The process of awakening has brought with it both a sweetness of recognition and also a sense of “gosh, how could I have missed this all along?” One area where this has become increasingly apparent is in my relationship with my husband. It seems that intimate relationships have a way of stripping us naked and bringing out what lies deeply embedded to the surface, in a way that no other relationships do…
For years, it seemed that we were drifting apart. The usual suspects of family, work, etc aside, it was as if our paths were different. I felt that I could not share my “spiritual” self with him. He would accept my “personal activities” as he called them (meditating, praying, etc) with considerable disgruntlement. However, the main issue was that he wanted me to be “subservient”. My men friends tell me this is every guy’s dream 
But, that did not sit well with the strong-willed and independent woman that I was strongly identified with… Friction galore! We seemed to have forgotten why we came together in the first place…
That has all changed the last few months - subtly, gradually and exponentially, in that order. It occurred to me that all relationships and the world in general, are akin to the reflection in a mirror. I point a finger and the reflection points back, I smile, it smiles back, and so on… Of course, we have been told this all our lives… But, the primary issue is that our perception of what is seen in the mirror is distorted when we are identified as the separate, small self. As we clear and polish that perception, things appear a lot clearer and for what they truly are…
As that process has continued here, I first came to see how at least part of the problem lay with my own issues of self-worth. With a shift in perception, that was blown away, and the walls between us disappeared. There was no one “there” with low self-worth and insecurities, strong will or independence. Only pure, blissful is-ness. With that, love gushes through and there is an overwhelming desire to give… What happens to the reflection when we open our arms in love and delight? 
There is a new-found intimacy, joy and curiosity, much deeper than even our early years of marriage. We suddenly love hanging out together, and talk more than we ever did, even about “spiritual” things. Even in disagreements, there is humor and playfulness. The more I open and surrender to the moment, the richer and sweeter it gets. A love that cannot be classified as “romantic” or otherwise because it just is. No doubt this will evolve and change in a myriad ways. He stated recently that I am a “much better” person than the one he married so many years ago. I smiled in gratitude and returned to what has become the main pre-occupation - polishing that mirror.
In hindsight, it was/is about being subservient - not to anyone in particular, but to the here and now.
kami
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3
lovely…thank you
that’s awesome
reminds me of how my relationships have changed so much also. The love I feel for (and the love I receive from) my girlfriend has changed so much, since in March this year, I had the first clear recognition of ‘no-self’.
Now it’s just an increasing intimacy and supportive love with her, and in fact with life itself.
<3 <3
love it. When you dis-identify then the mirror dropped its curtain of illusion and resistance vanished. This is how we all are, open and simple.
Oh yes and men’s fantasies are definitely not subservient women, at least mine isn’t. I got a feisty welsh woman.
Beautiful! That’s the experience here too - intimacy with the is-ness, life itself, which somehow expands to include others…
Hmmm… you must be an exception then… Or is it that you have come to accept what is??
“Feisty” is an adjective that is used quite a bit with me - all good!
Love,
kami
I was engaged to a subservient woman and broke it off a few weeks before the wedding because I realised that I wanted someone who could stand up for herself. I wanted a woman who was strong and independent and not someone who hung off my every word and doted on me…haha I got that As the saying goes 'be careful what you wish for, you might just get it ’ . We have a completely equal relationship which has grown and grown and continues to evolve. She argues more with me now than she did at the start, I cannot get away with a simple statement without evidence and facts, it’s worse than being in a courtroom.
Maybe I am in the minority. Well that goes for most things, I have never followed the crowd, always done it my own unique and sometimes foolish way.
That’s the sure sign of a leader and sage, you know.
Much love to you.
A beautiful post Kami.
This is absolutely my experience as well. My wife absolutely brings stuff to the surface that I don’t want to see (but really need to). 
It’s not that she is trying to do so, but as long as I am willing to look into the shadows of my own soul, this is the result.
Hmmmm… perhaps a cultural thing?? Maybe not, maybe it’s individual, but I can say for certain that this is NOT “every guy’s dream.” Both long term relationships I have been in have been with initially “subservient” women. I don’t particularly like the word subservient, and maybe the words “timid” or “lacking in self confidence” would be more accurate to describe these two women, but in both cases, within 4 or 5 years of us being together, they have ended up being much more confident and willing to speak their mind, no matter how they anticipate me feeling. This results in more of the above point about bringing stuff I need to see to the surface. The initial timidness in both of these partners did however often times manifest in them acting subservient towards me, but having an intense and often overbearing personality myself, this only seemed aggravate and irritate me. I need someone who will stand up to me and call me on my shit even though I often don’t want to see what they are reflecting and it can cause resistance and turmoil at least at first.
This has also been my experience. In fact, I think the tendency to “desire subservient women” that can be noticed in many men is actually just masking their own feelings of unworthiness. They/we feel unworthy, so when someone acts in a subservient way towards us it (temporarily/artificially) makes us feel more worthy/better about ourselves.
This is what I see the desire for subservience turning into… an outpouring of service, from both sides. The whole “sub” thing creates a hierarchy, increases separation. True service, especially when coming from both sides of a relationship, results in an outpouring of radiance and divine love.
Love!
Carson 
Got to chime in and agree with Carson there. I prefer a relationship based on equality, and woman with a smart mind, and strong, loving heart.
