An afternoon question that nags me and here am I sitting and writing. Yes – a Friday afternoon that one thinks is associated with TGIF (Thank God, Its Friday). Personally, I’ve never really understood the concept. For a Friday afternoon only heralds the coming of the next day.
Coming back to where I am. Am actually in a phase of deep cogitation… A friend and colleague of mine this morning remarked, “…don’t think so much…”; she takes my face book messages as indicators of my existential reality. Well, in some ways, they indeed reflect what I feel within; but then am I not eligible to be what I am? Or what I feel?
I don’t want to get into the bit about “what / who am I”. Go to the philosophers for that or religious preceptors for that. Not to me. But yes, I am in quest. My blog name says it all; and the quest is different. It could be for a thing, a person, an idea, an abstract concept, an image of self or other – the list goes on.
Right now I am examining my relationships. Of late, I’ve become superstitious. I use the word in the sense of a belief or extra attention to synchronistic occurrences. One can debate the idea of synchronicity, but right now for a change, I am with my heart. For the uninitiated, synchronicity is about examination of near simultaneous occurrence of two events that are acausally related and yet are linked with each other. Carl Jung (to the best of my knowledge) was the first one who extensively worked on it in scientific manner (whatever that word may mean)! Deepak Chopra in his book, “Synchro Destiny” gives multiple examples.
Ok, ok – I do meander a lot. But what the heck – this is my blog!!! Well, I am reflecting on relationships. It started off sometime (means a fortnight or so) ago when the inevitable question cropped up from my mother, “so what about marriage?” I’d once written a long blog on marriage; but what I’ve been thinking about is about relationships? The past 2 days has seen me receive forwards on “relationships” like never before. They provide different and interesting perspectives – some find favour with me while others seem pedestrian bookish discourse.
What does relationship mean to me? Logically, a relationship cannot exist standalone. It needs two or more. Let me get into it a bit deeper – so let me google it out. Got an interesting take, at the site: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=relation which goes thus:
relationship
1744, "sense of being related," from relation + -ship. Specifically of romantic or sexual relationships by 1944.
Let me see what it has to say about “relation”
relation
late 14c., from Anglo-Fr. relacioun, O.Fr. relacion (14c.), from L. relationem (nom. relatio) "a bringing back, restoring," from relatus (see relate). Meaning "person related by blood or marriage" first attested c.1500. Stand-alone phrase no relation "not in the same family" is attested by 1930.
So, where am I: back to square one – the etymology has not really helped. So I will go ahead using the word in the way I understand it viz. building the ‘ship’ of ‘relations’. And for me a relation is about the investment made in order to build / sustain / nurture a sense of emotional connect with the other. And that other could be any thing or any one.
You may ask what am I looking for? Well, I am looking for a relationship – a means of relating to myself. I see many different aspects and facets of myself. Some that I like and some do not agree with me; yet, they are aspects of me. How do I relate to myself? And what does it really mean to relate to myself? Does it mean relating to my dreams, thoughts, ideas, ambitions, fantasies, wishes, desires, feelings – what else? These are all aspects internal to me – private of me that originate in my being (either at cognitive, emotive, conative or psychic levels). Or does it mean relating to others – to the outside world – to the world of men and women, plants and trees, animals and materials? Actually, all of us relate to both.
But why is it that I find that in my relations I am not there? Or in some cases, the other person is not there? An act of relating pre-supposes an effort on part of self. When I say, “I relate”, I am in effect saying that I take responsibility and invest emotionally in…” The only question that nags me now is, “what about the thing / person invested in?” Am I aware of and sensitive to them? When I say that I relate with (say for example) my mother as her son, I am saying that in my eyes she is my mother and assuming that in her eyes I am her son? I will not know the latter till I ask her. So does it mean that a relationship is built on part projection and part assumption? And further, does it imply that to the extent of my assumption and projection, it is not based on what the reality is / could be, but on what / how I perceive it?
To clarify that muddle: Do I love my mother for who she is or for my perception of who she is? The same goes for any relation (and we talk of persons here). Does it mean that I relate with the person or my idea of / about that person? In all honesty, I must confess, that in many of my relationships (with family, friends et. al.), I relate to my idea of them. In that sense, I am not fully aware to their world, to their reality and to them. With both conscious and unconscious projection, I impose my view on them – on the idea of who / what they should and can be.
And if that is so, “do I really have relationships and what do they mean to me?”
Friday, February 19, 2010
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