Archive for April, 2010

Do you yearn for connection, enter relationship with high expectation, only to find yourself disappointed in the other persons lack of compatibility with you?

At a very deep level all of us crave connection. In fact it is our deepest yearning to experience profound connection. In truth the only time in this life that we are truly connected with another human being is when we are in the womb. At this point we are surrounded by the body, energy and being of our mother. We are physically linked to her, nourished by her and protected.

At the moment of birth we are rudely ejected from this state of blissful union with another. The sense of separation can be intensely traumatic, as many who have done re-birthing work will know. And so there is a sense of something lost, something which we would like to reconnect with. Most people spend the rest of their lives trying to recapture this sense of oneness with another. If we are typically male, we seek it in connection with the feminine; if typically feminine it is in the masculine we search for this completion.

Of course this longing for oneness also has a deeper meaning – the longing for union with the divine, which can be expressed through the union of polarity of masculine and feminine.

So as we go through life we tend to search for the other – what James Hollis in his book “The Eden Project” calls the “Magical Other”. It is as though this Magical Other will somehow complete us. We feel as though we are not whole and if only we could find this Magical Other we would be complete.

And so we look, we find someone and we enter relationship with them, hoping that they are this Magical Other. We find someone who shares our interests, our joys and fears and with whom, perhaps we can begin to open to love.

But sooner or later we begin to note that this Other is not exactly the same as us. We note the differences and they begin to niggle. If only they would do it this way, it would be better – more like ME!

This is when power games can begin to kick in. If the Other doesn’t do it our way, there can be a tendency to punish them. Or we may withdraw or start turning our energy inwards. Or outwards to another Other!

At this point we have a choice (as we always do); to continue playing the old games of power play or withdrawal; or to do things differently. Instead of criticising or judging the Other for their difference – learn to celebrate these differences.

This is nowhere more true than in heterosexual relationships where the difference between the masculine and feminine is profound at every level – physical, biological, neuro-chemical, emotional, mental, spiritual.

Instead of wishing the Other would come over to our way of doing things, celebrate the fact that men and women do things very differently.

I’m not suggesting that you stay in relationships that no longer serve or honour you. Just that we should have awareness around these issues and that we should all make conscious choices. I’m not saying that magic doesn’t happen within relationship, it is – but don’t confuse projection with magic!

If we can reach the point of celebrating the Other for their differences, then we not only honour the differences between men and women, but something truly magical happens. An alchemical process occurs that changes the nature of our relationship. It drops us into a deeper level of understanding, respect and honouring in which both masculine & feminine can open more fully to each other and to love. This is the true magic to be found in the Other.

Love and Will – another expression of masculine and feminine

Most of us are familiar with the concepts of the masculine and feminine. These differ from male and female. Although typically most men tend towards the more masculine and most women towards the feminine this is by no means exclusive and the concepts of masculine and feminine are not gender limited or limiting.

Shiva & Shakti

In tantra the masculine and feminine energies have very specific roles. The masculine is portrayed as Lord Shiva. His qualities are presence, attention, solidity, steadfastness. He is consciousness, awareness.

The feminine is known as Shakti. Shakti is the goddess, she is energy. In science all matter is actually energy, vibrating at different frequencies. Shakti is that energy and so she is all that is manifest.

Shiva observes Shakti with impassivity. He is merely the witness. There is a saying in tantra that without Shakti, Shiva cannot even lift his finger. Another saying has it that without Shakti, Shiva is a corpse. So the duality of Shiva & Shakti, of masculine & feminine is essential to life.

Another way to express these concepts of masculine and feminine is through the imagery of Love and Will.

Three Types of Love

Love, as we may easily imagine is the feminine principal. There are many models for Love. It comes in many forms but here is one model based on Osho’s thoughts in “Love, Freedom & Aloneness”. The lowest, he says, is Lust; physical desire, sexuality. This is the base of the pillar of Love. It is not Love in itself but without this foundation the pillar of Love cannot be built. Osho says “Sex is just an opportunity to grow beyond it[self] – but one has to pass through it”.

