YeKengalé

One of the most beautiful aspects of good relationship is the phenomenon of learning to take the position of another. Every relationship, (familial, cordial, intimate, business etc) naturally produces its own tensions at some time or other as egos clash. The person we think we are at any phase of our development has its built-in passions and prejudices, natural result of our experience, our socialization, our story. As no two snow flakes are alike, no two personalities are exactly similar, no matter how deeply grounded in shared values, shared opinions and perspectives or shared experience. There is bound to come the time when sentiments and convictions are not aligned and it is in that very moment that moral judgments are made and offense is taken (whether given or not).

These moments either spark the seeds of discord, distrust, and disunity; or awaken the soul to expand its ground of being and become more than it was before. The latter happens when one party decides to consider and serve the interest of the other rather than seek its own. This is the fulfilment of the New Testament scriptures:

Phil 2:3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself.

Romans 12:10 Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another;

and I corinthians 13:4 Love….is not self-seeking.

The absolutely beautiful thing about this way is to behold the healing of soul fractures as ego dissolves in the decision to serve rather than be serviced. Often, not only is the person making the decision to serve transformed, but also the person being served. Selflessness expands self while selfishness contracts it; always an amazing process to persons more oriented to the individual rather than collective dimension of human consciousness and being.

The process is particularly beautiful in long standing relationships where, over time, onlookers notice what appears to be role reversals – A husband who takes on the positions of his wife as she takes his. A parent who speaks for his/her child as the child speaks for the parent. A community leader who represents his/her people’s interests even as his/her people identify with him/her. Opposite selves have expanded to accommodate perspectives and approaches once foreign to the individual self and the emergent self is bigger, wiser, kinder … and more beautiful and powerful than the polar positions which informed its expansion.

Of course, we always have the option to double down when challenged by what appears our opposite. The truth of being however is that the shadow of every substance resembles it. We all are reflections each of the other. We are all absolutely related.