Physical Attraction

What about physical attraction?

The wish for the magical relationship, in the US anyway, is often referred to in the form of a casual question: "Is he the one? or Is she the one?"

There are lots of traps in the thought pursuit of “the one.” Even if you are not chasing “the one” but something less dramatic and more casual, it really makes no difference, fiction remains fiction.

Why? Because the entire pursuit assumes that you need something which, in and of itself, is false. Yet, believing this intensely, we race furiously to fill the perceived lack by finding the seeming perfect other. We can only experience disappointment, guilt, and a host of other non-joyous emotions living within this fiction.

Let’s put the seeming issue to rest.

What does non-duality have to say about it?

There is no special person called “the one.” Everyone is equal and everyone is “the one.” No single person then deserves more of your love than any other.

Without exception, you are an all-inclusive being. That means that you don't get to exclude anyone. Special relationships then are illusions. Your former categorizations were delusional increasing your own case towards your personal isolation and desolate state. All relationships are equally important.

Does that mean that you will never be with one person - that magical person that seemingly visited you in your dreams?

Perhaps yes, perhaps no. That’s not the point here. The point is merely, repeating, that all relationships are equally important.

It may be that your higher will wants you to be with just one person for an extended period. If that is so, it will happen, and you couldn’t prevent it from happening. What you can do though is accept that there are no accidents, relax, and have fun.

What about these so called teachers or healers, psychics, surgeons, lawyers, ceo types, the homeless, the pain-in-the-butt neighbor that always complains, senators, governors, the president, are they special? Yes, in that they are your equal - an aspect of you. The degree to which you assign anyone of these seeming people in your life some inequality (higher or lower) is equivalently the degree of your personal willingness to live in fiction, in a delusional self-identity.

Remember, the universe is always and in all ways conspiring in your favor. Enjoy and honor then each relationship - as you are honoring your self every time. Does that make sense?

What if the universe, which is always conspiring in your favor, presents you with a person that reaches you, yet they don’t appear as you’d prefer. How then would you be able to interact with them as whole, complete, and innocent while you are staring at them through your assembled preferences?

Think about it. How could you have even seen them through such tainted lenses? You were still looking at what you wanted, at your designated answer to your mating question - comparing what you think you are seeing (their physical image or whatever seeming other pretend criteria you value) with that picture.

If the past and future, being perceptions, are unreal, you must have been living in a fiction. What does that say about the efficacy of your mating question? Since it is not NOW, it is not real. Acceptance of another is complete or not at all, no compromises.

Did it ever occur to you that the seeming other knows nothing about the seeming mating problem that you are adamantly attempting to solve?

Perhaps they are just happy to know you as you are. And, all the while, they were enjoying the moment with you, you were wrapped up in mapping your current physical selection criteria against some desired fantasy future state.

“Its not having what you want, its wanting what you’ve got.”

-Sheryl Crow-

Let’s continue with this movement to clarity:

A thought called love, which we are, is not limited to physical form. The body is actually outside of you - a projection, you are not actually within it.

Are you wrong for believing you are a body surrounded by bodies?
Neither of good, bad, right, nor wrong are being suggested here.

The question might be:

How do you feel thinking you are just a body surrounded by bodies?

...most tell me that they feel limited, vulnerable, and afraid in this idea of self and others....

...on occasion, someone will respond with a seeming mixture of enthusiastic adamance and even anger, that separation is good, preferred, and useful; to these thoughts, I say “run with it”...

why would I respond this way? i could give you several perhaps even what you might call well articulated reasons, but in each moment I merely open to that moment...

...you might find it useful to think of my response this way: with what exactly would I be debating by alternately claiming they are wrong? might I be making real (to me) an idea that I’ve decided (for me) is not real...? and, how have i decided what is right for me and what is wrong for me? I merely test whether or not I feel at peace within the idea presented, if not I let it pass by me, offering it no resistance....

Being merely a projection, the body is unreal.

So, when negotiating the pleasing bodies versus the hideous bodies or levels in between, you are essentially exercising preferences.

Preferences are means of the separation-thought system to make judgments. Both the separation-thought system and its chief tool to keep you confused - judgments - are unreal. To the degree that you think you are picking actual people using your judgments, you are confused.

Essentially, you are selecting and deselecting form or the unreal. You are, however, selecting and deselecting aspects of YOUR SELF in fiction. And, why is this seemingly something? Because you believe in your body identity - you, therefore, believe that real choices are being presented.

You cannot avoid the boomerang effect of these thoughts. Let me be blunt, if you loved yourself completely, you could never and would never pick and choose from what the universe presents you. It would all be completely acceptable, whole, and perfect, being part of you.

Are you harming anyone by making these selections?
In fiction, harm can be perceived - and care could be useful. In reality, NO, there is no harm. Picking between two NOTHINGS - this projected image or that - you aren’t actually doing anything in reality. Self cannot attack self in reality.

Both the past and future are unreal. Selection criteria may only be assembled based on your perceptions of either of these seeming time constructs. If they are unreal, your selection criteria is unreal as well.

Now, let’s get a bit deeper into why. The following questions, I will not answer. Take a look within yourself and find your answer.

A. In considering whether a woman or a man meets your standard of physical beauty, exactly what problem do you think you are solving - what need within your self is being served by this pursuit?

B. In other words, what is the purpose of the judgment as to their appearance? It clearly has some value to you, otherwise you wouldn’t have invested internally in the criteria development process?

If you are engaging these questions as suggestive of good, bad, right, or wrong, then you’re not really listening openly, you are afraid. Relax, we’re just looking within to understand what debris is blocking your awareness and perhaps why you put it there.

These inquiries are about the efficacy to you of any thought you hold. In understanding the value of a thought, you understand your self more - in that, as you release them, the absence of thought becomes more and more comfortable - but, while your ego identity rules, I would not recommend JUMPING radically to NOT THINKING. You'll end up running around proclaiming thinking is unreal, labeling it a pluralistic expression and you wouldn't be wrong, but - all the while not realizing that it was a thought that catalyzed that proclamation - so, in simplest terms you're not there yet - you're not in the absence of thought - and this is nothing about which to feel bad. Sometimes, these self-inquiries reveal that your thoughts on a particular subject served no purpose towards which you feel aligned today. Thoughts you hold about another, however, are projections of thoughts you hold about yourself.

Yes, that means that when you reject another on any basis, you are rejecting a part of yourself.

Don’t feel bad about this. You already are coping with the first rejection - the one placed upon the seeming other. I gently suggest that you don’t compound your challenge with guilt about that.

What is key to understand here is that you cannot judge another and avoid self-judgment. And you will not like the feeling of that self-judgment. That may be quite enough for you to cope with for now.

You might be trying to figure out what happened first. Time is not real, so I gently suggest you drop that pursuit. Its simple: thought equals cause. If you don’t like the entirety of yourself, you will not like the entirety of others. You are essentially projecting this dislike and returning to your awareness evidence of your split perspective on yourself - parts of you, you like, parts of you remain unacceptable.

Let’s take yet another tact here.

If we’re all one Nash, haven’t I elevated a lower order or bodily level concern in my thoughts and shouldn’t I be ashamed about that - that I select some and reject others?

Shame (guilt) is not your identity - ever. If you don’t enjoy sitting within the feelings that accompanied your judgments, perhaps consider the efficacy of the judgments to you - go back to questions A and B above.

hint: something about the unreal remains attractive to you, what is it and why?

hint 2: it is something about your identity that you secretly believe you are lacking....