Leonard Price
I desperately want to understand human relationships in terms of what is healthiest for us and for the world at large. I want to look at romantic love or what A Course in Miracles refers to as "The special relationship" and compare it to real love. I have been reading and researching most of the morning so I am hoping I am not too tired to get into a natural wave of free flow thought. Only one way to find out. So here we go....
Bursting the Bubble on Romance
We have all watched, with anticipation, as the hero on the big screen bends his handsome head down to kiss the beautiful heroine. At the moment their lips touch, the music in the background escalates signifying that their struggle is finally over and a happy ending is foretold.. We may experience those same butterflies of expectation and hope when the guy or gal of our dreams looks our way.
We wonder if they will call, and if the call will lead to a date, and that date to a long term relationship equipped with k-i-s-s-i-n-g in some proverbial tree as we eventually look down to see ourselves walking by with a baby carriage. Many of us begin fantasizing about our weddings when we are mere children, looking forward to the day when our dreams will all come true.
Through a long awaited intertwining with a special person, we will become whole and once we are whole we will be free of pain forever. Well maybe not forever...or completely.
We know romantic love is full of turmoil and unpredictability. We even assume that it is supposed to be...that's what makes it more exciting. We read about the roller coaster ride of passion in novels and poetry. We hear the twangs of downward falls that accompany lost love over the radio waves. And we get lost in the thrilling upward climbs in the honeymoon periods of our own new relationships.
Love is a fun, game of chance that promises if we win, we will find pure joy and happiness. Most importantly, it tells us, we will be saved from ourselves. We become addicted to the promise of freedom it offers. It is a pursuit we are more than willing to risk our whole mental life of peace on.
After all, the world is a scary place, void of safety, meaning and purpose for too many of us. We do not want to be alone in it. We feel lost, broken and incomplete...we need someone or something outside ourselves to fill in the holes. We want a reason to live. We seek refuge in the romantic love the poets and songwriters write about.
Price, an American Buddhist Monk,writes that most of us , "longing for authentic and moving experience, turn to the vision of the "lover," that source of wonder, joy, and transcendence, who, it is thought, must be pursued and if captured perfected and if perfected then enjoyed forever — or until some other lover lights up the horizon." (2005,par 9) We find ourselves on a mission to seek and find a person who can fix our brokenness.
We are told that we may not always win in love but we should not give up trying to find that "one" perfect person who fits us like a puzzle piece, convinced that when that happens everything will be okay. We hear the pain of lost love echoed through music and song but it does not deter us. We see people breaking up, getting divorced, yelling obscenities at each other or even killing for the sake of love or its end but we still believe that type of love...is the only thing that will save us.
Besides if it hurts that bad to lose it, how good it will feel to own it? We, as human beings, have been conditioned to believe that , "Love, or possibly the myth of love, is the first, last, and sometimes the only refuge of uncomprehending humanity." (Price, 2005, para 3).
Are we uncomprehending, when it comes to this version of love we use? I believe so. I believe romantic love differs dramatically from real Love which is the only type of love that will save us. Real Love is of spirit. Romantic love is of the ego. One is based on wholeness and completion; the other is based on an idea that we are separate, incomplete and alone. One is truth; the other is illusion. One brings peace; the other brings unfulfilled anticipation and grief amongst its few happy and excited moments. One is permanent and eternal; one is temporary and conditional. Hmmm!
The Illusion of Romantic Love
According to Arenson(2013), Price(2005) and A Course in Miracles our idea of love is a twisted version of real Love. In this twisted, distorted, egoic version... love is a desperate craving for something that we will never be able to truly attain by this means. Romantic love can never sustain us because it arises from our fear of being alone with ourselves.
Anything that comes from fear will breed more fear. Fear is of the ego and the ego wants to use whatever ploy it can to keep us from knowing the truth of who we really are. We somehow forgot who we are and from Whom we came and that sense of separation leaves gapping holes in our beingness. We feel anxiety, pain, grief , hatred and fear. Ego tells us we just need something that will lift us up from this painful perception. It tells us we will find it in a special relationship. We listen and we believe.
Anything that comes from fear will breed more fear. Fear is of the ego and the ego wants to use whatever ploy it can to keep us from knowing the truth of who we really are. We somehow forgot who we are and from Whom we came and that sense of separation leaves gapping holes in our beingness. We feel anxiety, pain, grief , hatred and fear. Ego tells us we just need something that will lift us up from this painful perception. It tells us we will find it in a special relationship. We listen and we believe.