The second level of Love he talks about is that of egoic love. This can have many forms but it is limited to forms where there is some giving and receiving. It could be described in transactional analysis terms. “I will love you so long as you….( affirm me/buy me things/comply with me/meet my needs)” There’s a vast spectrum of possibilities ranging from the reasonable (“I would like you to meet my need to be loved”) to the mercenary!

The third and highest level is Unconditional Love. This is the divine Love. It is not constrained by ego, by fear or our personal smallness. It is the Love which gives without asking anything back. If we are lucky we can experience this in relationship, not merely as some philosophical construct. Loving ones partner enough that we allow them to be exactly who they are, we may express Love towards them without wanting anything in return. This Love of course also extends beyond personal relationship and into the divine.

On the Will

The masculine principal may also be expressed as the Will. I mean this not in some rigid Victorian way but in a number of different forms.

Like Love, the Will has many aspects. These can be defined as:

Strong Will – use of Will power of achieve results
Skilful Will – using aptitude to find the easiest path to a desired outcome
Good Will – acts of kindness
Transpersonal Will – that which serves our Higher Self and hence the universal consciousness

The Will is the masculine in action. Will is what is required to create. We can train our Will to achieve whatever we desire.

Balancing Love & Will

Only through combining both of these can we function fully in both our masculine and feminine aspects. Will used without Love can be destructive and selfish. Love expressed without Will can be ineffectual.

Heart Exercise

Here is a simple exercise to help you feel both Love & Will in action. Stand side on to your partner or with a friend and hold their heart by placing one hand on their back and the other on their chest, both at heart level. The physical touch brings attention to that place and by having a hand in front and one behind, centred at the heart, this becomes the focus.

Invite them to breathe in through your hand holding them at the front. As they do, ask them to visualise Love entering into them through your hand.

Now invite them to breathe in through the hand holding them from behind. Get them to imagine that a sense of strength, Will and purpose enters their heart from your hand.

The hand behind holds the role of being supportive, stopping them falling backwards. It is an expression of Will.

The hand in front acts from Love, gently touching and infusing the heart with its gentle holding and loving presence.

Find the place where the two energies meet in the body and breathe into that place of balance.

Use your Will in service of your Love. Let Love guide your Will.

You are very comfortable in the company of men, perhaps even more at ease with men than with women. You have plenty of male friends, some of whom you love deeply and have a deep connection with. You can be relaxed and playful with them, you can share intimate thoughts, feelings and secrets with them, but you’d never sleep with your friends. You are not hanging out with them because you go to football with them or get drunk either. You simply enjoy being around them; you understand men and feel at ease in their company.

And yet despite being surrounded by these men, you don’t have a boyfriend and certainly not the mature masculine lover that your heart is longing to be met by. So, if you’re so relaxed and yourself around men, why on earth not?

Well, the answer is simple. If you surround yourself with men with whom you have no intention of sleeping a couple of things happen. Firstly you may give off signals to some other available men that you already have enough men in your life and this may put them off. But a man in his masculine will not be deterred by this.

So there is another reason. Ask yourself why you choose to surround yourself with men you choose not to sleep with.

The sacred feminine wants to be seen by the sacred masculine. In being in the company of men you are partly fulfilling that deeply felt need. You can get your need for the masculine met in a very undemanding and unthreatening way. You can enjoy the benefits of the masculine at a distance as it were. You can have a taste of the essence of masculine without actually needing to engage with it more fully.

David Deida makes a great observation about this. He says (and I paraphrase mildly) “imagine that your most perfect lover has just spent hours making love to you. He’s opened you up mre than you can open yourself, he’s ravished you until you melt, he has exposed your heart, every cell in your body feels pummelled, alive, tenderised to infinity, he’s opened you to beyond that, light shining through you and he’s relentless in his loving you for hours and hours……..” And now imagine that your platonic male friend comes round for supper. How attractive is he in that moment??

And because when you’re with your platonic male friends you prepare yourself, in effect you train yourself, to make yourself that little bit less attractive – because they’re platonic friends and you don’t want to sleep with them, so unconsciously you tone down your natural feminine power and beauty to a level where you cease to attract the attention from these men you don’t want them to give you.

