Hi Elizabeth, I was the moderator last night. I’m more than happy to continue the convo, if you like.

Hey there, Elizabeth!

In response to your topic “I’m interested in talking about how to have a spiritual basis for meeting people”, I have a few ideas.

I think in the simplest form, our interest in spirituality is mostly something we’ll do on our own. We meet people in our lifetime, some very closely, others at a glance, but when it comes down to it your own consciousness, and how you perceive yourself as an idea of God – goodness – an expression of strength, love, independence, patience, kindness, ability, expression and selflessness is the key factor in understanding identity.

We’re so blessed to live in a world of people. To get to know somebody and share moments of life with one or many people is such a gift. And I think that’s key when focusing on our relation with people in this world on a divine level.

Meeting people: co-workers, on journeys, on the street, companions, friends, enemies, loved ones, spouses. You leave that idea pretty open ended.

Even in my marriage I see myself as an independent, able to help and bless those around me. In fact one the of the struggles I’ve had with my wife is expressing to her a singular love, while also expressing my love for others outside of our relationship. But it’s been such a good battle – because not only have I learned how to comfort her in the relationship – she has learned how to be selfless with sharing experiences with others.

But the foundation of most of our arguments end up with our discussing God. At the end of the day we both love God, and we realize that our focus on and expression of God is what we’re here for.

That said this took a while for us to clarify, and we are still working on it. We didn’t have a clear idea of what marriage was for us, nor did we have a set of expectations to fulfill in our marriage. But wow – has prayer and patience and kindness brought us to good places.

Back to your topic. One thing has never changed in my mentality about meeting people in this world, meaning before I got married (while I was dating, or single) and now: We are here to bless one another. There are no rules in friendship, marriage, companionship, relationships, family, etc. The one thing we can rely on – forever, as an absolute – is the good we do bring to our experience with others.

In this week’s lesson on Spirit we hear “Your influence for good depends upon the weight you throw into the right scale.” And that just about sums it up. We’re here to figure out what’s right for us. No book, no person, no thing can show us that except for yourself and God.

We also live in a world that struggles with commitment, marriage, sexuality, etc. I’m not concerned with the seeming issues because I know in every situation – in a broken family, in a friendship struggling – I can be a factor of good.

When it comes down to it we are struggling with fear. Handle that, become the best expression of good you know, and go bless the world ;)

Ben

• This reply was modified 112 days ago by  Benjamin.

Elizabeth,

A Christian Science practitioner shared this on her blog a little while ago. I’ve actually already linked to this in another thread, so forgive me if you’ve seen it already and I’m being redundant. The following is a transcript of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks speaking on NPR about the Fourth Commandment:

Finding happiness doesn't necessarily follow from pursuing it, sometimes the deepest happiness comes when you are least expecting it.

There is a wonderful story about an 18th century Rabbi, Ravi Isaac of Bertechev, who, looking at people rushing to and fro in the town square, wonders why they are all running so frenetically. And he stops one and he says, "Why are you running?" And the man says, "I am running to make a living." And the Rabbi says to him, "How come you are so sure that the living is in front of you, and that you have to run catch it up. Maybe it is behind you, and you've got to stop and let it catch up with you?"

I would say that especially if you are the kind of person who is always blessing others, always loving others, but worried that all those others are too caught up with whatever it is they’re doing, or that you’ve just been neglected or passed over, how important it is to remember to slow down and let your blessing catch up with you. Be patient. Be gentle on yourself.

Another practitioner and dear friend once explained how vital it is to see yourself as loving, loveable, lovely, and loved. At the time I told her that I felt like I really had the “loving” part down; I knew how to love and bless others and especially when it came to relationships I felt like I was always the one initiating the loving things. And I told her that I might even have the “lovely” part down, and acknowledged that there was a lot of good about me that I shouldn’t feel ashamed about. But the “loveable” and “loved” parts were what really tripped me up. I protested that I’m not loved right now, because there’s no one in my life, and therefore that’s probably a good indicator that I’m unloveable, too.

I’m a math person, so this practitioner was very clever to respond to me at that point with a math-related analogy. She said that no one can possibly understand subtraction without also knowing addition. And you cannot understand division without also knowing multiplication. All four are just as vital, interconnected, and inseparable. Take one of them away and math doesn’t work. Just the same, with the qualities of being loving, loveable, lovely, and loved, take one of them away and Love wouldn’t work! All are needed, and all are present. And you have the right to claim — to demand — that in your experience right now. You have the right to stand up to the voice of inadequacy, neglect, or fear and tell it just how lovely, loveable, and loved you really are! You absolutely deserve that as a daughter of God.

@mainframe, sure I can share more :) I think I had approached dating with a certain sense of desperation– I felt unloveable, and so when someone expressed an interest in me I’d get totally consumed by the relationship. I’d lose some of my sense of objectivity and judgment, because “yay someone likes me!” After I realized that it wasn’t about getting, but giving– and I might add, did some serious Soul-searching and learned how worthy and love I was of Love– dating wasn’t this pressure filled thing. It wasn’t a big frantic search to find someone to complete me. I was more willing to share freely and let Love do Her thing taking care of the details.

When I first met my now husband, I can honestly say it wasn’t even on my radar whether we would start dating or not. It was just this natural thing where we had a great time getting to know each other at an event we were both attending. When we reconnected a few months later and started dating, it was so much easier. I think we both had come to a similar realization that we didn’t need to look to the other person as the source of our good, but instead could share that freely. I won’t say we’ve never had challenges, every relationship does. But I didn’t feel the need to try and make love me like I had in previous relationships.

@benchernif KOH/LEE love for the win! :)

These are some truly awesome replies, @benchernif and @inge ! And not that you thought you were, but neither of you were ever very alone with the tendency to pour your whole heart and soul and focus into a relationship you were in; that’s a fairly common approach I’d say. But I’d also say that for many people it’s a learning process to really be able to slow down and trust, and not let it become this constant-pressure thing where the sky is always falling.

I love your honesty, Inge, about the “yay someone likes me!” bit. That’s a really cute way to put it. But that’s really what it’s like for a lot of people. Isn’t it funny how it can seem so startling to us to think, “Holy cow, someone actually likes ME? … Are they really sure about that?” One of the things that helps with that is learning to love yourself. It can be quite easy to appreciate things outside of ourselves, especially when they seem to come in desirable forms that we think we’re lacking, but how important it is to properly identify ourselves as loveable… and loved right now!

And Ben, I love your humility in the lesson you shared about lowering your expectations of others. Anything that takes the pressure off and leaves it all in God’s hands is a good thing!

You guys are really great. Thanks all.

I love that math analogy and thinking about how loving and being loved are interconnected and they can not be separated.