Battle against possessiveness

kkrish · Jul 24, 2011

Dear Sri Sir
Beautiful! That's about all the words I could muster up to express my appreciation; there are infinity words all clamouring in my mind but I am unable to find the one that really would do justice to this article!
A good lesson! I must say I learnt this to some extent mysefl with my interactions with not just my spouse but my parents too! My father will not allow me to take too much advantage of him or my mother and he would clearly draw the line beyond which I could never enter.
I guess that early lesson had taught me how to allow my husband his freedom. I am glad that one more person (you) believes in this!
Thank you Sir!

Cheeniya · Jul 25, 2011

Dear Kamala
You are fortunate that you had the guidance of your parents in shaping your views about being possessive. Of all the things that can sour up a relationship, the one that should rank very high is possessiveness. I have seen a lot of young men and women suffering because of this scourge. K.Balachander had portrayed this beautifully in his movie 'Puthu puthu arthangal' in which Geetha was simply superb as an insanely possessive wife. Space is very important to nurture a relationship. Even a plant will not grow to its full potential if it is sown very closely to another.
Khalil Gibran has beautifully analysed this problem and come out with some lovely views. Some people say that possessiveness within a reasonable limit is fine but I am not in agreement with them. What is there to choose between a drop of cyanide or a whole bottle of it?
Sri

Viswamitra · Apr 30, 2012

Dear Cheeniya Sir,

You are absolutely right in saying that whether it is moderate or high, the possessiveness in all form is wrong. I would even go to the extent of stating that possessiveness is not even one form of manifestation of love, if we consider love as unconditional. Most of MIL and DIL problems are primarily driven by the possessiveness and not having an understanding that the same guy could express love to his mother as well as to his wife.

Even the scriptures are stating that One without the second manifested into many forms and even though forms are different, what resides in each one of us is one and the same. If this is true, we don't possess anything and nothing belongs to us. Where is the question of us possessing something? We have a duty and obligation to love one another but each soul has its own journey to become one with the Universal Absolute. If we interfere with that process through feeling possessive, we are actually hurting the progress of this individual soul. If we are not the body and we believe we are the soul, then, love is our form and there is nothing so special about it when compared to other human beings.

I read a book written by Rev. Berg called, "Nano Technology and the Mind over the Matter" in which the author describes when God decided to replicate Himself, he found that the only way he could do it is to create a vessel that could receive His Grace. However, this vessel still had the qualities of God and hence wanted to give only. Hence, in order to overcome this conflicting tendencies, He convinced the vessel to receive Grace in order to give it to other beings. Therefore, every human being had three qualities namely a) ability to receive Grace, b) to give it to the fellow beings and c) to receive Grace to give it to others. These are three tendencies called Tamos, Satwa and Rajasic. These qualities got embedded into every cell and molecules in our body. That is why when scientists looked int an atom, the found three elements called Neutron, Proton and Electron and Neutron in an atom representing receiving in order to give, Proton representing the tendency to give and Electron which has the ability to support any atom representing the ability to receive.

When soul or pure consciousness is nothing but manifestation of love, every cell in our body has the ability to receive, give or receive it to give. When we relinquish all of the three qualities, the cells will cease to exist and we become immortal.

Viswa

shyamala1234 · Apr 30, 2012

Dear Sri,

Being possessive is suffocating...at some stage the person feels like running away from the relationship. There should be space between a couple....that space creates trust in each other and the relationship would be comfortable. Then love blossoms.....in a suffocating relationship people cannot love though some claim that being possessive is a test for love. I don't agree with that statement.

Syamala

Cheeniya · May 2, 2012

Dear Viswa
The atomic theory of possessiveness is truly convincing! In whatever way we may look at possessiveness, it is certainly not acceptable. People who are possessive try to justify it as the true manifestation of love. Possessiveness is just indicative of highly sadistic love. It can be as obsessive as we saw in the film 'Guna' starring Kamal Hassan. Genuine love should be based on high mutual trust and that in turn should create enough space between the partners to feel free and creative. Khalil Gibran has beautifully summed up saying that possessiveness can be as ruinous to love as acid to a young plant.
Sri

Cheeniya · May 2, 2012

Dear Syamala
It is not the space that creates trust but vice versa. Only when trust is there, any space is possible. When a person is possessive, he slowly loses trust in his partner and that in turn results in the shrinkage of space between the two.
Sri

shyamala1234 · May 2, 2012

Dear Sri,

I think you are right. Only when trust is there space would be there.

Syamala

iyerviji · May 17, 2012

My dear Anna

Good post and well narrated as alays. I just got this from google about possessiveness

Once a friend very close to me, when sitting on bridge on a bright shiny day, raised her hand wide open and filled her palm with sunlight. She held it in front of me and said, "Look carefully at this sunshine contained on my hand.... It reflects and symbolizes Love".
This was how I learned: As long as you keep your hand gently open and allow it to remain there, it will always be there. However, if you attempt to close your fingers round it and try to posses it, nothing will remain rather than darkness and empty hands. This is the biggest mistake that people do when they meet love. They try to posses, desire, own, demand, and expect. and just like the sunshine vanishing from the palm, love will retrieve from you.

Cheeniya · May 18, 2012

My dear Viji
That's an excellent example.I remember the famous lines from the song Maria from Sound of Music, "How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?" The whole world is ours as long as we are part of it. The moment we try to own it, it goes out of our hands. This is particularly true of love. I know how much you love this Anna but if I start stipulating that you should not give any FB to anyone else, you'll just leave me and go! That's what possessiveness does!
Sri

iyerviji · May 18, 2012

My dear Anna

In that way I am very possessive. I dont know how you will take this. But since you have written what you feel about possessiveness I am also writing. But I dont want you to leave me and go any time. Whenever you give fbs to others I feel why my dear Anna is not giving me much fbs. Whoever I love I become very possessive, what to do though I know it is not right I cant change my nature also.