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April-June, 2006

Special Relationships

by Rev. Myron Jones

Most of our relationships are based on the belief that we are not whole, that we are missing some vital piece of ourselves, and that we can get that missing part if we just hook up with the right person. We seldom are aware, on a conscious level, just what it is that we are missing. So here we are with this fuzzy idea that something is missing and that someone else can complete us. I don’t know how we expect to find that missing piece when we don’t even know what it looks like.

The reason we feel incomplete is because we feel separate from God. I am a child of God, created by Him, created in His image and after His likeness. And yet, am I truly comfortable with that definition of myself, or do I try to keep a barrier between me and my Creator? Because if I do, if I think there should be some gap between us, a place where neither God is, nor am I, then I am going to feel incomplete, less than whole.

And so that is why I spend my life trying to achieve that sense of wholeness. I look for ways to identify myself as a whole person. I try to become special in whatever way I think will work. Most of us start out dreaming of success and wind up settling for much less, but always we seek for some elusive thing that says I am special in some way. Some people look for specialness on the other side of the street. I am especially bad, or especially lost, especially dysfunctional.

Our true identity as a child of God needs nothing to improve upon it. It is complete in itself, but how many of us believe in our true self, the perfect self that God created? If this describes you, then you don’t need to read this article because I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to the rest of the folks who feel like they have a bottomless hole in their soul that just cannot ever be filled.

I’m talking to the people who eat when they are not hungry because they mistakenly think that food will fill up that hole. I’m talking to the people who think that alcohol or drugs will satisfy that emptiness. I am addressing this to the folks who think Dillards is the god of happiness, or at least it is his favorite home. Have you ever indulged in an “if only” fantasy; you know, if only I won the lottery or if only I found that perfect soul mate? If you think that your next partner is going to be your savior, then I am talking to you.

I am talking to you because none of those things is going to complete you. Nothing outside of your mind can add to who you are. You are already whole and complete. What would the perfect creation of God need to make himself better? So if this is true, and logic tells us it is, then what happened? How did we get to the place that we find ourselves?

We all feel like something is missing. If we didn’t then we wouldn’t be spending all our money on stuff we sell at the next garage sale. How many people do you know who have been divorced at least once? Let me make this easier, “How many people do you know who have never been divorced?” I read an article that referred to first marriages as throw away marriages.

Where did this attitude come from? It comes from the idea that we are not complete, and that our completion comes from outside ourselves. We think that if only we found our perfect soul mate, then we would be complete. If the truth were to be known we are saying, “I’m looking for you to help me feel more special to make up for the feelings of lack and unworthiness I experience in myself.”(from Pathways course 905: Special Relationships vs Holy Relationships) And so we set out on the hunt for the one who will help us feel whole and worthy, and when we are not in a relationship the attitude is that something is wrong. And that if we are in a relationship and we are not happy, it must be that we made a mistake in choosing our partner and that it is time to move on.

Sometimes it is time to move on. There are legitimate reasons for doing so. However, if you are looking for happiness in your partner or anyone or anything else, you are going to be disappointed. We get out of a relationship what we bring to it. Cinderella is a fairy tale. We do not get married because we want to live happily ever after. Well, often we do, but it doesn’t work that way.

Relationships are a wonderful classroom, a place where we can do real work toward revealing our true Self. When we go into a relationship with this spiritually mature attitude, we can make great headway. Look at your relationships, romantic or otherwise, and ask yourself some questions about your expectations. Why do you want to be in this relationship? What do you want to get out of it? What do you expect the other person to do for you?

When I was married, I expected to get someone to talk to, to wake up next to. I expected to be special to that man, to be first in his loyalties, to be first in his love. I expected him to be true to me and to love me even when I got old. I had many expectations. I am certain he had many expectations of his own, and I am certain he was as disappointed in his expectations as I was.

What if I felt absolutely complete in myself? Would I have needed him to make me feel special and loved? If I am complete and whole, I don’t need anything. So what if I went into a relationship knowing that I don’t experience myself as I really am, but that I want to, and that I want someone to join me on this path. My relationship would still have many challenges, but now “I” becomes “we”; we are working together in full support of each other as we grow spiritually.

