Marriage. It’s a topic discussed frequently at my age.
As I get older it seems to become a looming ‘passing of age’ requisite into adulthood. When I read discussions between people who are pro-Choice Marriage Vs. Arranged Marriage I think: What’s the difference? It’s like arguing whether suicide is better than murder.
In my last article I wrote about commitments, and a few days ago Luna asked a question on our Facebook page that received quite an interesting array of opinions and experiences.
To people with a predisposition for solitude and introversion marriage is the ultimate life commitment. So I feel it’s something that must be evaluated very carefully. This following analysis may disturb, tick off, and potentially unhinge you. Or on the other hand, you might get a buzz out of it, and it might lift your spirits. Either way, come join in, and let me know your thoughts at the end.
History of Marriage
Through our socialization we’ve been taught that marriage is the “way things are supposed to be”. Until only a few decades ago it was a non-negotiable prescription for love in the Bible and many other religious texts. Human relations however, reach a lot farther back than this.
About 10,000 years ago, Nomadic hunting tribes who foraged around for food, decided to settle down and grow their food in the same place. This came as a result of the scarcity of animals to hunt, as well as the success female tribe members were having experimenting with the growth of small plants and herbs.
This single decision had several world-changing effects. Firstly, without having to move around, it became possible to accumulate food. While as before tribes could only have 100 individuals to make sojourning possible, now many more people could settle, bringing about the establishment of small communities. As these small communities began to grow, people began to know each other less, and began exchanging assets for assets, instead of sharing. And so currencies were implemented.
This establishment of small communities brought about the creation of social institutions, such as churches, laws and the military. For the first time ever, wealth could be hoarded. Or, in other words, one person could amass much more than another, making them more powerful. Personal security now depended on how much you accumulated.
But what does all this have to do with marriage? Well firstly, agriculture forced people to become attached to the pieces of land they worked so hard on. Suddenly, the feeling of “ownership” and private property that was non-existent in the Nomad culture, was born. The only way to secure a piece of land for your future generations (that now were also seen with a sense of “ownership”) was to control females and their sexuality.
Originally, Nomads were polygamous and women could sleep around freely. Often fathers didn’t know which children were theirs. But now to make sure that the children who were going to inherit their wealth and hard worked lands were theirs, the concept of marriage was developed so no female could sleep with any other male and vice versa.
Interestingly, prostitution became the by-product of marriage as well. Go figure.
How Selfless is Marriage?
So now, we’ve seen how the origin of marriage was to monopolize woman, and to treat them as another ‘private property’ item. Luckily, as time passed it’s evolved into a much less selfish act. But now, we’ve been taught that the powerful looking charade of marriage is something very romantic.
And sure, marriage is a hypnotizing experience. It really makes you feel as though you’re doing an act of meaning. Just think of the candles, the atmospheric locations, the sacred feeling of a priest and witnessing audience waiting to celebrate you. This all makes you feel that something great is happening, when in fact, nothing is really happening. The world doesn’t stop for you. It doesn’t start vibrating, and petals don’t start falling from heaven, apart from the little girl told to throw them.
But that’s exactly what our fearful minds need: an act of meaning. There’s a certain reassurance that comes when you feel a part of an institution that validates your love spiritually or legally. What do social formalities have to do with the feeling of love? They can’t give sanction. Love is a personal feeling between two people yet we try to make these public sanctions feel like they’re sanctions in our hearts.
Love is a feeling of significance, but marriage is an experience of sole meaning. Sure, that may be a good thing in the eyes of some people, but its meaning is to reassure our fearful, insecure minds that the other person won’t leave us. Love is a feeling of the heart, whereas marriage is a more tangible safety net for the mind.
In the end, marriage is to make love a contract, to put law above love. Just have a look around you, law has even made the marriage “business” lucrative, allowing you to get your “money’s worth” when things don’t go so peachy and everything ends in divorce.
It’s just another business transaction at the end of the day.
