1999-8-3 09:05:00
The Molecular Relationship - Chapter 14, Part 2
(6) THE NEED FOR EMOTIONAL FULFILLMENT
The key to emotional fulfillment is to avoid suppression. Suppression is a form of avoiding communication. This is especially dangerous when the negative emotions are suppressed for this can lead to disease. Just like steam pressure in a tea kettle can cause it to blow its lid, if it has no release valve, so can suppressed emotion cause a person to explode unpredictably. An unpredictable moody person is usually one who suppressed emotion.
Whether a person suppresses or not he has a need to express himself emotionally whether it be romantic love, hate, anger, happiness or any other feeling. The emotions should be controlled and rightly directed, but not suppressed. No one likes to live with a walking time bomb and this is what one becomes if he does not intelligently release his feelings now and then to let off the dangerous pressure.
One must find a release for emotional feeling as it arises or it can build up a negative energy pressure to a dangerous level. For instance, if one feels anger he should not pretend that it is not there. This is dishonest communication and negative whereas control of anger and honestly communicating it harmlessly is positive.
What then should we do with anger, or other negative feelings when we have them if we are not to suppress ? Should we attack the person we feel angry at? No. This would be uncontrolled emotion. Instead we must direct the expression of our feeling through the control of the mind.
When we are angry our emotional self sends a strong instinct not to think, but to immediately carry out a destructive action. However, the mind must override emotional authority and declare: "I will not release my authority to decide a course of action. I will stay in command." After maintaining the reigns of control the mind can then say: "My emotional self feels all this anger toward Mary that needs released. What is the most harmless way to let it off?" The mind then decides to communicate instead of attack. John says to Mary: "Mary, what you just said makes me feel very angry. I feel like strangling you. I, of course, will not do it, but you really upset me and hurt my feelings."
Most people have feelings within them, positive and negative, locked tightly within and fear letting them out in the open. They are afraid of becoming vulnerable, believing that they may be hurt as they have been in the past. Nevertheless, each person still has an inward longing to share and release these feelings and they wish with all their heart they could trust someone enough to intimately communicate with them.
If you are reading these lines and feel a need to share suppressed emotions, but cannot because you feel that you can trust no one to not hurt you then the solution is to let the mind assume control and tell yourself: "If I suffer pain because I trust another with my feelings it will not be as bad as the emptiness I now feel because I hide them. Therefore, I will share my innermost feelings, even at the risk of pain. Some pain mixed with pleasure is much better than non-existence."
Life is always less painful to one who communicates than to one who does not. In one way of looking at it we could say: "All emotional pain is an indication of a failure to communicate."
If one finds himself responsible for helping another person release pent up feelings he will be endeared in that person's psyche for a lifetime. The overflowing stream of peace and joy that follows such a release is sometimes overwhelming.
When one enters a situation where he can communicate and control his negative feelings, then he is faced with the need of using his positive feelings to create a fullness of joy. This is the circumstance we should all find ourselves in if we follow our inner urges to communicate.
He or she then works toward a fullness in communicating love-desire energies, affection, sexual and romantic feelings, appreciation, generosity and givingness, and freedom.
Affection is extremely important in a male-female relationship. It is the glue that cements the bond leading to oneness. A touch, a caress, a squeeze or a loving look says: "I care about you and love you as I love myself." If one did not receive much affection as a child he may not feel like giving or receiving a lot of it. If this is the case one should let the mind assume control and declare: "Giving and receiving affection will help me receive a fullness of joy; therefore, I will give affection."
If the mind drives one to be affectionate it will not be long before the emotions will be stimulated and they will "feel" like responding. Then the person will "change" into an affectionate person. There is no one in the world who does not have the capacity to appreciate affection. One should intelligently practice giving and receiving it until he is a master in this important area of life. He should also practice timing. Giving your mate a hug when he is in a rush may produce irritation, but giving the same affection on a lazy rainy day may be greatly appreciated. Sense when the time is right and then give affection and always be open to receiving it.
Sex is one of the most intense forms of giving and receiving positive energy and feeling. There are many good books available on enhancing the pleasures of sex so we need not go into that. Nevertheless, the underlying principle of sexual fulfillment should be stressed: "Communicate your sexual needs to each other and seek to fulfill them in your mate so long as no pain is created."
