Tag: marriage

How to create a blueprint for conflict: a map back to love

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A relationship is a wonderful tool for your spiritual growth.

How you as a couple respond to conflict can tell you a lot about a relationship.

You can be in a partnership where every conflict pushes you further and further apart, or you can be in a relationship where every conflict brings greater intimacy and opportunities to get free.

And for the spiritual seeker getting free is the most important thing.

In the heat of conflict, it is very difficult to remain conscious. Most of us get swept up in our triggers, our stories, our opinions, our unhealed trauma.

I have learned that what we fight about is not as important as how we fight. I’ve learned that if you put your attention on fighting better, the topics that come up also tend to soften.

It is all part of learning to love another human being, and yourself.

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Simple daily relationship practices to grow love

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My posting schedule has become a little erratic. After 3 months working from home at my parents house in BC, we moved back to Minnesota where I’m involved in a few research projects. I’m still finding my groove here. Reya is back at daycare. My husband and I largely work from home but I do go into the hospital on days where I have patients to enroll or meetings to attend.

I am applying for Internal Medicine residency later this year. It’s sort of a pinnacle moment of my life; something I’ve worked towards for the last few years, and I’ve battled a lot of inner demons to get to this place. The application process is extensive, and along with working and spending time with my husband and Reya, I don’t have a lot of free time at the moment. It’s something I need to prioritize over the next few months, so while I will continue to post consistently on here, the interval between posts may be a little longer.

That being said – today I want to talk about relationships and the little ways we can steadily show up to do the work of love. Here are some simple practices that grow love and connection between my husband and I during this busy season of life.

Make their happiness your priority

Every morning, I ask my husband 2 questions.

“What is one thing you could do today that would make you feel productive?”

This is usually one of his most important tasks of the day. The needle mover. Things like “Finish the brief I’m working on / this chapter / this draft / start my online course etc”

Followed by;

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Thoughts on finding the one

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I have a juicy topic to discuss with you today. Marriage. Life-long commitments to love. Soulmates.

You may have noticed that I love love, and that I love my husband. I am romantic and I am a relationship oriented person. I learned many of my major life lessons through the relationships I’ve had – and though that is not everyone’s path, and perhaps not the path I would necessarily recommend, it has been my experience and I honour it as such. 

Many of you may also already know that I had an arranged marriage. I believe I have a valuable perspective as a person who has had relationships and has ultimately had an arranged marriage. Picking your life partner, your ride or die is a very important decision. And it is something we have to do when we’re relatively young and don’t necessarily have the life experience, maturity or wisdom to pick a good one. We may not even have the skills we need to grow love, I know I certainly didn’t. It’s one of those things you learn while doing. It is the great work of love.

Here are some of my thoughts on finding the one.

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How we transformed our marriage

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Note: I had been wanting to share some photographs from our wedding day 2 years ago, but for some reason never got around to it. So I have included them in this post 🙂 The photographs bring me back to such a wonderful day in my life, and I hope you enjoy them. 

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I have something to tell you. My marriage is blossoming.

It is so full of love. And joy.

It feels like a flower that is in bloom in the summer. The season is right. The atmosphere is right. The flower grows and blooms and it is beautiful. I don’t need to do anything, I only need to admire its grace.

But it wasn’t always like this. There were a lot of bumps in the beginning.

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Drops of Summer

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Summer is coming to a close and my heart is ready for the winter months, for shedding of my old skin and creating warmth from within. Here are photographs of some moments of summer.

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The Wedding Series: In the garden of lights

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The night before the wedding we have a party at my grandparents home. It is a chance for me to receive blessings from all our relatives and close family members. My grandfather is a strong, wise man who adores all his grandchildren. He asked me “What would make the party special for you?” and I said “lights.”

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When I stepped outside after getting ready, I felt like I had walked into a magical world, a fairytale garden. The warm indian breeze, the inky blue night sky, the starlight and fairy lights, the emerald green reflecting off the trees.

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The wedding series: Sangeet & Haldi

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For those who know anything about Indian weddings, they will know it is no easy feat. It is full of beautiful rituals and wonderful traditions, all designed to prepare the bride for her journey in this lifetime as a wife. I enjoyed every single moment of this experience. And look back at this dreamy celebration with so much gratitude and joy.

The first wedding event was the Sangeet and Haldi.

The Sangeet function is a music and dance event. A bright, vibrant celebration of preparing for all the magic of a wedding . Songs that are about weddings are played, women dance together and laugh together. They rejoice in all that love and marriage is!

The Haldi is the ritual applying of Haldi (turmeric-  for her spiritual purification) all over my body, along with honey (for her sweetness of character) and milk (for innocence of her heart) all over the bride, preparing her on the heart and soul level for becoming a wife.

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A few days in India

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Good morning everybody. It is 3:50 am in India and I am awake due to the jet lag.
I love being in this country. I have a diary entry that I wrote in the summer when I was last here, and I think it quite perfectly describes my experience here, so I will share it with you today.

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7 types of relationships: throat, third-eye and crown couples.

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According to the Vedas there are 7 types of relationships that we can experience in our lives. These 7 categories of relationships achieve a certain type of harmony between two people that correspond to our 7 chakra centers: your root center, sacral chakra, solar plexus, heart center, throat chakra, brow chakra (third eye center), and crown chakra.

You can read a brief description of how chakras affect our motives to create harmony in relationships in my first post on The Root Chakra Couple here.

I will be doing a short series of blog posts regarding these 7 energy centers, and the kinds of relationships that tend to emerge from these influences.

Today we will discuss the throat centered couple, the third eye centered couple and the crown chakra couple. These are the three highest level relationships and are usually quite rare to come across.

This concludes are series on the 7 types of harmony found in relationships according to the vedas. I hope you enjoyed it 🙂

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7 types of relationships: The Heart Centered Couple

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According to the Vedas there are 7 types of relationships that we can experience in our lives. These 7 categories of relationships achieve a certain type of harmony between two people that correspond to our 7 chakra centers: your root center, sacral chakra, solar plexus, heart center, throat chakra, brow chakra (third eye center), and crown chakra.

You can read a brief description of how chakras affect our motives to create harmony in relationships in my first post on The Root Chakra Couple here.

I will be doing a short series of blog posts regarding these 7 energy centers, and the kinds of relationships that tend to emerge from these influences.

Today we will discuss the Heart Centered couple.

Continue reading “7 types of relationships: The Heart Centered Couple”