Familiarity Breeds Contempt
It’s well known that introverts have longer lasting relationships than extroverts. When you don’t seek constant stimulation it makes it much easier to remain content in a relationship. Introverts are generally thoughtful and in search for depth and meaning which also helps in this area. In any relationship however, it’s easy to become complacent, and that is the danger which we should be aware of. After all, it’s human nature to take things for granted.
When we fall in love, we feel so ecstatic it’s understandable that we feel our love will last forever. We’ve been taught all our life that true love lasts forever, so we start making promises for the future that we’ll love eternally. But how can you make such promises for the future? Nobody knows if that feeling will still be there or not.
Once you’re married there’s a duty involved of loyalty and commitment. That dutiful love breeds an unhealthy kind of complacency. When you promise to love someone forever, your mind begins to take the other person for granted, because they promised and you promised … so everything will be okay, right?
It’s all a bit naive, don’t you think? What’s the point of working on a relationship that is safe?
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Conclusion
It’s only when you’re kept on your tip toes in the dating stages of not knowing if the person might leave you for someone else – (because there’s no legal/spiritual commitment) – that you try your hardest.
Dutiful love is distasteful to receive, and in the end, the duty is much more important than the actual desire of love. Marriage can work only if people learn to fall in love all over again with the same person every day – to wake up and be ecstatic that you’re still in love, and they’re still in love with you. But marriage doesn’t play a part in that.
Love is like a flower, it blossoms unexpectedly. Some last for a day or two and others for a whole season. Love as a relationship helps you grow: it’s non-possessive and it gives you freedom. Unfortunately some people are left clinging to dead flowers.
Don’t allow yourself to fall into a loveless marriage.
A loveless marriage is no better than prostitution. In the end you sleep together for personal gain, in other words: financial comfort, fearfully appeasing other people’s opinions, and avoiding the fate of being lonely.
I know the contempt mentioned in this article all too well. I got married to someone I had doubts about and, after 3 and half years, I feel like there are only tiny fragments of me left. I have done things in this relationship, because of this relationship, that I never thought I would do. I married my husband because I didn’t think that I would have another chance to live this prescribed existence that I was supposed to want.
I hope that, one day, I can come back and tell you all that I have made it through this.
Dear Mr. Sol, thank you for your excellent article. Let me share some related experience of mine. I am unfortunately one of those who indeed offered, or agreed to, marriage as a kind of love gift. My partner who later became my wife wanted a child while I didn’t. But I yielded to her passionate requests, in part because of remorse as I betrayed her with my ex who wanted me back and I failed to resist ill-directed “compassion”. Not only I agreed to have a child, I spent a lot of effort, time, and money to finance in vitro as we’ve been too old to have a natural child. Now, several months ago I yielded again to my partner’s request, this time to marry – again to prove my love as well as a compensation for us not living together (I have my job in another city) and her being forced to bear 95% of child caring. Now my wife wants me to finally live with her, regardless of my job. And this is precisely at the time I long more and more for solitude. A disaster is coming no matter what I decide to do. Instead of two potentially happy people there will be three unhappy, including the innocent child.
To all those who may be in the situation I was several years ago:
1. Never ever allow remorse to be your moral guide. Be “selfish” instead – other people will then suffer much less.
2. Do not marry if you have slightest doubts.
3. Better not to have children at all than not to love them when they are born.
Be extremely careful, don’t be weak, don’t repeat my terrible errors.
All the best, Joos.
Insightful and meaningful!!!!
so well put!
I’ve always felt that myself, but got caught up in social pressure trap. When “my man” proposed I did think it would be romantic, but the longer we were together the less I wanted to do it. Then one of my friends got married (after I’d got engaged she was the one who said she wouldn’t like the idea herself, and there she was getting married before I even thought of it!), few other things, and we set the date. But when it got close I grew more and more opposed to the idea again, had a breakdown just before. And they tell you that’s normal, that everybody feels that way, so I stuck to the word I’d given and thought it should get better. As it turns out, it was normal, however not for the reasons society wants you to believe in, but exactly because of what’s outlined in the above article.