There has been so much written on how to put romance in a relationship that we need not go into it here except to say that this is an important area to practice giving and receiving. Most people are aware of how much little things like notes, flowers, a night out on impulse, a walk in the park, and other amenities can mean to a relationship. We must merely practice what we know in this area.
Freedom is, however, an emotional need that is worthy of comment. The couple should allow each other a certain amount of "space" as it is currently called. Almost everyone wants to belong to someone and likes to be possessed to a certain degree, but when that possession interferes with a desired freedom of thought or action then there is resentment. One must examine his mate's need for freedom and allow her the space he or she needs to act and express himself. He will also find that he will be appreciated if he works to stimulate his companion to greater avenues of freedom. Nevertheless, the interpossessiveness that is agreed upon by the two must be strong enough to hold the bonded relationship intact.
THE NEED FOR ORDER
This need includes the need for balance, rhythm, harmony, and judgment. It could also be called the need for cyclic activity.
Despite the fact that we live in a liberated era where everyone wants to do his own thing, all people have a need for a certain amount of structure in their lives. We can see how order is necessary for living things by observing nature. The sun rises and sets at certain times in certain seasons and living things adjust to this. Birds and animals retire to sleep at certain times and rise at predictable times. They eat, store, build, migrate, leave home, and mate at certain set times of cyclic activity. If this is interrupted, their harmony is disturbed.
There is no living thing more out of harmony with nature than man. In seeking his freedom of expression, he often goes to the extreme and doesn't balance himself with order as demanded by nature. When humans lack order in their lives, they are out of harmony and often become sick or emotionally disturbed.
Therefore, order is a human need just as love is and is needed for man to obtain a fullness of livingness.
Some types of order that is beneficial to man are:
1. Going to bed, rising, and napping (if desired) at approximately the same time each day.
2. Eating at about the same time and frequency each day.
3. Study at certain times.
4. Entertainment at certain times. Man instinctually wants entertainment on weekends.
5. Sex should be adjusted to harmonize with cyclic desires.
6. Work at set times.
7. The laws of the land.
8. Religious ceremonies, sacraments and observances.
9. Contemplation, prayer, and meditation.
10. Marriage as a stabilizing structure.
Often, people with no objectives in life who suffer mentally, emotionally, and physically merely need some order and structure to build their life around. This is basically how the churches the world benefit man. Their basic benefit is not so much in the knowledge they impart for they impart very little, but the benefit is that they give order and objective to a family's life. Very few people will admit that the need for order is the reason they go to church, but in the last analysis it usually is.
You will notice that those who are not active in a church will usually be involved in some civic organizations or fraternities. This involvement man seeks is merely to fulfill his need for structure and order. Those who do not have some structure in their lives inspired by some organization or cause are usually listless and feel empty. These are often the type of people who turn to crime. They find no order in society to suit them so they turn against it.
The marriage relationship is so sought after by many because it fills a great need for order. In fact, many people get married more to stabilize their lives than for love. Marriage brings in the new ordered sequence of seeing someone you care for on a cyclic basis Any newly established cyclic routine brings additional order and therefore, more purpose in people's lives. When children arrive, new cyclic encounters occur and greater stability reached. These ordered relationships, can, if they are structured correctly, bring more fullness in a person's life.
The need for ceremony is part of the need for order. This is a basic human need that has received little or no attention by psychologists.
The human need for ceremony is well illustrated in the marriage process itself. For instance, a couple could merely agree to live together with no ceremony and the relationship could be just as successful as a full fledged man and wife. However, this is rarely the case because of the need for ceremony. Man has created the ceremony of the wedding rites, vows, and laws governing such so he can feel a stamp of public approval on this major decision. Man has created covenants that bind this relationship so he can have more order, structure, and purpose in the hope of creating a more permanent relationship.
To create more order, man sets up authorities whose word is either law or sanctioned by it. Men and women are married by such an authority. They exchange rings. That is another ordered ceremony. After that, they have the wedding reception. The bridal dress and wedding cake are two more ingredients which fill the need for order here along with all the order amenities of the wedding reception.
Very few couples can really "feel married" unless they follow the accepted public order in getting there.