In a practical sense, what is the difference? Ok, let’s use the first relationship as an example. Jim and Susan are involved in a typical special relationship. They both want the other to be loyal. They want each to be first in the other’s life. Jim and Susan are supposed to be going out to eat. Jim says that he has changed his mind about going out because his friend wants him to help carpet his new living room. Susan becomes defensive. She has an agenda. She wants to be first in his loyalties and now feels betrayed. She feels that her agenda has been threatened, and since her agenda reflects her need to be made special, it feels like a personal attack. He is taking away her sense of specialness.

Feeling attacked, Susan quickly designs a defense strategy. She decides to go for the old tried and true guilt trip. “How could you choose him over me? We never get to do anything together. I already bought a new dress and did my hair.” In other words, “Feel so guilty that you give me my way.” Susan is speaking not from her true Self, but from her ego which is in constant battle, with guilt being the glue that holds its relationships together. (From 905: Special Relationships vs. Holy Relationships)

Now Jim feels guilty, and in need of defense. So he thinks up a defense strategy. He decides to take the offensive and convince Susan that she is a selfish, self-centered, umm, “witch.” The battle escalates. And that is what they have now; not a loving relationship, but a pitched battle, one of many in a war that they call a marriage.

This does not have to be the way it is. The relationship became a battleground because of the purpose they gave it. They set up this inevitable result when they decided that the purpose of the relationship was to get something from the other.

Pathways of Light course 905: Special Relationships vs Holy Relationships expresses this succinctly: In truth, love in this world of bodies really means, “I want to be special, but I also feel alone, lacking and unworthy, which I can’t stand. Will you be my special partner and promise to keep your body around and help me feel special? This will help submerge my pangs of loneliness, lack and unworthiness. I will get the specialness, acknowledgment and attention I want so desperately. In return I will shower you with specialness. I will agree to give special attention to you and shower you with my exclusive ‘love.’ Through our alliance in being special partners, we will avoid the side-effects of loneliness and guilt that our desire for specialness brings. We will be happy our way, in our little world of specialness. We will be each others idols and replace the Love of God.”

This doesn’t have to be. We can choose differently. We can recognize our oneness in God and by setting a clear intention to express that truth of our selves; we open our mind to the Holy Spirit for the healing of those specialness thoughts. We don’t have to do it alone, and in fact cannot do it alone, but to receive His help, we need only to look honestly at what we are doing and ask for correction.

Suppose they had chosen another purpose. A Course in Miracles says, “The value of deciding in advance what you want to happen is simply that you will perceive the situation as a means to make it happen.” Can you see how different that will make things? Suppose their purpose in having a relationship was to support each other in their spiritual growth, and to learn to have a relationship built on unconditional love rather than special love. In this case, when Jim decided to back out on the event, Susan might still be angry because she wanted to go out. However, because of their shared purpose, it would not have to escalate into war.

Susan could express her disappointment in the change of plans without needing him to capitulate. The need to be right that was experienced in the first relationship stemmed from a need to be special. It stemmed from a need to have specialness make her feel whole. In the second relationship, she still experienced the need to be special, but she will probably recognize that error because it is her intention to see things differently.

Jim is her partner in this process and wants to help her get there. He knows that giving in to her perceived needs may not be the most loving thing to do in this situation, because that would be reinforcing the idea of special guilt relationships. So he may still go to help his friend, but because he understands the dynamic he doesn’t feel personally attacked, and so is able to be loving in the situation. Even when they slip into the attack/defend mode, they both know that this is not the answer, that specialness is not the goal, and so at some point one of them will get off the merry go round.

The point is that whoever is saner at the time can stop the cycle of attack and defend. It doesn’t matter who does it because no one is trying to win on a personal level. They recognize that unless both of them win, neither wins. They are in this together. No one is trying to get something from the other.

Just recognizing that we are trying to complete ourselves through our relationships and that this never works is enough to open our mind to another possibility. There is a way to be in relationships that honors our self and our partner by honoring God as our Creator. We can achieve this by looking honestly at our relationships and asking the Holy Spirit to correct our errors.

© 2006, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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