What ego doesn't tell us is that our seeking of some special other, like all seeking and craving in the physical world, is a thirst that will never be truly quenched. It is an attachment to something that will not end the suffering we want it to end, it will only cause more. It will not ground us and keep us stable because this type of love is always changing. It will not serve and protect us no matter what because it is very conditional.
In short, we won't get what we want from this type of love...just more longing and craving. “So powerful, so insistent is it that we seldom notice that the gratification is rare and the craving relentless. Love is mostly in anticipation; it is an agony of anticipation; it is an ache for a completion not found in the dreary round of mundane routine." (Price,2005,par 7)
In short, we won't get what we want from this type of love...just more longing and craving. “So powerful, so insistent is it that we seldom notice that the gratification is rare and the craving relentless. Love is mostly in anticipation; it is an agony of anticipation; it is an ache for a completion not found in the dreary round of mundane routine." (Price,2005,par 7)
Romantic love is simply an illusion. It isn't real. Ego feeds us with fear and hate which are also illusions but we believe them to be true so we cling to the only plausible route of salvation ego offers ...the special relationship. Yet, it really doesn't save us.
According to, A Course in Miracles, "The special love relationship is an attempt to limit the destructive effects of hate finding a haven in the storm of guilt. It makes no attempt to rise above the storm, into the sunlight.” (ACIM, T:16:IV:3:1-2).
We want safety. We want freedom from these awful emotions we are tricked into believing we are destined to feel. We want the sunlight. So we seek out a special partnership, to fix it all and to give us what we want. But it really doesn't fix it all, does it?
It doesn't fix it because it is only an illusion. It isn't real. We will not escape the illusion of hate with this illusion of love. “The special love partner is acceptable only as long as he serves this purpose[creating and maintaining a place of safety]. Hatred can enter, and indeed is welcome in some aspects of the relationship, but is still held together by the illusion of love. If the illusion goes, the relationship is broken or becomes unsatisfying on the grounds of disillusionment.(ACIM, T:16:IV:3:5-7)
According to, A Course in Miracles, "The special love relationship is an attempt to limit the destructive effects of hate finding a haven in the storm of guilt. It makes no attempt to rise above the storm, into the sunlight.” (ACIM, T:16:IV:3:1-2).
We want safety. We want freedom from these awful emotions we are tricked into believing we are destined to feel. We want the sunlight. So we seek out a special partnership, to fix it all and to give us what we want. But it really doesn't fix it all, does it?
It doesn't fix it because it is only an illusion. It isn't real. We will not escape the illusion of hate with this illusion of love. “The special love partner is acceptable only as long as he serves this purpose[creating and maintaining a place of safety]. Hatred can enter, and indeed is welcome in some aspects of the relationship, but is still held together by the illusion of love. If the illusion goes, the relationship is broken or becomes unsatisfying on the grounds of disillusionment.(ACIM, T:16:IV:3:5-7)
What is Real Love?
Real Love is of the Spirit , of the now and it does not cause pain. It is the permanent and real truth that brings peace. (Arenson, 2013) “How can real love devastate you when real love
is the absence of superficial egoic needs, the absence of falsehood, and all
real love is the presence, and the present? With love, there can be emptiness,
but no feeling of emptiness”. (Par 9)
Love is a real love of Self without hatred, fear and guilt. "For love is wholly without illusion, and therefore wholly without fear.” (ACIM, T:16:IV:11:9)
Real Love is found within. “If you seek love outside yourself you can be certain that you perceive hatred within, and are afraid of it. Yet peace will never come from the illusion of love, but only from its reality.” (ACIM; T: 16: IV: 6: 5-6)
Real Love is whole and complete within itself. Though we can deceive ourselves of its true meaning, it is our true nature so there is no escaping it. The search for love is, "Ceaselessly searching for the ultimate feeling
of completion. That which is searched for exists already within." (Arenson, 2013) We need to turn our eyes from the outer world and let them rest on the inner world where Love is bountiful and sure.
So now that we know the difference between real and romantic love what do we do? Break up with our partner, join a Buddhist monastery and forsake all romantic relating?
No...healthy and mature romantic love can offer much joy to our lives. We do not forsake it unless we are committed to getting completely beyond the confines of all physical world attachments in search of the higher glory (what the Buddhists might call Nirvana/nibbana, and the Christians... "a full devotion to Christ".)
