Depth & Insight

Relationships are the most contrasting experiences in our lives meaning that they cause the greatest joy and also the greatest suffering. To have a harmonious relationship we need to learn how to evolve together instead of evolve apart. We need to find a way to cultivate harmony while allowing personal change to take place. One of the most important keys for helping that harmony take place is cultivating unconditional love instead of attachment.

What most of us call love or falling in love is not actually love, it's attachment. Unconditional love is the state of being purely positively focused in an attitude of appreciation for something that we are paying attention to. That's much different from what we actually call ‘love’ on a normal basis. What we call love — which is actually attachment — is the need for another person. What that means is you fulfill some need which I don't feel capable of fulfilling for myself so I feel a void when you are not around because the absence of you means that need will be unfulfilled. Thus my happiness is dependent on what you do and don't do. That is attachment. That is not unconditional love. We will lead happier lives if we can get into the modality of unconditional love and provide our own needs for ourselves instead of seeking them through other people.

This does not mean that you need to learn how to stay in relationships with people who harm you or who you don't actually feel enjoyment by being around. That is not unconditional love. You only know unconditional love when that love and your happiness is not conditioned upon what other people do or don't do.

Of course, the art of finding unconditional love is a practice even for those of us who are the most evolved on the planet. How many people do you actually know that have mastered unconditional love? People who can remove their own happiness from what other people do or don't do to them or for them? No one, right? Even those who are pretty good at cultivating harmonious relationships still have not mastered it, so don't expect yourself to practice unconditional love with perfection 24 hours a day. It's a practice for every single one of us. No matter how evolved you think you are you still have got more to go when it comes to unconditional love.

Every single thing you do that gets you more happiness, every single thing you do that brings you more peace is going to help you to come into contact with learning how to love unconditionally. Your quest towards enlightenment is the same thing as your quest towards unconditionally loving. So literally anything you do to benefit your life is going to be helping you to learn it.

There are things in life you deem important enough to enter fights or battles in order to get them or keep them no matter what it costs you. But many of the battles of your life are such that you enter without realizing what you are doing and having any need to be part of. This happens because you can't control every single event and person around you so you don't always get from others what you like or expect or deserve. There are battles you choose to fight because the victory is important to you since you believe in your cause and keep going regardless of the obstacles placed in your way.

Just stop for a moment and look back at the tasks that you have successfully completed up to this time and ask yourself how many battles you had in those years behind you and how many of them was really important. How many of them helped you to move forward in your life?

Many of the battles we fight on a daily basis are battles that have no purpose and do not make sense at all. You are wasting your time and energy when fighting for things that, even if they are won, leave you exactly where you have been or even make you fall backward. You should exercise your powers only for good reason, because trying to convince some idiot of your truth for example is a battle that you are fighting in vain. When you are complaining about the weather or allow yourself to get stressed because you are stuck in a traffic jam and your row of cars is not moving fast enough you are wasting your energy. Is it really important to retort when somebody addresses you with irritation and with the obvious intention to hurt you by words he or she says out of temper?

Many of the cases we choose to fight a battle that has no consequence to our lives is about pride and sense of justice. You regard someone's words as a personal attack and rush to defend yourself, but exercising your energy in that way will not bring you any reward in your life. Regardless of the result of that battle the effect of it is minimal or zero which means it is not an important battle.

So the most important word you should learn to say is NO. When you understand that you don't need to persuade every single person you know and don't need to complain of the rain, you can lead your life more effectively, because you can preserve your energy for the battles that are really important.

The first step toward that is to realize that your battles are too many. You are wasting too much energy on things that are not important and you can't accomplish what is important because you get exhausted. If you don't realize this in time you might push yourself too hard which can result in serious consequences like a stroke for instance. Surviving a stroke makes people view things from a new perspective. Those people learn what is important enough to be concerned with and what is not. But you don't have to survive an illness in order to change your perspective.

Just enjoy your life while caring only for those who are really important to you. Don't complain when the weather is bad, instead be grateful that you have legs to walk in the rain and a healthy constitution so that you can suck in and fill your lungs with the air refreshed by that rain.

Fight only those battles that are really important and you will find that the battles you are engaging in are very few. But those few are worth using all your capacities and exercising all your powers in order to win them. Actually you keep fighting as long as it is necessary because you are bent on winning them. Most of our failures are not the results of our being incapable or weak. They are the results of our fighting too many battles that are good for nothing so basically all we do is letting our energy leak out.

Always ask yourself: Do I REALLY have to fight this battle? Is it an important one? Does it make any difference if I win? Does it contribute in any way to my happiness? If not, let things be as they are. You don't have to pick everything up that is put in front of you. Select what battles are worth the fight for most people who try to involve you in a quarrel only want your time and attention. But this is their battle, not yours. If it has no place in your life, force yourself to say no and walk away unruffled. Preserve your energy because you will need it when fighting for whatever is really important to you.

