Feeling unfulfilled. Is this worth it?

21. Yoga and Relationships
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I don’t want to be overly negative, but I need to get this off my chest. Please bear with me.

So many changes in the last few years. Just to be alone. Just to barely want to keep going. So many nights in the beautiful wilderness…alone. So many adventures with the light ring. Alone. Living alone. Travelling alone. Alone. Alone. Alone.

I’ve lost so much creativity and motivation. Broke away from a failing marriage seven years ago. Broke away from a hurtful family and learned to live without them. Was excited to explore relationships and have some fun. Platonically, some of that has happened…and failed. Romantically, it’s been a desert. I’ve spent that time falling apart and picking up the pieces again. Perpetually. No closer to anything, seemingly. Now my youth is fading and I’m feeling incredibly unfulfilled. At first I could attract attention/looks, but I wasn’t in a place to do anything about it, focused on re-establishing myself. Now I’m older and my youth is fading. I’m finally stable (maybe?), but now I’m feeling irrelevant and unwanted.

But (?) something has shifted the last few months, and I’m taking care of my health in a meaningful way (again). There’s synchronicity, gratitude, and the (at least illusion) of some hope. But (!), while the gratitude and shifts are apparently real, so is the extra depth of not believing any of it. I’ve seen this all before. It doesn’t go anywhere. And since I’m no longer numbing myself with my habits, I now feel the deep heartache at all moments from waking to sleep. Again. I’m taking care of myself. Great! Who cares? It won’t change a thing. I’ll never not be who I am.

I don’t feel any closer to companionship. I don’t feel any closer to enlightenment. If anything, I feel like I just keep losing and being stripped of everything. Hope. Creativity. Looks. Youth. Friendships. Relevance. It’s all going away and there’s a constant deep pain of loneliness and overwhelming unfulfillment. What if it’s just not worth it? Why am I even trying at any of this?

I can’t bypass this or meditate it away. It’s like permanent marker on my heart.

With love, gratitude, and a very broken heart…
-David

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Hi David,

I recognize myself in some of the things you’re saying. I’ve long longed to break away from a hurtful family. I finally succeeded, but I underestimated how tough the time right after could be. Still, in some way, I believe it was necessary. It’s part of a another cycle of things breaking, and eventually something new will reappear. Who knows, maybe these sort of cycles continue forever?

It sounds really good that you were able to shake certain habits and, as weird as at sounds, I believe it’s a good thing that you’re able to feel your heartache again. Not that you should become attached to it. I mean that it can be a sign of waking up and feeling fully. It’s good to feel that you’re alive again, instead of being identified with some habit. It’s something to be celebrated! I’m sure you will get used to the sting at some point, effortlessly hold it in consciousness. It might even feel blissful.

All the best from a fellow AYPer

Adrian

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Dear David,

I hear you.

We are to turn these feelings (the pain, the loneliness, the overwhelming unfulfillment) into fuel for the Bhakti fire. Turn it into longing for your ideal. Work this suffering into a climatic peak, let it flood over you. It will be followed by bliss and you will be comforted.

Sey :pray:

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David, I feel the sadness and fear in your sharing. I have experienced some similar events in my life and know the pain and loneliness they can create. I don’t have all the answers. I hope this note finds you feeling a little more hopeful, and if not, I hope you continue to find the strength to keep at it as things have a way of improving with time. The mind is skillful at stacking a series of disappointing circumstances and drawing a linear trajectory with a very pessimistic projection.

The start of your note made it painfully clear how alone you have been. Someone pointed out to me last night being alone and lonely are different things. Creating circumstances where you can connect with others is a good thing to explore even if you are an introvert. I just wanted to reach out and say I hear you and you are not alone in this.

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Yes, it is time to see it and feel it all, this is a dark period for you that will lighten as you acknowledge and release it to the silence that you have been cultivating these past few years. It is time to honor your body, endeavor to endure, put a smile on your face, and whistle while you’re working. It is time to question your mind stories, of the things that haven’t happened yet, of whether or not you are worthy, and attend to what’s before you today. Choices made today will influence your tomorrow. Our practices, over time, give our attention influence so that if we direct it in daily ways that serve our wellbeing, your future will reflect that positively.

I am retired, in a very stable time in my life and really love my alone time. Since the wife works from home, I devote my days to yard work, volunteering, keeping a clean house, cooking the meals, and most of the remaining time with my health and yoga practice. It is true as you age, you notice becoming more invisible to many. One of the ways I counteract this, when there is an opportunity I engage others with a simple smile, an act of kindness, or a fleeting word or two, Whenever I need a boost of humanity I go food shopping at the market, empty my mind and take it in. Also, whenever you feel lonely, make eye contact in a mirror, and talk aloud. It is a tremendous shift in perspective, you are no longer just in your head, but addressing yourself directly. It actually is hard to maintain eye contact when you feel less of yourself, notice that. It is a practice both powerful and silly, and may provide temporary relief.

