Recently I found myself exasperated with my spouse. I no longer remember the actual topic, only that there was a moment when I asked him to participate in my life in a certain way and he declined. This may have been an implied request. As I stated, I don’t recall exactly. I do however remember how I felt about his response.
He did not seem willing to travel with me as I explored something that was weighing on me. I wanted to go into the depths of my heart and soul. He did not want to go there. As a result I felt rejected, unloved and alone. It was a very personal request that I had made of him. I felt vulnerable in my asking. As a result, I admit I felt in that particular moment that my love was not willing to love me “enough” or in the way that I thought I needed.
What was not clear to me at the time – I had asked him to join me in a personal deep dive into my psyche, forgetting that this was my journey and not his. His unwillingness to join me was reasonable I know realize.
Have you ever had the experience of needing some wisdom or insight and having the perfect message arriving at the perfect time? Like magic, or similar to the Burning Bush that Moses experienced. I have this type of experience fairly regularly. Funny, it still surprises me most of the time – and this is one of those times.
I recovered a few hours later from my sense of rejection – or maybe I found a little compartment within me to store the feelings I had. A couple of days later (and not on August 2nd), when I read Mark Nepo’s reflection for August 2 (The Book of Awakening http://marknepo.com/books_awakening.php), the light bulb went on as I thought more seriously about the expectations I had had of my beloved.
Mark’s August 2nd reflection is titled The Mermaid and begins with a quote from William Butler Yeats.
A mermaid found a swimming lad,
Picked him for her own,
Pressed her body to his body,
Laughed; and plunging down
Forgot in cruel happiness
That even lovers drown.
It seems so easy to forget that the one I love and have made a commitment to is someone separate from me. I easily say that it would be boring if we were just like each other. Yet I also find myself wishing he was just like me and would simply come along at my beckoning.
This type of enmeshment is so normal when we are falling in love - only noticing the similarities between us. This is a natural and necessary entanglement as two people begin to bond in an emotional free-fall and quickening that makes us feel giddy, dizzy and ecstatic.
Remembering Yeats’ quote, I was like the mermaid who dove into the depths with her lover, forgetting that she was not one and the same with him. Though we each have a deep connection with the one we love, we cannot sustain this conjoined existence without suffocating. I had forgotten that my beloved has the same need to breath. I had forgotten how much I appreciate all the things that make him so lovable and special.
When we fall in love, we do so in what Mark refers to as the Overlap – the place between the land and the sea – where both meet. This is the place I think of as the sea of similarities – those moments of ecstatic resonance where the boundaries blur between self and other. This experience can seem as if two are breathing as one, so to speak.
Rationally, I know this is not possible but at the time I was not in a mindful place. As a result, I felt disappointed when I was faced with the reality of our differences. As uncomfortable as it is, the tug of differentiation I was experiencing was very necessary for my relationship to survive – even if it was feeling as if the love was dying at the same time.
I think it comes down to finding another source of air when I feel as if I cannot breath without my lover. The same goes when it feels like he is suffocating me. Or perhaps, it is that I need to be clear about where it is that I find my life-giving breath. This means I will need to learn how to do my deep soul diving by myself – because I am the one who wants to do this deep work!
After experimenting some with diving alone, I came to the conclusion that the relationship I have with my beloved is my home base. It is the very place I wish to return to after I have taken a solitary journey into the life-giving depths of my heart and soul. This is what it means to be doing my own work. My love can only accompany me so far, just as I can only walk with him for only a short distance. The rest is mine to do, and his to do if he chooses - alone.