Q&A with Gary Zukav about his new Book, Spiritual Partnership
Today we are delighted to welcome New York Times best selling author, Gary Zukav, to our blog. Gary is the author of Spiritual Partnership: The Journey to Authentic Power. His book, filled with poignant examples and practical guidance, empowers us to explore our emotions, intentions, choices and intuition, and to use them to create profound spiritual growth. Now see for yourself:
Nourishing Relationships:Please tell us about spiritual partnerships.
Gary Zukav: I am very happy to be a part of your blog and your extended family, and I am very happy to share all that I know about spiritual partnerships and creating authentic power.
Spiritual partnerships are the most fulfilling, substantive, and deep relationships possible. They are relationships between equals for the purpose of spiritual growth. Growing spiritually means creating a life of more joy and less pain, more meaning and less emptiness, and more love and less fear. As we become aware of ourselves as more than we once thought that we were – and this is happening to millions of people – we long for relationships that are the most meaningful and rewarding possible, that support us in becoming healthy, vibrant, creative, and loving. These are spiritual partnerships.
N R: I understand your book is about not just couples being in spiritual partnership but that all our relationships can become spiritual partnerships. Will you talk about this more?
G Z: You can create spiritual partnerships within your family, with your friends, your coworkers, your neighbors, and with another individual as a couple. No matter who the spiritual partner or spiritual partners are, the spiritual partnership operates the same way. It is a vehicle that supports the partners in it to become more aware of their emotions, to become more aware of their intentions, and in making the most healthy choices that they can, choices that will create consequences for which they are willing to assume responsibility. My spiritual partner Linda Francis and I have been together for seventeen years. We are married, yet we see our relationship as a spiritual partnership, and we see ourselves as spiritual partners. I am committed to my spiritual growth, and Linda is committed to hers. I am responsible for my spiritual growth, and Linda is responsible for hers. Yet I support her in growing spiritually and she supports me. We began creating spiritual partnerships with our granddaughters when they were 6 and 8.
N R: I have good friendships and I feel that they are spiritual partnerships. How can I tell?
G Z: Friends want to make you feel better when you feel bad. Spiritual partners help you look inside when you feel bad and find the internal source of your pain, such as grief, guilt, depression, etc; and then experience it as fully as you can so that you can challenge and heal it. Friends think that the causes of their pain and happiness are outside of themselves, for example, that they are overwhelmed because they have to much too do, or that they are devastated because a partner left or a child is sick. Your work load, the departed partner, the sick child are triggers of your painful experiences, but they are not the causes of them. The causes of them existed before you had too much to do, your partner left, or your child became ill. The pain is real, but it’s cause is not outside of you. It is inside of you. Friends will try to help you ease your pain or distract you from it, but your spiritual partners will help you find and heal the source of it forever, if you are willing to do that.
N R: What is the relationship between my concerns about getting older and changing my relationships into spiritual partnerships?
G Z: It is natural to become more interested in deep and substantive relationships as you begin to appreciate the complexity and richness of Life, and sense the beauty, compassion, and wisdom in it, even in circumstances that sometimes appear to be tragic. However, the thirst for spiritual growth is everywhere, in every age group, in every culture, and in both sexes. A new consciousness is emerging throughout the human family that will not make any of us more kind or wise, but will eventually make all of us more aware – aware of experiences and dynamics, and compassion and wisdom that the five senses cannot detect – and aware of new potentials. Those are the potentials of authentic power and spiritual partnership.
N R: I love the idea of spiritual partnership, but it is a frightening concept that spiritual partners only stay together as long as they are growing together. Can you explain this further?
G Z: One of the dynamics of spiritual partnership is that spiritual partners remain together as long as they grow spiritually together. Since spiritual partnership is a partnership between equals for the purpose of spiritual growth, if one or more of the partners stops growing spiritually – for example, stops challenging his anger, or her need to please, and refuses to begin again – the reason for the partnership no longer exists, and the partnership will fall apart. Other partners will continue in it, but not that person because his commitment no longer supports theirs (spiritual growth). Is this dynamic of spiritual partnership really frightening to you, or is it frightening to a part of your personality that needs the world to be the way that it wants, and becomes frightened when that does not happen? Creating authentic power is the process of becoming the authority in your own life, more aware and more responsible than you were in the past, and able to challenge the frightened parts of your personality (such as those that are angry, jealous, vengeful, feel entitled, need to please, etc.) and to cultivate the loving parts of your personality (such as those that are grateful, patient, content, appreciative, etc.)
