Connection is the Heart of Peace-filled Relationships

Podcast: Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

MAUDE: Phil and I recently visited with a dear friend at her home for a scrumptious dinner. The dinner wasn’t the only thing that was delectable that evening. We had a powerful experience of our connection. Through the many hours of the evening, we talked, ate together, and communed both verbally and in silence with each other.

We felt relaxed, heard, seen and appreciated. We were interested and enlightened by the conversations, thoughts and ideas as they poured forth. We sat together in silence, communicating and sharing the essence of peace that grew in the room around us.

And that is one of the profound impressions that I had afterward. We, as in all three of us, were deeply connected, in one unit. It wasn’t only that she and Phil, or Phil and me, or she and I were each connected. No, this was quite different. The three of us were in one relationship with each other.

It felt very special and rich because of this difference. There was a circle of warmth that engulfed us all. As we moved many leagues deeper in our connectedness, a joy and a lightness of being permeated that room. It didn’t matter really what the topic was, whether the state of the world or the dressing on the salad, it was the quality of relating that held so much value.

The expansion of the relationship to encompass three, and yet be one, was part of the magic of that evening. We were living out of the knowing that we are all connected in a familial way, that we want the best for each other, and, yes, that we are all on the same side.

And it led me to think of spreading peace one relationship at a time. As many of you know, this is the underlying raison d’être for Phil and me to write our articles and books. Upon reflecting on the soul-satisfying experience of that visit, I thought: this is the way. As you live that peace, and as you become a messenger of that living peace, you can broaden the number of individuals who are part of any given relationship and experience that sense of peace together.

PHIL: I have been obsessed for years with the thought that the invention of language has given us a new way of understanding the world in addition to our sensory, emotional, intuitive awareness. The English language makes these hard to distinguish; John Cleese points out that it has just one verb for knowing, whereas other languages have two forms. Our connections with each other happen on both these levels. As the nursery rhyme has it:

I do not like thee, Doctor Fell,
The reason why – I cannot tell;
But this I know, and know full well,
I do not like thee, Doctor Fell.

I hope you know the sense of having a connection with someone. It is often muted by the cacophony of life, but when both of you are relaxed and present, you feel in sync, in harmony, on the same wavelength. It happens when you drop your public persona and speak from the heart. We have a truth meter that recognizes this. It’s not perfect—this is the field in which actors and con men work—but our intuitive self is pretty good at recognizing it.

At best, when our words and feelings are concordant, we have, besides our usual sense of identity, an additional sense of “us”. Again, English is poor at supplying words for this. My thesaurus offers bond, connection, attachment, fellowship, belonging. In a peaceful relationship, there is no barrier to moving in and out of this state.

It is not confined to couples. It can happen between any two people, and even with three people. Y’all become a triad, not three individuals or three dyads. And more? How about a meal for four where there is a single conversation that everybody shares in? Or a dinner party for eight where everybody contributes in turn?

This is the sense of connection. We connect with words, but it is also a sense, a sense that precedes language and stems from our social nature.

Photo credit: Maude Mayes
Photo note: Connections in the park

Read what else we have written on this topic.

Get our free weekly newsletter about how to have a harmonious relationship.

Tell your friends!