Attachment Vs. Love - From The Rapid Realization Podcast

This is an episode from the Rapid Realization Podcast about Attachment vs. love in Relationships. The talk is centered around awareness of the two things which are commonly confused with one another. As Zen Buddhism teaches - attachment is the root of suffering. We look at differentiating attachment from love to be able to move through loss, grief, or changes in relationships.

Transcript

And welcome to today's episode,

We're talking about attachment and love.

And I want you to first think about all the things you are attached to right now.

I'm gonna go ahead and do it with you because I'm attached to plenty of things.

Honestly,

I'm attached to my bed and how comfortable it is.

It's taken a while for me to find a bed like this bed and it's not even mine,

Okay?

I became very attached to it when I moved in with my partner.

I'm attached to my dog.

I'm attached to my partner.

My body I'm attached to and its ability to walk and have sight.

These are all things that I can clearly identify that are attachments that I have.

What about you?

Now,

I know that I'm attached to these things because if I lost my bed or someone comes and steals it,

I'm definitely gonna go through some suffering for a period of time until I find one that's just as comfortable as it.

And also,

When my dog passes,

I will mourn her greatly as I have my last dog.

And if I lose my ability to walk or see,

I'm gonna go through a mourning and a suffering of not being able to walk easily to certain destination or places or to not be able to see the sunrise over here in Florida.

Now,

As the Zen Buddhism teaching says,

Attachment is the root of all suffering.

And we can be attached to a lot of different things,

Attachment to our thoughts or even ideas.

We cling onto images or even fantasies how things could be.

But when things don't turn out the way that we would want them to be,

Then we do create a lot of suffering.

We cry,

Mourn or hurt because of the attachments we had to a certain expectations.

Because maybe you've heard of the saying as well,

But attachments create expectations.

And I believe we have a lot of expectations as well as attachments that may be maladaptive around relationships and love.

And I honestly believe that we really confuse these two things,

Attachments and love.

And so I wanna go in deep about really what are attachments,

The suffering behind it,

And love.

And I have to say that this week I've encountered or connected with a number of people that have gone through recent losses,

Breakups or ending of relationships.

So this is really focused around those people to help them kind of come to a better understanding around the attachment and love that we have.

And I hear these quotes a lot in those certain situations.

But I love them,

They need to change.

But I love them,

We were going to get married and have kids.

But I love them,

I can't let them go that easily.

I love them,

How can they not love me back?

I love them so much,

I would do anything for them.

If they love me,

They would listen to me.

Or I love them,

So they should listen to me.

Now if you've listened to all of these,

There's really a common theme behind it,

All these statements.

There is a deep attachment and also expectation behind them.

And we do tend to do that,

We tend to tie this expectation behind them.

We tend to tie this expectation with love.

This love attachment and expectations are all kind of almost blended all together.

Because for me,

I feel like we really don't know what having love for someone is.

So let me first explain what love is,

Because it's one of those things that it's just really hard to fully explain it and put a definition around love,

Because it's a feeling.

If we even looked up the definition of love,

Then we find in the Webster Dictionary,

Of course,

That it states that love is a deep affection for someone.

That's it,

It's a deep affection for someone,

And it's a deep feeling that we do have for someone.

It's the sense of caring and just goodness that we want for someone because we love them,

We have deep affection for them.

So I know that's almost like a very,

Very simple definition because the feeling is far more palpable and deep that that doesn't even give it justice,

Right?

But we're gonna have to go with that.

But here's a story that I actually heard that I thought was a really good example of what we're loving,

Cuz that's the other thing.

We get very confused of what we're loving.

So here's a gentleman and he's saying,

There's this little boy and this little boy is eating fish that he actually caught while he was fishing with his father.

And he says to the father,

After they cooked up the fish and they're eating it,

He says to the father,

Man,

I love this fish.

Really love it so much.

And the father was like,

Well,

You killed it.

You went and you fished it for it and you killed it.

So does that mean you kill what you love?

And he's like,

No,

But I love the fish.

He's like,

No,

Son,

You love what you feel when you eat the fish.

You love how the fish makes you feel when you eat it.

It makes you feel satisfied.

It makes you feel maybe fulfilled.

It makes you,

It creates all these good feelings in you.

That's what you love.

So you love the way the fish makes you feel,

But you don't love the fish itself.

Because if we did,

We wanted to kill it,

Right?

We wanted to cause harm to it.

And so I thought this was such a great explanation of us in relationships and what we're really loving in relationships.

Because we do typically have this type of love in relationships.

We have this fishy love where we really are loving the feeling that the person is bringing to us or the feeling that we get when we're with someone.

But do we really love them?

Every time we eat a fish,

We may expect that the fish is going to make us feel a certain way.

And so we have an expectation.

We have an attachment behind what that feeling is going to come from having that around us,

Like a fish.

So that's a fishy love.

But if that feeling goes away every time we eat a fish,

Then we're going to be upset.

We're going to feel sorrow.

We're going to get upset because we're like,

Why isn't that feeling coming back?

Why am I not feeling that way anymore?

Every time this fish is,

You know,

I eat fish or just in retrospect,

Why am I not feeling that feeling every time this person is around?

Why is this person not making me feel that way anymore?

And so then we get upset.

Love has no expectations.

It's just love.

It just is.

Love is just completely being.

And when we really love,

Almost like the love of a parent to a child,

You just want them to be good with who they are,

You know?

We want them to just be them.

And we love them unconditionally.

So why is that understanding of love any different if you were or are in a romantic relationship?

So would you say it's true that if I love you,

Then you'll do what I want?

Or is it true to say that if I love you,

I want you to do what brings joy to you?

