The Trouble with Over-Spiritualizing Relationships

The Trouble with Over-Spiritualizing Relationships

Many schools of spiritual thought include dogma about romantic relationships. Very often that dogma is used to oppress and repress, and often causes great harm.

As a tarot professional, I spend a great deal of time speaking with people about their relationships. I find that, in many cases, I have to help clients slog through these harmful beliefs.

Depending on the school of thought and culture people come from, they may use different terms to describe a similar concept.

The central theme is generally that there is a particular person, somewhere in the world, who is destined to be your true love. In some schools of thought that person must be of the opposite gender, or of your same race, or it can’t be true love.

YouTube is full of tarot readers preaching about soul mates and twin flames. There are ‘love coaches’ who charge thousands of dollars to help you find your twin flame. These coaches teach these theories of soulmates and twin flames as fact.

No matter where we come from or what we believe, we can all understand why we have spiritual feelings about relationships. When we meet someone that we connect with we feel a sense of destiny. We feel our connection as a spiritual certainty. Sometimes it truly is. Sometimes, though, what we are feeling is more about chemistry and desire than spirituality.

The problems with propagating mystical beliefs about destined relationships are legion. In the course of my career, I have seen all of the following behaviors, and more.

People stay in abusive relationships because they believe their abuser is their soulmate.

People eschew workable healthy relationships because they are waiting for a perfect connection.

People feel shame for bonding with someone, who, according to their religious dogma, shouldn’t be their partner.

People who are sadly widowed don’t seek a new connection because they believe there is only one possibility for love in this life.

People resist healing from a breakup because they believe that the relationship was destined, and they did something wrong to change the course of destiny.

People refuse to develop communication skills in relationships because they believe that if something is meant to be, it will work effortlessly.

Lonely people refuse to be proactive in trying to meet people because they believe that destiny will do the work for them.

Happily single people feel pressure to be in relationship.

When it comes to theories about our spiritual nature as individuals, and in relationships, we have to remember that theories and beliefs are just that. Beliefs aren’t facts, no matter how closely those beliefs are held.

Love, in all its forms, is indeed a spiritual thing. Our ability to love one another is, to me, the surest proof of a Higher Power. Yet, in all things, God helps those who help themselves.

Good relationships are hard to find, and harder still to keep. When we over-spiritualize the concept of relationships, or the relationship we have or the relationship we lost, we make finding and keeping love harder still.

Does your Relationship have a Future, and Does it Matter?

There is no denying that we do relationships differently, much differently, than in generations past. Yet, we often trot out our grandmother’s worn-out relationship wisdom to help us understand the complexities of modern life. Sometimes Grandma’s advice is timeless. Some of the time old relationship protocols just don’t translate well to our new world.

One of the standard and unquestioned rules of dating is to make sure your relationship “has a future.” The person you are investing time in must be “marriage material.”

If you want to get married and have kids, this is an essential rule. If you don’t want kids, you might want to rethink this rule. For you, the present may be more important than the future.

Sometimes we meet people who aren’t exactly “marriage material,” but who are really enjoyable to be around. If marriage is what you are looking for, these people are a waste of time for you.

However, if you are not interested in reproduction, or if your kids are already grown, the value of a relationship might be measured more in what it offers you in the present, rather than what it might secure for the future.

Generations ago, people formed relationships to ensure their survival. Now, we are perfectly capable of surviving on our own. Often, the purpose of a relationship can be recreation and enjoyment, rather than sharing work and resources.

These days not every relationship needs to have a future in order to be considered an appropriate relationship. Sometimes it really is ok to just be in the now, as long as everyone is on the same page.

In a rapidly changing world, it’s important to remember that the relationship norms of earlier times may not work for every person. The freer we feel to create the exact relationship that works for our unique situation, the more likely we are to find the simple happiness of love.

The Truth about New Relationships

Many times people are taken by surprise when their new relationships fail.

“I just know this is the one for me. We have a connection.”

