Relationship changes once you stop supporting stories

[dubhasa]

What I am discovering is that many relationships change once you stop supporting your own and others stories.Once you see things as they are, previously huge issues, major disappointments etc. simply vanish.
Others have big issues dealing with this change in you. You appear very much unconcerned and distant when contrary is true. Now in fact you are closer than ever because you have eliminated huge layer in between.

I am not sure how to deal with it at practical level. In REAL life, I understand completely that there is nothing to deal with.

Is this what you experience?

[kiki]

Is this what you experience?

Yes. When there is the appearance of a relationship dynamic going on there is my role arising within the play of the relationship, but that role is easily seen for what it is.

Waking up is the recognition of all the roles we temporarily embody, and in that recognition there also comes the relinquishing of the role spontaneously when it is no longer needed. But even while the role is present there is no longer the tendency to get lost within it.

[eseward]

Once you see things as they are, previously huge issues, major disappointments etc. simply vanish.

Absolutely.

Others have big issues dealing with this change in you.

Sometimes.

JMO of course.

[yougarksooo]

Yes, that is what I experience.

What I am discovering is that many relationships change once you stop supporting your own and others stories.Once you see things as they are, previously huge issues, major disappointments etc. simply vanish.

What a wonderful awakening. To live in this fully...each moment. Awake. Whenever someone begins talking, I know immediately that, no matter what they are saying, they are telling me who they think they are. Nothing more.

[Larryfroot]

Absolutely Yougarksoo,

I recently had a flash of blinding insight into the nuts and bolts of a relationship (long term) simply by dropping the stories around the pain. Drop the stories and whatever remains is true. That was the message I got at any rate. And I wasn't even searching for the 'why'. It just came unbidden in a quiet moment after I had been sitting with the pain without story and without resistance.

[yougarksooo]

Drop the stories and whatever remains is true. That was the message I got at any rate. And I wasn't even searching for the 'why'. It just came unbidden in a quiet moment after I had been sitting with the pain without story and without resistance.

Yes, and then to live each moment in that truth. Not to have it as just one realization, but as a way of seeing, always.

[Larryfroot]

That's the one. We take things so personally...and a lot of that is aided by the stories we tell about 'my' pain, 'my' triumphs, 'my' anxiety. We create an entire myth (of stories) around blaming someone else or blaming the situation or blaming ourselves. When really all that pain and difficulty arises from the simple fact of being human. Taking the person out of the equation and dropping the stories is such an important step (for me, at any rate) towards the end of suffering.

[suraj]

You appear very much unconcerned and distant when contrary is true. Now in fact you are closer than ever because you have eliminated huge layer in between.

Can you explain Dubhasa , how?. What is that 'layer' that you have eliminated. Actually I am concerned about appearing 'unconcerned' and 'distant' to the other person.

[Suzanne]

Has anyone found this to be true:

I was involved with someone who was full of stories and eventually, after a year's time, unveiled lots of suffering and dramas. I let them come and go as storms and that worked for a while. I did not participate or deny his dramas. I let them be and let them pass.

But eventually he started making ultimatims, because he was feeling that I was distant. What was really going on was I was just accepting him and not reacting, not validating his ego. I would re-connect physically and emotionally when he was ready.

He was trying to "get" me to "give" him what would make him happy. He felt I was withholding these things from him deliberately.

We parted after 2 or 3 incoherant conversations. I am happy that I did not engage my ego or painbody and pass on any labels or judgements onto him, or start bargaining with demands of my own. He made the decision not to call me up again.

Basically, I made no sense to him because he coudn't hook me into reacting either way about his many demands.

Anyone else find themselves in this sort of predicament with an intimate partner?

[dubhasa]

That is exactly my experience suzanne.
Not only intimate relationships but almost all other relationships, friends, coworkers, parents anyone else with whom you shared stories with earlier. You in fact become boring and dull because you don't share gossips, interesting stories about someone else. When talk to my ....(Friend, parent, neighbor, spouse whoever) I can immediately tell what they are expecting from me. Confirmation about their stories and participation in drama. I can still do it as I used to but I just don't want to anymore. It's not that I am being prudent but I just don't enjoy gossip, stories or misfortune of others. Instead I "understand" them and I am a lot more empathetic now than before. Flip side of the whole equation is since others don't get what they want, I am blamed for it. Either for being distant or inconsiderate. I am just amazed at how desperate people can be and how much recognition they continually need to prop up themselves !
I don't know any solution for this. And I don't even know if this is a problem. It is what it is.

[Ives]

There is a sadness to awakening.

