map the dark moments

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Now lets talk about relationships that hurt.
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Are you in a relationship (and I’m not only talking romantic connections here) where you are always trying too hard to please or impress someone, never being enough, not able to let go? A relationship where you desperately need someone’s approval, understanding, attention, support, etc, instead often receiving the exact opposite, and yet you keep going back for more.
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I know you know what I’m talking about. and I know that you have tried in your own way to deal with it. maybe you’ve tried to ignore the emotions, physically ran away from the person or got defensive and rebellious. And still it persists. Why? Why won’t it just go away and leave you in peace?
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Because these kind of relationships are hard to leave for a reason. They are significant. They keep molding you and pushing you and challenging you, emptying your reserves, testing your best intentions, forcing you to look inward asking “why?” And this is exactly what you have to do to find the remedy…look inward and explore.
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If you want, you can do this exercise. Find a quiet place. You can use a pen and paper if you need to. Now focus your thoughts on this relationship. How does it make you feel? What does it force you to do? What do you crave from it but never get?
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Don’t be afraid to dig deep.
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Then when you figured out what you need from the relationship, take a step back and shift your attention to the other person. As neutrally as you can (without judgment) really look at this person and see why he or she can not give you what you crave from them, not because they mean you harm or don’t love you, but because they simply can’t. (They are not equipped with the “tools” or the situation prevents them or they don’t have the emotional reserves, etc.) Find the empathy in your heart that will allow you to forgive that person. This will probably not happen right away, but it might surprise you how much it changes things, taking away a lot of the weight you felt.
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Now step back into your self again and see how this relationship makes you grow. What are you forced to learn? How has it changed you or made you stronger? Can you see how this has benefited you later in your life, maybe preparing you for something bigger?
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At this point in the exercise a funny thing will probably happen in your mind. You will experience a moment of deep love and gratitude towards this person that has been torturing you for so long. This means that you have allowed your soul to expand. You have taken back a piece of yourself that has been missing, making you more whole in the process.
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You have done something generous and really amazing.
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Now see the healing begin…how you become free to see the simple beauty in the complicated workings of this relationship and feel how the energy slowly starts to change.
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Here’s one more question. Can you see patterns repeating (sometimes in other relationships) until you’ve learned what you needed to learn from that relationship but resisted? Maybe things that have confused you will suddenly click, giving you a lighted map of the dark moments in your life. And maybe this will allow you to stop some of the pattern from repeating again.
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This is not a quick fix. This is a life changing exercise that you can use for multiple relationships at different stages in your life. It could be easy with some relationships and a LOT harder with others (and it may not work with some because you are not ready or supposed to learn that lesson now). There’s no need to force it or rush it. Give it time to play out and give yourself plenty of breaks, realizing that you are doing your best and that’s enough. But be open to explore the dynamics of the relationship without automatically putting yourself in the role of victim.
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You are NOT a random victim of circumstances. You may in fact be receiving a divine gift.
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(C) Photograph, MJ Calitz, 2010