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Articles of Grievances II: Romance
My first article I have written shows no signs of life so I thought I would move on to the next one; Romance.
A New Phenomenon
While a certain degree of romance has existed for thousands of years, it has come to be exaggerated, coveted, craved more so than ever in this era. Speaking of America in particular, it is undoubtedly the most cherished thing in our culture for people of all ages to aspire to.
Since the Romantic era, there is a national but very much so an individual desire to find that special someone. A someone whom you can share all your worries and fears, your hopes and dreams. A someone that can meet all our emotional needs, be there for us always, be ever-faithful to us. A reasonable person would look at us and see on the surface just how illogical this is.
I of course am not denying that people occasionally will find someone very compatible, but too often we obsess over someone real or of the imagination and we attribute very unrealistic characteristics to them. Perfect this...perfect that. In the end, if we don't get this, we suffer. (4 Noble Truths ring true no?
)
Culture of the Irrational
In America perhaps more than anywhere, we are brought up to think that someday we find someone we love for the rest of our lives, get married to them, have kids, and live happilly ever after. But a look at divorce rates proves that this does not happen most of the times. And there are plenty of miserable married people.
Our culture is filled with ads in newspapers and even online dating filled with desperate people trying to find an almost god-like being to rescue them. Kind of sad really.
Japan, however, places much more of an emphasis on friendship though. Firstly, genuine friendships are almost always much more stable than romantic relationships. Romance is very dependant upon a number of factors it can be very unstable with just one little thing to alter it in a very negative way. Friendships are typically much more sturdy, and they are much less delusional. There are far less expectations in friendships.
Fantasy and Attachment
We all have our fantasies and for teenagers, they typically revolve around romance. I am no exception, however I try not to fantasize about relationships in particular. Sexual fantasies are common, yet I believe there is far less attachment (emotionally ) to that person. They are easier to overcome.
I know a friend at school who has been hopelessly obsessed romantically with this girl for 3 years now. They are friends sort of, but she does not return the same feelings as he feels. This has lead him to a kind of depression really and I feel that he neglects to remember just how many friends he actually has.
Instead, when we focus only on one person selfishly I believe, we forget about all the other relationships we have that are capable of growth.
Conclusion
A lot of people say I am depressing and a downer for the things I say. But this is far from the truth. I only try to dispell the illusions created in part by society and our very minds as well.
I am interested to see what the married folks here have to say on this topic. Perhaps I am biased in the fact that I am not involved with anyone right now. My life is quite simple and I find nothing lacking in it. I see people all the time at school whose lives have been turned into personal hells as a result of bad relationships. The amount of stress damages them socially and scholarly as well.
I look forward to your comments.
Knight of Buddha
A New Phenomenon
While a certain degree of romance has existed for thousands of years, it has come to be exaggerated, coveted, craved more so than ever in this era. Speaking of America in particular, it is undoubtedly the most cherished thing in our culture for people of all ages to aspire to.
Since the Romantic era, there is a national but very much so an individual desire to find that special someone. A someone whom you can share all your worries and fears, your hopes and dreams. A someone that can meet all our emotional needs, be there for us always, be ever-faithful to us. A reasonable person would look at us and see on the surface just how illogical this is.
I of course am not denying that people occasionally will find someone very compatible, but too often we obsess over someone real or of the imagination and we attribute very unrealistic characteristics to them. Perfect this...perfect that. In the end, if we don't get this, we suffer. (4 Noble Truths ring true no?
)Culture of the Irrational
In America perhaps more than anywhere, we are brought up to think that someday we find someone we love for the rest of our lives, get married to them, have kids, and live happilly ever after. But a look at divorce rates proves that this does not happen most of the times. And there are plenty of miserable married people.
Our culture is filled with ads in newspapers and even online dating filled with desperate people trying to find an almost god-like being to rescue them. Kind of sad really.
Japan, however, places much more of an emphasis on friendship though. Firstly, genuine friendships are almost always much more stable than romantic relationships. Romance is very dependant upon a number of factors it can be very unstable with just one little thing to alter it in a very negative way. Friendships are typically much more sturdy, and they are much less delusional. There are far less expectations in friendships.
Fantasy and Attachment
We all have our fantasies and for teenagers, they typically revolve around romance. I am no exception, however I try not to fantasize about relationships in particular. Sexual fantasies are common, yet I believe there is far less attachment (emotionally
) to that person. They are easier to overcome.I know a friend at school who has been hopelessly obsessed romantically with this girl for 3 years now. They are friends sort of, but she does not return the same feelings as he feels. This has lead him to a kind of depression really and I feel that he neglects to remember just how many friends he actually has.
Instead, when we focus only on one person selfishly I believe, we forget about all the other relationships we have that are capable of growth.
Conclusion
A lot of people say I am depressing and a downer for the things I say. But this is far from the truth. I only try to dispell the illusions created in part by society and our very minds as well.