NR: Thanks so much for joining us today, Gary – and for your wisdom and honesty. Your tribute to our most important relationships is like a breath of fresh air.
We’re also grateful to all the readers who have dropped by. Click on the title at the top of this post - that will take you to Gary's website where you can learn more about him and Spiritual Partnership.
If you have questions for Gary concerning his stimulating new ideas about our relationships, please click on "Comments" and let us hear from you. Log on again tomorrow - we’ll be summarizing your questions and Gary’s feedback.
Labels: authentic power, deep relationships, Gary Zukav, Linda Francis, N Y Times best selling author, Nourishing Relationships, practical guidance, Spiritual Partnership, Virtual Book Tour
posted by Nourishing Relationships @ 6:45 AM
15 Comments:
This question may be too hard to answer in this format, but what is the first step to building a spiritual partnership?
I've become very close with my coworker and I think he may be my spiritual partner. Can this affect my marriage? Patricia
i have been a fan of yours for many years. from what i've read about this book, you talk about knowing ourselves differently, as personalities and souls - what is your definition of soul?
I know the 5 senses and like the idea of multi sensory perception, but what is it? Catherine
I know the 5 senses but like the idea of multisensory perception even better - what is it?
Re: I have been a fan of yours for many years. From what I’ve read about this book, you talk about knowing ourselves differently, as personalities and souls - what is your definition of soul?
Many people are beginning to experience themselves as more than they thought they were, as more than bodies and minds, tissues and organs. The something more is your soul. Your soul is the part of you that existed before you were born and that will continue to exist after you die. The soul is an idea, or an ideal, or nonsense to people who are not yet multisensory – whose perceptions are limited to those of the five senses,what they can see, hear, taste, touch, and smell. Yet multisensory perception is now emerging in millions of just such people. It is the ability to receive information that the five senses cannot provide. Millions more already experience their lives differently, as meaningful, and they long to give the gifts that they were born to give, the gifts that their souls want to give. These people are also beginning to see other people as more than they thought they were, too. This is all good. Spiritual Partnership: The Journey to Authentic Power will help you to recognize your multisensory perception and use it. You are already experiencing multisensory perception or you would not be drawn to matters of the soul.
I've been in therapy for the past year - I am working on my negativity and controlling my anger. Would being in a spiritual partnership help me with these issues? Georgia
Gary, I just read your response where You specifically state what the 5 senses are. Can you give a concrete example of a multisensory perception? Phyllis
Re: This question may be too hard to answer in this format, but what is the first step to building a spiritual partnership?
The first step toward creating a spiritual partnership is to set the intention to make your spiritual growth your highest priority. This will attract you to others with the same intention and make others with this intention attractive to you. Are you looking at a spiritual partnership as a special relationship that is distinct and separate from your other relationships? You can create many spiritual partnerships, and as you do your experiences will be come more and more meaningful and nurturing. A good next step would be to visit our website, www.seatofthesoul.com, and print out the Spiritual Partnership Guidelines from the home page. Look at each of the guidelines and see how you can apply it to your life. When you begin to apply these guidelines, you will creating authentic power and that will allow you to create spiritual partnerships with others who are doing the same, no matter how they describe what they are doing. I also suggest that you read my new book Spiritual Partnership: The Journey to Authentic Power. It explains spiritual partnership and takes you through creating it step by step.
Re: This question may be too hard to answer in this format, but what is the first step to building a spiritual partnership?
The first step toward creating a spiritual partnership is to set the intention to make your spiritual growth your highest priority. This will attract you to others with the same intention and make others with this intention attractive to you. Are you looking at a spiritual partnership as a special relationship that is distinct and separate from your other relationships? You can create many spiritual partnerships, and as you do your experiences will be come more and more meaningful and nurturing. A good next step would be to visit our website, www.seatofthesoul.com, and print out the Spiritual Partnership Guidelines from the home page. Look at each of the guidelines and see how you can apply it to your life. When you begin to apply these guidelines, you will creating authentic power and that will allow you to create spiritual partnerships with others who are doing the same, no matter how they describe what they are doing. I also suggest that you read my new book Spiritual Partnership: The Journey to Authentic Power. It explains spiritual partnership and takes you through creating it step by step.
