The spiritual foundation for sustainable relationships
When a child is born, it has only one relationship — with the mother. This relationship is extremely deep, the child has no other shelter than her. But as one grows, one starts developing bigger circles of acquaintance and friendships. In a teenage, when the hormones start raging, one experiences an all-new urge to make new and more friends, to experience some thrills and romance. Excited by the prospects of fulfilling relationships between friends, future family, etc, people get obsessed with fantasies.
However, most people experience certain trends in every relationship. It begins with a fresh breeze of newness. We like some or many external attributes, habits, and/or reputations of the other person. Sometimes people are mesmerized by certain ways in which someone reacts, or smirks, or speaks. However, when we spend a substantial amount of time with the person, we start seeing their faults and shortcomings. The “mesmerizing smirks” change to “irritating expressions”. The “cool” activities change to “unbearable” ones.
If the foundation of the relationship is simply made of superficial elements like looks, money, fame, etc, and not made of higher values like tolerance, forgiveness, gratitude, selflessness, and willingness to adjust and sacrifice for a higher cause — the relationships end up in breakups, cheating or even enmity. It is thus vital that we make it a priority to nourish our value systems with these virtues. How could this be accomplished?
First, we need to introspect about the foundation upon which we are building a relationship. What are our expectations? If it is simply based on selfish aspirations and over-expectations, we need to be alarmed by its hollowness. But even if we intend to have a selfless relationship based on higher values, one often finds oneself succumbing to behaviors that make it bitter. How could these tendencies be transcended? As Albert Einstein rightly pointed — “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”. Spirituality offers a higher dimensional approach to dealing with these issues.
Rather than waiting for others to change, or blaming them for the way they are, we need to take the responsibility of changing our own selves. The focus needs to shift to building one’s own character, nourishing ourselves spiritually, and learning to transcend our lower instincts. By taking out a sacred time from our daily routine for spiritual practices like reading inspiring life histories of saintly people from scriptures, connecting with God through recommended processes like chanting God’s names, and associating with people who try to cultivate these values, we can replenish our higher-value reservoirs. This gives enough strength to act on a paradigm that is higher than the naturally selfish and negative thought process we may possess.
