Buddhism for Couples E-Book

Sarah Napthali

• Herausgeber: Allen & Unwin
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

Every now and then - not very often - we meet a woman who has mastered the art of being in a couple, who has managed to keep the flame alive long after the honeymoon period and well into the trials of parenting. Sarah Napthali is not one of these women but is happy for readers to learn from her mistakes. With her trademark emphasis on self-compassion, she explains how she has applied Buddhist teachings to patch things up, hold things together and even, on good days, scale the heights of relationship happiness. Written for both men and women, Buddhism for Couples tackles the loaded subjects of housework, anger, sex, conflict and infidelity, before introducing Buddhist strategies that can enrich a relationship. Applying Buddhist teachings can improve our relationship by guiding us to delve more deeply into our psyches. Through mindfulness and ever-growing self-awareness, the teachings help us to become more familiar with the workings of our minds and bodies, more aware of our thoughts and beliefs, so that we can see our behaviours with more clarity. Alongside Buddhist teachings, Sarah explores the latest psychological research on relationships and discovers numerous overlaps. Humorous and informative, Buddhism for Couples provides a fresh approach to living as a couple, persuading us to leave behind stale, habitual ways of relating that don't seem to work.

Leseprobe

First published in 2014

Copyright © Sarah Napthali 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.

Inspired Living, an imprint of Allen & Unwin 83 Alexander Street Crows Nest NSW 2065 Australia Phone: [phone] Email: [email protected] Web: www.allenandunwin.com/uk

Cataloguing-in-Publication details are available from the National Library of Australiawww.trove.nla.gov.au

ISBN 978 1 74331 810 2

E-book ISBN 978 1 92557 618 4

Typeset by Bookhouse, Sydney

contents

introduction

chapter 1 the difficulty of living as a couple

chapter 2 letting go

chapter 3 mindfulness of our thinking

chapter 4 battling negativity

chapter 5 anger

chapter 6 housework

chapter 7 communication

chapter 8 reducing stress and anxiety

chapter 9 who is our partner?

chapter 10 sex

chapter 11 infidelity

chapter 12 tolerance of difficult behaviour

chapter 13 forgiveness and understanding

chapter 14 turning things around

chapter 15 being authentic and present with our partner

chapter 16 cultivating love

chapter 17 sorting out what really matters

some concluding points

acknowledgements

notes

introduction

TOMEK LOOKED UP AT me from his breakfast, an apologetic expression on his face, and uttered, ‘Oops’.

‘What have you forgotten?’ I asked, assuming he was about to assign me an errand.

‘Connie is getting married next week and I’m supposed to make a speech at morning tea today wishing her well. Any chance you could write a speech and email it to me?’

‘But I’ve never even met Connie!’ I blurted. ‘What on earth could I say?’

Connie was the personal assistant in Tomek’s area at work. Tomek works for a large engineering consultancy so the audience for the speech would be twenty or so engineers and draftsmen, almost all male.

‘It only needs to be a minute or two,’ Tomek tried to reassure me. ‘Just say a few general things about marriage. I need it by ten o’clock this morning if possible.’

Fortunately I have the kind of brain that remembers humorous one-liners so, with only a little help from Google, was able to furnish Tomek with this short, if unoriginal, speech before the ten o’clock deadline.

We are gathered here today because our Connie has decided to live in an institution . . . the institution of marriage, that is.

I highly recommend it . . . so much so that I’ve done it twice!

I also support gay marriage . . . why should heterosexuals be the only ones to suffer?

To get a woman’s perspective, I asked my wife for some advice to give to a woman getting married. She said that marriage teaches you all kinds of personal virtues such as tolerance, patience, forgiveness and lots of other qualities she believes she would never have needed if she hadn’t got married.

Yes, there is nothing in the world like the unconditional devotion of a woman . . . It is a thing no married man knows anything about.

But on a serious note, we wish you well Connie for the years ahead and hope you enjoy your honeymoon in Fiji.

I rang Tomek that afternoon to find the speech had elicited a few laughs, although he had excluded the line about gay marriage as a little bleak for the occasion.

Striking that task off my to-do list, I could not suppress a quiet voice inside which inquired, Is this all I have to say about marriage? All this cynicism? Is there nothing sacred about this bond?

