we went out to dinner ... Chinese as I recall.
1. Challenge yourself to find as many things as possible all around you to appreciate and to be grateful for every moment of your day.
This is an EMERGENCY FIRST AID procedure, in addition to being good daily Buddhist practice.
It will keep heart and brain open and connected, healing and healthy.
Heart and brain must be open, connected, and balanced with one another for health! (physical,mental,emotional,spiritual health). It is the open, connected, and balanced brain and heart together that comprise the higher mind!
The analytical brain has a tendency to react to emotional(physical,spiritual,mental) disconnect and injury registered by the feeling heart by simply dominating and shutting down the heart. This reaction is an attempt to block the natural feelings of shock, confusion, and (most of all) pain and grief.
Ideally pain and grief are supposed to pass through the body and be released and healed. It is a natural automatic healing process of the body/mind/emotions/spirit. As the Buddha teaches: do not cling! These things are supposed to be simply observed and allowed to pass through the body unhindered such that they are released by the body and healed!
When the analytical brain dominates and shuts down the feeling heart in an attempt to block/escape the feeling of pain, it actually traps and holds the pain in the body, creating further injury, a clinging to the injury (woundedness), and a tendency to cause further injury to self and/or others (acting in/or acting out)...
rather than allowing the pain and grief to pass on through the body and be released and healed.
Gratitude and appreciation are the antidotes to this unfortunate tendency of the brain to react by dominating and shutting down the heart and further injuring it by entrapping and holding the pain in the body rather than allowing it to pass through and be released.
You see? Girlfriend distanced heart connection
the analytical brain reacted to feeling of fear/confusion/disconnect/pain by immediately shutting down heart.
The analytical brain took over (without the feeling heart!) uh oh...
Things can get really ugly when analytical brains go acting without input of feeling hearts!
Heart and brain must be in balance, connection, and cooperation with each other for good health (physical,mental,emotional,spiritual)
after all (worst case scenarios: brain tries to shut down some of heart (heart attack)) or heart tries to shut down some of brain (stroke!) in attempt to improve the balance between them! eeek!) You see? When brain is quieted, devoid of distractions, and not dominating heart, heart speaks to you its own message...
And so practical advice would be:
(to heal self)
First course of action: appreciation and gratitude practice.
Second course of action: seeking balance between brain and heart.
(to heal karmic residue):
Explanation of and sincere apology for lack of right speech due to brain/heart disconnect and imbalance. (The fact that men are trained by our militaristic society to express fear as anger is no excuse for bad behavior in personal relationship interaction)
Expression of deep appreciation and gratitude for the joy the relationship gave you
Expression of regret over the apparent loss of the relationship,
Expression of best wishes, fond regards, and metta toward her.
(to prevent karmic issue from recycling back again):
Establishing good communication, balance, and partnership between analytical brain and feeling heart
with metta
and empathy
Aura
Aura
When the storm clears...lets say about 6 months from now then you can figure out what went wrong. Actually the very allowing and being with it will allow it to go on its own. When we reject or pull in the feelings of the break up and such we prolong it. the only way out is through.
the compassionate thing to do is to take care of oneself.
then become quiet.
Open yourself to heaven and earth,
and be like the forces of nature:
When the wind blows
there is only the wind;
when it rains,
there is only rain;
when the clouds pass,
the sun promises to shine.
If you open yourself to insight,
you are at one with insight
and you can use it completely.
Open yourself to heaven and earth,
then trust your natural responses;
and everything will fall into place.
- Lao Tzu
Anyways, I've gone through my share of heartache and I just don't think there's much you can do about it at the moment. Let the emotional pain arise and don't repress them. Your best friend is time. Time heals all wounds.
don't worry about progress, because progress will happen naturally by opening the heart and doing the right thing. Recently, I heard a yogi say that 'yoga is putting things in their right place', so maybe just ask yourself: 'what did I put in the wrong place, and where should I put it to have it in the right place'?
Take care,
Maarten
Nothing lasts forever anyway, I suppose I go into a relationship knowing that it will end some day. if not through separation it might be through death. Death in the end separates us all.
Even your pain is impermanent. Well I am sure you never knew your gf 25 years ago right, and you were happy. What makes you think you cant be happy not knowing her anymore now.
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Thank you all for your kind words and guidance. I am truly grateful.
Do not try to avoid or suppress the mental pain, it will only grow stronger this way.
Like what taiyaki said, be mindful of the feeling and let it be is crucial, but I believe just feeling without reflecting is ultimately pointless as you learn nothing. Suffering and happiness are not two things (quoted from Thich Nhat Hanh), reflecting on your suffering is the most direct path to happiness.
So once the strong emotion subside a little bit, you have to feel the pain and at the same time reflecting on it. Try to feel its characteristics, desribe them with words, understand the why and how of them, talk to them, and whatever you find you have to accept and embrace them with empthaty. I study some psychology, psychotherapy case study, social neuroscience and buddhism teaching to help myself in understanding the emotion and its root. I would not elaborate on my findings because I think our pain and root are all unique, but so far it works great.
You are feeling the pain not because you lose someone, but because you lose a part of you.
Best wishes to everyone!