If you could consider a committed, intimate relationship as a Spiritual Path, you may find a new possibility for healing and joy that can bring a greater truth, vitality, and aliveness to your relationship. For many people, an intimate relationship is about getting their needs met, feeling safe and loved by another. This can often be a complicated arrangement that creates issues of misattunement with each other, such as feeling ignored, misunderstood, forgotten, criticized, shamed, betrayed, hurt, etc. Instead, consider viewing an intimate relationship as being a form of a spiritual quest or path for learning how to connect more deeply within yourself.
Falling in Love
In the first bloom of a romantic connection, you fall in love and it feels ecstatic! This falling sensation is one of letting go of control (with little fear), of surrendering to a sense of yourself that is beyond you. It is akin to the ecstatic feeling of spiritual enlightenment. As Marianne Williamson puts it;
“From a spiritual perspective, the original high of a romantic connection is thrilling …. For in a quick moment, a gift from the gods, we are likely to suspend our judgment of the other, not because we are temporarily insane, but because we are temporarily sane. We are having what you might call a mini-enlightenment experience. Enlightenment is not unreal; enlightenment—or pure love—is all that is real. Enlightenment is when we see not as through a glass darkly, but truly face-to-face.” – Marianne Williamson