•

A few years ago, I met a woman called Beth, who was a long-term Buddhist practitioner and marriage counsellor. She told me something about her life with her husband that kept returning to my mind. ‘Every night after we finish eating dinner, we join both hands, look into each other’s eyes and tell each other things we feel grateful for in our relationship, taking turns. Really simple things like, “I feel grateful that you swept the front porch,” or “cooked dinner” or whatever.’

Over the years, I kept recalling this image of Beth and her husband because I found this behaviour so strange. I couldn’t imagine doing this if I lived to be a million and three. Yet I could also see that her ritual was a very intelligent, rational and wise act to engage in. It countered one of the most widely cited problems of long-term relationships and one of the leading causes of divorce: lack of mutual appreciation. As a couples counsellor, Beth was in a position to know that expressing gratitude, cultivating what some therapists call ‘a climate of appreciation’, was one of the best things she could do for her marriage, and, doubtless, her own sense of wellbeing.

I started to think that maybe, in some way, I was blocked. Perhaps, full of blockages. Yet with Buddhist teachings at my fingertips, I knew I had the tools to work on my karmic knots.

•

For years I hesitated to write a book applying Buddhist teachings to the couple relationship. Not least because it might set off my ‘imposter syndrome’. Who was I trying to fool that someone like me could write on the topic of adult relationships?

Right now, for example, I have on my desk a cherished book entitled Everyday Blessings, about applying Buddhist teachings in family life. A Zen Buddhist couple, Jon and Myla Kabat-Zinn, wrote the book together.

Imagine! My husband doesn’t even read my books, let alone write them with me or even show the slightest interest in Buddhism. I do not hold this against him as such behaviours are simply not in his nature and it would be unrealistic—unfair even—for me to expect him to change who he fundamentally is. Still, I could never provide readers with a model of Buddhist marriage like the Kabat-Zinns, whose faces smile at me now from the back-cover photo, a picture of compatibility and shared values.

As the months passed, however, it slowly dawned on me that perhaps, as a woman who has found marriage difficult at times, my perspective on marriage and how to improve its quality could be helpful. After all, when it comes to talking about our relationship worries we tend to gravitate towards people who have experienced similar problems to our own. We may hesitate, for example, to take our relationship problems to friends who appear to live in a perpetual state of marital harmony. Importantly, authors who admit to plenty of difficulties are less likely to make others feel inadequate, inferior or in some way failing.

When I say ‘difficult’, I do not mean my husband torments me. Not intentionally anyway. My husband is an amazing and impressive man who I admire a great deal, but he could never be called easygoing—his role at work with almost a hundred people reporting to him requires him to be anything but. Our particular challenge is that we have extremely different tastes, opinions, values, hobbies and talents. This isn’t to say I believe men are from Mars and women are from Venus. We both come from Earth. (Engineers, however, can be another matter.)

And while I would describe my experience of being married with children as constantly improving, when I think back to those early years with babies, we did start from a low point. Of course, the vast majority of couples struggle in their marriage on the arrival of babies. Karen Maezen Miller, a Zen Buddhist priest and author of a comforting book called Momma Zen, eloquently described the shock of a new baby: ‘My resentments swelled and crested nearly every day. How unfair the circumstance. How overwhelming the duty. How complete my loneliness as I slogged through the tedium.

I could not fault my tiny daughter these offences; loving her was easy and involuntary. So I faulted my husband. Loving him, you see, was entirely optional. I fortified myself against it with silence and stinginess.’1

One hardly needs to read any further to guess that such a clear perception of her situation—‘my life is hard; I blame my husband’—was sufficient to slowly begin to heal the relationship. This is the great gift of Buddhist practice: seeing our lives more clearly—through non-judgemental observation—helps us to make changes that benefit everybody.

Along with perceiving our lives more clearly, Buddhist teachings provide other benefits to a relationship. The Buddha offered us the Four Noble Truths:

1. There is suffering, so understand it.

2. The cause of suffering is attachment, so let go.

3. Suffering can end, so realise that it can.

4. There is a path out of suffering, the Eightfold Path.

While I will elaborate on these throughout the book, consider the Second Noble Truth, which is about letting go of attachment or self-centred craving. This teaching can benefit a couple relationship because there are so many attachments we all bring to a partnership that we could let go of. This book will talk, for example, about letting go of anger, of expectations, of unhelpful thoughts and beliefs, and of attachment to our views.