I am interested to see what the married folks here have to say on this topic. Perhaps I am biased in the fact that I am not involved with anyone right now. My life is quite simple and I find nothing lacking in it. I see people all the time at school whose lives have been turned into personal hells as a result of bad relationships. The amount of stress damages them socially and scholarly as well.
I look forward to your comments.
Knight of Buddha
0
Comments
Love Actually?
Pretty Woman?
Sleepless in Manhattan?
(Gosh, how many others.....?!)
Verdict?
Real Life does not imitate Art.
I don't think that websites are going to help someone find love, it's got to find you.
LOL!!!!
KOB - I agree with you on your point about having a friendhsip with your mate is so much more important than romance. I can honestly, wholeheartedly say that my husband and I are the best of friends. We were friends before we were ever romantically invlolved. We spent hours upon hours just talking each day before our relationship ever moved farther along. I was engaged to someone else when I met my husband, and so I entered the relationship with him on a "friends" basis, and so did he. And now here we are - very happily married and the best of friends! And of course, it helps that I happen to find him the most handsome, stunning, adorable man in the world!
I have been married before and so has my husband. I met my husband when I was 15. I knew him for 10 years before I married him and we became best friends before we ever married. We have now been married for 22 years. Neither of us were best friends with your 1st spouses. There is nothing that I can not tell him or talk to him about. A marriage is hard work. You will not always agree and that's ok, there is nothing wrong with learning to " agree to disagree" and go on. Being best of friends helps you to be able to work things out when issues arise. And they will.
Romance is great!!! Don't get me wrong.........But friendship is the backbone to a good marriage.
And I agree. It does help that I still think that my husband is the most handsome, kind, loving man on earth.....lol and that's after 22 years.
Divorce is a disaster for kids. And my 1st husband and I did everything to make sure our son came 1st. Never bad mouthed the other, always got along for his sake. If we had issues we took it up with each other when he was not around. And it was still hard for our son.
But on a different note. My husband that I have now and I also have a son. And when he was younger. He use to say to us. Why do you have to talk everything over, why do you live together, why can't you 2 be like normal parents and be divorced so that I can get more presents on holidays, get my way more often and when mom makes me mad......I can run to dad and when he makes me mad I can run to mom. What is wrong with you two. I just don't understand why you can't be like normal parents. This was an out burst said in anger..........
I say to you...........there is some humor in this. But how sad can that be that out of all his friends.......and he has several. We are the only couple that are still married to each other. I believe it's way to easy to get a divorce. It's just easier to walk away from problems and not try and work them out.
I think that the problem with romance...are the underdeveloped sensibilities of the participants.
If you are open to sharing some of your relationship with your friend / love partner, you said you were engaged to someone else when you first met each other. What happened with your former engagement? Did you leave the first relationship for your current husband? Or did it change on its own?
I mentioned elsewhere a book by Stephen & Ondrea Levine on using an intimate, consciously committed relationship with a love partner as a spiritual path and devotional practice in itself. Interesting reading on this subject, if nothing else.
But what do i know, Ive yet to experience such a lasting, healthy committed relationship myself. Though have met a few people who have been in truly healthy, vital, spiritually radiant and loving monogomous relationships for many years, so do recognize for some it is possible and healthy to share, experience and live such spiritual and balanced "romantic" love and be spiritually awake still.
I don't mind sharing that information with you....my relationship with my fiance at the time that I met my husband wasn't going so well. He was a very nice man, but our relationship just didn't have that "spark". If I had married him, I knew that I would not have been truly happy. So he and I had discussed this, and then I started speaking to the man I am married to now, and then decided to call off the engagement. My fiance was really ok with it ending as well, so I knew it was the right decision.
Thank you YogaMama.
Ive found myself in a slightly similar situation, perhaps.? Though a bit different. I met a women with whom there seems to this 'spark' or 'irrational connection' of the spirit as she has referred to it between us. It didnt start off immediately like that, though we were both very open, genuine and revealing about ourselves with each other as friends. She is married, and has been with this same man for 15 years. But according to her marriage to her husband has lacked a feeling of 'spiritual connection', emotional support & appreciation with him for most of their time together the past 10 years. During that time, she has had several sexual affairs with an ex of hers, and never told her husband, which in my own feeling is not so healthy, as that will usually do more to contribute to feeling more disconnection between people in such partnerships. And before she moved back to Canada she started to open to me intimately like that, but I was not comfortable with doing that and told her i felt she needs to deal with whatever she feels is lacking in her marriage first. And either heal it and stay together or if its healthier to seperate then do that. The dishonesty alone anyway curtails more authentic relating i feel. So she has moved back to Canada with her husband, and she & I have been staying in touch through e-mails and phone calls up to a few days ago when i told her i felt i want to stop relating with her until she either focuses on being fully present, accountable & honest with her husband so they can heal in clarity and maybe even continue growing together, or recognizing if what is lacking between them is really so important and unavailable that it would be in their best interest to seperate.
