Being Single And Opening Up To Love

W was single and approached me to help him rejoin his life with a partner. I first had to share that there is never a vacuum in nature, therefore he was not single. His partner exists, it was himself. His focus was on his feelings, his consciousness, his experience.

With True love, there are only two options for intimacy. Self or other. We are either in a relationship with ourselves, or someone else. Nothing is ever missing. We cannot do both well. Either one of these two is dominant. IF we are single or in a relationship that is suffering from a lack of intimacy and affection, chances are we are in the former, a relationship with ourselves.

If our highest priorities are focussed on ourselves, then our core intimacy is with our self . We become independent, emotionally frail, hyper driven, super sensitive, self conscious, self aware, self motivated, self inspired. If any these conditions exist, we have most likely become the intimate relationship we seek. We have gone within, and stayed there.

If we surrender in love and become other obsessed, we probably fail to be self aware, self conscious, self motivated, self inspired. We then have become dependent on others. Co dependent as it is referred to. Deeply vulnerable, intimate and in love.

This intimacy exposes us to pain and suffering, so, when a relationship fails we often resort to self dependency in order to protect and nurture ourselves. It is meant as a temporary measure until we are ready to re enter relationship.

There are many teachers, therapist and authors whose aim it is to cause their students to become self dependent. I followed that path for some time and 5 major relationships later came to realize that the missing intimacy I wanted was because not only had I become self dependent but I had chosen self dependent women in my relationships. I really wanted intimacy in relationships in which love and dreams are shared and enjoyed.

So, you can see the difference between healing mode and sacred relationship mode. I am reluctant to endorse any sense of independence from a co dependent relationship for fear of causing people to do what I have done and that is to "be on purpose" and therefore immune from the intimacy that come from vulnerability.

Seems weird. But when I saw my highly evolved yoga guru, Sri K Pattabhi Jois, cry on and off for 2 years after his wife's death, I realized that one of us, either him or me, had got it wrong. Self righteously, and following my American teacher, I held my ground, I stayed "on purpose" preferring independence to that vulnerability I saw in my yoga master.

Co dependence is a catch word. Few people want it because most are afraid of the downside, the potential hurt that comes if a relationship fails. Those who teach independence come from broken relationships, their methods and life process are designed to protect and avoid, rather than re immerse themselves in innocence and love.

One critical key to truly falling in love is innocence. If we approach our relationships with hurt and pain from the past, using blame and victim or guilt to sustain those past feelings, then there is no way that we can truly fall, and therefore achieve this beautiful truth of honest, and sustainable love. So, emotionally at least, we must learn how to heal wounds, become innocent, to surrender all the fears, ambitions, paranoia and phobias that we have accumulated order to truly become present and fall in love again.

Intimacy comes from vulnerability, and vulnerability comes from uncertainty. So, in the realm in which we really share, Sacred Love, there is a great vulnerability and uncertainty. Both of which contradict the notion of being safe, self directed and on purpose in life.

The key to moving from single-dom, to relationship with a significant other is to turn the attention from yourself to someone else. It is a new habit, a way of making other's feelings more important than your own, of choosing to say sorry even if it's not your fault, of wanting for their happiness instead of your own. This is the turning point, moving self consciousness to other consciousness. Not worrying about what they think of you, but worrying about what they feel about life. Simply put, it's the process of surrendering the ego that protects us, and becoming vulnerable again. This is sacred love, sacred relationship.