The spiritual component of relationships

Ginnie: How we can follow our spiritual urges and at the same time deal with relationships that take a lot of time and energy. How do we keep a relationship going with someone who has not spent much time on spiritual development?

Malvantra: Each situation will be its own unique set of circumstances, though these relationships take on patterns that have similarity. When the spiritual dimension in one individual is lacking or dormant, this complicates the situation. It is not insurmountable but would bring far greater work to the progress of friendship than would two people motivated on a spiritual path. This realm of spiritual perspective, of theological conception, can seem unimportant to physical creatures so largely oriented toward the external world, that certainly one could live without it if the friendship is there. But this is not the case.

Imagine, for instance, having a relationship with another personality that does not have a body. This you would find difficult for that entity to be purely spiritual and mental. Would you continue a relationship of an intimate nature?

Likewise, if an individual lacked mind, this would make your values shift and your goals change regarding just how you are going to pursue relationship. So, the spiritual is extremely important. I do however, express that — and I realize you well understand that the spiritual quality isn't simply intellectual understanding of religious principles but rather that personal drive toward higher ideals, toward enacting truth in your life, toward enhancing the moral, the beautiful. To decide the parameters of a relationship one must honestly ask oneself and sincerely face the feelings and the thoughts that you respond to yourself with, "Am I involved to be a minister, to guide another soul into birth in a spiritual sense? Or is this relationship that I desire one that is to be on an equal footing?" Both choices are good in themselves, but you must value the import of either one at the given time and choose appropriately.

Since there are many mortals on Earth in need of spiritual ministry, you do not have to take on the task with a significant or romantic relationship. It is far more empowering in one's growth and ministry if there is mutual support, if there is, in the times of withdrawal from the activities of life, an infusion of energy, understanding, sympathy, and encouragement from one nearly equal to yourself in a spiritual sense. It is far more exhausting to be on the job, so to speak, when you are more appropriately in need of retreat. But I speak of this in regard to those intimately personal relationships of love, for this type of friendship breaks down some of those personal boundaries that everyone can retreat into for recuperation, and this relationship overlaps those boundaries.

In all other relationships one need be very careful not to evaluate that another individual is not spiritually active in order to be a friend, a co-worker, a business partner. You do understand that the spiritual dimension infuses life with eternal values, higher ideals of living. But you still retain your boundaries for retreat in these other relationships. You are available to be an example, to let your fruits show, but you are not obligated to avoid a relationship because the individual is spiritually stagnant.

It is this boundary of personality that I seek to impress upon you as important to guard, for it is from this center that you spring forward to be of assistance to your fellows in many ways. Few individuals are received into this inner arena. Jesus, as he lived on this world, carefully chose three apostles to share this inner circle with him, but often he spent this retreat alone in the hills with the Father. Yet he engaged with a vast array of personality types, differing inclinations, and at different rungs of the spiritual ladder. He did not avoid them because they were pagans or sinners. He sought them out. But when it was time to be in
care of his own nourishment, he chose carefully who he would be with.