Conscious Relationships

Enlightenment is intimacy with all things. ~ Dogen Zenji

                What would it be like to be in a truly conscious or enlightened relationship?  In order to answer this we must enter into that experience ourselves.  We must be willing to let go of our ordinary notions which are based on attachment, object relations and ego-identification.  No problem, right?  Such relationship is free from possessiveness, jealousy, control, dependence or codependence.  A truly conscious being is complete within herself.  There is joy in sharing time together but there is the recognition that these temporary forms that we assume arise from and will return their source in pure Being.  As Rumi says, “Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere.  They’re in each other all along.”

                Real love is a kind of enlightenment, an awakening to a shared sense of being.  Unfortunately we tend to pull back from this into our defensive ego-positions.  Where there was unity and harmony we fall back into conflict, seeking to please or control, deceit, blame and judgment.  We forget that we have shared the sacred universal force of love and start to question, “is this person really meeting my needs?”  Although we might stay together the pain of our inner separation drives us further apart.  Love is ecstatic, powerful and empowering.  In response the ego retreats in fear and defensiveness.

                Enlightened love begins with work on oneself.  One doesn’t need to change in the ordinary sense of “self-improvement.”  Instead it is a process of self-acceptance and self-inquiry.  Instead of turning to the objects of the world for self-confirmation and gratification, one turns within to find one’s source.  Meditation is key.  Meditation has been shown to accelerate psychological development.  This means that with consistent ongoing practice it can take us into higher stages beyond ordinary ego development.  It can help us to evolve.  It can move us into the possibility of conscious love.

                The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad tells the story of an ancient sage named Yajnavalkya who reached a point in his spiritual development where he decided to renounce his family and wealth and go into the forest to meditate in solitude.  The purpose of the ascetic path, of course, is transcendence.  The ascetic seeks to transcend the world of appearances; of name, form and change.  His wife Maitreyi approached him and he assured her that he would leave his considerable wealth to her, that she would not be left in material need.

Maitreyi, it turns out was also somewhat spiritually evolved.  She asked her husband, “Will wealth keep me from death?”  Yajnavalkya of course replied “No.  You will live and die as an ordinary rich person.”  As we begin to awaken we start to realize that all of the things that we seek and cling to in this world are very temporary, whether wealth, fame, relationships or anything else.  As the common saying goes: you can’t take it with you. 

Maitreyi asks her husband to share the secret of immortality with her and he begins by explaining, “A wife loves her husband not for himself but for the Self within.  A husband loves his wife not for herself but for the Self within.”  We can easily understand this on one level.  We love another person for how they make us feel.  When I encounter my beloved I feel a sense of inner ecstatic delight.  In the same way all of the things that we love in life are basically triggers for an internal state which we call love.  On a deeper level this feeling of ecstatic delight is the momentary recognition of the transcendent being that lives within each and every one of us.

                When we get stuck on the level of name and form we think that there is an object of our love which separate from us.  We fail to recognize the presence of the non-dual Self which is love itself beyond name and form.  As Ram Dass jokes, “We are all God in drag.”  When we look inside ourselves, when we inquire into and rest in our self-nature we find that we are one with the Self whose nature is Being-Consciousness-Bliss.  United inwardly with the Self we are beyond name and form, suffering and mortality.  We are liberated beings, jivanmuktis.

The Yoga perspective says that human beings have three basic psychophysical behavioral modes or gunas.  These are known as tamas, rajas and sattwa.  Tamas is characterized as unconsciousness, inertia and sleep.  Rajas on the other hand is characterized as passionate emotion, strong desire and attachment.  Sattwa is characterized by wisdom and mental/emotional stability.

We can see these three modes embodied in the physiology of the brain.  Science views our brains as evolving over time.  Within us we have a reptilian-brain, mammalian-brain and neo-cortex which is uniquely human.  Nature seems to have incorporated various stages of neural evolution within us.  Our reptilian brain is basically instinct-responsive.  It is concerned with self-preservation and species reproduction.  Our mammalian brain is more sophisticated and associated with the capacity for feelings.  Our more newly evolved brain is shared somewhat with the higher primates but is significantly larger in human beings.  It is associated with our capacity for language and abstract thought. 

We are each composed of these three modes of being, perceiving and interacting.  Our job is to integrate all three in our experience of living in the world.  Ideally our more highly evolved brain should be in charge of our thoughts, feelings and behavior.  However human beings are more than just abstract intellectuals.  In terms of relationships our feelings and emotions are an intrinsic part of who we are.  Even the poor maligned reptile within is necessary for our continued existence.  However, we should rarely rely on it for advice.

                Conscious relationships are based in an awareness of all three modes of functioning within us.  We relate on sexual, emotional and intellectual levels with everyone we meet.  This is just the reality of who we are as embodied beings.  To be able to enter into a conscious relationship we need to have a deep self-awareness.  We need to be aware of our own drives and conditioning.  We also need to be aware that our real self-nature is beyond these.  We need to awaken to the reality that we are luminous, expansive, consciousness-beings perhaps trapped or perhaps just playing in the material world. 

             Conscious relationship means awakening to the Self within all: awakening to Oneness.