What's Wrong with Relationships? Can't We Just Get Along?
Note: this is an excerpt from Dr. Roland's forthcoming book The Facts of Life--Finding Happiness and Maybe Improving Your Relationship Too.
Each partner seems to bring out the worst in the other, and each complicates the other's issues, as both become more wrong, and also full of blame. Each senses that the other person is somehow exacerbating their wrong, but fails to see his or her own part in what is going amiss.
In such a relationship, both are wrong--he in his way and she in her way.
The situation might not be so bad if there was sound instruction around--men and women of understanding and wisdom, who understood what was going wrong, and knew how to help the couple navigate their way back to happiness.
Unfortunately there is precious little understanding around. And for this reason, the human race has deteriorated to a low level of abusing and being abused.
Believe it or not, all the horrors of violence and intrigue in the world have their origin in the man woman relationship gone awry.
The home is the spawning ground for all the crime, mental illness, and violence you see in society.
If men learned how to love women properly, instead of using them, we could collectively usher in heaven on earth instead of the hell on earth that you see now.
We need to discover what love is. But, as i said, there is precious little understanding around. Few are they who have both the courage and thew wisdom to tell the truth--which might awaken the people and rescue them from their current suffering.
Mostly the advice from the sex experts, psychologists, counselors, and marriage therapists revolves around the misguided notions that sex is love and that marriage is for the purpose of getting our needs met.
We all know, especially those who have been in and out of relationships, that sex is not love. Yet sex love and romance is what the popular culture, the arts, music, and the movies around the world, and even the misguided so called experts, are telling us by precept or subliminal suggestion.
We are being degraded when by the ones who pretend to help us. They treat us like animals, suggesting that pleasure is the highest good. We are, in their eyes, pleasure seeking animals.
We are told that a relationship is to get our needs met. And of course, they tell us that one of our needs is sexual pleasure and more and more of same. No wonder people become selfish, the base ego needs for self gratification, at the expense of another, and calling it clove, is what they are told to look for, expect and even demand.
When the culture icons and experts' lead s us into troubled relationships and we become unhappy; we are again degraded by being told that the answer is more sex, better sex, other sex, or more varieties of getting our ego needs met.
They cater to the lowest common denominator. Our fallen ego is toked and buying into the lie, we become more determined, based on their wrong counsel, to assert our wants and needs, leading to more abuse, more frustration, and more unhappiness.
When error lead to unhappiness, we are again degraded. this time we are told that not only are we animals, but that our unhappiness is due to chemicals, a chemical imbalance in the brain.
The truth is that we are spiritual beings. Sex is not love (though we can have sex with love). The human race is not rising, it is falling. We need to hear the truth spoken clearly, so that it is like a breath of fresh air. Then we can heave a sigh of relief, because what we always knew in our hearts is confirmed.
We need some simple principles that will hold us in good stead, but we also need them explained so that we won't have a misguided notion of how to apply them.
Mostly we need to understand what our true needs are, and we need to learn how to love each other so that we help each other and not hurt each other.
Take heart. Probably no one has ever shown you the way. Many well meaning parents, teachers, counselors and clergy do give proper advice, but they just don't have the courage of conviction so they waffle and waiver, or they doubt the truth in their heart, or they have part of the answer but not the whole thing.
Much of this book will be devoted to pointing out error and relieving you of the faulty notions that are wrong but nevertheless generally ascribed to.
A lie can kill you. For example, we all know that getting in a car with the wrong person, having sex with the wrong person, or doing something risky that everyone assures you is "safe" can be fatal. Similarly, buying into lies about human nature, or about relationships can lead to wrong choices, ruined lives, destroyed marriages, broken families, and harming the children.
Just look around at the current state of families, rampant physical and mental health issues, and a coarsening of society as a whole, and ask yourself if people are getting the kind of advice that leads to wholeness, happiness and marital bliss or not. It is obvious that something is wrong. People are being misled somehow.
Therefore, this book may at first seem negative, but it is only because I first must point out errors clearly, so that you can see the truth about the errors. Secondly I won't tell you the usual foolishness about romance and passion, and candy, hot tubs and Valentine's Day lines--you've heard plenty of that already, and how much good has it done you?
What you need is the truth so you can wake up from your misdirected lifestyle and see through the lies and believe them no more. The truth may at first seem like a wet blanket, spoiling the party time--but if you look carefully, you will see that happiness and right choices are just on the other side of letting go of error.
We do need love. in fact, most of our issues stem from not having received love or the right kind of love, especially in our formative years. Love is not comforting (at first). It is corrective. But not with anger. love has understanding in it and patience. It helps you to see the truth and wakes you up so you can begin to function from your own intuition and center of dignity. it
When you were a kid or teen--did you every have a teacher who set standards and was tough? She would not accept excuses and she demanded good performance. She was not mean, just had a no nonsense attitude. Well that is very close to what love is. Love does not put you on. Love does not assure you and reassure you that wrong is right, or make excuses for you. it tells you the truth so that you can see for yourself what is true or right. And love does not pressure you either. It gives you the space to choose without pressure.
I do not wish to be your leader. I only wish to tell you the truth with patience and kindness, but with firmness, so that you can have a chance to hear it clearly and then be able to see the problem so clearly that you also see the need for patience with each other and with yourself.
Basically all I want to do is help people. Recently I have had some experiences just trying to get two new tires, and trying to find a decent dentist who won't try to extract every penny he or she can out of me. Often we are so used to being lied to and ripped off, that we are grateful if someone just doesn't hurt us in some way.
I tell you the truth and you can read dozens or hundreds of pages of my articles and chapters from my books online for free. My audio is free and all I ask is a small donation for a meditation, or a reasonable per minute charge for professional coaching. I do this as a volunteer, but I have to survive. If I grow broke and end up on the street, how can I help you?
In addition to all the free stuff, and the benefit of my 22 years of experience for free, look what you can get for a small amount.
A $5 initial email exchange at Liveperson, where you can take as much time as you like in your email to describe your issue and I will answer with some feedback and some resources and strategies..
For a $5 donation I will send you a pdf of my 300 page book The Myths and Mysteries of Marriage-- a manual on improving relationships.
Where else can you get this kind of value?
