The Rhythmacy of New Relationship

Today my heart is at peace, soft & smushy.  Yesterday, in the bursting energy and light of the full moon, I was feeling the increasing anxiety of the inevitable drop as the emotional roller coaster gradually makes its way to the top.

I met a beautiful soul 3 months ago and we dove full force into an intimate relationship starting with daily email check-ins while I was sick in bed with the flu and then progressing to 1-12 hour encounters at his place.  I felt an intense emotional and physical connection with him.  I also felt frustration when I wasn't getting explicit verbal assurance that he felt the same.  He seemed very open the first couple of encounters, almost a hunger for intimacy.  I experienced a high from our time together, which flowed and felt easy.  I wanted more and I was willing to communicate how excited and happy I was about us and him.

Intuitively I sensed that he was just as aware of our awesome connection, after all, he was in the dance with me.  Yet, I could sense a shift when he began to put his guard up.  I noticed it in our love-making, which went from feeling like an organic, expressive dance to feeling more like I was being serviced and he was following some kind of formula to get me off.

I noticed I had created a story that he doesn't trust women so I found myself wanting to assure him that he can trust me and that I'm not like those other women who've hurt him in the past.  I attempted to create an emotional safety net for him by providing evidence that I was trustworthy.  Admitting to a tiny, insignificant lie that I had told him last week as proof that I am honest and willing to come clean so that he didn't have to worry about me lying to him in the future.  I also needed to express how much I liked him and give specific examples of why he is so wonderful.  In other words, I was driven to make him feel special.

What I began to see in my meditations was that underneath my intention to create a sense of emotional safety was my need to control his experience.  The way a salesperson might put on their friendliest face to a customer who walks into the store, ultimately, to get that person to buy whatever is being sold.  Upon further investigation, I discovered that underneath my need to control his experience was fear that he wouldn't buy into my desire and unspoken goal for an enduring We.

What if, in the end, he chooses to walk out of the store without buying anything?  I will have failed.  I would have wasted all this time and energy I had put into the relationship, albeit a relatively brief one.  My heart might not break but it would definitely be bruised and it was indeed still tender from my last year-long relationship that left me paralyzed for a good month from the overwhelming emotions and loneliness.

Truth: I am the one who is needing emotional safety.  He might also need it, but the truth is, I've never explicitly asked him.  I projected my own fear of rejection and need for some sense of commitment onto him.  I made assumptions and created a story about what he needs in lieu of attending to my own needs.  I am, indeed, becoming more aware of this pattern of externalizing my needs, which, in hindsight, has played out in many of my past romantic relationships.

What's different this time is that I've become aware of this old pattern earlier on in the relationship.  I also know that I have the power to let go of this pattern of avoiding my own emotional needs.  I choose to acknowledge my need for trust, honesty and open communication.  I give myself the space to feel my feelings.  I honour my emotional needs instead of judging or repressing them.  I care enough about myself to investigate the origin of my fear of abandonment in an effort to dissolve past trauma and expand into the wholeness of who I am.  I have the courage to name my fears and also to be vulnerable and share my fears with him, if he cares enough and when he has the space to hear them.

META-STORY:
It is in a state of deeper groundedness in my relationship with my self and with him, that I find myself able to re-centre and to redirect my energy into my own life.  I see how focusing my attention on him serves as a distraction or escape from the areas in my life where my soul is truly needing to be fed ~ currently, that area is my creative work, which includes this blog.  For years, I've been fantasizing about committing to writing regular posts to share all of the stories contained within me that are waiting to be written.  I am aware of the thick resistance to committing to creating something that is uniquely mine.

I'm discovering how meeting one need (deeper connection with self) creates more space for me to meet another need (creative expression).  In energetic terms, as soon as I acknowledged and let go of my resistance to my own emotions, I immediately surrendered and opened to my creative force & flow.  That force that I was subconsciously pouring into this current and past relationships.  This divine force that wants to flow through me... and move YOU.



DAILY ALCHEMantra:
What new ways of being are possible in relationship?


DAILY DOSE of MUSIC that MOVES ME:
Listen to "Prabhujee" By Ravi Shankar