Time and Distance
Jun. 5th, 2011 08:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cedar_groveFrom The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.
We can perceive silence as rejection in an instant, and then build a cold castle on that tiny imagined brick… Just as we must dust our belongings from time to time, we must wipe away what covers us when we are apart.
When I speak to people and tell them about mine and Mir's relationship, and the distance between us, the usual reaction (as well as sympathy for our plight) is one of surprise that we can manage the distance between us.
I won't pretend it's easy, but at the same time, it is. I know that's a contradiction, but… see… it's talking. It's learning what effects the distance has, the way to deal with the issues that rise up.
The one I fall prey to the most, is described in the first part of the quote there… the misconceptions about what a silence means, what might have caused a cross word, what a particular tone might indicate. It's all too easy to take the blame on your own shoulders – it is for me, anyway.
We've learned, sometimes the hard way, that you have to talk, you have to be open, you have to find the words to describe the feelings – what's going on – and not use the distance to hide things from each other; to not say things when you should, that kind of thing.
The hardest thing to manage is time… the fact that conversations sometimes take longer than a five hour time difference allows – the fact that when you need someone, it's too early in the morning to call them, or they're already at work and can't be reached… and the fact that if one or the other of you gets sick, you can't always, (hardly ever it seems, in fact), be there to care for each other as you would want to be, and to realise that if that happens, it's not rejection, just the distance getting in the way. We are both loved.
To those of you reading this who are in relationships where you live together, where you share your lives in a conventional way, don't let the opportunities and the blessing that you have fall by the wayside… don't take each other for granted, and – as my father once told me – never go to bed on an argument. You are loved.
There's no need to seek the truth-
just put a stop to your opinions!
-Seng-ts'an
We can perceive silence as rejection in an instant, and then build a cold castle on that tiny imagined brick… Just as we must dust our belongings from time to time, we must wipe away what covers us when we are apart.
When I speak to people and tell them about mine and Mir's relationship, and the distance between us, the usual reaction (as well as sympathy for our plight) is one of surprise that we can manage the distance between us.
I won't pretend it's easy, but at the same time, it is. I know that's a contradiction, but… see… it's talking. It's learning what effects the distance has, the way to deal with the issues that rise up.
The one I fall prey to the most, is described in the first part of the quote there… the misconceptions about what a silence means, what might have caused a cross word, what a particular tone might indicate. It's all too easy to take the blame on your own shoulders – it is for me, anyway.
We've learned, sometimes the hard way, that you have to talk, you have to be open, you have to find the words to describe the feelings – what's going on – and not use the distance to hide things from each other; to not say things when you should, that kind of thing.
The hardest thing to manage is time… the fact that conversations sometimes take longer than a five hour time difference allows – the fact that when you need someone, it's too early in the morning to call them, or they're already at work and can't be reached… and the fact that if one or the other of you gets sick, you can't always, (hardly ever it seems, in fact), be there to care for each other as you would want to be, and to realise that if that happens, it's not rejection, just the distance getting in the way. We are both loved.
To those of you reading this who are in relationships where you live together, where you share your lives in a conventional way, don't let the opportunities and the blessing that you have fall by the wayside… don't take each other for granted, and – as my father once told me – never go to bed on an argument. You are loved.