Your body becomes used to this toning down effect and learns it so that when you do go out on dates it doesn’t know what level of femininity to present. This is not to say that platonic male friends are a bad thing for women, just that we always need to be aware of our interaction with the others. Every interaction with another has a sexual element to it. So just be aware of what level of sexuality you want to project and turns the filters on or off accordingly.

Your body yearns to be taken by the masculine and to be met at its deepest level of the soul. If you try to get that need met by platonic male relationships, you are constantly frustrating yourself. In effect you are only filling yourself up half way and at a deeper level you will always feel unfulfilled. So make a conscious choice about where and how you get your needs from men met and choose to bring all of your femininity to your meetings with men. Then it is more likely that when you bring your full feminine, you will be met by the full masculine and both male and female will find the deep sense of wholeness which comes from that sacred union of polar opposites.

Are you attracting unavailable men into your life? Are you single, yearning for a relationship and all you get are men with girlfriends, wives or those who live in a different country?

You want to be in relationship with a good man who can be there for you and who can love you and open you to love more fully than you can open yourself. But you find yourself attracting men who aren’t available in one form of another. Why is this? What’s going on?

It’s easy to go from this place of not being met to a victim place. Why can’t I attract the right people? Why does everyone else have a partner & not me? Why are these men behaving like this around me?

When we’re in this victim place, it a place of dis-empowerment; things happen TO us, we don’t have any say in them. We can feel rootless, ungrounded, pushed about by the ebb & flow of the vagaries of the universe.

The first thing to do is to reclaim your power. And the way to do this is to re-claim your projection. The painful truth is that YOU are giving out something which is attracting this type of man into your life. If you were giving out something different, you’d be attracting different types of men – the men you REALLY want to attract. But you’re not; you’re attracting unavailable men or men who can’t commit to you. And so you deny yourself the experience of surrendering to love in its fullest potential.

And here’s the most painful part: what you’re seeing in these men you attract is a projected part of your own self!

Many spiritual traditions tell us the material universe is Maya, illusion. In some sense it is. My belief, within tantra, is that all this “stuff” around us is very real. But that we create it ourselves. In a very meaningful way, we are all gods and goddesses within our own universe. The mind is a projector, a film camera. The universe is our projection screen and our DNA is the film can which records the experience.

So, onto the projection screen of life we project all manner of things. One of the things we project is ourselves – onto other people. As the Talmud says “we do not see the world as it is. We see the world as we are”. When we encounter others, it is very useful and insightful (though often painful) to look at the other and ask ourselves – what part of myself do I see in you? Or make the statement in your mind “When I look at you I see my own… (anger/fear/love/divinity/rage, etc., etc.)”. Just complete as appropriate.

Once we begin to reclaim our projections we also begin to reclaim our power. As long as I hold the belief that “things just happen to me” or “only a certain type of person is attracted to me”, I have no power over events. As soon as I reclaim my projection and realise that it is I who am attracting these people, I have the power to chose who I want to attract into my life. I can change my behaviour to meet my deeper needs.

So, if you are attracting unavailable men into your life, or if you attract men who aren’t willing to commit to loving you fully, don’t look at them and ask “What’s wrong with them?” Look to yourself and ask yourself “What part of ME is unavailable for a relationship? What part of myself doesn’t want to commit?”

When you dive deeper into these questions, you can find surprising answers. It is likely that you have experienced rejection before and your mind and body have learnt that you can not trust the other. Often this belief system is laid down in childhood with our relationship with our parents. And so the mind and body learns to shut itself off from love. We unconsciously give off signals that indicate that we are not available for love and in doing so we attract only those who are equally unavailable or unwilling to commit to open their hearts in the fullness that you so long for.

This type of self examination is not easy. It takes great courage to look deep inside and to reclaim what we most want to deny. But the rewards are huge. They are no less than being met in the deepest need of your whole being: to allow yourself to be truly opened by love and to be met in union and celebration of the sacred masculine and sacred feminine with another.

