Of Beautiful Relationships

Isn’t it strange that in improving relationships, we focus to learn more about others rather than ourselves?

From a young age, I was fascinated with ways of fostering relationships being an emotional and sensitive person. When I was in my teens, I was reading books on communications and psychology. Erich Fromm’s "The Art Of Loving" was one of my favourite books then.

With the knowledge I acquired, many were amazed by the seeming maturity beyond my age which pleased me considerably and further fueled my interest in these fields. However, at the same time, such knowledge caused repercussions. I began to expect relating at deeper levels. Relationships soon became complicated, bringing about suffering.

It’s ironic that with my knowledge of psychology and communications skills, I frequently felt misunderstood. In fact, in all my arguments with my husband, I complained that he failed to understand me.

I now see that understanding has to be a foundation for any knowledge to be practical. All the knowledge I obtained was not truly understood. I was applying the knowledge as a kind of tool to fix and manipulate my relationships with others. During the course of doing that, I had not given much thought to learn about understanding myself better.

My teachers at WISE have gently shown me how critical it is to understand the views that determine the mind's traits. We relate through the lenses of these views. These views define our meanings about others and the issues. As a result, we react accordingly.

This kind of learning of how to observe the self is most interesting, though not necessarily easy. I did not realize it could be so vulnerable connecting to myself. To think I spent most of my life doing the opposite – observing others and the world – and defining my self-worth through them. No wonder I'm burdened with the heavy baggage of judgments.

There is much to learn about this mind, its traits, and views which are being upheld. When I understand myself better, I relate much better to others. The understanding helped me come to recognize and appreciate the diverse mind traits. It also helped me to understand what fueled the demands and the expectations.

Seeing through understanding is wonderful, indeed, it makes relating beautiful …

In grace,
Nancy
28 September 2021