The Buddha’s Noble Eightfold Path can also shine considerable light on a couple relationship. This path includes:

1. Skilful understanding

2. Skilful thought

3. Skilful speech

4. Skilful action

5. Skilful livelihood

6. Skilful effort

7. Skilful mindfulness

8. Skilful concentration

With skilful speech, for example, Buddhist teachings can help us develop communication that is sensitive, authentic and conducive to peace. With skilful mindfulness, we can become aware of our thoughts and beliefs about marriage and slowly realise that relationship satisfaction can be, for a large part, ‘all in our heads’. We will meet a psychologist who believes that skilful mindfulness can help with a lack of sexual desire. Skilful action is about ethics and avoiding harm which, in the case of marriage, might mean steering clear of an affair or other acts of betrayal.

•

Buddhism has moved from country to country over the centuries and each new culture has produced subtle adaptations, shifts in emphasis and cultural influences. As Buddhism has spread to the West, there have been further adaptations as Western teachers have chosen to emphasise aspects that chime with the democratic, egalitarian principles we value. In the West, we are far less likely to rely on, or become, monks and nuns in order to practise. The quiet, secluded life of traditional, monastic practice in the East gives way to practice amid a complex web of relationships. Western Buddhists focus increasingly on bringing awareness to our relationships, to the quality of our presence with others. Western teachers almost always have partners, and usually children too; celibacy is rare. A large proportion of Buddhist teachers, some say half, are also counsellors or psychotherapists who, for a living, help people navigate relationships.

We can trust that the Buddha would have approved of an emphasis on relationships. On one occasion his attendant Ananda approached the Buddha seeking clarification:

As he was sitting there, 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, and comrades, he can be expected to develop and pursue the Noble Eightfold Path.’

I have seen the ‘admirable friendship’ of this scripture translated as ‘virtuous friendship’, ‘spiritual friendship’ or ‘sangha’ (the community who help you practise). However we translate the scripture, it suggests that Buddhist practice is about far more than solitary meditation and that relationships, and their capacity to hold a mirror up for us, are crucial to our spiritual development on the path. Many, including myself, would argue that how we interact with others is the ultimate test of spiritual practice. How valuable is it to spend hours in deep meditation if we then treat the people in our lives coldly?

One of the main benefits of Buddhist teachings is that they can change our perspective on our relationship. How easy it is to become caught in a rut where the whole relationship runs on automatic, driven by stale habits. How easy it is to become trapped in circling negative thoughts about our partner. Most of us operate with what psychologists call a ‘negativity bias’. Throughout the millennia, focusing on the negative helped us to survive as a species as it helped us deal with danger and all kinds of threats in the environment. Now that we no longer have to worry about coming face to face with a dangerous predator, this negativity bias, while sometimes helpful for identifying problems, can also lead us to relentlessly, and needlessly, focus on the negative. Constantly bracing for the worst blocks the potential for joy and connection. Many of us waste years compiling lists of our partner’s faults, ruminating on character flaws, while overlooking a wealth of positive qualities.

Driven by the negativity bias, so many couples reach a stalemate where both claim ‘I’m not going to lift my game until she does.’ As long as both cling to this stubborn standpoint, as Tomek and I have done at various points in our marriage, there is no hope for the relationship. Sitting around waiting for our partner to change before we allow ourselves to enjoy a loving relationship is a risky, though common, approach. All we can realistically control is our own behaviour, but if we ourselves begin to act more lovingly, it is far more likely that our partner will rise to the occasion.

Of course, many feel apprehensive at the thought of applying Buddhist teachings in their relationship: Hang on, I’m already doing most of the giving in this relationship. Will Buddhist teachings turn me into a complete doormat? If I become more compassionate, who is going to look out for my needs? Yet whenever Buddhist teachers raise the topic of compassion, they invariably mention the importance of compassion for ourselves, for our compassion needs to encompass all beings, excluding nobody. If our own needs are not being met, then we need to take action to redress the situation by requesting change or setting boundaries. The Buddha himself was pretty unequivocal on this. King Pasenadi and Queen Mallika approached the Buddha to check whether their feelings of love for their own selves over their partner were acceptable. The Buddha replied:

I visited all quarters with my mind. Nor found I any dearer than myself; Self is likewise to every other dear; Who loves himself may never harm another.

For the Buddha, self-interest is natural. We all want to be happy and avoid suffering. Understanding our own self-interest is what helps us avoid violating anybody else’s.

