Conscious Versus Co-Dependent Relationships

Having clear-cut, non-demanding, frictionless relationships where we can be fully ourselves is currently viewed as a myth. The principles of Conscious Co-Creative relationships involve releasing a false self-image of who we are. When we  It suggests that many of our relationship exchanges are unconsciously painful, compromised and self-destructive. When we evolve beyond the relationship problems of conditioning, defenses and idealization that are common in our world, we embody our creative nature. Let yourself question who you are as a creative being and what or whom you serve. This path supports its members to acknowledge their creative destiny and design, so our relationships are fully transpersonal and free.


— From The Wise Old Sage Commentaries
We will demonstrate the principles of Conscious Co-Creative relationships on this website and in classes.

The Yin and Yang of Co-Dependent Relationships

Why is it that our relationships become challenging, adversarial and demanding? Why is it that the more we want a relationship, the more difficult it is? The simple answer is that our fears and desires activate our needs, which force us to negotiate an exchange. We believe a compromised relationship that serves some of our needs is better than the rare one that could serve all our needs. Every romantic relationship is full of expectations, mutual demands for performance, and the imposition of standards of caretaking. Why we constantly return to them is that we need others to validate our personal safety, security and self-importance.

All co-dependent relationships operate on three cultural assumptions: 1] the other person should make us feel safe; 2] we have a mutual obligation to create security together; and 3] in order to manifest our self-importance, we need to be in control. This creates reactions: 1] When we don’t want to include our partner in everything; 2] When we want to be independent; and 3] When our partner always has to prove themselves better. These reactions lead to many situations where it is safer to isolate, separate or insulate than to actually engage our partner.

One problem is that we are identified by our past behaviors, beliefs, and frustrated desires. We call these patterns parental Imprinting, Defenses and Pretenses. While we unify our personal expectations around these patterns, we become less flexible over time, until we become crystalized and unable to change. We build a sense of independence when we can define ourselves separately from our parents and partners, which initially spurs our development. Our reactions become the way we know our world, and why we become so dedicated to using reactions to get what we want. Our demands increase the less we can adapt, until we become the squeaky wheel that needs the grease.

Co-Dependent attractions are unbalanced demands for acceptance based on false familiarity (Excitement), mutual fears (Intensity), and merged projections (Anxiety).

Co-dependence is when we rely on another to reinforce our perspective, because we either do not know how to do it, or we refuse to because our partner would then reject us. It takes mutual denial of Life, Light and Love to create personality substitutes in the form of false safety, security and self-importance reassurance. Anytime we break a poisonous link to our personality needs, it causes confusion, dissonance and pain for our co-dependent partner. This is the result of defining our personality needs in terms of each other, so the more we need a partner, the more we want them to need us. This discourages change or growth, because we want our partner to depend on us.

The reason co-dependent relationships are initially so enticing is that by ‘falling in love’ we feel stimulated and euphoric. Our experience of modalities (which is sensations, feelings, emotions, and thoughts) seems to open a lock where counter-balanced expressions (modalities) become, for a period, infatuating. Because of parental and society repression, only a few people can match our circuitry or match our particular needs.  Excitement tells us they reflect our parental ideals.  Since we are all repressed by society and our family, we seek out those with complementary strengths, to complete us, rather than being whole ourselves. The problem is that, if one person changes their distortion balance, the other person will seek to push them back into their old pattern.

When we want more from relationships, it activates our fears, desires and the need to control our partner. Without any malicious intention, we fall into comfortable patterns of seduction and enticement believing we are entitled due to our effort and relationship skills which we use to compromise. We either enforce expectations and role-playing, control and performance exchanges, or romantically rescue another partner. This produces disassociation, disengagement or enmeshment patterns, respectively. The more we are not on the same page, the shorter the relationship. Some of us repeatedly experience the pain of co-dependent breakups, resolving not to get as involved.

Bringing the Tao of Relationships into Harmony

Co-Creative relationships begin with internalized, healthy and balanced sensations, feelings emotions and thoughts. Any imbalance in these experiential modalities invites Co-Dependence, as we are attracted to people who externally counterbalance our weaknesses with their strengths. Co-Dependence is therefore two-parts trying to make one complete human. Since our modalities also define our masculine (sensations & thoughts) and feminine (feelings and emotions) sides at the base of our perceptions, the degree of imbalance between our masculine and feminine unconsciously invites its opposite. Therefore, Co-Dependent relationships seek balance externally, while Co-Creative relationships are internally free to choose what connections will work in each moment.

Co-creative relationships are not based on the exchange of needs, although there is much more sharing. They do not involve painful breakups, because they are composed of conscious mutual choices. The only surprises are about who we could be or how we could creatively operate as conscious partners. When we adopt unified attractions(such as Autonomous Aliveness, Intimate Vulnerability, and Creative Responsiveness) there is no comparison, competition or negation of participants. Every experience attracts aligned partners based on bringing together their beauty, truth and goodness with ours. This shift from negative, polarized attractions to positive, unified attractions changes the way we learn and grow from each other. If this is something you want to know more about, become a member of our group and receive a free booklet on Co-dependence to Co-Creativity.

Co-Creative attractions are autonomous but able to be mutual. Since they are self-defined, they do not require agreement and abhor any need for seduction or convincing.

Co-Creative relationships possess the tools to know when we are out of balance in our masculine and feminine. Growth can be shared, or kept internal when partners individually do not want to grow or change.  Co-dependent partners demand that others follow their lead and if a partner doesn’t agree, they just withdraw. We use Autonomy to know when to speak our complete truth and when not to. We can appropriately reveal our intimacy and vulnerability in service to deeper bonding and mutual trust. Even in co-dependent relationships, there is an expectation that we will spend time together, even if it is not of mutual interest. Mutual learning and co-creativity are the hallmarks that distinguish conscious relationships from those that are not.  Being in relationships where our creative choices are always our own, where there is reflection and re-creation by our partners, is what makes these partnerships great.

error: Content is protected !!
0
Would love your thoughts, please comment.x
()
x