loving relationships – Bela Dubbelman ~ LIVING TRUTH Therapy & Meditation

One of our deepest longings is for true intimacy. It is also one of our greatest fears.

The fear of rejection for who we truly are makes us hide behind a mask and living in pretentions. Only when we learn to love ourselves first, can we invite real intimacy with others to happen in our lives.

Learning the difference between relating and a relationship

“It is because of the pain of love, millions of people live a loveless life. They too suffer, and their suffering is futile. To suffer in love is not to suffer in vain. To suffer in love is creative; it takes you to higher levels of consciousness. To suffer without love is utterly a waste; it leads you nowhere, it keeps you moving in the same vicious circle.” Osho

We learn as children that we are only lovable when we behave in certain ways. Often love is used as an exchange; I only love you when you do what I want you to do. Consequently, we start to hide our true feelings, repress our spontaneous response, and judging our natural self. We learn that being false pays off and we start to live our lives based on lies. Over time we forget how to be open and real. Painfully disconnected from ourselves, we can no longer allow others to come close to us.

Feeling disconnected we confuse aloneness – a state of feeling oneness with the whole – with loneliness. We become demanding on the other for our wellbeing and feeling loved. Instead of relating we create a relationship with set rules entrenched in the same model of substituting an act for love.

We tend to set our boundaries based on the painful intimate experiences we had in the past. We build a wall around us to prevent others coming too close to us. Thus, believing we will not get hurt like this, we live isolated in our well build prison.

“The person who has not known the other in deep love, in intense passion, in utter ecstasy, will not be able to know who he is, because he will not have the mirror to see his own reflection.
Relationship is a mirror, and the purer the love is, the higher the love is, the better the mirror, the cleaner the mirror. But the higher love needs that you should be open. The higher love needs you to be vulnerable. You have to drop your armor; that is painful. You have not to be constantly on guard. You have to drop the calculating mind. You have to risk. You have to live dangerously. The other can hurt you; that is the fear in being vulnerable. The other can reject you; that is the fear in being in love.” Osho

WHY ATTEND THIS COURSE?

In a safe and contained group setting we will explore our wounds, misunderstandings and false believes around intimacy. When we experience that everybody is afraid of intimacy, it invites us to step away from behind our false identity and protective wall.

Realizing that we are all vulnerable and sensitive human beings who were not seen in our lovability just for who we are, makes us less judgmental towards ourselves and others. Learning to love ourselves first will transform our love to an – open hand gesture – instead of clinging or being demanding on others. The other will feel welcomed instead to share in our overflowing heart space and we will mutually acknowledge that love arises from this abundance.

“Love is an open sky. To be in love is to be on the wing. But certainly, the unbounded sky creates fear.” Osho

Opening to Intimacy invites you to take a risk to come out of your comfort zone and playfully meet others just for the joy and fun of getting to know oneself and the other person.

“Love is painful because it creates the way for bliss. Love is painful because it transforms; love is mutation. Each transformation is going to be painful because the old has to be left for the new.” Osho

WHAT WILL I LEARN?

To understand that real intimacy starts with intimately relating with oneself first
To learn how to lovingly take care of what you hide inside you
To recognize your parental and social conditioning around intimacy
To understand how we all have an Inner Man and an Inner Woman
To recognize and respect your own physical boundaries
To understand the difference between loneliness and aloneness
That in meditation we experience the space of at-oneness as the ultimate intimacy

WHAT IS INCLUDED?

A live 3-day course. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
Friday: approximately 10 hours with breaks including OSHO Kundalini Meditation
Saturday and Sunday: approximately 12 hours with breaks including OSHO Dynamic and OSHO Kundalini Meditations
Various techniques to explore your issues related to intimacy
Individual introspective exercises
Group processes and group sharing
Osho quotes and insights about our misunderstandings around intimacy
Q&A sessions with facilitator

“Love creates problems. You can avoid those problems by avoiding love. But those are very essential problems! They have to be faced, encountered; they have to be lived and gone through and gone beyond. And to go beyond, the way is through. Love is the only real thing worth doing. All else is secondary. If it helps love, it is good. All else is just a means, love is the end. So whatsoever the pain, go into love.