“Your deepest desire is to be recognised as light, adored and worshipped as love’s radiance, offering yourself as a gift of love to be claimed by true divine masculine integrity, ravished open to God by love’s deepest claim to your heart” David Deida, Dear Lover.

Deida writes so beautifully about the feminine, he is a constant inspiration to me. Each time I read a chapter of his books, I feel re-inspired. For me, what he writes about here is part of the goddess nature of women. When the feminine is in surrender, she can truly go into her natural state of flow and in doing so, she connects deeply with the Now and to her divine essence. But for her to do that requires her to be held safely enough by the sacred masculine.

(I’m using “she/woman” and “he/man” to denote masculine and feminine here, though just to be clear, it’s by no means limited to gender. Each of us holds both masculine & feminine qualities and a man can embody the feminine just as powerfully as a woman – its just that typically men are more masculine and women more feminine so I’ll stick with that hetero-normative assumption in these blogs to simplicity!)

When a woman feels she can trust a man, she can begin to open herself. But this requires something very trustable from the man. He needs to be PRESENT. This is one of the most important qualities of the masculine. In tantra, it is the essence of Shiva – pure consciousness, awareness. The feminine is in the Now more fully than the masculine but the masculine is more in awareness, whereas the feminine is more about action/energy. In surrender, she flows as the ocean, crashing against the rocks of the masculine shore which contains her vastness. The masculine is stillness, being present to witness the majesty of the feminine in her power and full flow. Surrendering into her flow, the woman offers herself as a gift of love, a sacrifice – which in its true meaning, means a sacred offering – to the divine.

When a man can be present with a woman, she can relax into her flow and open. The more present the man, the more the woman can open. Each chakra opens like the most perfect flower, unfurling into blossom. Eventually, if the man can hold a strong enough presence, the woman can open her 6th & 7th chakras and in doing so she actually becomes the goddess, embodying her in all her beautiful and sometimes terrible glory and power.

If the masculine is strong enough, when this happens the man has no choice but to fully surrender to the goddess; he can only worship and adore her. In holding the space for the woman the gift for the man is that he is rewarded with meeting the goddess within his woman. In surrendering to the masculine the gift to the woman is that she is adored by her man and becomes the divine light of the goddess.

More on this soon…..

Good relationships take effort and time to allow hearts to open and soften into each showing themselves to each other. To do this we need to communicate clearly with our partner and learn to express ourselves and our needs more clearly.

Be Explicit About What You Need

We can only expect others to meet our needs if we know what they are ourselves. So firstly, work out what it is you really need within the relationship – whether that is being together or time alone, silence or socialising, physical touch, more softness, etc. Ask ourselves what is it we really want from the other?

As children, most of us learnt that “I want doesn’t get” or were told “Don’t be so selfish”. SO we learn that it’s not ok for us to ask for our needs to be met, so we stay silent about them. When we don’t express our needs, they are unlikely to be met. The more specific and explicit you can be about your needs, the more likely you are to have them met.

By expressing our needs we risk rejection, having our needs neglected or misunderstood. It’s much easier to stay silent, allowing our feelings of neglect and resentment build up until it’s all too easy to blame the other for not meeting our unspoken needs.

Practise expressing your needs to the other. Work out what your own needs are and learn to share them with your partner. But be aware, this does not mean that the other has to comply, just because we express them. Your partner has needs to. Encourage them to express their needs to you as well. Sometimes your needs and those of your partner may be in conflict. Instead of becoming locked into argument over this see if there is a way that you can step aside from being so involved in the situation and work on it as a couple. Rather than asking yourself “what do I need?” ask “what do we need as a couple?” Assuming that you still want to be in relationship with this other, then the greater need is that which meets the needs of the couple rather than the individual needs of either of you. Tackling the problem together rather than on opposing sides is more likely to have a beneficial outcome for you both.

Be Wary of Expectations

Having expectations of the other limits possibility. For example, the more we identify them as “annoying” the more we are likely we are to perceive only their “annoying” traits. It’s as though we are looking through a filter which only lets through what we expect to see.

