Landon Saunders
Woody Allen, at the end of his movie Annie Hall, tells an old story that he says reminds him of the way most of us feel about relationships. He says a guy goes to the psychiatrist and tells him he has a brother who is deeply troubled. He believes he's a chicken. The psychiatrist asks him how long this has been going on. The guy said three years. The psychiatrist says, why did you wait so long to get help? The guy shrugged his shoulders and said, we needed the eggs. Allen concludes this is why over and over we go through so much in our relationships. We need the eggs. And yet, do you know how much we underestimate our need for relationships?
Announcer
Hello again, everyone. This is Heartbeat, the podcast featuring insight and teaching from the more than 50 years of work done by Landon Saunders. Today is part one of a two part series on relationships and an exploration of the idea that the key may be to begin by being happy. Now, let's get back to Landon.
Landon
Carl Jung wrote, in spite of all indignant protests to the contrary, the fact remains that love, its problems and its conflicts is of fundamental importance in human life and as careful inquiry consistently shows, is of far greater significance than the individual suspects.
Not only do we underestimate how much we need relationships, we also underestimate the dangers in relationship. Like that famous egg Humpty Dumpty, we perch our relationships precariously on high walls and when they fall, we call in all the king's horses and all the king's men to help us put them back together again. And we miss the lessons. It's so easy to miss the lessons of relationship and when we do, all we get is punishment.
It's like the story that was told about the poet who was warned that a house would fall down on him and kill him. He stayed out in the open, never going near houses. But then one day an eagle dropped a tortoise on the poet's bald head, mistaking it for a stone. You see, two houses are going to fall on your head and on your relationship. And they're the house of ignorance and the house of blindness. Thornton Wilder talks about this in his play, Our Town.
Emily, who has died, gets to make a last visit to her town. When she comes back to the grave, one of the dead say to her, now you know that's what it was like to be alive, to move about in a cloud of ignorance, to go up and down, trampling on the feelings of those of those about you, to spend and waste time as though you had a million years, to be always at the mercy of one self -centered passion or another. Now you know that's the happy existence you wanted to go back to, ignorance and blindness.
Ignorance and blindness, these are powerful forces in any relationship. And when they predominate, then you miss the lesson of relationship. Now, what are those lessons? Well, here's one. Relationship is nature's way of shedding light on who you are and what you can become. It's a kind of Damascus Road experience in which your life can get turned around where the ignorance and the blindness can drop like scales from your eyes. That is, if...you know how to relate to another person. Another lesson. Relationship is nature's way of teaching us not to be our own best friend, but how not to be our own worst enemy. If we learn the lessons relationship is trying to teach us, we are freed from so many self -tramps. But if we fail, we wind up broken and with broken relationships. Yes, we should learn from relationships and change instead of simply repeating relationship first grade over and over and over again. The lessons about the reality of relationships are painful lessons. That's why so many try to drop out of the school of relationships. But this is the one school it is almost impossible to either drop out of or to graduate from.
There's always more to learn in our relationships. Now, let's go a bit deeper into something I've mentioned before, this matter of being fun to be with. Just what does that mean? Well, I believe that walls are built and wars are fought, oftentimes because, to put it bluntly, we're just no fun to be with. We often lose friends, or we lose the one we love to another man or woman simply because we're just no fun to be with. Ogden Nash put it quinkly. One would be in less danger from the wiles of the stranger if one's own kin and kith were more fun to be with.
Now I don't mean you have to be the life of the party. You just have to understand that life was meant to be a celebration. You see the difference in that? There's such a difference in the individual who is at the center of things at the great party. That person may be the most miserable individual there. No, what I'm saying is we must understand that life is a celebration and we must learn to act that way day by day. And I'm not talking about faking it either. The old art of
putting the upturned coat hanger in your mouth to force a smile. Nor am I talking about being the total woman or the totaled man. No, being fun to be with simply means you must give what you have in each moment.
You find something to enjoy, to be excited about, to care about, to think about, and you share this feeling. Give it and don't hold back. Everybody's got something exciting and the people who are fun to be with realize it and share it. Their cup overflows and they don't mind passing it along. Being fun to be with includes things just like appreciating people and most importantly the people you're closest to. You know, people are designed for appreciation and you can appreciate them even though you disagree with them or even if they irritate you. You know, you can just say, you you aggravate the life out of me but I appreciate you because you help me grow.
Being fun to be with means you're not afraid of what's new either. Not in you or in your friend or your partner. It means you cherish the differences. They're perfect topic for a lot of humor. You see, even the people who are really struggling with difficulties are simply nicer to each other when they're having a good time. What I'm really talking about is mood insurance. Mood insurance for your family. Have you insured the climate for your relationships?
You've ensured everything else. Why not ensure a climate of growth in your home and wherever you are? You do that by simply being fun to be with. Joy creates the greatest possible climate in relationships. And such a climate is contagious at home and at work. But I'll warn you, you'll need a pretty hearty variety of joy to survive some people's bad moods. Because it's usually the bad moods that dominate. Have you noticed that?
A person in a bad mood walks in and suddenly everyone is apt to get down. Yes, your joy will have to be pretty hearty sometimes.