Yes you are alone today, feel it and surrender it as much as necessary. Yes you are depressed today, feel it and surrender it as much as possible. Yes you are older, you will never be any younger, feel it and (as Sey suggests) offer it up to your higher ideal. Tomorrow has not happened yet, your attention matters and has influence. You matter and have influence on your tomorrow. Do only what serves you, and when confronted with something that doesn’t, feel it, examine it, use the skill you have practiced in samyama and lighten your burden with intention. You have so much life left and apparently very talented from what I have seen! Your art serves you greatly, IMHO. You have been cultivating inner silence through your practices, invite it forward in your life with your intentions and attention. Forget liberation, whatever will be will be, use your silence and practice (and a smile :slightly_smiling_face:) to heal yourself and move along. :folded_hands:t2::heart: You have got this David!

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Hi David,

I can relate to a lot of what you’re going through. My Bhakti isn’t as strong as it was in the past and I feel like I’ve lost faith. I also struggle with being alone and wanting a romantic relationship, but have a lot of trouble because of social anxiety. I’m middle aged now and am more aware that my time is limited, and feel like I wasted time in the past. I feel alienated sometimes with my Christian family. Thankfully I live alone. I wish I had an answer for you, but just wanted to share some of my experience.

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Hi David,

Sorry to hear about the struggles you are having. There is no need to meditate anything away. In fact, it is not possible. If we attempt to push things away, they simply come back stronger.

What you are experiencing is perfectly normal. Fortunately the spiritual path is designed for exactly your situation.

The most important thing is to not expect any miracles. Don’t expect your situation to be turned around in a day, or a week, or even a month. But, it is possible to make incremental steps that will turn everything around.

The first key step is in noticing the suffering and its cause. The heartache and wanting it to go away. So, there is aversion there. The wanting things to feel meaningful. That is grasping after something. And when positive shifts do occur, we want to hold onto them and for them not to disappear in an apparent meaninglessness. That is clinging. And underneath it all is the “I sense”, the ashmita, the ahamkara, the “I doer”, the feeling of “I’ll never not be who I am”.

If you wanted to summarise the Buddha’s teachings this is how they start out: “There is suffering, suffering has a cause: There is aversion, there is grasping, there is clinging, there is attachment, there is the I sense…”

So, nothing much has changed in 2,500 years! The human condition is still the same. And the way out of suffering is still the same. That has not changed either. It still involves allowing the mind to come to stillness repeatedly through a daily meditation practice. Then, in that stillness comes peace, equanimity, and contentment. Gradually those things deepen into bliss, the witness and samadhi. From repeated entry into samadhi comes liberation. Then there is no more attachment, clinging, or aversion, no more “I sense” and no more suffering.

The first steps are actually the most important - the cultivation of equanimity, contentment and peacefulness. This is because once we have cultivated these qualities, daily practice becomes very easy. Before then, it can be a struggle to come to the mat every day.

I should mention that it is also possible that you are experiencing energetic overload. The symptoms you are describing can be energetic overload symptoms, especially if the heart chakra is opening. If you have been doing a lot of practice and spending a lot of time alone, this could be the cause of your troubles. Being alone amplifies the flow of prana in the body, increasing the process of inner purification and making any overload symptoms stronger. This is why Yogani always advises people to remain socially active during the day. It is also the reason monks and nuns spend long periods of time in isolation - they are deliberately trying to amplify the purification brought about by their practices.

Some of the symptoms of an opening heart chakra are grief, despair, sadness, loneliness, desperation, lack of self-worth, hopelessness etc. Luckily, these symptoms do not last forever and will gradually give way to feelings of joy, beauty and unconditional love. However, how long that takes, depends on the unique matrix of obstructions of the individual.

If you do feel that you may be experiencing energetic overload then self-pacing and grounding are the solution. Then once you are stable and have been stable for a period of time, you could increase practice times again.

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Thanks for the responses and encouragement, everyone.

Apparently, I need to focus on the fundamentals. Despite all my intense spiritual seeking over the years (reading, contemplative solitude, breath awareness, art), formal sitting practices haven’t ever stuck and have thus been a limited part of my practice. I’m an under-sensitive meditator and there’s very little to reinforce the habit right now. But, I see there’s probably no other way at this point unless I want to distract myself longer just to arrive here again.

