None, O beloved, loves the husband for the husband's sake, but for the Self that is in the husband; none, O beloved, ever loved the wife for the wife's sake, but for the Self that is in the wife. None ever loves anything else except for the Self.
Brihadaranyaka Upanishad
When we contemplate the relationships we are involved in during this human drama we need to ask, "Who am I seeing and relating to?" Am I connecting to the 'self' of this being or the Self? Am I bonding with the ego or that internal/eternal essence in the person I am married to, going with, birthed, befriended, or work with?
Most of us are attracted to the ego and body of the other. We tend to see that alone as the person we are relating to. We do not see the Self, though the Self is always gently calling to be seen. It is the reason why we relate and connect with others in the first place.
What is it that attracts man to man, man to woman, woman to man, and animals to animals, drawing the whole universe, as it were towards the centre?
Vivekananda
Love is that force. It is what holds everything together. Yet, we get all caught up in this little petty form of love which is really just attraction and attachment, don't we? Instead of asking , "Am I seeing and responding to the other person's Self?", our relationships tend to operate on these questions:
"How does the other person's ego feed and protect "me"?"
"Are they making this life illusion I have of self comfortable or are they challenging me to the point of 'disturbance'? "
Are they allowing me to keep running from what I stuffed or stored inside or are they triggering it?
As long as they allow us to perpetuate this illusion of 'self' we may deem the relationship as healthy and satisfactory. We open up.
We fail to see that this force that pulls us is not on the surface. It is much deeper. What are we opening up to, albeit superficially, when we have satisfying relationships? What is this force?
It is what is called love. Its manifestation is from the lowest atom to the highest being: omnipotent, all-pervading, is this love. What manifets itself as attraction in the sentient and the insentient, in the particular and the universal, is the love of God. It is the one motive power that is in the universe...
Unattached, yet shining in everything, is love, the motive power of the universe, without which the universe would fall to pieces in a mment, and this love is God.
What we are opening up to is the Self, not the self. We are loving the Self in us by recognizing the Self in another. We see that Self is love. We are love. They are love. All is love.
All is well.
Vivekananda (n.d.) 2.4 Bhakti or Devotion. The Complete Works of Swami Vivekanada. Kindle Edition.
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