'My Other Half'

Dear reader,

The quest of this period remains around relationships and especially about erotic relations. 
I have discussed earlier about individual integration that can occur in a relationship.
I want to discuss a little more about what the process of a relationship might involve. The following thoughts are a 'product' of my own knowledge and experience and in no way they are presented as an 'absolute' truth. 

When we begin to get to know a person that we are attracted to then we slowly start to have feelings for her. We get excited, we fall in love, she takes time and space in our mind, heart and in our lives. There is a new contact that can progress into a relationship and slowly or faster we start to open up and show who we are, what we have experienced in our lives etc.
As the relationship continues it feels like we are inviting someone to our house and start talking to him about it, showing him its various rooms, the small objects, what they mean to us, when we bought them and why we put them in the place they are in, etc. We expose, that is to say, to a lesser or greater extent who we are and whatever that entails. A process particularly sensitive because it may contain things that hurt us, things that we are not proud of, difficult life experiences that have scarred us and to some extent may have given shape to who we are, how we see and connect with others and the world etc.

At the same time, the other person is starting also to show us his house. He opens up and enters the same delicate process and shares who he is and what he bears as a person, from the past, how he is in the now, his dreams and his views of life.  This information we receive somehow we hear it, we evaluate it, we take it in and somehow we connect with it or not as the other one does with ours.

Everyone enters a relationship from a starting position, with some expectations and with some fantasy about how he imagines the other to be. As we slowly (or fast) getting to know each other these are being confirmed and fulfilled or we discover that the other is not ultimately who we thought he was and perhaps we would have liked him to be. For many the love story ends there because what one or both discover or see is that what the other is does not suit them or they do not want it. Thus, they both leave each other' in a peaceful or aggressive manner.

For some other relationships, love may not leave at this point because one or both may realise that who they other is may not be exactly what they imagined, but they still like and attracts their interest for some reason.

In relationships there is a beautiful opportunity for self-knowledge, spirituality and love. The close connection with someone hauls like the memories of a trunk the fears of commitment, rejection, growth, separation, vulnerability. Issues of closeness and distance, loneliness and companionship, life and death.

A person who feels himself as half, inadequate, non-interesting or any other adjective that indicates lack, will attract a person with a corresponding or opposite sense to himself.
Imagine someone living in a ready house to be with someone who thinks they live in a palace. At first glance it sounds incompatible but if they agree that these roles want to play then the relationship can work for both on this basis.

I think that every person, regardless of whether he feels he lives in a palace or a hut, will have some broken furniture, a broken door, maybe freshly painted walls depending on his experiences and lessons in life. 
One can spend his whole life observing from a distance and ignoring or pretending that he does not see the repairs that his house needs and someone else to spend his life slowly and at his pace to repair it and, thus appreciate and rejoice it day by day.

From a spiritual perspective there is no better or worse home, there is no hut or palace and at the same time we all have a hut and a palace.  This is where real integration comes about, managing to accept and love the opposites within us and by doing so the opposites and the imperfections of the world.

The other comes with the eyes of a mirror to show us-if we want to see of course-how it is exactly the house we live in, whether we are happy there, what we want to change, what can be the home of our dreams.
The other's visit to our home is an invitation of love because it can show us another damage, it can help us fix it, it can give us an idea of a new decoration, it can support us in how we want to make it , it can show us how our house connects to the other houses. Of course, we can do the same for the other by opening our hearts. We always have the choice to accept this by asking for understanding and respect or to raise the walls of selfishness by defending that we have the whole house under control and we don't need anyone's help.

Any significant relationship is not in itself a common 'home', but can be a common space where the two houses can meet and mutually benefit from each other as at one time one can work in the basement, the other can be working on the roof.

With Love,
Panos