buddhism and romantic love...

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toujour_333

a simple buddhist
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hello all,

i need your advice right now since i am battling a crippling question. this is my story:

i have recently met one of the most amazing people that i have ever met. this person embodies most of what i want in a partner. however, my emotions run rampid when i am around this person and i feel like i cannot control them like i normally can. i feel some of the most immense joy just being in this persons presence. its nothing sexual either, i mean, this person is really physically attractive, but im not focused on that. just the thought of being in a relationship with this person makes my heart go crazy and im afraid that this may make things harder for me in my practice. i dont want to give up buddhism for love, even though right now i would hasten to say the word love, but i feel this strong connection towards this person unlike any that i have ever felt before. and therefore, my question is this:

what does the pali cannon say about romantic relationships and how do you all deal with being romantic with the one you love without becoming too attached to these feelings?

i dont want to seem cold and emotionless, but im normally a very logical and rational person, however when i am around this person, that all goes away. just the smile on their lips makes me go crazy and my heart goes wild. i really care a lot about this person and i would hate to not be able to be around them or to spend time with them, however if i cannot control myself, im afraid that that may be what is to come. what can i do to deal with this situation? its even ruined my meditation practice since i cant seem to get my mind of the this person. i dont blame this person for doing this to me, rather my lack of being in control of myself. so, any advice for the young practioner? please help, i beg you.

be well in peace
 
or this, also the Dhammapada:

If you find an intelligent companion
who will walk with you,
who lives wisely, soberly, overcoming all dangers,
walk with that person in joy and thoughtfulness.

If you find no intelligent companion
who will walk with you,
who lives wisely and soberly,
walk alone like a king who has renounced a conquered kingdom
or like an elephant in the forest.

It is better to live alone;
there is no companionship with a fool.
Let a person walk alone with few wishes, committing no wrong,
like an elephant in the forest.
 
Interesting topic: I've always felt that within a Therevada type of Buddhism you have a clear choice between directly aiming for enlightenment and living a lay life - romance being part of the second.

If you feel so strongly for a person, I personally would go for it. You describe yourself as young, so your life is ahead of you. As far as I see, this relationship could
1) live up to the potential it seems to have now, showing you that this life is not suffering after all
2) fail to do so, and give you a deeper insight into the nature of how happiness is bound up with suffering

If you renounce life without experiencing it, you may be more vulnerable later.
 
Namaste toujour,

thank you for the post.

i would tend to agree with Obvious Child at this point...

if you are a monastic then romantic love can be rather tricky since it would have to be platonic.

if you are a lay person, there really isn't any problem :)

what it seems like you are saying is that your emotional states appear to be rapidly shifting without much consciousness control... though i could be incorrect on this inference.

if that is the case, there are several ways in which we can exist in a comitted relationship whilst remaining within the Buddhist Sangha, as Seattlegal and Samabudhi mentioned.

in my particular school, the Nyingma, there really isn't any sort of stricture placed on loving relationships... in fact, Padmasambhava was married to a Chinese princess named Yeshe Tsogyal who become one of the greatest teachers that Tibet had ever seen. (though, it is the case in the Nyingma monastaries that such things wouldn't be permitted).

in any event... the salient point here, in my view, is that the laiety and monastics have different stances on this and it really depends on where you are in the practice.

perhaps the Uppadha Sutta is relevant here:

I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was living among the Sakyans. Now there is a Sakyan town named Sakkara. There Ven. Ananda went to the Blessed One and, on arrival, having bowed down to the Blessed One, sat to one side. As he was sitting there, Ven. Ananda said to the Blessed One, "This is half of the holy life, lord: admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie."

"Don't say that, Ananda. Don't say that. Admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie is actually the whole of the holy life. When a monk has admirable people as friends, companions, & comrades, he can be expected to develop & pursue the noble eightfold path.

"And how does a monk who has admirable people as friends, companions, & comrades, develop & pursue the noble eightfold path? There is the case where a monk develops right view dependent on seclusion, dependent on dispassion, dependent on cessation, resulting in relinquishment. He develops right resolve ... right speech ... right action ... right livelihood ... right effort ... right mindfulness ... right concentration dependent on seclusion, dependent on dispassion, dependent on cessation, resulting in relinquishment. This is how a monk who has admirable people as friends, companions, & colleagues, develops & pursues the noble eightfold path.

http://accesstoinsight.org/canon/sutta/samyutta/sn45-002.html

metta,

~v
 
i appreciate all the advice that everyone has given here for me. it has really helped a lot in my decision. well, the person that i was referring to up above and myself talked and i dont think that i will be persuing a relationship with them since they are on different paths than myself. ive also been toying with the idea of becoming a monastic since i feel that i am being called down that path. however, that is a decision that i have pleanty of time to make, being that i just turned 21. however, after fasting a few days and turning towards meditation i think i have decided against romantic love for the rest of my life. the way i see it is this:

why further that persons clinging by giving them something to cling to when instead i could be helping them find their path and achieve enlightenment in their own way. instead of furthering their samsara, i think it would be better to try to help them see the true nature of it. what does everyone think? it seems like a good idea to me, however it seems like a very lonely path although i do have great friends. but, theres nothing like feeling that romantic love for another, but it does only end in pain.

