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Journey to the Sacred Aug 17, 2009
Buddha and the Art of Intimacy
Take a day out of your ordinary weekend, of shopping for clothes or a new stereo, to sip and savor the vast insights and wisdom in Dr; Lowenthal's new book, and you will be gracefully guided beyond the trappings of the material and superficial world to that place in your depth, in your core-in your soul, where your capacity for truly intimaterelationships can be found and needs to be developed.
Dr. Lowenthal eloquently applies the teachings of the Buddha (dharma) to the often turbulent waters of our relationships with our partners and loved ones. We learn that, as with the lotus flower, whose magnificent bloom derives from muddy waters, that our own spiritual maturity, and the fulfillment we seek in our relationships, require us first to be aware of, and then to transform, our own emotional and cognitive mudslides into the magnificent bloom of lasting love.
We learn from the Buddha that we are all booby-trapped, with misguided thought patterns, and emotional reactivity habits, to drive ourselves and our relationships into a ditch. It seems, everyone suffers, to some degree, from inherent or socialized form of relational road rage. Our partners appear to have received specialty training, in just how to push our buttons,leaving us, with the help of our misguided thoughts, to conclude that our partners are the cause of our distress. By the time our emotional reactivity and misguided thoughts are mixed with those of our partners, a potent Molotov cocktail is made that both seem compelled to drink. Whether we erupt overtly, or covertly through withdrawal and alienation, we end up in a place, so far removed from our loving centers, that we can hardly recognize ourselves or our partners.
Dr. Lowenthal helps us to realize that our mission-should we choose to accept it-is to nip this hijacking
process in the bud, invite and help our partners to do the same. By more closely observing our errant thoughts and quickly escalating emotions, we become a witness and a host to those parts of ourselves we would sooner deny, disassociate from, but readily see in others. We learn we can extract the energy of the upsets,and reapply it for a more beneficial purpose. Like using the power of a river to run a saw mill, we learn to redirect our distracted consciousness back to its center, and not just allow it to cause flooding.
Our thought patterns and reactivity habits tether us too the superficial world. The Buddha inspired us to liberate ourselves from these tendencies. Dr. Lowenthal then shows us how we need to apply this potential for liberation to our relationship world, and how to transform those battle grounds, into sacred proving grounds as we become 'mutual caretakers, not proprietors or owners' of our intimate relationships. Even if we are mistakenly convinced that our reactivity was only activated by our partner's reactivity, we become aware that our reactivity becomes part of the very air our partner is breathing. If the Buddha taught us that our reactivity is entangled by our attachments, Dr. Lowenthal, inspires us to roll up our sleeves, work directly with our attachments, to realize the fulfillment of our capacity to love unconditionally.
Brian Ackerman
Psychiatrist, Founding Member American Family Therapy Association
Founder: CALMER LIFE: Center for Awareness Love and Meditation (Lancaster, Ma.)
978-706-1290
0 of 1 found the following review helpful:
True Heart Aug 13, 2009
Dr. Lowenthal writes with such warmth and intimacy that he invites you into your heart. He is deeply practiced and the wisdom he has gathered over decades of personal and professional work is right here for the reader to pick up. To live from our real nature, our Buddha nature, is to live consciously in the many relationships we are in. There's no escaping relationship, we live in the web of live. To do so joyously, lovingly, patiently, compassionately is the way of the heart. Martin Lowenthal makes that way easier to discern, easier to follow and easier to delight in!
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