I’m trying my best as it is, but more or less explained the above some time ago to my now husband. After barely 8 months of marriage, I felt it’s eating away at me as a person, especially that he “believes in marriage” with all its conventional implications.
I am glad that I am not on my own in this and that people are waking up to the broader picture, without the fear of being somehow deminished. Love should have no boundries, no owners, no prohibitions.
Maybe the only thing is that for “normal” people it may give them a bit more authenticity, as after marriage they don’t need to try and “keep” the other person, so they ease into being more themselves.
There is of course a lot more to say on the subject, but that’s my piece for the day.
Thank you.
Find love in yourselves for yourselves people and let it flow freely from there.! x
Hello Mateo,
This was a wonderful post and something I needed to see today. I just turned 32 and I am single, still searching for “The One”. My lessons and growth over the past few years have been about uncovering the illusions behind marriage in my own mind from what I had learned as a child. My relationships in my 20’s failed because I stayed focused on commitment and duty to someone because “that’s what an adult does”. All the while, my heart and soul were throwing flags up all over trying to get my attention!
At my soul level I believe in love and unity between two people and coming together to create something bigger through love. I have struggled the past 2 years between awareness that marriage is a contract in our modern world and the very deep desire to create a partnership that changes the family paradigm. I see the depth of your post here and I think it is because I have come to a few different levels of awareness within myself. I do want to get married, however I am coming from a place that wants to share my life with another person fully, as a mature, healthy and emotionally stable individual. To work at a relationship in order to grow with another. I do want the wedding and celebration, but I see it as a ritual I will perform with my beloved to lend energy to our commitment. Does that make sense?
Given what I have learned on my personal journey, I can say that I have made a conscious and aware decision to marry some day because I now know why I want to. And it’s not because I feel I need security, or to keep with the status quo, rather I am following that deep desire inside of me that wants to grow through partnership. I feel as if this was the underlying message you present: to be aware of the illusions of marriage and go within to find our own truth about the subject, vs. the world’s opinions on the matter. Thank you for this post, and thanks for the space to share my thoughts!
Namaste
Thank you Nicki for sharing your experience and thoughts.
It’s interesting as in the comment below I was answering why marriage is unnecessary to experience the benefits of a committed relationship. There is however one aspect of marriage that I think is great, and that is the ritual involved in it.
It’s a moment of transition, between being a solitary individual happy with your own company to that of sharing your solitary wealth with another mature enough persons solitary wealth. Two people that can perfectly be happy when they are by themselves, without any neediness, or fears of being lonely, decide to share (at least for now), their lives together in a purposeful and committed way.
In this regard this transition period merits a ritual to mark this experience, to let our subconscious minds know we are entering new waters, new times. If it is possible to create such a ritual without all the systematic institutionalized of legal or religious marriage then that would be the wisest way we could create healthy, lasting, growth encouraging relationships.
I’m happy to hear you’re wise enough to have decided to wait this far, it shows you’re comfortable in your own company, you’ve learned to relate to yourself enough that will make you able to relate to another person once within a relationship.
Warmly,
Sol
Mateo, that is such a beautiful way of looking at it! I thank you so much for sharing, and I completely resonate with what you said here. I love that you describe the transition period, that is such a perfect description of marriage for me. The way you describe possibly creating marriage rituals that are not systematic/religious sparked my soul. I have felt for a while now that part of my mission in life is to create a partnership that will act as inspiration for a new paradigm in love.
It will take us collectively some time before it completely shifts, but I have felt it coming. I often wonder if we will see an uptick in common law marriages in the near future, where people live together long enough to be seen as “married” by institutions. Just food for thought!
Anyhow, thank you again. You are a very wise soul and I can definitely see what your vision is, love it! We will get there :).
Nicki
Thank you Nicki.
I feel it as well, we are definitely beginning a second wave of collective spirituality that is breeding amazingly beautiful communities of people, inspiring ideas and visionary ideals.
It’s my pleasure to be honored in sharing this journey with so many like minded souls such as yourself, who inspire me and my work and remind me we are many heading in the right direction.