On the flip side, one habit that’s easy to reinforce is asana practice, which is absolutely my favorite. I finally found a good studio close by and have been able to get myself to my mat consistently in the past few weeks and it’s been an incredible thing to reintroduce to my life. I’ve started to feel the familiar frustrations of creativity bubbling under my psyche, and I’ve also been cooking a lot and taking walks in the woods. I don’t think I’m overloading, but I’m also trying to do my best at grounding activities. I think the current anger, frustration, and dejection are good since they’re real and need to be seen as they naturally are. I’m reminded of this quote by Simone Weil:

““The capacity to pay attention to an afflicted person is something very rare, very difficult; it is nearly a miracle. It is a miracle. Nearly all those who believe they have this capacity do not. Warmth, movements of the heart, and pity are not sufficient.”

I believe she’s talking about the witness. I’m trying to do this internally for myself.

I may share more thoughts that have come up in the past week of reflection, but this is enough for now.

Love, gratitude, and heartache,

-David

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Hi David,

Just to mention… anger is another symptom of energetic overload. It is related to the manipura chakra activating too fast. Quite often, the heart chakra and manipura chakra can be activating at the same time as they are right next to each other, and influence each other.

You may not be an undersensitive meditator at all. You may be over-sensitive, but simply associating symptoms of energetic overload with other causes.

You may find this lesson useful:

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Just want to chime in with an update.

The past couple months have been good, and I continue taking care of myself in deeper ways than I’ve ever been able to. Good habits abound now. Asanas are going strong and the community I’m making at the studio has been a godsend. Nothing traditional about their practice style, but it fits me super well. I’ve even managed to be consistent with a nightly sitting practice of SB & DM. Others around me are commenting on my energy, mood, and well-being. All changes for the better.

I reread the lesson about over-sensitivity. Good to know. While it’s possible that my natural state is one where my nervous system responds easily to practices, I still don’t think I’m overloading. Moreover, anger is an inevitable part of what’s going to come up for me and my karma, so it’s not a very useful metric right now to know if I’m out of balance or need to dial back. Any opening in the Manipura region is going to be immediately felt as anger for me. My bad habits were specifically about repressing this. Instead, my focus is to keep the heart centered and my life grounded so that I can redirect the energies into useful work as anger invariably comes up for transformation.

Even in the face of all these good things, the heartache remains unchanged. When I moved out of California four years ago, I didn’t know if I was going to make it through that time. I shared on the forums that there were four things I’d regret if I didn’t make it. I’ve been reflecting on that list, and I’m astonished that it hasn’t changed at all; it must be written deep in my heart! I’ll summarize again:

1.) Sharing freely what has been given to me with a grateful heart
2.) Knowing an awakened Shakti
3.) Experiencing external romance and intimacy
4.) Creating the art that I know is in my soul, that I came here to express

I think these outline something deep in my bones like a mission, and the heartache I feel is a sense of disconnection from them – especially the last two. The first one I can somewhat practice through my work, since I’m now at a place in my career where I can do some mentoring and share my knowledge that way. The second is currently helped by the asana and sitting practices. The third is a blinding, soul-crushing pain I can barely tolerate, but there is nothing to do besides cultivate good habits and love. Tend to the garden, and maybe something will happen. The fourth is a deep, slow ache accompanied by an equally deep excitement. It’s painful to know exactly what I want to build and share but not yet be able to find the inspiration to bring it into reality. I have all the means to do it, but that last motivational piece is missing that would precipitate it out. It feels very related to the romance pain, but that’s a knot I haven’t figured out how to untie.

With love and heartache,

-David

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Hi David,

I feel your pain, my friend. We all do. It’s a longing that manifests in our lives in one form or another. I experience similar things, and one thing I have found through my own practices and time spent on this path is that as we progress, deeper and stronger layers appear. Because we have cleared away so many surface disturbances and spent so much time looking inward, we lay bare layers that feel intimately connected to the sense of “this is really who I am.” It is beautiful and terrifying. It’s raw, and as I said, deeply tied to what we identify as our “person.”

This is something I want to offer for you to consider. If you look closely at your previous posts and truly try to understand them, all of this connects strictly to the person. This story is attached to the ego—to its needs, its wants, its desires, and its fears. And it is all entirely understandable. You can see clearly why there is this desire, why there is this heartache and longing. You can understand it and hold deep compassion for it, right?

The core element underneath it all is love. It is the love you have for yourself, for God (if that pointer resonates with you), and the love you want to share, manifest, and live. The ego’s storyline translates this into: I want to make art, I want romance, I want to give, and I want to be seen as the Love and Light I know I am. Isn’t that wonderful? Isn’t that something to be thankful of? To be gratefull for? Your mind wants Love because it KNOWS IT IS LOVE!

