Here are 5 things to remember before falling in love. Of course there are many more things we should try to keep in mind before we make a commitment to a partner, but for today, here are 5.
You do not “find a relationship”, you are given one.
It’s easy to believe that we have the ability to “find a relationship”, but when it comes down to it, is that really how it works? Is it really just a matter of “finding” it? But then, how do you know where to look, where to be, which social circles to mingle in? And what happens when this concept turns to be equally easy as it is hard? What if you just can’t seem to “find it” even though you are looking in all the right places?
New-Age Spirituality and psychology promotes the idea that you “attract” your ideal partner, as per The Law of Attraction.
This is true in the sense that I believe that you will “attract” the partner and the relationship that you deserve. But not necessarily the partner that you want, or the relationship you fantasize about or even the partner you might “think you deserve”.
How do you know exactly what you deserve? It’s really simple. You deserve everything in your life right now, everything exactly as it is. The good, the bad, and the ugly.
If you desire more for yourself, you must make yourself worthy of more, and your life will change in order to reflect just that.
So, we cannot “find” a relationship, we are given one. It is a gift. And our gift will be exactly what we deserve and it will be given at the most appropriate time for us.
When someone gives you a gift, we do not have the right to demand the gift at a certain time. It isn’t really something we can make suggestions with. We simply have to wait and be open to receiving it one day. But does “waiting” mean being completely passive? Maybe clearing out a space in your wardrobe saw you can “law-of-attraction” your way into a relationship? No! You have much more important things to do this time, such as developing good character traits within yourself (these things are not created in a day, it takes a lot of time!), learning special skills, learning how to take care of others, and studying what it really takes to make a happy family (more on that in the next section).
If you start to believe that you were “given” your partner you will start to treat your time with them as a gift. Because, it is.
I recently read this quote in a vedic forum: The flower does not need to call for the bee, it simply needs to bloom.
Being single is a very valuable time in your life
Whether you have recently become single, or you have been single for some time – I hope you realize that this is a very valuable time for you. I know you probably think it sucks, but it doesn’t suck! Be patient. You have a lot you need to work on during this time anyway. At this time you have a very special chance to educate yourself, to prepare for your next “test” in life. And the tests we take in the area of love and relationships tend to be the hardest ones, they bear the heaviest karma. So, work on yourself. Begin to make improvements in your life on all different levels: physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual.
Develop your good character traits, and start breaking down your back habits (materialism, addictions, spreading gossip etc) one by one.
When I say good character traits, we have the tendency to think of things like “be more confident” which is basically how we would like to project ourselves out into the world. BUT, this is not what I mean by good character traits. Good character traits is what we must change on the inside; the fundamentals. Things like kindness, love, compassion, optimism, generosity, humility, calmness, patience, gentleness, grace etc. You can read more on these qualities in this blog post, about how to cultivate inner beauty for women.
Whilst doing that, simultaneously look at your negative characteristics and study the skills you need to eradicate them from your life, one small step at a time. Examples of negative character traits are: anger, greed, lack of will power, selfishness, coldness, negativity, being judgmental, pride.
You see the problem with our negative characteristics is that they can remain dormant for a long time, but when they exposed to the joys of love during the honeymoon phase, these qualities tend to spoil quickly. So once the honeymoon period of your love wears off, you will be left with a huge mess to clear up, that is – if you don’t work on yourself a little bit first.
Also take this time to learn some special skills. Indulge in some life-enriching hobbies. Study how to take care of people and naturally you will learn how to take care of yourself too. Learn how to bring others joy. Only the person who is learning how to bring others joy can find peace with themselves.
If you are single it is because you do not need to be in a relationship yet. And as soon as you do, you will be in one. It will happen the moment you deserve one. It will be that fast!
Ask for someone to love, not someone to love you.
One of the fundamental principles of a good, solid relationship – is that is not going to be about you. It is about the other person. If you can live according to this principle, you will have a happy relationship. If both people can live according to this principle, they will have a great relationship! But if not both, then at the very least – you. It truly only takes one person to change the fate of the relationship. In fact, I believe that we women were given the ability to change our relationship on a deeper level and to a slightly greater extent than men.
We should shift the focus of our relationship to adding value to our partner’s life, and not simply to make ourselves happy, and not to simply enjoy our partner. At the beginning of any relationship this is of course very easy, and very natural. After the honeymoon period wears off, it isn’t so effortless. It becomes harder to do that, but it is at that very moment – when you simply just don’t WANT to put your partner first (“because it just isn’t fair!”)- that it is most important that you do.
The time in your relationship serves as time for you to perfect the way you love another person. They are your guru, teaching you, disciplining you, reflecting you and showing you every thing you need to know about yourself and about love. So try not to see a relationship as time for you to be loved perfectly, but as a time for you to perfect the way you love another person.
The people closest to us are not here to be enjoyed
We like to believe that the people who we allow closest to us in our lives are the people that we will be able to enjoy the most. To simply enjoy another person is when you interact with them with the expectation that they should bring you joy and pleasure by the things they do, think and say. We see someone we like and feel that they are such a pleasure to be around! And then we try to bring them closer, and more involved in our life. After a while we realize that things are not so easy any more! In fact, this sweet person seems to bring us more problems than good. Well, what happened?
You see, the people who we bring the closest to us, or who are brought close to us by default – are here to discipline us, to punish us, to teach us life-lessons. They are here by the laws of Karma due to our actions and our unfulfilled duties of the past. Through them you will pay off your heaviest karma. Through them they also give you the greatest opportunity to burn off your karma and achieve happiness. They are not here to simply be enjoyed, as you can see, they have a very serious job to do!
It is in fact easier to “enjoy” people who are further away from us. That’s why we can maintain pleasant, harmonic, low-maintenance relationships with the friend we see once a week for coffee, and yet, to maintain that same level of harmony in our relationship with our partner, with our children, with our parents, with our siblings – is much harder.
So don’t expect to infinitely enjoy your partner after you get together, because after some time they are going to start resent being “enjoyed” and so will you.
Your partner will be your mirror image
Whatever qualities you possess, it will be reflected in your partner in either a masculine or feminine form. Men and women all have the same character traits, however they can be expressed in different forms in the male and female body. For example, if the woman is a cold woman, a woman who is unable to express warmth and affection, she will be given a man who is also “cold” but in a masculine form; inattentiveness, laziness.
If the woman is very independent and brave, always takes charge of situations, and is controlling – she will be given a man who is irresponsible, indecisive, and has apprehension about the future.
If the man is always angry, he will be given a woman who is secretive, who hides a secret life and her desires from him.
If the woman is unfaithful to her husband either physically or emotionally, she will be given a man who is unreasonable and unintelligent (he wont be able to make intelligent life decisions).
If the woman always criticizes the people closest to her, she will be given a man who simply has no motivation to achieve his goals.
If the man is very responsible and takes care of all his duties in life, he will be given a woman who listens to him and trusts him.
if the man is intelligent and makes it a priority to educate himself and develop himself, he will be given a woman who is faithful to him.
Going by this logic, this means that the best way to change something about your partner or about your relationship is by changing yourself. If you can change yourself, then your partner will also change in order to reflect the laws of nature.
I plan on doing a blog post about that later.
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Thank you for reading today. I hope you are all keeping well and warm this November.
With love, Malavika.
