Though it may be difficult to see, we have a serious self-esteem problem in our society. We are, in short, either taught that we don’t exist, taught to hate ourselves, or some combination of the two. Most people you see walking around on the street don’t feel worthy of love. And this seems to be a matter of selflove, or the lack thereof.
Self-hatred is perpetuated by nearly everything we see in the media, but most particularly advertising. It is reinforced hundreds of times a day, perhaps more boldly than any other emotion.
If we are lacking self-esteem — a problem so pervasive as to be invisible — we are going to have a lot of problems in relationships. This can account for much of our stuff around jealousy. For example, if we need a relationship to know that we exist, then we will naturally feel that our existence is threatened if our partner so much as smiles at someone else.
If much of our trip in relationships is designed to cover up a lack of real self-awareness, we are adding several dense layers of complication to finding out who we really are. It would seem that the real solution to our relationship stuff, our jealousy, our loneliness and many other factors, is to figure out who we are, enter a conscious relationship with that person, and then take that into our relationships with others.
In other words, we need to get to the place where the most honest relationship we have in the world is with ourselves, and then let that overflow into our encounters with the people around us — not forgetting what order these things happen. Unfortunately, we are taught to have relationships with ourselves that are based specifically on denying and deceiving ourselves. This is a sad state of humanity, but one that could be easily addressed — if we were somehow relieved of the fear to look within.
WY… The *entire* Western eros pattern could have been so different had the gnostic Valentinus been elected Pope. He was a bishop, and on the short list for one of the earliest papal sedes. A pope who believed in reincarnation and that “god” was a dark angel sent to screw with humanity! That there was no original sin, virgin birth or divine jesus! Can you imagine?
Oh well, at least we have Valentine’s day, which, despite the Catholics’ attempts to turn it into a mini-Lent, has bloomed with his wisdom.
Although I understand the OTO’ers (with whom I am friendly) have dipped the heirogamos in crowley and rolled it in RAW, it is still a valid rite. And there are mawwages (I perform them) that set the partners free within and beyond each other.
(I have an alter ego that I swear is a female Mad-Max –princess bride– who keeps mumbling ‘the bwessed awwangement’ as I deliver the banns.)
As for ‘a future lifetime when people aren’t so stupid about sex?’ – make art. Make art that speaks this, make art that sings or howls or whispers you. State your peace within the medium that is half-now-you/half-future-you and set it loose to find your Psyche. She’s out there, looking for the Sign. Make the sign, then let it do the talkin’.
Wishing you grand love,
M
Eric: Thanks for writing this stuff and sharing it.
My astro chart is full to the gills with symbols of autonomy. Among them are a Capricorn sun, Uranus in the first house ruled by a retrograde Venus in Aquarius loosely conjunct Jupiter, and Saturn on the south lunar node. Additionally my Gemini moon resides in the 8th house giving me a deep instinct for needing an open door in any relationship. I get freaked out if I feel like all the people in my social life know each other as happened briefly when I was most deeply involved in an alternative religious community known as OTO.
Yeah so what I’m getting at is that I tried for a few years to manifest the kind of relationship I was socialized to think I want: marriage, soul mate, what the fuck ever. Retro Venus in Aquarius AND a Gemini moon? Yeah, had I grokked my astrology when I was 12 I might have done things differently. Reading what you’ve had to say about sexuality over the years has shed light on many of the hidden patterns in our culture enabling me to sort out just what bugged me about getting stuck in possessive relationships, me afraid to be alone and trying to control my partners so I wouldn’t have to be. Of course with Venus in Aquarius I kept attracting women who wouldn’t put up with it. A blessing in disguise! Oh and I just learned that Eris is conjunct my 7th house cusp and moves so slow that it’s basically a lifetime arrangement. Marriage? HA!
Chewing on these meditations over the years I’ve come to recognize masturbation as a form of sacred sexuality, perfectly valid in and of itself, letting it out of the dungeon where it’s led to believe that it’s what losers do when they can’t find a girl to fuck. I’m sensitive enough to life energy that I can feel the buzz of desire in the buds that are next spring’s leaves and flowers by squeezing them lightly with my fingers. Translate that to people sensitivity and I haven’t been able to manifest partner sex since the fall of 2001 save for a short fling in 2004. If I feel a woman’s trepidation, I back off. To me no always means no. Mercury in Capricorn, please say what you mean cause I don’t understand subterfuge. Of course that strategy isn’t likely to lead to sex in our puritanical culture. No might mean yes? Oh please, come back when you know what you want and can verbalize it please. It’s take matters into my own hands or go crazy. I chose the former.