We can never control or change the other. They are how they are. Give them the freedom to be who they are and try to accept them for it. I love Eckhart Tolle’s thought on this. In any situation, he says, “you have three options: remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally”. So make an empowered choice around the other about which of those works best for you. Don’t seek to control them or put expectations of behaviour on them because the chances are that if you expect them to cheat on you, they probably will be driven to it by your suspiciousness.

Be Yourself and Allow the Other to be Themselves

As Monty Python pointed out in Life of Brian, “you’re all different, you’re all individuals!” As I comment more fully in my blog The Search for the Magical Other (15th April 2010), instead of aiming to make the other more like you, learn to celebrate the differences between you. Allow the other space to expand into themselves and celebrate them for that. The more someone is truly themselves the more the layers of protective shell fall away, revealing their true, divine nature.

“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man”
Shakespeare, Hamlet Act 1, scene 3, 78–82

One of our core needs is to be seen and this is nowhere more essential in our adult lives than in intimate relationship. Part of this is being able to express ourselves clearly and honestly, taking some risks possibly in doing so. Another key part is giving space to the other so that he or she feels that they are seen and heard too.

Active Listening

We probably all think that we know how to listen, but actually this is a skill which we typically need to learn and can hone with practise. Too often when the other is speaking it’s easy to go into planning our own reply or thinking if we can relate to their story and do we have one similar of our own to tell them. We can often interrupt the other by making words of assent which we might think are letting them know that we’re listening but which can feel more like interruptions themselves, however well meant.

Active listening is a different way of listening. It’s a way of actually hearing the other fully. When someone is talking to you don’t interrupt them or respond immediately. Don’t think about you are going to say, just listen.

When there is a suitable pause, you may like to do one of a few things. Check that you have understood the other correctly but reflecting back to them what you’ve heard – just a few key words can be very powerful. “So, sounds like you feel hurt when this happens”. This will ensure that a) you’ve understood them properly and b) you let the other know that you have listened to them and understood them. This makes them feel truly heard.

Responding vs. Reacting

This is a big one. When someone says something which effects us by creating an emotional reaction we can tend to reaction without thinking – just speaking from that place of feeling hurt or upset. This reactiveness leads us deeper into argument, by just batting things back and forth. When you’re partner says something which creates an emotional response in you, try practising not being immediately defensive. Just try to experience, internally what it feels like to hear what the other says and how it lands with you. Allow yourself space to feel what that is like, even if that’s really uncomfortable. However, uncomfortable it is, it won’t kill you. Just breathe and allow yourself to feel it as fully as you are able. In feeling into the sensation we pause, both experience and contain what is going on in us.

It is in this pause that awareness is created. If we move straight from hearing to reacting, there is no space for awareness and so no space for growth. This pause gives us the opportunity to feel into and understand what’s really happening for us. It’s only when we can understand what is happening for us that we can respond from a place of knowing exactly where we are at that moment. This difference between reacting (immediately) and responding (after reflecting) gives us choice and with choice comes empowerment. This is the empowerment of speaking more openly and honestly from our heart, in the moment.

Learn to Let Some Things Go

Not every battle is winnable. Not every battle is even worth fighting. Instead of picking on every gripe or feeling that you need to bludgeon your partner into agreeing with everything you say, learn to discriminate.

Learn to see what really matters to you. Which areas of your life are truly significant? Where can’t you compromise? Knowing this, you will be able to let go of things in other areas which are less important but which can so easily become arguments over small things.

If we think that every single point is a potential battle ground and we argue over everything, our life quickly becomes very dull. We can easily become process junkies – only happy when we are in heavy duty discussion over some minutiae.

This is not to say “don’t argue”, but limit yourself to what matters or allow a small grumble out when you need to without needing to resort to a full scale discussion. Especially for those of us in the healing or therapeutic community it is all too easy to begin to relate to our partner through a series of processes. Hiding behind the mask of “authenticity” and “integrity”, we develop a pattern of only feeling connected to our partner when we are locked in angst ridden discussion.