what are you guys thoughts on that? i dont know if this is the place to put it, but i dont see the point in starting a new thread for something as simular as this. thanks and be well in peace
 
toujour_333 said:
why further that persons clinging by giving them something to cling to when instead i could be helping them find their path and achieve enlightenment in their own way. instead of furthering their samsara, i think it would be better to try to help them see the true nature of it. what does everyone think? it seems like a good idea to me, however it seems like a very lonely path although i do have great friends. but, theres nothing like feeling that romantic love for another, but it does only end in pain.

what are you guys thoughts on that? i dont know if this is the place to put it, but i dont see the point in starting a new thread for something as simular as this. thanks and be well in peace
Click to expand...

Hi Toujour,

This is definitely something I have struggled with. For me, I think that walking the middle path means that I can't push romantic love to the side. In the past, I've been intrigued by monasticism and "renunciation," but I still liked girls. ;) As you described earlier, sometimes strong feelings get in the way of meditation and practice. One way is to push those aside and dive into meditative bliss, but I've found that, for me, that's a form of denial and not facing my true nature. It seemed like a simplification and an easy way out--although it certainly wasn't easy trying to restrain myself from my passions.

Passion--such a loaded word in Buddhist practice, one that many instinctively recoil from. Passions are seen as something to transcend. But that's in-the-box Buddhist thinking; for me, it is Buddhism in the box, something to be bought in a corporate book store. I prefer to dive into and live my passions. Sometimes they bring pain, yet sometimes they bring great joy--for both myself and others. Buddhism is not about skirting joy. It's about releasing yourself from suffering. I'm familiar with the old argument that pleasure brings suffering, but I'm not talking about simple pleasures. I feel that joy is different, greater, something of the essence of awareness. And you can certainly cultivate joy through romantic love, although it does come with thorns.

To me, Buddhsim is about balance, which I would say is something to look at deeply when considering pursuing romance and love versus shelving that passion for the dispassion of a detached calm. One thing that I like to keep in mind is that a calm reserve or peace found in meditation is not permanent; of course, nothing is. But while the world is in flux and we participate in its spiral dance, are we keeping our balance, or are we tipping this way or that? Romantic love can throw us off kilter, just like any passion, if it is not developed with strong intention. The same could be said for meditation. And yet both can be powerful parts of our practice.

My thoughts,
P
 
I just remembered the interesting Epicurian take on this

Epicurus was a Greek philosopher who said pleasure/happiness was the highest good, and is thus associated with luxury and extremes. However, his own school believed in eating enough to live and developing quiet of mind without attatchments: a sort of Buddhism without an afterlife.

Epicurus himself said all sexual relations were bad, as they caused clinging and pain. However, many of his disciples said they were acceptable as long as no strong emotion was involved on either side, as this gave pleasure without clinging. So by these standards, a sexual relationship is OK, as long as you're not in love or anything with the other.

BTW, I'm glad Vajradhara agreed with me: I was worried I might be seen as leading people astray from the path to enlightenment. As for your second issue, the qusetion of compassion in not making another cling, this cuts to the heart of Buddhism for me. I am dubious about appeals to the afterlife to work out moral decisions, and I find that my life as it is now, if not for everyone else, is not actually suffering. Also, that the suffering is worth it for the happiness, and is in fact a valuable experience. The rejection of experience seems to me to be the fear of contingency: Buddha's message tells us that something isn't worth having if it can ever pass away. I prefer the Taoist approach, inasmuch as I understand it, which embraces the change and flow. For me, Buddhism is too like the adolescent griping in Paul Simon's 'I am a Rock'

'I won't disturb the slumber of feelings that have died,
If I never loved I never would have cried...
I have no need for friendship, friendship causes pain;
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain...
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb,
I touch no-one and no-one touches me....
I am a rock, I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain, and an island never cries.

It's a very good song, and I haven't given its artistic merit due credit by chopping it up here. It's based on John Donne, who said 'no man is an island', and that he was not unaffected by any man's death, as he was bound up with mankind. R S Thomas later noted the relationship between Donne's statement and portrayed the Buddha
'disproving Donne, himself an island,
surrounded by the oceans of space and time' (I paraphrase badly: I'll look it up when I get home)
 
It is a lonely path. I'm sure any realised being will tell you this. Difficult, lonely, simple. However, Buddha failed to qualifier how painful/enjoyable the path is. That is up to you.
 
Namaste toujour,

with regards to becoming a monastic or not..

if you have a teacher that you practice with already, i would suspect that being would be more appropriate to ask since they will have some understanding of your practice and capacities.

that being said, i suspect that the most that any of us online can do is to be supportive of whichever decision that you make :)

metta,

~v
 
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