Re: I've become very close with my coworker and I think he may be my spiritual partner. Can this affect my marriage? Patricia
Dear Patricia, a spiritual partnership is not only a couples dynamic. It is a new type of relationship that is replacing all other types of relationships. It is a partnership between equals for the purpose of spiritual growth. Spiritual growth requires you to become aware of all of your emotions as physical sensations, both those that feel good and those that are so painful that you think you cannot bear them, and while you are feeling your emotions make choices that will create the most constructive and healthy consequences that you can imagine. It requires you to become aware of your intentions, to consult your intuition, and to cocreate with the compassionate and wise Universe. The question you must ask yourself is whether or not you are willing to become more aware of your emotions, intentions, and choices and use your awareness and will to create in the healthiest ways you can. It may be that bringing spiritual partnership into your marriage will transform it, as well as creating many spiritual partnerships with your family members, and friends, in addition to your coworkers.
Re: I've been in therapy for the past year - I am working on my negativity and controlling my anger. Would being in a spiritual partnership help me with these issues? Georgia
Dear Georgia, spiritual partners can be very helpful to you, but only you can challenge your anger and need to be judgmental or criticize. Spiritual partners, if you allow them, can point out to you when they feel that you are speaking (or perhaps just fuming) in anger and when they feel that you might be judgmental. If you react to them (become irritated, angry, etc.), you will know that they are telling you things that will be helpful to you if your intention is to challenge the frightened parts of your personality that are angry and judgmental. Challenging them means stopping when you feel the need to lash out in anger or be judgmental and instead look inside yourself for physical sensations, for example, in your chest, solar plexus, or throat areas, and feeling them, even if they are painful. Then while you are feeling the sensations in your body, do something different than those frightened parts of your personality habitually do. Choose to do something that will create the most healthy consequences instead of the most destructive, even if that means simply not speaking in anger or judgment. The more you challenge frightened parts of your personality, the more their control over you lessens until it eventually disintegrates. Spiritual partners can help you become aware of when a frightened part of your personality is active, especially one that is so familiar that it feels like “just who I am”, so that you can challenge it. But no one, including your spiritual partners, can do that work for you.
Re: Gary, I just read your response where You specifically state what the 5 senses are. Can you give a concrete example of a multisensory perception? Phyllis
Dear Phyllis, there are many examples of multisensory perception, and I am sure that you will recognize some of them. For example, knowing something that your five senses could not have told you, such as that your child has been in an accident; or not to leave in the car before checking the brakes. You may find yourself knowing things about other people you that your five senses did not tell you, for example, that a person who appears rough is actually kind, and that someone who appears polite is not to be trusted. You may have the experience of sensing that your life has a meaning and that it is important to you to find and live that meaning. As I said before, it is also sensing that you are a soul as well as a personality, both at the same time. I am now uwing twitter to support people in creating authentic power and spiritual partnerships, so you might want to sign up for my tweets, many of which will help you remember to look for multisensory experiences, and to recognize them in yourself.
Do you have a Twitter address where I can follow you?
Re: Do you have a Twitter address where I can follow you?
My twitter address is http://twitter.com/gary_zukav. My Facebook address is http://www.facebook.com/GaryZukav. I love using the internet, and I am glad to support you on it. Please sign up on both. I also invite everyone in the Nourishing Relationships family to visit our website www.seatofthesoul.com. When you do you will find the first two videos that my spiritual partner Linda Francis and I have recorded. I hope you enjoy them. They will give you a sample of the high quality support that we are preparing for our brand new website, which will be online by the end of this month. Our new website will be interactive, playful, highly supportive, and will offer you more and more tools and activities each month. It is a joy to be able to be with you on this blog. Thank you Phyllis and Rosemary for inviting me into this wonderful community.
Love, Gary
Post a Comment
<< Home