The belief that you just lost your one chance at true love makes it hard to heal and move on.

The fact is this. Every new relationship has a phenomenal chemistry. Ever new relationship has an energy and a sense of destiny. That’s how relationships happen. Without that “new relationship energy” there would be no relationships at all.

We make a mistake when we assume that amazing feeling of being newly in love inherently means the relationship is meant to me.

Fifty years later, if you are telling the story of how you fell in love at first sight, then you know that “new relationship energy” held the promise of a future.

Here’s another thing. That couple that has been together for fifty years had some red flags about each other back in the beginning. Knowing that comes in handy when we are angry that we went ahead with a doomed relationship even though there were some red flags.

Just as every new relationship has that high-octane chemistry, every new relationship has some red flags. If you wait for a relationship that has no questions and no concerns, you will wait a lifetime.

The bottom line is this. Enjoy your new relationship, and see what happens. Make note of the red flags, and don’t attach to a particular outcome.  And, if you relationship ends, don’t kick yourself. Sometimes we have to explore opportunities that don’t work out.

Finding the right relationship is a numbers game. There are bound to be some that don’t work out. If you can simply enjoy getting to know another person without the pressure of worrying about the future, you will more easily find the person who is right for you.

The One who got Away

We all know about the fish story. Whatever the size of the catch it will never match the glory of the one the fisherman missed. What is it within us that makes us mourn and long for the one that got away more than we are grateful for the one we caught? It doesn’t really matter when it’s about fishing, but it matters a lot when it comes to love.

Recently an article appeared on Yahoo Health that really irritated me. The title is “Study: One in Seven Adults is not with Their True Love.” The article is about a survey of 2,000 adults which discovered many people had “made peace” with their partners but felt that the “love of their lives” was someone who had “gotten away”.

The survey was conducted by an organization that produces an opera festival, so clearly the questions asked may have been written more for their dramatic impact than their ability to create a legitimate scientific study. The article irritated me because it tried to use science to propagate harmful myths about relationships.

To a certain extent I believe in fate and karma when it comes to love. If someone really is your “true love” you will be with them when the time is right. There is no force that could keep that from happening. So it stands to reason if they “got away” they got away for a reason. And if they got away, you have no idea whether or not a long term marriage would have worked with this person.

In the drudgery of cleaning toilets, washing dishes and paying bills it is easy to fantasize about someone you knew when you were young and carefree. Young love is special and poignant. It is harder to find romance amongst the day-to-day operation of a household.  But are people really naïve enough to believe that the one who got away would love them and support them and work with them better than the one who stands by their side year after year? And who is Yahoo Health to promote such unhealthy suppositions?

Another unhealthy supposition promoted by this article is the concept of the one true love. That may have had merit when people were married at thirteen and dead by the time they were thirty. With the longevity we now enjoy there is time in many people’s lives for more than one true love.

Rather than encouraging people to pine for an overly romanticized lost love it may be healthier to help people consider the stability and support many long term relationships provide. If you are not feeling the love for your partner right now, don’t despair. In a long term relationship people fall in and out of love with each other all the time. If you allow the relationship to go through its phases and cycles you may find that you rediscover love with the one who has been by your side all along.

If your long term partnership really doesn’t work, don’t let the fantasy of a long lost love sustain you. If it is time to start a new chapter have the courage to do that while looking to the future rather than to the past.

The age of social networking has brought with it many late-in-life reconciliations and reconnections. It is not unusual these days to hear about a couple who broke up in college and after marriages and kids have reconnected in their senior years, courtesy of Facebook. These are often stories with happy endings, but we cannot assume that these couples “should have” been together for all these years. When we are older being with people we knew when we were young can help us to feel young once more. Sometimes we imprint and bond with a first love. The comfort of that bond can be a blessing in old age whether or not we have spent the majority of our life with that person.

Most of us will have a story about the one who got away. Time will have a way of improving on that story. We may de-emphasize the important point that ended the relationship way back when. The alcoholism may seem like less of a burden in hindsight, for instance. It is important to remember our younger years and to treasure and learn from those memories. But chances are the one who got away did so for a good reason.