Announcer
Well, Landon will be back in just a moment. But as always, we want to remind you that there are additional materials available for you from Landon Saunders and you can access them simply by visiting the website. Thisishartbeat .com. There's never any obligation. We respect your privacy and we hope you'll visit soon. Thisishartbeat .com. Now, let's get back to Landon.
Landon
usually don't have a good time, even when that time comes, because they're out of practice. It's like a story Will Rogers told. He said he asked a druggist if he ever took time off to have a good time. The druggist replied, no he didn't, but he sure sold a lot of headache medicine to those who did. What being fun to be with is really about is maturity. It takes a pretty mature person to laugh, and especially themselves.
And only the mature person can risk making a fool of themselves and sometimes on purpose or of enjoying nonsense and foolishness, not being so worried or self -conscious about maintaining your image. A French poet rather outrageously once said, an intelligent woman is a woman with whom one can be as stupid as one wants. Well, I guess the same goes for an intelligent man. Further, fun to be with. It's an attitude that can handle change and crisis which are inevitable in life because life is full of both. But you're still glad to be alive because you're a profound enough person to have considered the alternative. And the person who's fun to be with, well, they know how to play. And they're not so compulsive even in the inevitable crisis or disappointment or tragedy. No, you've got a broader range than you may have realized, a resiliency. It's not a matter of getting what you like but liking what you get.
And you're not so afraid of not fitting in or standing out or being a little different. After all, you are just a little strange. Fun to be with doesn't mean you have to be a wit. It just means you're delightful. Delightful. Delightful in your own way. You're a listener, an empathizer, an encourager. These are the people who are fun to be with. You're not the big expector or the big rejector or the big criticizer.
No, you're honest, sincere, authentic. You don't always have to have a great day, but you try. Now, let's pause moment, because I realize I'm on grounds a little bit dangerous. I'm talking a better message than I'm sometimes able to practice. We're in this thing together, you know. Lord Chesterfield, in one of his famous letters, wrote, in matters of religion and matrimony, I never give advice, because I will not have anybody's torments in this world or the next. laid to my charge.
Well, in my life, I'm afraid I haven't always been so discreet. But at least I'm not as blunt as one woman I heard about. Her friend showed her a picture of the man she was going to marry. She was a little apologetic because, well, he really wasn't very much to look at. And so she said, you know, he's not very good looking, but after all, beauty's only skin deep. Well, her friend took one look and said, skin him. A lot of work that's been done on relationships strikes me as being just It's more dermatology than internal medicine than it is getting to the inner feelings and meaning.
And I don't want to talk about relationships as if they're just some big problem or I don't want to lead you to believe that all the problems can be solved. They can't. They don't have to be solved. And that's because, and get this, at the heart of relationship is a great mystery, not a great problem. And do know what the proper response to a great mystery is? Well, it's not formula. And it's not getting
Steps one, two, three and four all down exactly right. You can drive yourself crazy trying to figure out your relationships and trying to do this and trying to do that. Let me tell you what the proper response to the great mystery that lies at the heart of relationships is. It is joy. It's joy. It's not a hundred things to do or a hundred things to remember. Now, it is the nature of relationships, the very nature of them that make me talk to you about things fun to be with or about joy. Jesus understood this. He told the people, don't rejoice in what you've done and what you've accomplished. Rather, He said, rejoice because your names are written in heaven. You have a relationship. And that means relationships rest in grace, always. That's why joy is appropriate every day, no matter what happens, no matter how much pain, no matter how much conflict.
If your relationship rests in grace, then it's okay. And it's why joy is so powerful in the relationship. It's why it can be there no matter what is going on. It is because it is something that springs out of that which is deepest in you and that which is most central to the whole universe. Joy is. You can have it any time you choose to reach out for it.
It's why it creates the best of all climates in which a relationship can grow. And so here's the most important thing I have to say to you. You cannot love unless you begin by being happy. Now, you probably thought you entered relationship in order to be happy, in order to get happy. You expect the relationship to generate the joy and the happiness you need. What you maybe haven't thought about it. that your expectation can so quickly become the poison that destroys the relationship. Think about it this way. All the other person really has to work with when you come to them is what you bring with you to the relationship. Now, if you don't bring any joy with you, how can another person build greater joy in you? They have nothing to work with, nothing to build on. I guess what I'm saying is, if you want joy in a relationship, you'd better bring a six pack along with you.
The relationship you must be watchful of is the one then that has no joy. It's like going fishing with a friend who brings no fishing equipment along, stating he's just going to use his hands. He'll just dive in the water and catch the elusive slippery rainbow trout with his bare hands. And yet, every day, thousands of people go out to catch the intimacy of a good relationship empty -handed. I'm telling you, love is not enough. you have to take some joy along with you.
Announcer
Six packs of joy available right here. Thanks a lot for joining us for today's episode of This is Heartbeat, the podcast. And a reminder that part two is upcoming. To be sure you catch it, follow or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We'd also like to remind you to visit the website, thisishartbeat .com, where you can find more information.about materials that are available from Landon Saunders and Friends of Heartbeat. Until next time, thanks again for being with us. This is Heartbeat, the podcast.