Much warmth,
Sol
Hi Sol, at the risk of also sounding patronising, I agree with Jade. I remember having similar high-minded views in my 20s, and in fact I have never chosen to be part of the marriage institution myself. But you know what? Once you get past the age of anyone giving a shit whether or not you’re doing the conventional thing, or you’ve done it and then divorced and then your parents get off your case and drop their projected ideals onto you (the experience of some friends), the whole marriage thing starts to lose some of its ‘heat’.
My parents are now in their mid-70s. They’ve had a conventional marriage – he has taken on the traditional hunter gatherer mantle, and she has been the caring home nurturer. For years I scoffed and was dismissive and felt the whole thing was a big compromise (in other words their choices did not reflect MY choices). How cocksure and arrogant I was! Now what I see is a couple who are actually a very good match. They have both found emotional and financial refuge in the relationship. They’ve had their ups and downs, pissed each other off, been unhappy, been happy, and now, looking at this ageing couple, both of them anticipating the next milestone, the BIG one which takes them over the edge of life, seeing them so co-dependent, so intertwined, it’s very poignant to see the care and devotion towards each other, to see my hardheaded dad from younger days treating my mum with such gentleness and patience. So heartbreaking to know that one of these days life will separate them forever, break their union and break their hearts, I’m sure… They have certainly not spent the last 50 years of their marriage in the throes of bliss, no one does! They’ve had bad days, bad years, bad decades, who knows? My mum told me recently that it took her 15 years to forgive my dad for taking her abroad for what turned out to be a permanent move, not the promised 2-years – wow! I know I couldn’t have agreed to that, but somehow she resented him, yes, but eventually they found a way through the mire. Maybe she did it because of her financial or emotional dependence, but nevertheless she chose to say yes, and the final outcome did not make her bitter. (I doubt I have that kind of fluidity).
A long-term partnership is a friendship that has many seasons. It’s about life and the relationship bringing out all of who you are – the good, the bad and the ugly. It’s about your partner being your companion through all of that and coming to love themselves through accepting all of who you are, and vice versa. It’s not about falling in love, it’s about learning to love ourselves, and others, unconditionally – committing to relationship as spiritual path. And if the marriage is ‘just’ about financial security and refuge from the big bad world, then that’s good too. If it’s about creating a secure environment to bring up children, amen to that! It can be a vessel for personal growth, or a vessel for security – a contract. Who is anyone to judge? How do we know what our fellow men have been through, what losses they have suffered, what they need in order to find their way through this life, with all its challenges…? And if you’re looking for sustained romantic love then obviously you will be bitterly disillusioned, which is also great, because shedding our illusions, however painful, will throw us back onto ourselves, and bring us closer to Truth. It’s all good!
Hola DD,
I think you and Jade, misunderstand my point in this article and are interpreting it solely at face value rather than as a part of my many other articles that delve into relationships, love, the longevity of them and the nature of unconditional love.
I believe everything you’ve beautifully described about your parents relationship is possible without the institution of marriage. My effort is to encourage the maturation of a person and with that maturation comes their ability to discern whether the relationship they are in is one of love, of growth or just of stagnation.
You can grow as a person, share your vulnerabilities and become a generally better individual through expansive, mature and healthy relationships. These relationships are rooted in love, love for growth, for exploration, for understanding another and ourselves. That’s the Love I refer too, I completely agree the ‘ecstatic’ love felt in the beginning of the relationship can never be sustained permanently. As illustrated in the flower analogy, love goes through different phases of blossoming…but it is the Love, the spirit, channeling through the vessels that is the most important thing.
For this Love to occur, marriage is irrelevant. It’s not only irrelevant, it runs the risk of creating a ‘label’ or role of husband/wife, a story or a dutiful feeling in a person that will get in the way of their maturation.
It’s the same issue with Religion and Spiritual Growth. Religious teachings CAN lead to spiritual growth but ultimately it lends itself, its name, its ‘contract to God’, to be misused, to be misinterpreted, to create unnecessary obstacles along your journey.
