According to most spiritual teachings, our attachment to people or things is the cause of our suffering. Whether that attachment is to material things, physical substances, an unhealthy relationship or maintaining our status in society; is irrelevant. It could be about keeping up our public image or being attached to watching silly reality shows; the source of the attachment doesn’t matter.
The point is that in the midst of our attachment, we truly believe we can’t live without that person or thing. The fact that we repeatedly outgrow various attachments at different stages of our lives doesn’t stop us going through the same blinkered responses, every time.
I’m sure everyone can think of something in their past that felt terribly important and indispensable at the time. We can all recall embarrassing moments when we couldn’t live without this or that person; crying our eyes out because they didn’t feel the same way.
Years later we may look back and wonder? ‘What was all that about?’ We may not even notice the pivot-point in the attachment drama when something inside of us said: Enough. It’s often just a feeling of ‘oh I’m over it.’ that we experience retrospectively.
Yet in the midst of that attachment, we’re willing to defend our position to the hilt and engage in all kinds of unhealthy drama. We may even be willing to have arguments with friends, family or even strangers-if it comes to it, to defend our position.
If it’s unrequited or unhealthy love, we may also be willing to humiliate ourselves publicly for the sake of it. Then once the attachment has run its course or been made to run its course; its ability to impact us begins to drain away.
These moments of draining away, are moments of pure freedom. We realise we don’t need and never really needed; that thing or person we thought we couldn’t live without. In those moments we’re in a space of pure and unfettered freedom. That is until the next attachment comes along.
We all have basic human needs. For example, the need for food, clothing, shelter or connection; but from then on it varies. Each of us has different levels and types of needs.
We have unique ideas of what we believe to be fundamentally important in our lives. We have certain levels beyond which we won’t allow ourselves to fall; unless something comes in and shakes us up that is!
Our non-essential needs are usually based on what we believe is most important and are influenced by our family, peers, our cultural background or sub-cultures. Yet as we step into greater autonomy and awareness these non-essential needs change and evolve.
We then find that what was important to us before, now no longer has the same impact. We create new desires and new attachments based on what is important to us now.
If we see all our non-essential attachments in the same light then we also see a common truth. That it is our attachment to certain people, things or particular outcomes; that cause our feelings of suffering.
A willingness to let go of our strong feelings of attachment means we can begin to enter a space where we can take them, or leave them. We can pick them up and put them down at will.
Paradoxically, this willingness strengthens our core relationships and alleviates drama. Which then allows us to view any feelings of attachment with greater magnanimity.
That is until a new and enticing attachment comes along–all shiny and glittery, or an old and unresolved attachment rears its head. Then we’re likely to start the whole delicious cycle again.
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Yve Bowen is a passionate writer and copywriter. As a copywriter she provides engaging content and marketing copy for stressed out Sole Traders and Entrepreneurs. Find Yve at https://keeper.marketing.
