liberation of love (aka, "let the goat come to you")

[aethyrflux]

it is rare that i meet individuals whom i am able to trust so quickly and learn to love so unconditionally as i feel that i have in my relationships with todfox, and eposia... so, it just figures that eposia would have to move away for her career advancement just as we are getting to know one another. b/cs is not that far away, though... we moved her out there

Comments

[trans_simian]

Oh, I just can't resist. Although I do agree with many of the sentiments expressed here, I must play devils advocate for a moment, or else betray my own punk rock sensibilities.

What about the expectation that the person that you are in a relationship with have no expectations? Isn't it normal for people to expect things of each other? Isn't it an unusual expection to ask for someone to suspend their expectations? Note that the person that you are in a relationship with did not agree to fulfilling this expectation of expectationlessness. It also sounds like the giving of expectionlessness is attached to the expection that expectionlessness will be returned, which of course means that expectionlessness is not really being given in the first place.

I think that this 'world view' is not so much a rational way to be in a relationship, but more an expression of a particular emotional state, or feeling about certain relationships. I also think that the feeling that there are expections is not all about the other person, whom one might suspect of harboring expections, but rather it is probably more often than not about a persons feelings that there are expections, and these feelings can have a variety of origins.

In my experience, most people are trying for connection and love in their relationships in the best ways that they can figure out. The real key to making that work (if that is what is desired) is to get past whatever is getting in the way, and make that connection, to see what is truly wonderful about the person, and to figure out ways to relate that make both people more alive and human. That might even mean getting over the bother of having someone expect things of a person.

Ofcourse, I do also think that if what it takes to bring more love into the world is to give up on some expections, that's cool. But everyone needs to give those up, including the people that for some reason were expecting to be relating to some kind of in-the-present zen master of love.

But yeah, openess, honesty, acceptance, compassion and communication are good, and resentment is bad. Lust of result might, in some situations, be good though.

[aethyrflux]

that would be true, if that were the case!
however, i didn't say that people should have no expectations...
i said that "i am infinitely more willing to give to any relationship in which my partners do not have *unspoken* expectations... and instead are able to clarify with me what exact expectations we have of one another"

and i'm not sure that you are talking about the same thing that i am when i refer to "lust of result." q.v. the commentary on AL I,44 would you care to share a situation in which you think this kind of "lust of result" might be a good thing?

[trans_simian]

A lot of the issues that people have with someone having certain expectations of them come not from those expectations being unspoken, but from their just being there. If someone had an expectation of you that you didn't want to fulfill, and they told you about it, and you said that you didn't want to fulfill that expectation for them, and they went on expecting it of you, I think it would irritate you just as much as if the expectation remained unspoken. So it seems to me that it is not really about the expectations not being talked about, but rather about their existence in the first place. I am not saying that you are being unfair with all this. It is a totally reasonable place to be at, but I think it really is just a feeling about expectations, and the people harboring them are not actually doing anything bad.

This post is very thoughtful and filled with groovy free love vibes (that's a good thing!), but it does also make it seem like you ask a lot from a person you are in a relationship with. I suspect that you all slack off on this stuff a bit when it comes to practice. It does sound like relationship-wise you are in a good place now. That's really cool!

The good lust for a result thing was a joke. I understand that you are using 'lust of result' in a magicko-poetic-technical sense and context, as in being present within one's process/will in the universe. (Note that even in this context there is of course the fringe recursive case where lust for result is desirable.)

But I was joking, letting the word lust mean what it commonly means when used in the context of relationships, which is carnal desire. In which case having carnal desire for someone can be a good thing indeed.

[aethyrflux]

If someone had an expectation of you that you didn't want to fulfill, and they told you about it, and you said that you didn't want to fulfill that expectation for them, and they went on expecting it of you, I think it would irritate you just as much as if the expectation remained unspoken.

perhaps that may have been true of me in the past, even recently, but i think that i have been getting a lot better at accepting people's differences... one thing that has managed to fluster me recently is when people represent themselves as expecting one thing, and then it turns out that they want something completely different... unless they just don't know what they want at all, really... but these are also natural human conditions... change, fluctuation, mystery, ignorance, fear, etc... and i must accept that people are going through whatever experiences they are going through... and if i am going to develop relationships with them, then we just need to be able to communicate, or be okay with not communicating for a while, until we figure out whatever we need to figure out to be able to accept one another for who we are, eh?

todfox & eposia shared an important exercise with me the other day that i have severely underestimated in the past: it can often help people relate better when they remind each other periodically that they are friends who want to benefit each other, not enemies trying to manipulate or otherwise take advantage of one another!