At the age of 50, he hated his mother most. She was ailing and was bed ridden. He said that if it was in his hands, he would kill her. Very rarely we would see someone hating mother so much. I went into everything he had to talk about his childhood and he said that his mother was never there for him. She was busy socializing. So who took care of you? Servants and my brother. He used to hit me, punch me and I always wondered if she were there I would have been better. That explained the reason of his anger as he wanted her around and she was not there. I asked him again, did you tell her about you being his and he said no! So what guarantees that in the silent room your brother would not have done same even if she was around? What if you would have told her and she would have taken an action? She was not there physically but she made sure from her side she arranged everything for you. May be this is what she knew about how to bring up children. Moreover, you have been angry all your life for someone else’s deeds. It was your brother who hit you but you hate your mother. It was like sudden doors opened for him and he broke down. What should I do now? I have given her hatred all this life and probably this is the reason that she is suffering from cancer. I expected her to be something else and she was not and I blamed her for my expectations. So the thing is she is still alive, go and share your heart with her and see what you can do now. I went to her, told her everything, and last few months he spent with her only. After she died, he met again and said that he could not explain how peaceful he was. He gave her what all he could and she left this world with peace on her face. That time he did not expect anything from her, he just wanted her to be happy.
In another incidence, one couple was fighting and the points were, he is not doing this for me, she is not doing this for me and they had couple of reasons. The gentleman said that, they would have taken divorce if they would not have children. She felt same! But when they had decided to stay together, they thought let’s make it peaceful. I asked both of them to write the complaints, because when you are fighting you keep repeating same points and get into torturous mode. But when you write it is an eye opener for you. They could write 3-4 points for which they had been fighting. Now, they were asked to write the things they have been doing for each other and they feel the other person is doing for them. It was to share open heartedly. They realized the list was much longer and it took them more than hour to finish it. So what was killing their relationship? Few complaints and not acknowledging what the other person is doing. They resolve the issues easily and few they let go because they were in past and had hurt! They forgave each other for them. After that it was easy as they had lowered their expectations. So was it over burden of expectations?
After working on so many different types of relationships and relationship issues, I realized, relationships become wreck under the weight of expectations. We cannot eliminate expectations. Just that we have lower them down. Lesser would be expectations, more rewarding the relationships would be because in that case we would be able to see what the other person is doing for us. Once we are able to see that, we feel rewarded and we know the efforts from both the sides. After that we are not surrounded by the questions like I am doing so much, what the **** he is doing for me.
Always remember relationships do not happen on their own. We need to create them, nurture them with love and then we can see them prospering.