Most simply put; if the benefits of a committed relationship that you’ve described can be achieved without the institution of marriage, then why get married? Sure it ‘helps’ as a way to force a sense of security in a person while they inevitably experience ‘growth as a person’, but my work involves helping the maturation and awaking of fellow travelers.
I’d rather they maturely decide to enter relationships fully aware and awake of the friction that comes when relating to other individuals, than have them blindly commit to a promise in front of a judge or priest and experience growth as the ‘forced’ unavoidable outcome of having to co-exist with another person.
Almost half a century ago, I married. It was a four year one night stand. We lived together about six
months before deciding to marry. Only my mother (my best friend), brother, and friends knew. My
mother wanted the wedding her way, my ex, his way, and I wanted it my way. Of course we did some-
thing I once said I would never do! Flew to Las Vegas! In those days, I did not listen to my intuition.
I even had a couple of dreams, where the content was, you’re marrying the wrong man! My head got in the way, telling me I couldn’t break it off, look at the people I would hurt. It lasted four years. I learned a lot! After the divorce, I embarked upon a project, Love, respect, explore me. About six years later,i had a child. After the paternity suit, the mother of my heart said,” don’t you think you should start dating?” I dated, but was celibate, by choice. Met this guy at a friend’s, didn’t know it, but it was a fix-up. We became friends. He was buying a new business, relocating to my area. His former wife said she’d keep him on her health insurance for a year after the divorce. She didn’t. I had really good benefits where I worked. He had medical concerns. We would marry (court). I would put him on my medical insurance. We would make no changes to our lives. Neither one of us
wished to remarry. One day I’d been reflecting, had I ever maturely, healthy, loved. The answer was no. Was I going to search, naw, too much work. I had a full life. After I got him on my health
insurance, we would divorce and not tell anyone about it, still making no changes to our lives. The
doctor who did my pregnancy test five years before, did our blood tests. The judge who presided
over my paternity suit married us. Almost forgot, before going to court,I got to thinking,do I really
want two divorces? No. On the phone,when he asked if I would marry him,I said no. He asked,
what if I want you to?” I said okay. After court, he said he didn’t want a divorce. Five months
later he asked, isn’t it silly paying rent for two cats? On the same date as the court thing, a year
later, we had a conventional wedding. Over 16 years we renewed our vows eight times, each
time in a different geographical location. Of course they all were wonderful. I think the best was
in Suquamish WA, in Chief Seattle Park, conducted by a tribal elder and his youngest daughter who
knew all the rituals. Do not remember what year, but on a deserted beach in Fort Lauderdale,
FL, early morning right after a beautiful storm, I proposed to him. He left earth nine years ago
with a smile on his face. The same expression he had whenever he told me he loved me. Hope
I did not bore you with my story.
Thank you for sharing your experience Sea, it’s a great way of illustrating the articles idea :).
Lovely
Hi Mateo,
I accidentally stumbled upon this blog and this is the only article that I’ve read so far. I can’t wait to read all the others once I am able to allocate more free time for online reading. I am glad that we share the same viewpoint on many issues that pertain to marriage.There are many social, psychological, anthropological, economic, and philosophical theories that try to explain this institution and I’ve done my share of reading and reflecting on them back in college as a former student of Sociology. Unfortunately, I never found any of them thorough in their explanation, which is understandable since all academic disciplines have their own paradigms and discourses. That is why I always look for new ideas and insights on the side in order to come out with a more unbiased opinion.
For me personally, marriage without love is purposeless and meaningless. Unless, of course, one is interested more in its social than personal benefits. If one values more social and economic status, security, and law’s permission for biological reproduction, which are all good things per se, then, I guess marriage can be of some benefit to them. But, I still think that such relation will sooner or later lead to pain, boredom, stress, frustration, and generally negative experiences. Severance is most likely to occur once any of the party starts a process of awakening and realizes something must be wrong. And the problem is not marriage but the absence of love which is independent of it. Love can not be guaranteed by marriage. It’s nature is elusive, not something to be captured hoping it will last eternally. It is impossible because love “dwells” outside of time. I don’t see this view as being too romantic or idealistic but rather as practical and very much in sync with reality. I am not sure if anyone (especially children) can thrive off a loveless environment. And it is not only detrimental to the couple in question but also to the society as a whole, which is directly affected as we are society and it is us.