Even the Christ had to fill people's need for order when he healed them. Often, if he would not have done it, the people would not have had enough faith to be healed. Sometimes Jesus had them bath in water, another time he poked his fingers in a man's ear, another time he anointed a man's eyes with clay made from his saliva, other times he touched their eyes, or tongue, or laid his hands on their heads. Part of the reason he used these techniques was because he recognized people's need for ceremony and order. People couldn't believe they could be healed unless he followed a strange ritual of some kind. He perceived the need each person had and tried to adjust to it to strengthen their faith.
We should search for the need for order and ceremony in the lives of ourselves and our mates and seek to fill it. Seek to be a part of the order that is in your companion's life. Seek to create all the order that is needed to bring a fullness, but beware of being overly rigid. Too much strictness is probably a greater evil than not enough order.
Couples should seek to establish mini-sacraments in their relationship: A bottle of wine on a special occasion, getting an ice cream after a movie, collapsing in each other's arms after the kids are in bed, kissing each other on going and returning from work, saying "I love you" before going to bed etc. These little rituals we all establish help stabilize a relationship through order. If we lack these little ceremonies it will be found to be advantageous to consciously create a few.
Retired people are especially in need of order because their lives are so disrupted by losing the ordered sequence of going to work. An amazing number of people die within a year or so of breaking off from the work cycle. Those who have a happy retirement are those who can keep order and structure in their life. This is probably more important than diet or exercise for living a long, healthy life.
To become a fulfilling giver, one must learn to control giving with the mind, for if the giving nature is controlled by the emotions, then we will only give when we "feel like it". When giving is controlled by the mind, we will find ourselves giving when we don't feel like it, but at the same time accomplishing a great good. If we only give when we feel like it, we are no better than the savage who does the same. But when we give when we think of it, or when it makes sense, then we become the master of the situation and become a true giver.
Most persons have times in the marriage relationship when they do not feel like giving communication, loving feelings, or loving words. This is the greatest opportunity to exercise mental control. The mind is like a muscle and it cannot become strong enough to control the emotions without exercise, but after sufficient and regular exercise, it does become strong enough so mental control is effortless.
Here is one of the best mental exercise you can do: The next time you have your feelings, hurt by your mate and find it difficult to show any love at all, take hold of him or her and look in the eyes with as loving a look as you can muster and over a short period of time say "I love you" three times. This will dispel much of the negative feelings you have, even if you do not get an "I love you" back. Any person seeking the path to union and fullness must develop the power to do this exercise IN ANY SITUATION. When this is accomplished, he will gain a sense of freedom and liberation never before felt and will realize to some degree that the peace that passes all understanding is not dependent on circumstances or other persons, but on the individual himself.
If the first exercise mentioned above does not dispel all negative feelings, then try this second one: Within the period of one hour, give something three times (tangible or intangible) or provide a needed service for the person who hurt your feelings. Remember that the other person is not responsible for your negative feelings if your mind is in control. Thus, it is not his or her responsibility to dispel your negativity. It is your own. It matters not how dire and wrong is the deed your spouse did to you. It matters not that she does not accept your "I love you", or gift, or service. What matters is that you give them, and giving them you liberate yourself. This is why Jesus said: "Give to him that asketh thee." (Matt. 5:42) He also said we should go the extra mile. . .Simple advice, but difficult to do.
If, after these two exercises, the negativity is not yet dispelled, there is one more thing you can do: Ask your spouse to do something giving for you. One thing may do the trick, but three things over a period of time is preferable. Do not pick something difficult, but choose something you know he or she can easily do. If you have told him/her you love him/her three times and given to him/her three times, then (s)he should be ready to give to you. If (s)he hasn't given to you in some way, ASK. The giving will make you feel better and bring peace in the home.
Generally, these three steps will dispel any negativity in a relationship unless a major rift has occurred and the other party is utterly beyond response.
A yielding nature is essential to create oneness in any relationship and it must be possessed by both parties. People who are trying giving and yielding are rare and when they are found, they are usually mated with someone who is unyielding and takes advantage of their good nature. One yielding person can make a relationship bearable and somewhat workable, but it takes two cooperators to make a true union.
There is a basic difference between giving and yielding. We generally give that which we feel like giving, but when we yield, we give in areas that me be against our feelings for the sake of a relationship Yielding is the highest form of giving, and, if both parties possess an amount of it, the marriage can be "made in heaven". It is a simple ingredient in a successful relationship that is ignored by most because they do not "feel" like cultivating it.
Copyright 1999 by J.J. Dewey, All Rights Reserved