True Love Beats the Mythical Soul Mate Every Time

I think I’m both lucky and smart in love. I’m lucky because I married a great guy almost twenty years ago. I’m smart because I am able to use tarot and intuition to help all sorts of people in all kinds of love life situations. Just as nothing can be more joyful than love, nothing can be more frustrating and painful than romantic difficulties.

Over the many years I’ve spent helping people sort out their heartaches a few things have become clear to me. Here’s one of them.

People of all genders, all ages and all sexual orientations have one thing in common – we all want romantic love.  Well, not all people want romantic love– but most do.

Many people are lucky to find a relationship that suits their needs. They settle nicely into lifelong relationships. One thing most of those people will tell you if you ask is this. Maintaining a relationship is hard work. Even when you are with the right person, even when you are head-over-heels in love for decades, relationships require a lot patience, compromise, compassion and communication. The other thing they will tell you is that it is worth it all of that, and more.

Many other people are still searching for a right partner, or healing from something that didn’t work out.

One term I hear often from those who are searching and healing, but not from those who are happily partnered, is “soul mate.” Very rarely will I hear a person who’s been happily married for two decades refer to their spouse as a “soul mate.” Single people are looking for their soul mate. Recently jilted people are saying “But I thought we were soul mates!” There are spiritual leaders who make a lot of money telling lonely people how to find their “soul mate”.

I wish they would all use a different term.

“Soul mate” is a good term to use to describe someone who shares your values and ideology, or someone with whom you have a deep spiritual connection. A soul mate can be a creative partner or a work partner. A soul mate can be a person with whom you have a past life karmic connection. But to describe a workable love relationship as a “soul mate” relationship sets up unreasonable expectations. In many cases setting up those expectations causes single people to fail to find a workable partner and causes love partnerships to fail.

You could say this is simply an argument of semantics. If a person wants to use a particular term, what’s the harm?

In my mind, the harm is this. Finding and maintaining a relationship is hard enough without putting that kind of pressure on it.

Beyond that, the concept of “soul mate” in this context suggests that there is just one person who has been somehow spiritually ordained as a right partner for you. If you somehow fail to find that person, you had better get twenty cats and learn to knit.

There truth is this. There are many potential partners on the planet for each of us.

Often in the beginning of a relationship when the chemistry is really good and the couple is focusing on their similarities rather than their differences they will decide they are soul mates. When they break up a year later they may feel as if they have somehow messed up their one shot at love.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between great chemistry and a spiritual mandate.

Are there relationships that are indeed spiritually mandated? I believe that everything happens for a reason. If you have a lousy relationship perhaps there is something you need to learn from it. If you have a great relationship maybe there is a clear purpose for you to be together. Spirit is always present. If something doesn’t happen it is because Spirit didn’t ordain it.

Another problem with the soul mate concept is it may cause single people to be too picky. Yes, we need to be selective in love. On the other hand, if you are waiting for perfection you will be waiting for a very long time. Cue the kitties.

Long term relationships aren’t for the squeamish. But for those who are lucky enough to find one and make it work the rewards are spectacular. I think the process would be easier if we were looking for a true love with a decent human partner rather than a mythical “soul mate.”

Fifty Shades of Judgment

What an interesting trend the "Fifty Shades" phenomenon has become! It makes me smile for a number of reasons. First, I actually enjoyed the books. Second, I am excited that a no-name erotica writer can make it to the NYT Bestsellers List. Third, I think it is great that, when confronted with a little bit of kink, mainstream America eats it up. At a time of really repressive social conservatism, we need something like Fifty Shades to balance things out.

Recently, though, I have noticed that it is hard to start a conversation about any sort of fiction without having people bring up the Fifty Shades trilogy in a negative way. "It's got no plot!" "It's demeaning to women!" "It's not well-written!" "It teaches a bad lesson!"