And that’s the truth: You already are that love, you are the light, You are what you are seeking!
All of this missing, this longing, and this unfulfillment resides in the ego alone. It belongs to the story, to the one seeking, to the one wanting. It’s simply part of the ego’s journey. It’s part of the dualistic nature of the mind. This love is ONLY ONE.

Let this ego search, let it desire, let it suffer! but know: You are the pure witness to these states. You are not actually affected by them. Let this awareness be the ground on which the story unfolds. This is the love that you are, the love that frees all egos from their storylines. You don’t need anyone because you are everyone. You are the lover and the beloved. And in this awareness, know that the person is always seen; it never gets lost. It is seen when happy, and it is seen when sad. The seeing remains the same—unchanging, indifferent, and awake. There is nothing it does not hold or allow; it is infinitely deep.

This love is always present. It is simply what is. When your mind is truly quiet, it tunes into it naturally and becomes one with it. When it isn’t quiet, you can just observe the noise as the mind yells and repeats its story over and over again.

I think being aware of this helps us connect to a deeper level of silence. There might be disturbance, but it’s only on the surface. The sea can be rough and violently tossing at the surface, but in its depths, it is always silent, calm, and undisturbed.

Wishing you the best, <3

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Hi David,

I can feel you and it seems like you are stuck at some point. When the desire for something becomes very strong it can lead to bitterness over the long term. For strong cravings the process of letting go, as outlined in AYP, can look like an inaccessible path to go.

The other way you could go about that is the tantric way of fullfilling it. I don’t know much about your situation, but it seems to me like you are stuck and have been overthinking for quite some time.

To get going on your path of fulfillment you could ask yourself, what is the next step I could possibly take to make my craving (see your points 3 and 4) be fulfilled. The step must be doable right away and not have any precondition. Then do it. Feel about the momentum you created and repeat spotting the next step at your earliest convenience. Just get going and leave behind overthinking and the urge to arrive at perfection aka your longed for goal.

When deep longings are fulfilled (and sometimes we don’t even have to arrive at the end) karmic bindings are released along the way.

So my take on this, don’t try to meditate it away. Take a step towards your dream. Ask yourself, what do you do or want to do? Then go where people want and do the same. There you will find something.

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Being stuck is a good way of putting it. To be clear, I’m not trying to meditate these things away like they shouldn’t be fulfilled. It feels like the healthiest perspective is that the ego should be allowed to pursue all of this wholeheartedly while also cultivating the central knowledge that “I” am the one watching it all unfold. Let the kite fly and enjoy.

Point 4 – the art – is actionable. Maybe the pointed inspiration is harder to come by sometimes, but the global push is still there and made easier by the asana practice. I’ve done quite a bit of design work in the last few days to tackle some of the more technical aspects of my projects. And I’m taking an intro to stained glass class this weekend to explore how to incorporate that into my work. All of this is slow, but great.

Point 3 – intimacy – is a total void. Truly, from the bottom of my heart, I have absolutely no idea what to do here. And it wraps back into the art and inhibits it. We all have a peacock tail we use to impress a partner. Mine is my creativity. A couple months ago I watched a male peacock showing its beautiful fan to a female, and she looked like she couldn’t care less. I felt a kinship with that bird.

However, there’s one important shift here that I’m waiting to see how it unfolds. The yoga studio I’ve found is quite special, and it’s the best fit I’ve ever had. It’s the first time I’ve felt a sense of really integrating into a community. Interestingly, it’s almost entirely female. I’m sometimes the only male in a class of 40 people. The instructors are all getting to know me, and I’m making some casual friends as well. So, I have some hope that something can unfold from this. Still, there is no actual relief in sight. The blunt reality is that, despite being there for all the right reasons, spending tons of time in a room surrounded by attractive women dials up the pain. I also have a long history of being well liked by women but not being desired in that way. So, I’m even skeptical of my own hope.

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:upside_down_face:

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Well this is far away from AYP.

I guess there are 20 female practitioners in your yoga class feeling the same way you do, overthinking, being inactive in between hope and possibility somewhere in their lives. This is part of the human condition. Why not talk to them about that? You might have something in common.

You could be supporting to open up a bit. Don’t let them wait for ever. Find out who they are. Isn’t this artful too? Isn’t this also karma yoga, to help them find out if they like you or not? I really mean that, think about it! Don’t be selfish, this is not just about you. Give them the opportunity to like or dislike you for who you really are. They can only know if you show yourself. At least they are social creatures that want to know.