I certainly can not speak with authority on this topic and I don’t intend to. This is simply how I perceive it and create my reality accordingly. So, thank you Mateo for bringing up this subject and sharing your thoughts with the rest of us. I appreciate your honesty and I’m really grateful that I found a place for those unconventional and free thinkers that are usually misunderstood and under-appreciated.
Hi,
This subject has become a kind of “open taboo” in our relationship. For long I’ve been having a huge and painful resistence against the idea of marriage. But not long ago as I have started to run towards my fears, not away from them, and step by step opened myself towards accepting them, and trying to learn from them, I am able to see this a bit more clearly. There is still this huge fear, but I don’t feel guilty about it anymore.
I see marriage as a social institution, a social contract, and it has nothing to do with love. I’m not condamning it anymore, and as you’ve written somewhere above/below – marriage is neither good or bad. But I cannot see it “alive” as love is. If love and marriage are equal then myself and my ID card are the same thing as well.
Now about my fear of marriage, there still is a resistance in me, because if there wouldn’t be I would probably just say to my partner yes, ok, I’m going to marry you. But I can’t, even if he is telling me for a long time now that he would really like that to happen and it would be really important to him – and we are together now for eight years.
But I can see it more and more clearly now, that the more I love him the less I want to marry him. I feel as if like I would exchange aliveness for a contract. As if we would create a statue of our love and friendship, and from now on we would have to refer to that and nothing else as our love and friendship.
I know that he understands me on some level and I also know that getting married is important to him at some other level (as we all have some cultural and other types of attachments).
But still, where I get lost are the (painful) discussions about marriage as the contract you need in society to be able to play the game with more bonus points – which comes down to other people and institutions (for example healthcare, taxes etc) “recognition” of your relationship. That is the point where I am experiencing those moments of deep sadness – like there is only one right answer there, and it is not the one that feels true to me.
I don’t actually know anyone I can openly talk about this (except my partner who is too caught into this story obviously), so I’m happy you wrote this article and I could share my thoughts here :)
Hola Andrea,
You have summarized the internal conflicting experiences of many in your words.
Love and marriage for so long have been forced to be fused together as one and the same that even if you do find a partner that understands why you are reluctant to marry, they still take it personally or struggle to free themselves from their cultural conditioning.
In my experience, follow your bliss and listen to your intuition. If you are free from marriage cultural attachments and they are not, then you’ve been put in the position to share the wisdom you carry.
One of the most detrimental things is to ‘compromise’ by reducing yourself from a higher position of understanding into a lower one, pretending you want to get married just to make the other happy. A deep unconscious part inside of you will always carry a heavy heart that you didn’t listen to your authenticity which slowly corrodes the relationship.
Instead, bring your partner to the higher position of understanding you are in, help them liberate themselves. It will take time and effort but if you’re successful you’ll both share a deeper unity and bond in being at the same level. If not, then your separate paths can easily lead you both astray from one another in future when bigger struggles appear.
This article makes it seem like being married is less-fulfilling than a regular romantic relationship. Because it’s easier to leave the relationship, both (or more, if poly-amorous) parties are more likely to make an effort to make the other happy, without stress.
So what I’m getting from this article is that marriage is selfish, love-less, and just plain cruel. It’s harder to leave someone you are legally bound to, which can create problems for those in abusive situations, or who are just plain unhappy with the relationship.
Right?
Hola Oblivion,
Marriage in and of itself is neither good nor bad, it is the people who are married that are at fault.
If a person has reached a sufficient level of soulful maturity then marriage can be just as beautiful as any regular romantic relationship.
The problem is that for people who live robotically, reactively and unawarely; marriage becomes an even further hindrance to experiencing romantic love. If we are determined not to grow as individuals, to avoid change, to avoid self-exploration and instead choose to find a life long partner that will fulfill all the qualities we lack, then marriage is not a vehicle of real love but instead just an avoidance crutch of ourselves and our own unexplored problems.