As with my past books, I take the unconventional approach of drawing from the three main Buddhist traditions: Tibetan, Zen and Theravadin, even though Buddhists traditionally practise in one tradition only. My excuse is that I remain curious about all three traditions and enjoy investigating each of them. It is for readers to choose which, if any, is right for them. I personally practise in the Theravadin tradition, a form highly influenced by Western teachers, and this feels like home for me.

•

It would be fair to say I reveal rather a lot about my marriage in this book, an area that the great majority of us choose to keep private. In making aspects of my marriage public, I did have to consider the issue of Tomek’s privacy. We do have different surnames, though, and I have given him a pen-name for this book. My husband is Polish and Tomek is probably the easiest Polish name to pronounce. I also pledged to show Tomek every sentence that mentioned him, although he soon lost interest and said he trusted me not to defame him.

It has to be said at this point: I married a good man. Some live with partners who may be abusive or even among the 1 per cent of the population believed to be psychopaths. I would hazard a guess that leaving such individuals would help more than applying Buddhist teachings to a lost cause. I am no commitment fundamentalist. My assumption in this book, though, is that readers believe their relationship is probably worth staying in.

The power of Buddhist teachings is that they guide us to delve deeply into our psyches. Through mindfulness and ever-growing self-awareness, they help us to become more familiar with the workings of our minds and bodies, more aware of the thoughts and beliefs that drive our automatic reactions. Assisted to be calm and self-aware for more of the day, we begin to see our behaviour more clearly and our insights gradually help us to relate to our partner more lovingly.

CHAPTER1

the difficulty of living as a couple

PICTURE THIS SCENE. A real estate agent is conducting a small group tour through a cluster of attractive homes in a recently constructed suburb. After half an hour or so, there is uniform excitement among the group members who are all impressed with these spacious, modern houses set in carefully manicured gardens. The homes are even in the right price range for most of the group and all feel the elation of being close to finding the right home after a lengthy search.

‘There is a catch though,’ says the agent.

Hearts collectively sink.

‘These homes are built on reclaimed swamp so about half of them will eventually sink completely into the mud. It will take a few years though.’

‘You can’t be serious,’ says one of the women.

‘I’m afraid I am. And I should also add that a further 20 per cent of the remaining houses will sink quite far down into the mud without completely going under.’

‘That’s outrageous!’ cries one of the men. ‘Who in their right mind would buy one of these houses?’

The members of the group all return to their respective homes feeling angry and disappointed. Some decide to write formal letters of complaint to their local member protesting that a scheme with such a high failure rate should even be allowed to exist.

Many an astute reader will have already guessed where I am headed with this tale of real estate woe. The statistics quoted in this scenario are roughly the same as those we hear on the success of modern-day marriage. Here is a rather mind-blowing sample of the proportion of marriages ending in divorce across the Western world:

• United States: 53%

• Australia: 43%

• United Kingdom: 47%

• Germany: 49%

• France: 55%

• Belgium: 71%

• Portugal: 68%1

For de facto relationships, separation rates are even higher, the world over.

These statistics only capture the marriages where couples were prepared to go through with a divorce, a procedure widely recognised as one of the most stressful experiences. This begs the question, how many of those not divorced are happily married? A study from the United States suggests that at any given time 20 per cent of those still married are ‘in distress’.2 So a further 20 per cent of houses sink halfway into the mud without completely going under. At least such sinkage is not always permanent.

In the face of such a high failure rate, the lengths we all go to in order to find ‘the one’ seem curious. Even those who have suffered a divorce remarry at a rate of 75 per cent.3 Why do we keep signing up to this fate? One reason we often hear is that our quest is a biological drive: without two adults committed to childcare the species would not have thrived. Study after study does reveal, beyond all doubt, that a two-parent family is still the ideal arrangement for raising children.

So although this book may include some depressing stretches, such as most of this chapter (it does brighten up as it goes along), I would argue that knowledge is strength. If we are aware of the reality of what we have all got ourselves into, its pitfalls and traps, then we are in a position to prevent the worst. If we can use Buddhist teachings to reflect on the state of our relationship, then we can protect ourselves from that most stressful of events: relationship breakdown. Not that we are only interested in avoiding the worst: Buddhist teachings can also help strengthen our connection with our partner so that we experience more love and friendship.