Because if you love me,

I'll do what you want.

Or is it that if you love me,

You allow me to do what brings me joy,

What I want?

Learning to love like that is not easy.

And I think most of us are not used to this type of love.

And so we really don't know what experiencing love is.

And so what we're experiencing may be attachment,

Expectations,

Attachment to the feeling that we're getting with that person around,

Not to the actual person.

That's a hard lesson,

Though,

To learn.

It really is.

Because in breakups or loss,

We experience immense suffering,

Immense grief,

Because we're attached to them being around us.

We're attached to the memories.

We're attached to what could have been.

We're attached to the fantasy.

We're attached to the feelings that were created during the relationship.

But I want to correct some of the verbiage that's being used when people do breakup,

Is that they think that they're hurting because of how much they love them.

I'm going to say they're hurting because of how attached they were to them.

Love is always going to be there.

Love doesn't go away.

And that's also a mis-conclusion about breakups or loss or not being with someone,

Is that that love is gone.

No,

It's always there.

If it was true love,

If it was that type of love.

It was just seeing the person for who they are.

And I would say it's really hard for us to see who other people who truly are,

To really just fully accept them to their core,

Everything about them,

Their shadows and lights,

Because we haven't accepted our own shadows and all of our lights.

So how can we expect others to fully accept us if we have yet not fully accept ourselves?

So then I would say the beginning part of learning how to truly love is to first accept yourself,

Learn how to fully accept yourself,

Learn how to live in love,

To be love.

Love is that deep affection that one would have for someone.

So have a deep affection for yourself first.

Because how can we learn to truly love someone and have a deep relationship if we have not yet have a deep relationship with ourselves?

Instead,

What is happening is we're attaching ourselves to the idea and having expectations of how someone's going to make us feel.

We're having expectations that the good feelings,

Maybe in the beginning of a relationship,

Are going to continue to always be there.

That someone is going to complete us,

To make us whole.

Again,

It's going back to that fishy love.

If you're not coming back to that fishy love,

Then you're going to be able to feel that you're not coming into a relationship already feeling whole and complete so that you're not expecting or having any attachments to what will come of this,

Then you will have sorrow,

Suffering,

Hurt,

Pain,

Because it's going to change.

Everything changes.

Everything is constantly moving and shifting in life.

So how can we expect and attach to the idea which will likely change?

So in the beginning of a relationship and wanting to attach to the way that it is right there is holding on to that image or holding on to maybe the image of getting married or having children or all of these ideas that you have around what family needs to look like,

You're attaching to that image.

And that creates sorrow if it doesn't turn into that.

Because even we change,

Every cell in your body is constantly changing and evolving and shifting.

So the lenses that you see the world through is not the same lenses that you saw the world through even a year ago.

Every cell in your body is constantly changing.

So every seven years,

You're a whole new person.

So how can you expect a relationship or the idea of how it needs to be it always remaining that way?

That's the key to no suffering.

I'm going to say the Zen Buddhist monks that man,

They had something going when they are talking about the impermanency of life and embracing that the impermanency of everything is the key to non suffering.

Having an understanding that everything is going to change and that there is no permanency within anything,

Even a relationship,

Even how it needs to look like.

Even my body is,

I can't expect it to not change.

And I know we may mourn the change of it as we continue to get older,

But I know that as we continue to get older,

But we have to let go of knowing that it will change.

Everything around us will change.

Now,

I'm not saying that it's a good thing to not be attached at all.

We don't want to become avoidant of things just because of the sorrow that may come of it,

But just bringing fully aware of what we're really attached to or what we're grieving or what we are sad for.

Because when we go through a loss of a relationship,

Are we grieving really the person or just the idea or the feeling that they gave us?

And I know that's part of the reason why we do engage with people is because of how they make us feel and the connection that we have with them.

But when it comes to love relationships,

We have to really then ask ourselves,

Is that love or just attachment?

So then we can move forward and letting go knowing that we can continue to love someone and maybe learn in the next relationship or just learn with yourself how to nurture and create real love,

True love,

Everlasting love,

The type of love that will not change because that love is always the same.

Always the same.

There is no changing that feeling when you really love because that is what life is built upon.

Love is the language of life.

When people say they fall out of love,

Then I would say,

You mean you fell out of lust?

You fell out of passion?

For me,

That is not really that love because love is everlasting.

It never goes away.

But the love has to be the type of love that you see them for who they are.

You have a deep connection just with them.

Not with how they made you feel,

Not with how well they dressed or what role they would play out throughout your life,

How we would be the power couple and make this awesome career or maybe how we would both be able to purchase this house together or maybe how we would both make great parents.

Those are all wonderful experiences but those are all attachments to ideas.

If the relationship is no longer,

Then those ideas turn into sorrows because we are holding on to the image of what could have been as opposed to what is and what just was.

For those out there that may be grieving from a past relationship,

Just beginning to accept to know that you can continue to love someone and not be with them,

That is a completely different thing.

It's not the same thing but we let go of the attachments that we had of that person in order to move on so that you can open the door to new opportunities to create maybe a love that is more stable,

A love that is more sincere or more authentic and unconditional,

One that allows you to be you completely,

Whole and accepted for you.

Or maybe it's just an opportunity to give yourself time to find who you are and what you like and what you want so that you create a love for yourself first.

Learning to accept that,

Then stepping into the opportunity of allowing real love to come in.

You

Reviews

So affirming, thank you. I truly and deeply believe as I am being coerced to stay in a relationship.

Really interesting. Loved thefishing analogy. This all makes so much sense to me. Thank you!

This was thought-provoking and I will listen again. Thank you for sharing 🙏🏻🕊️☀️🌈🌸