We feel lonely, we feel scared and unprotected and we use another person to fix that rather than directly improving ourselves. But if we haven’t got the mindfulness to help ourselves, what hope do we have of being mindful enough to help a relationship, a marriage, blossom to the next level of its growth?
Hi Mateo, I like your thinking, but at the risk of sounding patronising, you speak with the zeal of a 20-something, and that makes you prone to being rather black and white in your thinking at times – as though anyone who doesn’t conform to your rather high/idealistic strictures for love and integrity is a fool or a hypocrite.
Marriage is largely a practical institution. Sometimes it coincides with love, sometimes it doesn’t. Often it does initially and then doesn’t. But at its best, as with the family structure at its best (and only then), marriage can be a container for the ups and downs of the human experience – a safe place where we get to be loving, caring, pissed off, hateful (sometimes), joyful, creative, destructive, moody – in other words fully human – and still, ultimately, be accepted. Marriage can provide a framework for a larger commitment we make to ourselves and to another – to not just act on impulse and walk when someone arouses negativity in us, which they inevitably will, but to experience ourselves and the relationship within a larger context, one that transcends whether or not we love or hate our partner on any given day. Having that kind of deeply embedded commitment, beyond the day to day vicissitudes of our egos, can actually be a blessing longer-term and engender a deep trust and love for those who we sometimes despise. And by the way that’s not an argument not to walk when that’s what is called for…
And of course the institution of marriage is ultimately flawed, as all systems that have sprung from the ‘domestication’ of human beings are… By separating ourselves from from the land, by placing ourselves hubristically at the top of the food pyramid, our whole human culture is rooted on very shaky ground indeed… But there it is, domestication did happen, and I’m sure we can all agree that humans are unlikely to go back to their hunter-gatherer ways in a hurry, however un’Tao’ we’ve now become…
Personally, I’m middle-aged and single and though I’ve had plenty of ‘opportunities’ to enter the marital institution, domestic ‘bliss’ was never a big draw… However, for sure life gets lonelier for many as they get older. Wishing to benefit from the financial advantages of a legal binding to another is understandable, especially for those with declining health and few prospects to take care of themselves, frail and vulnerable as they may be. As your articles on soul ages suggest, (drawing largely on the Michael teachings) different soul ages march to different drums. The younger the soul, the more conventional is their attitude to personal freedom and autonomy, and the scarier is the thought of striking out solo, which is after all the old soul’s game.
Remember what they say about old souls having a tendency to be judgmental of those who don’t conform to their high standards…?! So cut dem younger souls some slack!
Thank you Jade for this level headede reflection. I come from an upbringing where my caretakers always kept me on my toes, not knowing if they would be there the next day, not knowing if i would be there the next day. Now, to me a loving relationship provides for the safety one needs, so that each partner can grow, know they can count on one another. That doesnt mean taking one for granted, thinking the ones we love will never change, expecting them to be the same, and in the same disposition towrds us, as the day you fell in love.
I completely agree with you Sol…..you have same perception as mine when it comes to marriage….how wonderfully you have said “A loveless marriage is no better than prostitution. In the end you sleep together for personal gain, in other words: financial comfort, fearfully appeasing other people’s opinions, and avoiding the fate of being lonely. ” i too feel how people have kids and raise families without the ingredient of love in marriage. Love doesn’t mean lust or mere physical attraction which doesn’t last forever……In my country and community marriages take place not between two people but two families which is even worse….A woman is expected to please not just the husband but the entire family to gain approval. Marriages which are arranged are more like business transactions based on losses and gains. If the boy has something to gain materially from the girl’s family only then bride is considered deemed worthy otherwise not. Two people marry not because they love each other but out of obligation to parents. Even before they develop mutual respect and love, understanding for each other, they are expected to have kids and raise them….What a mechanical life people live, marry someone they don’t love and often don’t develop feelings even later in life….I think its living like animals more than humans….as we humans have emotions but animals only want to procreate out of the fear of extinction.