Imagine that you could see your problems from space. We are all ants crawling around on this planet, in 100 years we’ll all probably be dead. Our time on this earth, at least in this form, is limited, make the most of it. Life is rich and beautiful; don’t fall into the trap of spending your relationship like this!

The basis which maintains a good relationship is communication – the clear, open and honest expression of thoughts and feelings from one party to another. It sounds simple but there’s a lot of ways in which many of us can improve our communication to help enable better relationships. Ladies – don’t expect your man to intuitively know what you’re feeling. We’re not wired the same way you are and we miss a lot of the subtle signals that you ladies take for granted. Men – don’t expect your woman to think the same solution oriented, linear way you do; again – different wiring!

But even with these differences there are some basic communications skills that can make relationship a lot easier. If you’re reading this blog the chances are you’re familiar with some of these concepts but it never hurts to be reminded and there may be some new stuff in here too. Since there are quite a few of these concepts, I’m going to publish them over a couple of blogs.

“I” Statements

This is a very familiar one to start with for many people who’ve spent some time in Workshop-land but it’s incredibly powerful and it doesn’t hurt to hone this skill whenever we can.

Learn to talk about yourself and what you experience/feel rather than generalising. Often people say to me things like “oh well, if someone does….you react like that don’t you?” Sometimes I feel that’s not true for me, so I might feel “No, actually that’s not how I feel, so who are you talking about here?” Instead of saying “you” in an abstract collective plural sense, practise saying “I feel this….” or “this makes me feel…”

This simple tool helps us to own and identify with the statements we make rather than putting out there on someone else. When I hear someone use an “I” statement I feel they are talking from their own experience rather than referring ambiguously to some random other. This helps me to relate more fully to the person speaking. When I hear “you” statements, I’m not sure what the speaker really feels. Is he using code – talking about another but really (secretly) telling me about his own feelings or is he really talking about someone else? When this happens, I don’t see or I feel them as clearly as when they use “I” statements.

Making “I” statements also helps us to be clear about what we really want to say. “You” statements are a way of hiding behind anonymity. If I say “I feel/think/want/need this….” I’m making a clear statement about my feelings/thoughts/wants or needs. As the listener I can be sure that this person is telling me something personal about his or her own state of being. This doesn’t mean I have to agree with it, it just makes it clear that this is their truth in this moment. “I” statements bring a sense of closeness to the other; “You” statements keep us at a distance from others we can use them as a way to protect ourselves from truly owning or expressing our feelings.

Another aspect of making “I” statements is that we cease to be accusing of others. If you’re partner upsets you, try saying “when you do this I feel upset”, rather “you make me feel upset”. You cease to point the finger at the other and reclaim your own feelings. Reclaiming our projections (an aspect of ourselves which we put onto the other rather than accept in ourselves) is one of the most powerful things we can do to become aware. So, when I talk about how I am feeling and acknowledge that this is what is going on for me, I take responsibility for myself, my feelings and my reactions and responses. In this way the other feels less accused and in not feeling accused, is more likely to actually hear you than automatically go on the defensive. “I” statements bring a sense of closeness to the other; “You” statements keep us at a distance from others we can use them as a way to protect ourselves from truly owning or expressing our feelings.

Be Specific

Be specific about how you experience the other. Try not to use generalisations like “you’re irritating”. Instead go for “When you do [giving a specific example] I feel irritated” (note the “I” statement in this too). Be as precise as you can and express what feelings you felt at the time. Women – men need to hear about what you feel IN THE MOMENT, not a week later after you’ve sat on it and let it eat away at you. We men have short term memories for stuff like this and we won’t retain it so when we hear you talk about something that happened a week ago, we probably won’t even recall it and if we do we’ll relate to you as you in the environment we’re in now and will probably get confused by the disjoint between what you’re expressing (from the experience of last week) and what’s going on now. Ladies – be gentle with us men, we’re simple creatures!

When we use specific, descriptive statements we have the opportunity to say what’s going on for us; to see what’s really landed within us from what the other person has done or said. This can serve to slow the discussion or argument right down. Feel into it before you speak – what really landed with me about what just happened? In slowing down and checking this out, we have a chance to stop being reactive and start responding.

