BENGALURU: Relationship is the mirror in which we see ourselves as we are. All life is a movement in relationship. There is no living thing on earth that is not related to something or other. Even the hermit that abandons the world and goes into some lonely spot is related to the past, is related to those who are around him. There is no escape from relationship.
And in that relationship, which is the mirror in which we can see ourselves, in that relationship we can discover what we are: our reactions, our prejudices, our fears, depressions, anxieties, loneliness, sorrow, pain, grief. And we can also discover whether we love, or there is no such thing as love. So we are together, if you will, if you are serious enough to examine this question of relationship, because that is the basis of life. That is the only thing we have with each other.
And if we cannot find the right relationship, if we live our own particular narrow life apart from my wife, husband, and so on, that isolated existence brings about its own destruction. So relationship is the most extraordinarily important thing in life. If we do not understand that relationship, we cannot possibly create a new society.
When you are attached, to anything, there is always fear in it, of losing. There is always a sense of uncertainty. Please observe it for yourself. There is always a sense of separation: I am attached to my wife - I am not married, but suppose I am - I am married to my wife, married, I am attached to her because she gives me pleasure, sexually, gives me pleasure as a companion, she gives me pleasure as a cook - you know all the rest of it, I don’t have to tell you all this. You know all this without my telling you all this. So I am attached to her, which means I am jealous, frightened, and the consequences of attachment is the continuation of fear, of losing, jealousy, anxiety. Where there is jealousy there is hatred. And is attachment love? That is one point, in our relationship.
So is it possible to be free from our conditioning in our relationship? That is, to observe in the mirror of relationship attentively, closely, persistently, what our reactions are; whether they are mechanical, habitual, tradition. And in that mirror you discover actually what you are. So relationship is extraordinarily important.