Hola Jade,
Thank you for leaving a comment, I’m happy to hear you found the article somewhat provoking.
Although my thoughts my sound over zealous and idealistic; from my experience and what I’m trying to teach, they perfectly resonate with my intention. Granted I am in my 20’s physically but I feel that doesn’t really influence my perception, if anything, I’m much less set in my habits and can see with clarity the paths presented to me and where they may lead.
Many reincarnations doesn’t equate to being an old and wise soul, it’s similar to old people who’ve accumulated wealths of experience during their lives but end up gabbling in casinos and pokkie machines as a pass time.
A big hindrance that has occured in the evolution of our collective Soul Ages are the social buffers (just like train carriage bumpers that prevent one carriage from colliding with the other) like marriage. Anything that allows you to live your life in a lukewarm, protected way (as you point out marriage providing this safety container); refrains us from experiencing the intensity and depth of our suffering and without truly tasting the falsity of our ‘Self’ (the emotions, thoughts and beliefs about ourselves/others we identify with that bring us misery), you cannot awaken to a journey of truth, of something higher.
Yes marriage is a pacifier, just like a child who will fall and cry and wait for his parents to come make him feel safe. But, as has now been proven with Emotional Intelligence studies, when the parent doesn’t provide that safety, the child learns to cope with his inner turmoil and deal with it rather than having a parent come and quickly snatch him up so he doesn’t have to deal with any of that ‘distastful’ business.
Young Souls are necessary just as anything else in this world, but Old Souls are also necessary to spread awareness and encourage Soulful Intensity to occur, not out of judgment but out of an immense compassion to the collective suffering caused by these buffers. As a great wise Master said in the past; “Unless you feel your hair is on fire and the only way to extinguish it is with Truth, you will not progress very far.”
I hope this clears up my intentions behind such intense, uncompromising articles.
Marriage should not be just about love. Love or rather lust on which a lot of marriages are built last for 2 years max. Then two people should have commitment, and loyalty to each other. Because people have such unrealistic expectations of basing their marriages JUST on love, so many of those marriages fail.
GROW UP people…marriage is more than LOVE.
Hola Dina,
I see your understanding of love is that is only lasts for two years maximum and that is where we disagree.
Love at the beginning of a relationship is entirely different from the love you experience after years within the relationship, but that is still love. Love evolves with the relationship from the initial stages of physical attraction, excitement of the novel feeling to a more profound and deeper love.
It becomes a companionship, it becomes sharing each others presence caringly, a mutual awareness and being in tune with each other as you’re vibrating at a similar frequency. For this wonderful ‘aged’ and evolved feeling of love the rule I state in the article still remains; married is not necessary in order to experience any of that.
“Commitment”, “loyalty” are all words used to substitute ‘dutifulness’ and if we are in a relationship without love and out of duty because of a man made law of marriage, then we are just as dead as the relationship.
With all due respect you romanticize love too much. There is nothing wrong with loyalty and duty.
As you can see from my work, I am not a very ‘romanticizing’ type of person. I care about truth and reality, fairy tales are not my cup of tea.
I only share with you what I myself have experienced as love in my long term relationship with Luna as well as the couples I’ve met in my years of work who I felt had a deeper connection than most superficial relationships.
Loyalty is fine just as long as it is born from love and not duty. Duty is a very sad value to me.
People who do things out of a mental compulsion or promises such as duty live life without any joy.
They are doing something to gain something, there is a purpose behind it. They are being very good to someone, there is a purpose behind it, to keep their dutiful promise, to feel they are virtuous or to go to heaven. Then their goodness hasn’t got as much to do with the good act itself, but with the hidden purpose.
To act, not because we have to out of some dutiful purpose but because we want to, because we are so filled with joy and find such beauty in the act itself; that is being alive.
I’m loyal to my partner not because I have some sense of duty to her, but because I love her so much that I don’t feel the urge to do anything that would brake her trust. And if I did feel the urge, I’d tell her; because I value an honest real relationship more than I value my fears and insecurities of loosing her and living in a lukewarm love.