I think we need to talk about the difference between vulnerability and weakness, because too often you meet people who conflate the two. They think that vulnerability is weakness by definition. If you look up the definition of the two, you'll find that vulnerable means susceptible to physical or emotional attack or harm and it comes from the Latin word vulnerā(re) which means to wound. Weakness is the state or condition of lacking strength. This is very interesting because to be vulnerable is essentially to admit that you can be wounded and an acknowledgement of that to move forward anyway.

It takes courage to be vulnerable

If you think about it most of us are afraid of being vulnerable because we are afraid we'll be perceived as weak, but by definition it takes courage to be vulnerable, to admit that you can be wounded, to get in the boxing ring and know that you might get hit. And the irony is that the weakest people in the world are the ones that can't be vulnerable. They are the ones that never put themselves up for playing, they never put themselves up for hurt.

What is real strength?

Those of you who avoid relationships right now or avoid approaching that guy or woman because you are afraid that you'll be vulnerable know that that's not strength. Strength isn't standing in the corner putting up these walls around yourself and stopping yourself from actually getting hurt in the first place. That's not strength. That's a fake kind of strength. But it's just this vulnerā and as soon as it comes down what you have is a really weak person who lacks courage.

Being vulnerable means you are living

Some people are so terrified of their own vulnerability that they never actually put themselves in the game. You don't want to be one of those people because those people end up dead inside, because they never actually end up living. Just because you exist it doesn't mean that you are living. Living is when you're actually putting yourself out there, throwing some punches and acknowledging that you might get hit in the process.

What if you get wounded?

Have the trust in yourself and your strength to know that you can heal from that, that you can get over it. However badly you are wounded you can pick up and get going again.

Don't be so afraid to be wounded that you actually hide away in the corner and never put yourself up for it. If you want to get vulnerable, go out there and take some risks. Be prepared to be vulnerable, be prepared to stand up and stand up alone if you have to.

“Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened.” (Boyhood)

In this article I want us to take a movie and review it not in terms of how great the movie is, but look at it in terms of what life lessons we can get from that movie. Today’s movie, Boyhood is one of those films with about a hundred of life lessons. So now we are focusing on one simple life lesson that we can get from Boyhood.

What Boyhood Is About?

Boyhood is a movie that starts with a 6-year-old boy and follows him through his childhood until he reaches his adult life and begins college. You watch him age twelve years and it's the same actor going through this whole journey. And that's fascinating because although he is acting you're watching a real person grow up and go through his adolescent phases and go into adulthood. It's kind of weird. A lot of people think this film is a long film — it's 3 hours long — for me it wasn't long. I saw a guy's life condensed from 12 years into 3 hours and it scared the crap out of me. I first felt nostalgic as I watched it because it made me think of my own childhood and the passing of the years, and how you change and develop and get awkward and go through that, and all of these different phases of life made me realize there were such distinct phases to life and just how quickly they go.

Why We Need to Appreciate More the Life Phase That We Are In Right Now?

After the nostalgia I felt quite sad looking back and thinking of my own life having gone so quickly and then I felt nervous because I suddenly realized while I'm sitting here reminiscing about the childhood that is over I'm in another phase of my life right now that will also be over soon and it has an end. Every phase has an end and sometimes we are so busy reminiscing about the phase that has already ended that we forget that we are in one right now and that itself needs to be appreciated, we need to find a way to appreciate and be in the moment in the phase of life that we are in because that too will pass.

Seneca in his book On the Shortness of Life talked about life as being short only if you didn't know how to live it and didn't know how to use your time. I think when we get preoccupied with reminiscing or preoccupied with the future we allow the present to pass us by and then life does become incredibly short. We do wake up one day and realize that a year has passed or 5 years have passed or a decade has passed. I took from this movie that we need to appreciate the phase of life that we are in.

Here are 3 tips for enjoying and appreciating the phase of life that we are in right now:

1. Just pause for a moment and actually think of what's great about the phase that you are in right now. Because every phase comes with its unique advantages. Some people say school is the best days of your life. I think school has its pros but I definitely think school has its cons as well. When you are out of school you are into a new phase and there are new things to appreciate and the same is true when you are in your 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, wherever. We don't just define a phase by age, it can be defined by what you happened to be doing in that part of your life. What is good about the phase of your life that you are in right now?

2. Think of something that is worth doing in this phase of your life. Instead of constantly thinking about what you want to do before you die ask yourself what would be worthwhile right now while you are in this phase. What would aid your growth and aid your learning or what would just feel like living in this phase of your life?