Of course, we aren’t always aware of what is going on in each moment, but the more we practise being present and being aware, the better at this we can become and the better our communication becomes.

Making these specific personal statements, both “I” statements and the specific, descriptive statements, can make us vulnerable. We are telling the other how we are really feeling. We are showing them how their behaviours affect us. In doing this we open ourselves up and the risk in this is that the other may reject us. We may feel dismissed or unheard. But in speaking for ourselves rather than blaming the other we increase our chance of being heard and seen and in doing this, we increase the chance of having our needs met.

David Deida writes beautifully about relationship. In his model he describes 3rd stages of relationship. Briefly, these are as follows:

1st Stage

This is 1950’s model of relationship. The man is the bread-winner. The wife stays at home and “makes house”. The woman is subservient to the man and dependent on him for his largesse – money, gifts, even money for house-keeping, etc.

In this type of relationship the masculine is somewhat in his masculine, but it is an immature masculine, expressed through responsibility, often felt to be overwhelming. He is not in touch with his emotions – such expressions would threaten the stability of his world and rock his fragile ego structure.

The woman is typically in the feminine but in a disempowered place. She may have the softness of the feminine but she does not have the true strength of feminine power.

The root of this relationship is one of patriarchy, which is often expressed through disenfranchising women and the immature use (and too often abuse) of power by men.

2nd Stage

In the 1970’s the feminist movement helped to overturn this patriarchal hegemony and began to empower women. Unfortunately one of the consequences of this has been that women stepped more fully into their power by imitating the masculine and often becoming over-identified with this at the expensive of their feminine. The revolution against patriarchy held women to burn bras, ditch their make-up and ultimately, to move into more masculine professions and too often forget the grace and beauty of their feminine.

During this phase of development, men were encouraged to get in touch with their inner feminine and to express their emotions more freely.

This development was a wonderful and necessary stage but had some disastrous results. Men became im-masculated, women de-feminised. Both lost their way to their core sacred masculinity and femininity. Apart from being a revolution against patriarchy, this phase is signified by a sense of equality – making out that men and women are equal. Too often the concept of being equal and being the same were confused. Deida christens this stage “50/50” – where both men and women are unclear about their gender identity and roles and sit somewhere between masculine and feminine, pretending they are both and the same.

3rd Stage

Deida’s solution to this unsatisfactory situation was to develop a 3rd stage relationship. This is one where the man is in his masculine, the woman in her feminine but both show equal respect for the other. There is equality, in the sense of a lack of power struggle between genders, but there is not sameness.

The woman is loved and held by the masculine. This enables her to go into the flow which is her natural state of being, she can be fully in the moment and experience and express this fully. The man is connected to his core masculine – a place of centred, groundedness and presence.

In this type of relationship there is mutually recognition and honouring of the differences between masculine and feminine, not a sense that “we’re all the same”. It is an attraction of opposites, of the dual polarities of masculine and feminine in their mature forms.

4th Stage

Howeever, I believe there is something beyond Deida’s description of the 3rd stage relationship. Each of us holds both masculine and feminine energies within us, in differing proportions depending on our gender and how we identify ourselves sexually. But even the most masculine man contains a feminine element and the reverse is true for every woman.

So, to honour all aspects of our selves, we need to recognise both masculine and feminine energies within ourselves and to bring these into relationship too.

A fourth stage relationship is one where, lets say for simplicity, the woman is predominately in her full feminine flow. The man is predominately in his masculine presence. This is the mainstay of the relationship, a point to which both partners can return for stability and structure.

But within that it is possible for the roles of masculine and feminine to be reversed. The man may assume a more feminine aspect for a time and the woman will naturally step into the masculine. This is very different from the 2nd stage relationship where the identities between man and woman are blurred by a sense of sameness.

This 4th stage relationship works when the man is so fully connected to his masculine core that he can step out of it with comfort and into his feminine essence and when the reverse is true for the woman. Being so deeply connected to this masculine core, the man has the confidence to step more fully into his feminine, knowing that he is not going to be perceived as effeminate, weak or “less of a man”. He is so in touch with this masculine core that this will shine through, even when he is in the feminine. In a sense it is the power that comes from being able to show ones’ vulnerability fully; to be able to say, this part of me is scared or small, it’s my inner child. And I’m so connected to my mature strength that I can show this “small” part of myself to you.