However, all relationships are an interplay of yin/yang. My body is of male gender, and heterosexual inclination. Beyond that, all my identifications with gender end.
Relationships seem to me to be Awareness/That taking on the seeming of duality, and engaging in the dance of love and attraction with itself.
Identifying oneself with a particular duality - masculine/feminine, ying/yang, dominant/submissive - is just ego. The only thing I can say, from my limited experience of relationships, is that it pays enormously to allow the dualities of yin/yang to dance freely within you, without identifying as one or other.
I try to give deep listening and intuitive sensitivity to life, the situation and the other person. You find that naturally life itself lives you, and you are inclined towards the most intelligent behavior that is most lovingly right for the moment (instead of acting out a personality structure of beliefs, ideas, emotions, concepts): to be forceful or yielding, to apologize or assert yourself, to serve the other person and try to fulfill them or to choose what you want and go for it. Etcetera.
I feel that in every facet of life and relationships there is a constant dance of these opposites, and appropriate times to embody ying, or embody yang.
I have erred in life when my identification with one quality impeded the natural dance within me: In times of identification/attachment to yin I’ve been brittle, insensitive, aggressive, worked too hard with lower quality results, quick to anger, too carnal, over-excited. In time of identification/attachment to yang, I’ve found myself a bit weak and passive, lazy, depressed, lacking vitality.
It sounds like hippy stuff, but once you open to the flow, you find you are all and neither, your behavior and energy switching from yin to yang instantly as appropriate, alternating all the time from minute to minute, day to day, resulting in the most harmonious and beneficial outcome in all fields of life.
Thanks for sharing kami. It always feels good reading transformational stories like these.
Thanks Kami
Beautiful sharing.
Hi Carson!!
Can I just say I absolutely and totally love you?
About the cultural thing - actually, the men friends who affirmed this are very white I’ll make sure they stand corrected!! I agree with you that this is an individual thing… Although more global in certain cultures…
In our case, it was a tailspin in retrospect. My husband is one of the most wonderful human beings I know, a true karma yogi, with not a violent or overbearing bone in him. However, with my need to constantly assert myself even when it was unnecessary, he had become withdrawn and “subservience” was a word he used in exasperation. That made me more stubborn and inflexible… As soon as I gave up the need for control, all that gave way to treating each other with increasing love and respect - as equals… In reality, he admires my ability to stand on my own and that I stay with him not because I need to, but because I want to This whole thing has been a wonderful mirror experiment!!
Near and Yonatan, thank you!!
Love you all!!
Hi Josh
Very beautifully said - not hippy at all… Recently, I came to “see” I’m neither male nor female, yet I’m both… It was very freeing
Much love!
Hi Kami
I totally love you too! And it’s really great to watch/feel you grow like this. I get a big heart swelling sensation whenever I read your recent posts. Can’t wait to see you in person again someday.
I have no doubt. I’m sure it is prevalent everywhere, in every culture, in every “class,” even in every one of us to some extent or another (until it’s not anymore). I guess what I was mentioning was more that some religions, cultures, and personality types tend more towards desiring subservience in their female partners. I know that in some of the Christian sects I grew up in the men take verses like Genesis 3:16 very literally; “To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.””
Anyway, something that hit me as I have gone about my day with this topic in mind… I think there is a potential that there is a trend in the way karma yoga (service) plays out (at least for me). I tried to start a topic on it here at AYP, I think I called it “The Evolution of Service.” What I’ve specifically noticed as I’ve gone about my day with this topic in mind is that when action is done with a heart filled with a desire for service, the doesn’t even need to be another (to serve). Just having a heart filled with the desire to serve is enough to have every action filled with the radiance and divine love I mentioned in my last post.
Thanks for starting this thread… great food for inquiry here.
Lots of love,
Carson
You have been a key catalyst, guru Carson. No doubt here that we will meet soon and share stories late into the night, and I will come away a better person to have spent time in your presence, as it has been every time.
Yes!! Karma yoga is wayyyy more than “selfless service”. It is the attitude of surrender and desire for service, and love for whatever it is we might be doing. Even washing dishes is karma yoga when done like this. Most popular yoga talks about karma yoga as going to impoverished countries to “help”, which is fine, of course when and if we can do that. But we need not wait for such opportunities - they are presenting themselves in the moment. Selfless service to That, to our Ishta, in any and every form…
Love to you and your beautiful family.
Just to backup Karl and Carson,
I prefer strong playful extatic women who love to love and to be loved without fear over any dull dead subservient women. If that woman serves you with great love and respect and you do the same to her, then there is no real subservience either.
Any man or any woman, who lives together with someone who is practicing, will become extatic, strong and rdy for more love in both directions anyway. If both dive into silence and wake up the spinal nerve, then haleluja =P
So in the longterm if you do your practice, then no matter who you are with, he or she will become a god/goddess sooner or later aswell. Start thanking Yogani men/women of this planet as thanks to him you get more and more strong lovers, lucky lucky you all are =)
Whoa. Mucho inspiring. I bow to you with folded hands.
Thanks for sharing that Kami!
My relationship has been so up and down, and issues galore, but also with tons of happiness and love thrown in too. But the hard times can be sooo challenging to say the least! Certainly its not an easy road with relationships!. Thank you for bringing to light the truth, that in the end, it’s all a mirror/reflection of our inner world.