I used to be less sensitive, and I had more sex with women, but it always blew up in my face because I was always trying to manifest shit I don’t want. Marriage, kids, house, car, nuclear family claustrophobia. Where’s the middle ground? Well, being on my own for so long I’ve been able to discover how to push my own buttons, move the Qi in my body, to receive my own orgasms into the microcosmic orbit where it’s not just me but a sentient being one on one with Cosmos. At least I don’t jump into stupid relationships out of a fear of being alone anymore. Still, energy exchange with female partners just can’t be replaced by the Cosmos thing. Will I have to wait until a future lifetime when people aren’t so stupid about sex?
“…she is trying to make you jealous. Pretty ridiculous.”
Indeed – we mostly all have such problems with jealousy in ourselves – why would people malisciously (? – where’s my Virgo spell check – ?) try to provoke it in people they don’t even know? I admit I have never even heard of this type of behavior.
Yes, I like you, Victoria, have often gone out of my way to assuage and reassure jealousy!
Thanks to Eric for bringing such testy topics as jealousy out to air and discussion!
AnnaT
Eric~Read this whole series…great writing, and thought provoking. Thank you! Really speaks to my own experiences. I even read the horoscope portion; Poloma sure did hit my essence: “You see, I am an вЂ?out of bounds’ being. I am a collective soul in one human form, and, a collector of a soul’s experiences.” I’ve never found anyone else that “gets” this fully.
erratum: “embedded in the moral form” should have been “mortal” form
“Whatever Thymos wishes, it buys at the price of Psyche,” grumbled Heraclitus, speaking of the war between desire (i.e.thymos/thymus) and reason. ‘Thymos’ he went on to say, is the ‘moist’ soul, embedded in the moral form and the author of our cravings and hatreds. Its counterpart, psyche, is the airborne (psyche also means ‘butterfly’ in Gk), heart- (or more accurately, thymus-) shaped soul. Their contest was drawn out in the myth of Eros and Psyche, from whom Eros had to hide his divine origins. Psyche’s jealous sisters told her terrifying stories of how truly ugly her lover must be in order to remain under cover of darkness. Upon peeking at him, Psyche discovers just how beautiful he is; but that same realization brings instant loss when a hot drop of oil from the lamp falls and wakens him.
“This tale, and variations on their reunion formed the basis of the neoPlatonic Valentinians, a gnostic Xtian sect from the 3rd century, based in Rome. Rome had long venerated the sexual power of Juno on the 14th day of February in a ritual called Lupercalia (also celebrating the wolves -lupes- that had nursed Romulus and Remus). The wolves were considered the animated expression of Juno’s sexual appetite as well as symbol of the city’s courage (valentorius). On the day in which all of Rome was abandoned to sex, the Valentinians rather pragmatically set out to reinterpret the those festivities. They enacted the myth of Psych and Eros, insulting the early Church Fathers’ sense of propriety. After a few-hundred-years run, the Valentinian ‘heresy’ was suppressed around 700 CD. Shortly after, the Catholic Church announced the martyrdom of one ‘St. Valentine,’ declaring Feb. 14 a day of penance and prayer.
“We’ve seen how well that worked out. The “heart” (well, thymus) will have its say.”
excerpted from “In Search of the Wild Valentine,” Alana Keres, Tribeza Magazine.
I got an intro to how jealousy works through my truck driver nephew. When I left LA, he arrived with his semi and loaded me and a few possessions into his truck headed back to the midwest. We were driving through the dakotas behind a car with an older couple in the front seat and a spritely young woman in the back seat. My nephew and I were chatting away and I noticed the young woman in the car in front of us kept turning around and looking at us and smiling. After about five minutes of this, I said, this is weird. Do you know that woman? He laughed and said, she thinks you’re my wife and she is trying to make you jealous. Pretty ridiculous.
My neph is an over the road driver which means he does cross country travel. He told the story of the woman who would call his house in the wee hours of the morning looking for him within hours of the time he left for his week long travels. His wife was not happy about this.
He ran into a man at a truck stop who had a sad tale. These phone calls happened to his wife too. She went into a frenzy, did the divorce thing, and the guy’s possessions, including his self owned truck, were lost.
It seems that the female dispatchers were having a bit of fun breaking up marriages. I don’t get it. But it happened.
I have found myself, sidestepping, explaining, reassuring, backing away, doing all sorts of crazy stuff with wives to explain that I do not want their husbands.
And if the agreement is that sex is limited to the two and the two alone, if that is the agreement that was made, well then I ain’t gonna be the one to break their promise. If that’s the legal contract, then that is the legal contract.
And woe to the wives who are blamed for not being able to keep their man at home. For being told that she is not enough once again.
And for me, yeah I’ve been jealous and possessive in the past, had to give that one up. A fat lotta good it did me! All it does is destroy relationships. I ain’t saying jealousy doesn’t raise it’s ugly head now and again, but I talk about it now. Owning up to my insecurity allows me to take responisibility for my own feelings and foibiles. Out of this has come a different way of loving.
Eric –
Thanks for the barrage of anti – hallmark hearts & chocolate propoganda! I shall endeavor to have a love affair with myself, today!
AnnaT