Most of us won't take it that far which is a beneficial thing for the growth and survival of our species. We do not have to forsake our committed and intimate relations with others in search of enlightenment.
As much as I wish to wake up fully and consciously, I won't do that at this point in my life...because I love my present partner and I want him in my life. Besides, I do not look good in orange :) .
We do need to give up...we just need to wake up. We need to look at these relationships in a different and healthier way while we seek the Real Love that our partners cannot give us but that we can share with them once we find it.
Once we realize what real love is we seek it by going within. We detach from our desperation and our need for others to fill us by knowing they can't and most importantly, they do not need too. We are already complete and whole. We do not need to end the relationships we are in but we do not need to depend on them to be what they can't be, either...external things that save us from ourselves.
If we are not in such a partnership at the present time...we look with gratitude at where we are at, knowing we can use that time to embrace solitude. We can go inward to the source of all things and learn to love ourselves by knowing who we really are and from Whom we came. Once we find that we will be able to detach from our desperate need to find someone to fill us up. We will know we are already full and complete. Every relationship we approach from that point on will be healthy and mature based on the desire for Real Love over romance. We give up the desperate need for an external fix. We learn to love better.
No...healthy and mature romantic love can offer much joy to our lives. We do not forsake it unless we are committed to getting completely beyond the confines of all physical world attachments in search of the higher glory (what the Buddhists might call Nirvana/nibbana, and the Christians... "a full devotion to Christ".)
Most of us won't take it that far which is a beneficial thing for the growth and survival of our species. We do not have to forsake our committed and intimate relations with others in search of enlightenment.
As much as I wish to wake up fully and consciously, I won't do that at this point in my life...because I love my present partner and I want him in my life. Besides, I do not look good in orange :) .
We do need to give up...we just need to wake up. We need to look at these relationships in a different and healthier way while we seek the Real Love that our partners cannot give us but that we can share with them once we find it.
Once we realize what real love is we seek it by going within. We detach from our desperation and our need for others to fill us by knowing they can't and most importantly, they do not need too. We are already complete and whole. We do not need to end the relationships we are in but we do not need to depend on them to be what they can't be, either...external things that save us from ourselves.
If we are not in such a partnership at the present time...we look with gratitude at where we are at, knowing we can use that time to embrace solitude. We can go inward to the source of all things and learn to love ourselves by knowing who we really are and from Whom we came. Once we find that we will be able to detach from our desperate need to find someone to fill us up. We will know we are already full and complete. Every relationship we approach from that point on will be healthy and mature based on the desire for Real Love over romance. We give up the desperate need for an external fix. We learn to love better.
According to (Arenson, 2013), "The only remedy for love is to love better." (para 14). How do we love better?
We remove this notion of specialness from ourselves and from those we choose. We love all. We love without ego. We remember who we are and from Whom we came.
Then, we love without fear and we love without desperation. "When we lean hard, out of passion, we will fall hard — such is the nature of attachment. But when we do not lean, when instead we stand upright with an eye to the heights, then the love we bestow flows out of us without weakening us, like a superabundance of vigor. This is metta — loving-kindness devoid of selfishness." (Arenson, 2013,para 15)
Real Love is metta - loving kindness devoid of selfish ego need and craving. It is the one thing that will save us.
All is well in my world.
We remove this notion of specialness from ourselves and from those we choose. We love all. We love without ego. We remember who we are and from Whom we came.
Then, we love without fear and we love without desperation. "When we lean hard, out of passion, we will fall hard — such is the nature of attachment. But when we do not lean, when instead we stand upright with an eye to the heights, then the love we bestow flows out of us without weakening us, like a superabundance of vigor. This is metta — loving-kindness devoid of selfishness." (Arenson, 2013,para 15)
Real Love is metta - loving kindness devoid of selfish ego need and craving. It is the one thing that will save us.
All is well in my world.
Arenson, D. (2013)
The True Meaning of Love from a Buddhist Perspective. Mind-Body-Green. Retrieved
from https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-7740/the-true-meaning-of-love-from-a-buddhist-perspective.html
Foundations for Inner Peace . (2007) Text. A Course in Miracles: Combined Volume, Third Edition. Mill Valley,
CA: Foundations for inner Peace.
Price, L. (2005). Nothing Higher
to Live for : A Buddhist View of Romantic Love. Access to
Insight. Retrieved from http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/price/bl124.html
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