That sadness is to see others so asleep.

[Suzanne]

That is exactly my experience suzanne.
You in fact become boring and dull because you don't share gossips, interesting stories about someone else.

You know, dubhasa, I've always looked at these kinds of things differently than others, and I always wondered why I didn't make sense to others. I'm not saying I wasn't caught in ego-I most definitely was-I just looked at people and things from a longer view, and how they fit into a world view.

I remember saying something at the beginning of the Iraq invasion that this wasn't going to be any fun, and soldiers were going to suffer and die. I said this at the lunch table at work. A friend of mine immediately shot back at me that I was being insensitive to someone who had a loved one over there and I ruined her whole day.

Ruined her whole day!?! I ruined it? Really? Did I tell her something she didn't know? War doesn't ruin her whole day, but I do?

In this way I've always been more conscious of how we are all responsible for the harm we do others, and that has angered people. Anytime you state the obvious and unveil the group conditioning for the madness that it is, you risk the punishment of the group.

So, I'm sort of over losing people's approval, but it is easier to finally understand why I see things differently. The pack mentality gives alot of people security in a fear based world. And it's been a while since I've been fear based.

Now, it's easier to accept why so many people go along with the group madness. Everything is easier to accept.

But I still don't know how this will work in an intimate relationship. I hope I get the chance to try, but it's also nice to not be desperate for one, to see it as my salvation, or proof of my personal worth.

But I am really tiring of being those things for the men I meet.

I'm grateful for this board, for the chance to hear from others and imagine my life in these new perspectives.

[Webwanderer]

That is exactly my experience suzanne.
Not only intimate relationships but almost all other relationships, friends, coworkers, parents anyone else with whom you shared stories with earlier. You in fact become boring and dull because you don't share gossips, interesting stories about someone else.

This is an interesting challenge. People who tell stories of gossip and woe are often looking for validation for their victimization. One who is awakening from the dream of ego identity can see through the gossip to the underlying reality. We bob our heads in tacit understanding, but without providing the sought after verbal feedback we lose out value as an audience to the story teller. As a result we often become the next subject of the story teller.

I don't know about you, but it has made somewhat of a hermit out of me. This is no complaint on my part, I actually prefer my aloneness to the turmoil of relentless ego dialog. I still work in the world with lots of interaction, but developing new friendships is rare. Spreading my version of awakening consciousness in an active way only sends egos scurrying for more familiar company. So except for clear opportunities to add a helpful insight to someone genuinely looking for understanding, I remain relatively quiet and observant. I am at peace with the way things are and think only a little of the future, and even less of the past. The moment is a great place to be; it offers endless opportunities for new experiences.

[Suzanne]

We bob our heads in tacit understanding, but without providing the sought after verbal feedback we lose out value as an audience to the story teller. As a result we often become the next subject of the story teller.
I don't know about you, but it has made somewhat of a hermit out of me.

Wow! Everything is really starting to make sense! You're right: Gossip and group disdain are commodities that are spent like currency, especially at work. People gain a false sense of togetherness when they validate each other's superiority. I saw that happen during the invasion, when anyone like me who watched it all in horror was branded unpatriotic. Most people were cheering the tanks on, and I was just totally isolated in horror. So I learned to just clam up. No one ever commented on the peace sign pin I put above my ID tag. (I attached it to a small red white and blue ribbon.)

Now that the bloodthirst is somewhat satisfied, I'm not such a pariah.

But you're right: I knew I was losing value because I didn't celebrate our national show of force.

I also didn't relate to the (not a judgement, just a fact) rich shopaholics in my last town. Those women found their value in their money and consumption, and looked at me like I was from mars. I just moved, and I don't miss them at all, as I'm sure they never even noticed my departure.

Since this latest voyage deep into Eckhart's CD's, everything is starting to make sense, and I'm happier and more peaceful and more accepting. It's such a relief. And I don't bring my misgivings about the past into the now, so I really like my new town and new home.

[summer]

Interesting conversation here, everyone,

I also find myself beoming more of a hermit. I enjoy my own company, and just relaxing and taking it easy. Most of my friends and family seem to live at such a fast pace. Always busy, and rushing to fit everything into their busy schedules. As Suzanne mentions, there is lots of shopping, and buying new houses, new cars, new clothes and what-have-you. And then there are all of the social gatherings, like Halloween and Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthdays, weddings, baby showers etc. etc. etc.

I don't want to become a complete hermit, so I partake in some of these events with my children and the grandchildren,and their family and friends. Still, being polite, and having a good time, without getting caught up in it all, is rather challenging sometimes.