Cultivating a Buddhist practice has required me to be honest about my own role in relationship problems. Couples therapists claim that most couples come to counselling in the hope that their partner will finally see their faults and change. In distressed couples, individuals typically blame each other and fail to see their own role in any problems. I remember asking a friend how she was finding the book she was reading on the topic of emotional intelligence. I could only laugh at her answer: ‘It’s fantastic, I’m really enjoying it,’ she enthused. Then with a straight face she added, ‘There’s just SOOO much in it my husband could learn.’

It’s much easier to consider the faults in someone close to us than to see our own. As I have trawled through the literature on relationships, I too have found myself thinking, ‘I wish Tomek would read this’. I have even photocopied and bookmarked passages to show him the next time an issue arises. Meanwhile, I suspect I may have overlooked the message in the passages that relate to the parts of me I am reluctant to own up to, my shadow side.

Yet many a couples therapist tells us that while both partners play a part in causing problems, more often than we think it only takes one member of the couple to start making an effort before both benefit and change. I can certainly vouch for this phenomenon in my own relationship with Tomek.

THE FIRST NOBLE TRUTH

The First Noble Truth is simply: ‘There is suffering’. The Buddha used the word ‘dukkha’, which we tend to translate as suffering, unsatisfactoriness or unease, so it includes all our responses to that which we judge to be unpleasant: irritation, impatience, disappointment, fear, sadness and so on. The most literal translation of the Pali word dukkha is a wheel with its axle off-centre. Dukkha includes that niggling sense of being off-balance, out-of-kilter, or rickety. For many, the relationship with their partner is an excellent place to start considering this First Noble Truth.

An extended version of the First Noble Truth is: ‘There is suffering so understand it’. Buddhist practice requires us to acknowledge dukkha, rather than deny, ignore, or pretend that dukkha does not exist. The divorce rate alone is evidence that marriage, or any long-term couple relationship, is essentially unsatisfactory, or a source of unpleasant feeling, for substantial periods of time. Diane Sollee, the founder of the Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education in the United States, tells us: ‘All couples have approximately ten issues they will never resolve. And if you switch partners you just get ten new issues, and they are likely to be more complicated the second time around.’4

At first, ten issues that will never be resolved sounded like an exaggeration, even for Tomek and me. So as I was getting dressed this morning I decided to count the number of issues that Tomek and I are unlikely to ever resolve. I came up with eleven—and thought it best to stop counting there. So it is not hard to prove the First Noble Truth when it comes to living in a couple.

Buddhists talk of ‘samsara’, the wheel of suffering that results from living an unconscious life. We experience samsara in our relationship when we spend time repeating the same old arguments, falling into the same patterns of disappointment, when we refuse to wake up and see what is going on. We inflict what Buddhists call ‘conditioned responses’ on each other: the responses we have learnt work for us while growing up, that we believe have helped us to achieve our goals and protected us from hurt. Unaware of just how automatic these responses are, we assume they are inevitable and shut ourselves off from all our options. We live in a trance state, asleep at the wheel. With so much repetition in our interactions, the relationship starts to feel dull, all spark snuffed out. At the worst times, we feel distance, boredom and loneliness.

One way to wake up or reinvigorate the relationship can be to try something different to our conditioned responses, although to do this we need to have noticed that we have fallen into an old pattern. Perhaps our pattern is to see only our own needs and block our partner’s from our attention. Our pattern may be to over-talk rather than deliver a concise message, to lose our temper, snipe, nag, complain, bottle up our problems or go quiet and ruminate. Doing something different might mean writing about a grievance in a letter, or even a text, rather than arguing. It could mean expressing gratitude alongside any request for change. Or our new approach may include humour or compassion. It might mean increasing our awareness of how we word our messages, their length, and their clarity.

Buddhism can offer a variety of alternative lenses through which to perceive our relationships, lenses which happily disrupt our habitual ways of seeing. Imagine setting aside a couple of hours as a spiritual exercise—while going about your usual activities—to look at your relationship with nothing but curiosity, with a spirit of calmly inquiring What is this?, listening and being open and non-judgemental towards all experience. What a revealing contrast this ‘beginner’s mind’ would be with our habitual lenses.

Alternatively, we could perceive our relationship through a lens of gratitude, focusing on all the benefits we could enjoy if we remain open to them. Another lens is that of compassion, where we ask, ‘What is difficult about today for my partner?’ and perhaps repeat to ourselves, May he be at ease, or May she be free from strain. While such Buddhist perspectives can be cultivated in meditation, adopting them throughout our daily activities is surely even more valuable.