Finding the root of a relationship cycle I’ve been in since I was fifteen
by Pace on March 6th, 2009 @ 10:00 am in
How To Be Awesome
Tags: iron pentacle, sex
Another Friday, another epiphany from Iron Pentacle class. I realized this when we were working with the point of Sex, but it applies to broader relationship patterns as well.
It’s rare that my magickal self-work looks anything like traditional psychotherapy, but today I’m lying down on the couch and talking about my parents. Mark it on the calendar. (:
I have this two-year cooling-off cycle.
I get into a serious relationship. It gradually cools off, then eventually we break up after two years.
I’ve been running this pattern since I was fifteen.
Kyeli is the only exception, and I still ran the cooling-off part of the pattern even without the breaking-up part. Settling down, losing passion, sex drive cooling off, taking for granted — all things we’ve dealt with in our relationship.
Does this look familiar?
When I was a pre-teen, my parents started having marriage problems. They stopped being physically and emotionally affectionate toward each other, and they started sleeping in separate beds. Eventually they separated and got divorced. At the time, I didn’t know or understand why.
So I assumed it’s just the way things go in a relationship.
*waves in case they’re reading*
I’m not blaming my parents. I’m just noticing the source of this pattern. Now that I know its source, I understand it better, and I understand myself better.
Best of all, now that I know where it came from, I know that it’s not the way it has to be.
In retrospect, I get it. But the pattern didn’t form now; it formed when I was 11 or 12. Trying to logic at it in adult terms doesn’t work at all.
What has helped is this.
Simply acknowledging it. Feeling how it feels; remembering how it felt. Putting it in perspective; putting those thoughts and feelings next to my adult thoughts and feelings. Not judging or comparing them, just putting them next to each other in my mind and in my heart. Kind of… letting them talk to each other?
I’m not sure I understand it myself, but I feel as though a big chunk of cholesterol has been dislodged from the artery of my love.
That’s disgusting. Let me try again.
I’m not sure I understand it myself, but I feel as though a big rock has been dislodged from the dam of…
Ugh. How about we forget the metaphors?
I feel good, open, and freely flowing. Unbound.
Much better. Now bring it home!
Discovering the source of a pattern or assumption you have can give you power over it. Think about some things you take for granted; you think “That’s just the way it is.”
What if that’s not just the way it is?
What if it could be different? What if there’s some reason in your past that you’re making this assumption? What if it’s possible to change it? What if it’s possible to figure it out instead of taking it for granted?
If the world being “just the way it is” sucks for you and makes your life miserable, mightn’t it be worth a closer look?
- Related posts:
- Communication Quiz: “Our relationship is as intimate as it can be.”
- Your children are not obligated to repay you.
Are you ready to stop reading about how to be awesome and start living it? Our 52 Weeks to Awesome e-course is open for registration! With a commitment of just an hour per week, you can be living an awesome life in 52 baby steps. What better time to start than now?
7 Comments!
#2 Posted by 
Rachel on March 6th, 2009 5:16 pm | link
There is likely another factor. As best as can be determined, people are built to lose interest in a partner after a couple of years if they do not have any children with them. In evolutionary terms, this makes a lot of sense. In evolutionary terms you assume your partner is heterosexual and there is no birth control being used. If you don’t have kids after a couple of years then it is likely that either one of you is infertile or the two of you together combine such that you are unlikely to have viable offspring (say two harmful recessives). You each have better odds of having a child if you break up. So, emotions start to cool.
The obvious problem is that in many cases this is completely inapplicable to our life. Both partners may be of the same sex. You may be using birth control. You may have no desire to have children. But there is still a cooling off that happens. However, you can definitely work through it. A relationship is not doomed just because the people do not have kids. But it will usually take some work.
That’s not to say that your parents didn’t affect you. Just that it may have been even stronger because there were multiple factors contributing to the same effect.. Oh, and obviously this doesn’t apply when you are raising a child together or do have a child. But you weren’t doing so in every relationship you were in.
#3 Posted by 
Oliver Danni on March 6th, 2009 9:56 pm | link
You think that metaphor is bad? One time in an energywork class, my instructor was channeling an explanation for how energywork “works”, and all of a sudden he blurts out “…and love is like a yeast infection!” [room goes silent] “You know? Because it SPREADS!”
We still laugh about it, a year later!
This is a great post, thank you. :)
#4 Posted by 
Alex Fayle | Someday Syndrome on March 9th, 2009 2:17 am | link
I was going to talk about what Rachael said, so instead I’ll just post a link about the “love hormones”…
#5 Posted by 
scwizard on March 21st, 2009 11:11 pm | link
Sadly the source is too personal for you to tell us about it. Stop being such a tease .-.
#7 Posted by 
Heather the Great on March 23rd, 2009 7:50 pm | link
I love reading your blogs, Pace! Something about the way you write makes me happy. Thanks for sharing! Especially the bit about dislodging cholesterol from your artery of love.
#1 Posted by
Eileen on March 6th, 2009 4:42 pm | link
Wow! I went through something VERY similar to this recently… seeing how a specific pattern was shaped by my parents. It’s sooo important to notice these things, so that you/we can *learn* but I think so often it’s scary because it does feel like you’re *blaming* and when you love your parents and stuff, sometimes it’s easier to just not go there.
What a great insight! Thanks for sharing your process :)