For the woman, being in her masculine in this way is not about being the hard-headed business woman. It is being able to be present and loving. She is in stillness, not expressing her flow of energy in the same way as when she is in her feminine. It is as though her presence is intensified through the condensing of the energy which normally expresses itself as flowing. Instead of going into her flow in response to what is received, she sits in pure acceptance of what is. From this place there is awareness and consciousness which manifests in her having a greater ability to make choices about how she expresses her feminine energy. It’s a beautiful combination of Love & Will.

Again there is the polarity and attraction of opposites but in this case they may from time to time be reversed from the more conventional duality that Deida describes as 3rd stage.

As with all developmental structures, the 4th stage incorporates and transcends the previous stages. In this place both as men and women we have more freedom and flexibility to express more and deeper aspects of ourselves, both internally and in relationship and in doing so, we empower ourselves further and move closer to our wholeness which is our divinity.

Some relationships last a life time. Most, however, do not. The relationship is a mirror for where we are in our life and on our journey. If we can see relationship not as a statement about how the Other is but as a reflection of ourselves it can serve as an illuminating mirror to show us more about who we are at that time.

Every relationship is a lesson in love, sometimes a painful one. We may engage fully in love with the Other and then reach a point where the lesson is learnt and it is time to move on.

If you’re in relationship, look at your partner. Observe what attracts you to them. These are reflections of your own state of being right now. The wonderful things you see in your partner are also present in you. Now look at what stops them opening fully into love with you. These parts, too, are reflections of you. What part of yourself is stopping you from opening fully into love?

It may be that you have been lucky enough to find someone with whom you will spend the rest of your life. But, practically speaking, the chances are that you are in a relationship which will not endure. Don’t despair. I don’t mean to be negative, but to highlight how valuable these relationships can be if entered into with awareness.

Each person we attract into our lives in relationship (and that includes friendships and work relationships as well as intimate lovers) serves to show us something of ourselves. Each relationship is a lesson in love. In each relationship there is a psychic contract. Look at your relationship and ask yourself what is the lesson that you have (probably unconsciously) agreed to teach each other in this relationship. It may be that you have agreed to explore your sexuality more fully, or to test the trustability of a partner, learning along the way what behaviours bring you closer to this sense of trust, and which pull you away from it. Whatever the lesson, become aware of it and work to honour it in relationship.

If a relationship has run its course, and the lesson is learnt, its’ time to move on. If it no longer honours who you are or have become, it’s time to move on. If it no longer serves your higher good, it’s time to move on.

Ideally each new relationship builds on the last. The lessons of the previous relationships are incorporated into the new one and additional ones learnt. From a developmental perspective, each level of development includes and transcends the previous one.

Sometimes relationships endure, most don’t. In many relationships the Other can serve as a Gate-Keeper. You meet them on your path. You walk together for a while, then part company, the relationship having naturally served its purpose and having reached a natural conclusion. If the Other is a Gate-Keeper for you, he or she will take you forward in some way. You will become expanded, learning new lessons on your way and in learning these lessons, new possibilities arise. You will see new ways of being. The Other can show you this gateway which opens to a wonderful new world of possibility. But the Other cannot always walk with you into this new place. If they hold the key to the gate, that is if they show you this new way of being without being able to model it themselves, then they are a Gate-Keeper. Allow them to show you the way, but know that they cannot come with you through this gate. If this is the case, it may be that the relationship has served its purpose and it may no longer serve you to continue in it. Do not become angry with the Other for not being able to continue on your journey with you. Of course they can’t come with you; they are a Gate-Keeper, if they move on too they can no longer stand by the gate. So honour them for showing you the gate, bless them and move on, thanking them for their generosity.

In this way we can allow ourselves to move on from relationship and honour it, acknowledging the blessings that it brought us while still recognising that it was time to move on.