To have without holding
Co-dependence seems to be the theme of the week. Practicing I LOVE ME is hard because when we are immersed in desperation to fill a void inside of ourselves life becomes about filling holes and finding people who will do it and not about being alive and that leads to a whole host of dilemmas many folks seek therapy to resolve.
Many marriages are built on the need to "fill the void". Remember Jerry MacGuire? "You complete me." When we move from our moment to moment experience and notice and nurture all the parts of ourselves - the needy void, the vibrant alive part, the nurturer, the protector - The way we DO relationship shifts. With time, we find we can be more choiceful, tolerate more intimacy, set clear clean boundaries without getting pissed off, discover the miracle of our individuality rather than mind melding with our friends or partners, all of this ultimately feeling way more fulfilling.
The alternative is to try to become what others need us to be so they stick around indefinately to fill voids inside us. That is the cruxt of co-dependence. Usually the other person really digs sticking around filling our voids. They get some security out of it too. But the alternative is so much more challenging and vibrant.
Check out this poem, I think it illustrates this process in romantic relationships, how hard it is and the payoff.
In general, I am a Marge Piercy's fan and this poem in particular.
To have without holding
Learning to love differently is hard,
love with the hands wide open, love
with the doors banging on their hinges,
the cupboard unlocked, the wind
roaring and whimpering in the rooms
rustling the sheets and snappping the blinds
that thwack like rubber bands
in an open palm.
It hurts to love wide open
stretching the muscles that feel
as if they are made of wet plaster,
then of blunt knives, then
of sharp knives.
It hurts to thwart the reflexes
of grab, of clutch; to love and let
go again and again. It pesters to remember
the lover who is not in the bed,
to hold back what is owed to the work
that gutters like a candle in a cave
without air, to love consciously,
conscientiously, concretely, constructively.
I can't do it, you say it's killing
me, but you thrive, you glow
on the street like a neon raspberry,
You float and sail, a helium balloon
bright bachelor's button blue and bobbing
on the cold and hot winds of our breath,
as we make and unmake in passionate
diastole and systole the rhythm
of our unbound bonding, to have
and not to hold, to love
with minimized malice, hunger
and anger moment by moment balanced.
- Marge Piercy, The Moon is Always Female
