Are Relationships In General (sexual And Nonsexual) Solely Built Up On Selfish Desires?

[Rocky]

I've wondered this for a very long time and it makes sense and seems pretty obvious when I think about it, that everything that everyone does is in the belief that they will gain something out of it.

But then when it comes to thinking about relationships i can only think that its for the same reason, people only seek relationships with people in the belief that they will gain something out of it wealth, sex, emotional comfort, status and etc but people just call that love, it kind of makes me wonder what love really is. And if people stop providing what the other person seeks then they have problems and break up. 

It makes you wonder whether love and relationships are just built on selfish beliefs of what people are gaining from them, and for that reason surely that's something that could be feeding your own egos.

And not just relationships in terms of sexual relationships, but also in terms of friends and family too.

And if you stopped providing for them emotionally or physically somehow I'm sure they would think less of you?

Is there another way of looking at what relationships really are besides that? Because it kind of bastardises my trust in people when you think about it 

[SFRL]

We are social creatures. Love is a biological mechanism to increase the chances of us successfully procreating and surviving. 

In the end we are just a bunch of highly evolved monkey's. 

Edited January 30, 2017 by STC

[ajasatya]

@Rocky the only way for you to have your question answered is by going through a profound purification process, which would take years. maybe decades. until then you'll be trapped in this line of thought because that's just you being sincere about what you really feel right now.

[FindingPeace]

10 hours ago, Rocky said:

people only seek relationships with people in the belief that they will gain something out of it

Pretty much. In most cases. And it's easy to prove although most people will probably not want to take this close a look at their motives and see the truth.

Ultimately, every motive a person (or any lifeform) has is in some way self-serving. Othewise, what would be the reason to act? Every action benefits the 'self'. Whether it is breathing, eating, walking from a to b, earning money, buying material things, having sex or entering a realtionship. 'Relationship', incidentaly, is just a label. Take the label away and consider what it really is. And do the same with 'love'. We attribute a whole framework of beliefs and protocols around these labels. Most of which are self-serving. We attribute more to the frameworks of these concepts than we do to the reality of what is actually going on. What they really mean.

People don't really pursue a 'relationship', they persue the conceptual framework that we attribute to the label. A framework that comes loaded with self-serving benefits. Why do you think that relationships cause so much pain and suffering throughout our species and are inherently unreliable? Because when people aren't getting what they want out of it, it starts to become an ego battle.

Just ask yourself why you want a relationship, what you expect out of it. What is it you want from a partner? What you are looking for. These are the self-serving motives that drive people to do it. And for anyone who is already in a relationship, consider what you will lose if the realtionship ended. Right there are your self-serving motives.

But self-agenda is an inevitable, inehrent, part of life. You can't escape it. But it isn't something to be condemned. It is something to be accepted. As once you accept that this is how everyone is living their lives you become instantly more loving and authentic towards them as you can no longer judge or criticise another being. From this paradigm, people can stop the ego battles and have more authentic relationships.

We are conditioned to belief that selfish interests are a 'bad' thing. But this entire paradigm comes from a selfish self-interest. The concept of selfishness is supposed to be perceived this way as it is self-serving by its very nature. However it is unavoidable. Provided that noone is harming another, self-interest is a natural, inevitable and healthy motivation.

 

[Rocky]

@FindingPeace

3 hours ago, FindingPeace said:

We are conditioned to belief that selfish interests are a 'bad' thing.

Yea I kind of found this as almost a paradox, because naturally leo and others were talking about suppressing the ego, how to kill your ego and etc. But then there's content about people actively getting involved in relationships which are almost built upon feeding the ego. 

But I guess you can't really fight human nature and it could be healthy I suppose, I'm just looking at it from a different perspective, which is ok i guess, that just means there's more for me to learn  

[Shin]

That depends.

 

If someone wants a relationship because he wants to experience love, and sharing it with an another human being, no.

At its core, what you're searching if you're in that dynamic is to be one with the whole again, and the only way you have found is to fall in love.

The problem is, if you still live under the egotic paradigm, you will most likely "stop" loving that person at some point, because the love you feel about this person is a sneak-peak of what unconditional love is, and the ego can't possibly understand what unconditional love is, it doesn't want it and can't allow it.

So no, you don't seek a relationship because you're selfish in this case, but you can't sustain it indefinitely either.

 

If someone wants a relationship because he/she wants to feel happy, to feel secure, or because he/she wants to live through his/her partner success, and/or because this person wants amazing sex, well yes, it is very selfish and egoistical.

This is what most people seek in a relationship.

 

So how to be in a relationship that works indefinitely ?

By realizing who you truly are.

 

 

Edited January 30, 2017 by Shin

[Life Coach]

For most people yes, if you are enlightened maybe not. But most relationships are built on selfish desires, because the ego wants to feel safe, it wants to have comfort, it wants to use people, it wants its needs met, it wants to trade and make business to achieve sth and so on.

No need to lose trust in people because of this. It is in peoples nature, so forgive them. Forgive their ego, for they don't know what they are doing. They only want to survive and get the most out of life for themselves and they are running on autopilot. It's human.

You as a wise man can be better tho, you can use relationships to spread love and make everyone feel better because they have come in contact with you. Without wanting anything back, you can be independend and completely detached. But please don't become a victim and a doormat and a people pleaser. Don't let people abuse you and leech off of you

[aurum]

17 hours ago, FindingPeace said:

But self-agenda is an inevitable, inehrent, part of life. You can't escape it. But it isn't something to be condemned. It is something to be accepted. As once you accept that this is how everyone is living their lives you become instantly more loving and authentic towards them as you can no longer judge or criticise another being. From this paradigm, people can stop the ego battles and have more authentic relationships.

Love this. People seem to forget this part in the "kill the ego" frenzy that goes on in spiritual circles.

We're all on this forum because we're after something. Even people pursuing Enlightenment are after something. If Enlightenment truly offered 0 benefits, I'd actually think twice about the path.

But after Enlightenment, there's still a self. And it's still going to do self things. Even the desire for people not to be selfish is part of the self agenda. The Void has no preference for anything.

So really, the most egotistical thing is to resist the fact that the world is run by self-agendas. Acceptance for what is, no matter how "evil" or "selfish" it may seem is the "spiritual" thing to do.

[FindingPeace]

The moment your ego looks at another ego and sees itself reflected back, like a mirror, the way you relate to another human and to yourself, will change profoundly.

But until then, your ego will see every other ego as either a utility or as a threat. And it will see itself as the centre of its universe.

[Consept]

The way i see love is interchangable with acceptance. I think to fully accept someone is to really love someone. 

Romance and romantic love is a specific concept and actually goes against my definition of love because its acceptance with conditions. So i love you if you want to have kids or if you want to settle down or if you look attractive to me. So its not really acceptance at all its just the ego wants to be fulfilled and it believes someone can provide that, if they cant then the love is gone. 

You dont have to neccersarily like someone to love them, theres plenty of parent/child where on a personal level they dont get on but there is a deeper love and that is due to understanding and acceptance of the other. If you extrapolate this out you could and should love everyone in that you can have empathy, understanding for everyone. But again that doesnt mean that youll like everyone and want to be around them. 

So what youre left with is choosing who you actually like to be around and just enjoying the moment with them, could be a few people, could be one person