It feels important to support her in whatever ways i can in dealing with her marriage and partner who she does still love, but feels perhaps similarly to the lack of spiritual spark that you were sharing feeling with your fiance', on their own merits rather than being distracted by the possibility of lingering around in it without being fully responsable, honest & clearly accountable within it because there is someone else available who shares with us this connection we do feel is lacking in our marriage. But my feeling at this point is more that i am likely just helping her become clearer in herself and her relationship and be more participatorily accountable for its reality through respect and appreciation of this gently yet firmly.? I do recognize we all make mistakes and can change and grow to new understandings and ways of relating in more integrity, clear love and honesty.
Though given that she had 4 sexual affairs with a former partner, who she says she does'nt feel that spiritual connection with either that she feels we share, while with her husband and didnt even communicate this and specifics of some points of disconnect to facilitate clarifying the unspoken disharmonious energies and disconnects within their relationship, i am not so sure I would be into opening with her into an intimate personal union as partners as such? At this point, it just feels that being a calm and fully honest presence and friend supporting her dealing honestly, clearly loving and accountably with her relationship to herself as expressed toward her husband and marriage is the best way of relating at this time with no concern or really interest even in what might be able to develop between she and i later.
Thank you for sharing your story. Hope you dont mind i was a bit long with mine? Sometimes it can be helpful to share, even if its just expressing it and hearing others somewhat similar though different situations?
Recently they've had this whole pro-marriage thing aimed by the conservative party (politics) claiming that single parents are at the heart of poverty, 'yobbish behavior', poor learning.. and several other social problems. And that ppl should marry before having children
because a huge % of parents split if not married and have kids.
I'll keep my seeds dry today if you don't mind.
Love is but, the willingness to do for others.
Like compassion is begins and ends with the intent of the source.
BTW- It's that damn Jan Austin's fault. LOL!!
As a lifelong Janeite, I take exception to that remark!!!!!! She had a deep distrust for romantic love, understanding that it leads to disaster - just look at Pride and Prejudice. She understood that marriage is about security, which meant money. Love may follow on if one is lucky but a good, steady income made up for its lack.
Me, I blame the French: for sentimental stuff like Bernadin de Saint-Pierre's Paul et Virginie or de Sade's whole work. Add in Goethe and Sturm und Drang and you have the Romantic movement emoting all over the shop like a drunk vomiting their Saturday night binge.
And you see how that has come to be twisted by the masses.
It's not so much her as the simplton's who've read it. Or all all modern romance novels worthy the same praise?:winkc:
I haven't come across any modern novel from the 190 years since her death which matches up to the style, wit and irony of Miss Austen.
The choice itself is Hell and should never, never, NEVER be forced on students. How can you choose between?
Surely to love the world, you must love others, and to do that love yourself..
if you don't love yourself, love towards others is distorted surely.
There is, indeed, a process, a progression, from peace and love within to peace and love "between" leading to peace and love "among".
The sadness is that many, too many perhaps, start without a sense of love 'within'. When I have been asked by such people to work with them, I have found that it may be necessary to uncover what or who it is that they do love. Once that feeling is found, it can be enhanced and directed 'inwards' so that the person can begin to see themselves with a loving and compassionate gaze.
Some people find it easier to love even the worst but cannot find compassion for themselves. In the practice of Metta, we hold ourselves in the love of a parent for their only child.
On a personal note, I use a deliberate physical movement as well as visualisation in the practice, although I no longer remember the name our teacher gave to it.
then this is attachment and selfishness.. real love is different
its like this woman.. her husband beat her, treated her like crap.. so she left him and took the kids.. She found this great guy who cared for her.. But every few months she'd break with him and rush back to her ex.. saying she can't deal with it..
thats selfish and weakness.. and attachment but not love..
if she understood love, then she'd leave her ex for good.. :hiding:
love becomes distorted when based wholey on the self
Not unsimilar to the eye lens we can only send and recieve compassion to that which our compassion can penetrate.
I can't give my love to anyone. When I express loving kindness or anything for that matter
it's a reflection of my perception of what I am recieving from the cosmos that directs my intent.
My few years of being stage-struck left me with a deep and abiding love of Chekov. I would love to hear him in Russian. There is a rhythm to the 'native' language that can never quite come across, however good the translation. I've found that it doesn't really matter if one doesn't understand what the words mean, just like opera. But then I remember that there are a number here who dislike opera.
There is a very interesting study going on into the effects of labguage use on the brain. The example used is Shakespeare's "companion me" where he uses the noun as a verb (a common Shakespearean verbal trick). I found myself wondering how I would get the same effect in French - still wondering!