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Why cant I enjoy other people without becoming attacthed?
banned_crab
Veteran
It seems like I always end up expecting too much from them than I begin to suffer for it. I cant just tell myself "dont become attactched to this person" because thinking about it never really helps. I still make everything personal in my mind. What should I be doing differently?
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Just let yourself be attached if that is what happens. It's not the end of the world. In the mean time take refuge and meditate. Attachment is good news if it makes you meditate more and see all states of mind as changing and impermanent. Your relationships are the manure of your practice and struggling is exactly dharma practice.
If you can't help getting attached, and I don't think any of us really can (I fall in love easily, for example), then at least keep telling yourself "this too will pass", in whatever way you'd like to phrase it. Keep reminding yourself and you'll create a little bit of space, a cushion to pad the pain of loss.
Practicing Buddhism perhaps?
:buck: .
Perhaps it's your attachment to your expectations that causes you pain. Not your attachment to the people themselves. Be willing to give more of yourself and receive less in return and your relationships with others will improve.
I think there is a difference between having expectations and being attached. I'm quite attached to my husband and my children, I'm ok with that. It's just a different sort of attachment. Letting go of expectations (or your attachment to the outcome) doesn't mean never getting attached to people. If we never got attached, we'd never get married or raise our children. It's unhealthy attachment that is different. Clinging, grasping, wanting things to remain the same, not accepting when they changed, not honoring others for who they are even when we wish they were different.
Read this in a book today and found it helpful (for the record, the term nonviolence in this case is in reference to ahimsa)
Nonviolence asks us to trust the other's journey and love and support others to their highest image of themselves, not our image of them. Leave the other person free of our needs, free to be themselves and free to see us as they choose."
The part that strikes me is the "leave the other person free of our needs" and that resonates with me these days. Our ideas that we can take our needs and expect others to meet them is an unhealthy expectation.
@heyimacrab, you've been here a good long while and regularly asked questions. I'm pressed to point out that you've had endless threads with constructive answers, but you don't appear to have taken anything to heart and put it into practice.
Why is that?
Furthermore, when people turn your questions round on you, and advise you that you're merely re-hashing stuff, going over old ground and asking the same, old same-old, you accuse them of 'attacking you' and being critical or nasty.
Which is completely inaccurate.
So I'm going to ask you nicely:
have a look at your thread history, and ask yourself:
What of everything I have been taught, on this forum, by these patient, long-suffering, supportive and helpful people, have I actually put into dily, habitual practice?
Tell me when you have an answer to give, then I'll happily re-open the thread for your contribution, and for the thread to continue. Ok?
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