It sounds more like a discussion about a presidential campaign strategy than in does a simple romance trilogy!

It's interesting that the majority of those who complain about these books claim they have never actually read them. They've read excerpts and reviews, but not the actual books.

It may be that they shouldn't read the books.

Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed are erotic romance novels with a BDSM theme. Not everyone enjoys the romance genre, and BDSM is not for everyone.

But I do wonder why people who are not interested in the subject matter so vehemently decry these particular books.

It irritates me. I don't ever watch football. I think it is boring. But I understand that others don't agree with me, and that I really don't know what I am talking about when it comes to professional sports. So, I refrain from talking about what I don't know about. For me, it is a point of courtesy.

I think part of the desire to trash these books is the tendency for intellectual people to avoid anything that is popular. The masses are asses, and many things that appeal to the mainstream don't appeal to those with more sophisticated tastes.

It is also true that, in a technical sense, the Fifty Shades trilogy is not well-written. But neither is any Nora Roberts book, and you don't see people ranting about her.

I love Nora Roberts, but her style would make my English teacher cringe. Her point of view slips between characters in a matter of sentences. She randomly inserts the omniscient point of view; a device truly out of favor amongst modern novelists and editors. She repeats phrases regularly. She sprinkles her pages with em dashes as if they were Mrs. Dash.

Beyond that, there is only a fine line separating the romance of Nora Roberts from the erotica of EL James. Both are very spicy writers.

When we talk about escapist fiction, how much do readers really care about proper form? We want a story that engages us. We want to care about the characters. We want to find out what happens next. Personally, I think that any writer who can do that is a good writer, no matter what rules they break. Make me believe! Make me turn the pages! Make me sad when I've come to the last page.

In the past week I have heard so much misinformation about the Fifty Shades stories that I feel someone who has actually read the books needs to clear up the misunderstandings. And so, please enjoy a little Q & A in response to the statements I am hearing about these books from people who have never actually read them.

Q. Does the Fifty Shades trilogy have a plot?

A. Yes. It is the love story of a man who suffers from haphephobia and a woman who has never found romantic love necessary. Both are survivors of childhood abuse and neglect. Both have found ways to be successful despite these difficulties. Neither has ever before experienced real romantic love.

Q. Does the dominant male abuse the female in this story?

A. No. The female refuses to become his sub, even though she loves him. Furthermore, dom/sub relationships do not tend to be abusive. In these sorts of relationships, it is the sub who has all the power, not the dom.

Q. How well do these stories reflect the values and practices of the BDSM community?

A. There could be a lot of argument here - probably because there are a lot of different values and practices within that community. And, I don't claim to be an expert on this particular topic. The values of which I am aware (the stop word invokes an immediate stop, the sub is in the power position, and it is more about exploring pleasure than it is about inflicting pain) seem to be accurately described in the book.

Q. Are the characters realistic?

A. Probably not, but since when did fictitious characters need to be? I found enough realism in all the main characters that I was able to identify with them, and care what happened to them.

Q. Do these books promote abuse against women?

A. Um, no. If they promote anything, they promote the concept that a woman can remain strong in her convictions and do what is right for her, no matter how wealthy and attractive a man might be, or how much the woman might want to have a relationship with him.

A. Do people really have "playrooms" in their homes (i.e. the "Red Room of Pain")?

Q. Yes. It would seem that some people do.

Q. Do these books encourage deviant sexuality?

A. These books may spark the imagination and encourage people to more fully explore their sexuality.

Q. Is that a bad thing?

A. No.

The bottom line is this. Some people read Penthouse for the articles. Some people read erotic novels because they enjoy a good romance story. Fiction can be a mindless entertainment, but what's wrong with that?

Romantic fiction isn't for everyone. Erotica isn't for everyone. BDSM certainly isn't for everyone. But, at sales of more than 51 million copies for the first book alone, these books are definitely for someone! So why judge? Let's celebrate the fact that, in a diverse world, there really is something for everyone!