“If you don’t go into love, as many people have decided, then you are stuck with yourself.

“Hence people are interested in sex, because sex is not risky. It is momentary, you don’t get involved. Love is involvement; it is commitment. It is not momentary. Once it takes roots, it can be forever. It can be a lifelong involvement. Love needs intimacy, and only when you are intimate does the other become a mirror. When you meet sexually with a woman or a man, you have not met at all; in fact, you avoided the soul of the other person. You just used the body and escaped, and the other used your body and escaped. You never became intimate enough to reveal each other’s original faces.” Osho

Just being ordinary and loving yourself for it!

“Once you are incapable of loving yourself, you will never be able to love anybody. That is an absolute truth, there are no exceptions to it. You can love others only if you are able to love yourself.” Osho

We live in a world that honors only prestige, and our schooling systems teach us competition and comparison. Children are judged by using shame and guilt. We learn from very early onwards to reject ourselves, because rarely are we loved just for who we are.

Our self-doubts and judgments are sustained in the learned behavior of comparing ourselves with others. With self-love we become less and less self-centered. We no longer need to prove that we are better, bigger, more beautiful, or intelligent then others. We can just relax in who we are.

Group sharing allows us to see that we all have similar beliefs that get in the way of our self-acceptance and that we are all sensitive, human, and worthy of love.

“Real love knows nothing of the ego. Real love starts first as self-love.
“Naturally, you have this body, this being, you are rooted in it; enjoy it, cherish it, celebrate it. There is no question of pride or ego because you are not comparing yourself with anybody. Ego comes only with comparison. Self-love knows no comparison; you are you, that’s all. You are not saying that somebody else is inferior to you, you are not comparing at all. Whenever comparison comes, know well it is not love; it is a trick somewhere, a subtle strategy of the ego.” Osho

WHY ATTEND THIS COURSE?

Opening to Self-Love is a beautiful opportunity to gain an insight into the ways we reject ourselves, and to see that everyone has the same beliefs and fears that stop us from being loving and compassionate to ourselves and others.

With a clear understanding and experience of these inner mechanisms, the old habits of self-rejection and doubt begin to fade away. This allows us to open to our own intrinsic and unique beauty and to rediscover our essential value. When we open up to loving ourselves, we find that our meditation deepens and happens more easily. It also opens the way for positive and loving relationships with others.

“I teach you self-love. And because I teach you self-love, you have to be very alert. Self-love does not mean selfishness. Self-love is possible only if you drop the idea of the self – that is the paradox – if you unself yourself.” Osho

WHAT WILL I LEARN?

To recognize your parental and social conditioning around self-love

To understand that self-love makes you selfless

To learn how awareness unhooks you from your negative internalized voices

To understand the concept of the superego

To understand the difference between self-love and being obsessed with oneself

That meditation is an act of self-love

WHAT IS INCLUDED?

A live 3-day course. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

Friday: approximately 10 hours with breaks including OSHO Kundalini Meditation

Saturday and Sunday: approximately 12 hours with breaks including OSHO Dynamic and OSHO Kundalini Meditations

Various techniques to explore your issues related to self-love

Individual, paired and group exercises, designed to bring our inner critics into the light of awareness

Osho quotes and insights about our misunderstandings around self-love

Q&A sessions with facilitator

“Love starts with self-love. Don’t be selfish but be self-full – and they are two different things. Don’t be a Narcissus, don’t be obsessed with yourself, but a natural self-love is a must, a basic phenomenon. Only then out of it can you love somebody else.

“Accept yourself, love yourself, you are a creation of existence. The signature of existence is on you and you are special, unique. Nobody else has ever been like you and nobody else will ever be like you; you are simply unique, incomparable. Accept this, love this, celebrate this, and in the very celebration you will start seeing the uniqueness of others, the incomparable beauty of others. Love is possible only when there is a deep acceptance of oneself, the other, the world. Acceptance creates the milieu in which love grows, the soil in which love blooms.” Osho