3. Keep a daily list of what made today count. When I started alongside my daily to-do list keeping a list of what actually made today count — sometimes it was when I got something done for my to-do list I moved it over to the list of what made today count — but it wasn't just stuff I got done, it was things that I thought or things that I experienced or moments I had with people. I don't want this to be confused with saying how many things you can get done in a day because productivity isn't the same as presence. It's not the same as being present, as actually appreciating the day, appreciating the moment, feeling and sensing and enjoying the experiences that you are having. Those aren't always to-dos.

What made today count? In that way you will begin to appreciate every single day in this phase of your life instead of getting to the end of another year and seeing that that year just went by and you barely noticed it. So that's it 3 quick things to appreciate this phase of your life. If you haven't seen Boyhood, go and watch it. If you are like me you will feel sad, because it is sad to see time go so quickly and to see someone just so swiftly move through their life and to see how quick that goes, but it also does give you such a tremendous appreciation of the time that you have now and how important it is just to try and slow it down as much as possible because this phase will be over before we know it.

I hope you enjoyed this article, leave me a comment on Facebook and let me know what you think of either the film or this topic. If you are not following Depth&Insight on Facebook right now go to my Facebook page and click on the Like button because I have many more articles for you in store to help you keep up to date with our world by taking all the knowledge I have to offer to you. See you soon.

What is the mistake that creates every awkward date that you ever go on? When people go on a date, they create this big plan for what they will going to do with someone that is absolutely impossible to escape from. For example, a dinner is just an awful idea for the most part unless you already know that you like the person and they like you and you already have a connection and attraction. Going to a dinner date is really a nightmare because let's say after fifteen minutes you realize that you and this person have nothing in common. They have just said something that you thought was crazy, and you say to yourself: "I can't be in this person's company in the next hour." But you have just ordered your main course. Now you are stuck there for the next 45 minutes to an hour with this person and then at the end of the main course what will you going to do if he or she orders a dessert? You screwed for another 30 minutes!

It also looks kind of desperate when you don't know somebody, when you don't know if you have attraction and you have put down your whole evening to see them, the message that we send is "I have a whole evening for someone that I barely even know". How do we get around this?

Divide your date in three compartments

Well, we want you to think of your date as being three compartments. How you organize these 3 compartments will determine

● how easy is to escape,

● how stressful the date is, and

● how in control and cool you look in the process.

Going to dinner is like having two thirds of the date up front. That's why it is dangerous because now 20 minutes and you can't leave. What experts suggest is taking one compartment — the first compartment — and having that take place at a separate venue to begin with, then the remaining two thirds. Let's say you want to go for a drink in a bar. That's one third because it is easy to remove yourself from that situation. If you want to leave after one drink because it's not going very well you can, you can make your excuses (“I need to catch up with my friends” or “I need to go home and have some work done”), whatever it is, use that one third as the first venue that you go to.

You can save the remaining two compartments for something else. Let's say there is a bowling area around the corner and you don't tell your partner about that to begin with but the first drink goes really well and after a drink or two you say to him or her: “Now let's go to do something fun. There's a bowling area around the corner, are you good? I gonna kick your ass! Let's go bowling!”

What are the advantages of a venue that is risk-free and easy to escape?

Having one compartment take place somewhere that is easy and risk-free serves two big purposes.

1. You have an escape plan.

If it's not going well you can leave and you haven't committed yourself to the next two hours of something with someone that you don't really like.

2. Your partner has to earn your time.

If your partner is graduating to the second two compartments of the date is because he or she has done something right, he or she has earned it. If you had a great drink and then you said "You know there is a bowling area around the corner, let's go bowling", your partner is going bowling with you because they feel like you have a good time and that's why you say spontaneously "let's go do something else".

In your mind you already had an idea that you might be able to do something else with that person — by the way, that planning is key: you don't want to be stuck having a drink in a bar and have no ideas of where to take this date if it is going well —, but it is showing your partner that this is arising from the fact that he or she has done well and earned it. You haven't just given up an entire evening to someone who you don't know. You are doing it because you like that person.

The point is to divide the date like this so you don't put all the pressure around one activity in a date. The ideal date has one compartment somewhere that is risk-free and easy to leave, and if it is going well, you have the second two thirds in the next place.

Seeing your date in three compartments makes it much easier to manage.

I hope you enjoyed this article, leave me a comment on Facebook. If you are not following Depth&Insight on Facebook right now go to my Facebook page and click on the Like button because I have many more articles for you in store to help you keep up to date with our world by taking all the knowledge I have to offer to you. See you soon.

Depth & Insight

It takes courage to be vulnerable

What is real strength?

Being vulnerable means you are living

What if you get wounded?

What Boyhood Is About?

Why We Need to Appreciate More the Life Phase That We Are In Right Now?

Here are 3 tips for enjoying and appreciating the phase of life that we are in right now:

Divide your date in three compartments

What are the advantages of a venue that is risk-free and easy to escape?

1. You have an escape plan.

2. Your partner has to earn your time.

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