Relationships may be magical, as well as the greatest cause of our sufferings. There are various types of relationships, including the parent-child relationship, the husband-wife relationship, the relationship between friends, the relationship between colleagues, and the boss-subordinate relationship. We all have relationships. What is the reason that some of these relationships are so enjoyable, while others are a great cause of suffering? All those relationships that are shadowed by complexes become painful. Superiority and inferiority complexes make relationships painful.
There may be broadly four types of relationships. First, "I know, you don't know". In these relationships, we presume that we know and the other person does not know. Since we have a better exposure to life, we compare ourselves with the other person and start making the other person feel that he does not know. We keep pointing out the mistakes in the other person. This type is quite common in parent-child and boss-subordinate relationships. Naturally, parents and bosses have greater exposure to life and therefore, they would have many experiences that children or subordinates do not have. There is no problem, as long as the parents want to guide the children with their experience. The problem is with the "closed mind." When we close our minds, we become arrogant and bossy. We want to prove that we know more than you. The relationship becomes a battlefield to dominate and prove our superiority rather than a breeding ground for love and compassion. We develop a "one size fits all" solution and impose that on our kids.
Second, "I don't know, you know". In these relationships, we presume that we don't know, and the other person knows. We stop applying our minds to the problem at hand and expect the other person to provide all the solutions to us. We become overdependent. Slowly and gradually, the other person gets overburdened and often gets irritated. These dependencies make the other person quite insecure because he has to think of the "dependent partner" all the time and is unable to explore the growth opportunities. That brings both of them to a lower level of exploration, and both suffer in the process and live a substandard life.
Third, "I know, you know". These relationships are happy relationships, where both partners have confidence in the capacity of each other. At the same time, since they both have a belief that they know, there is not much of growth. They are both equally closed to whatever meaning of life they have understood and remain confined to that. In the eyes of the world, these relationships are perfect, but there is not much opportunity to grow.
The most wonderful relationships are "I don't know, you don't know". When both partners have this feeling, then both explore and help each other explore. The moment we have a feeling that we don't know and I want to know, the entire universe is a classroom, and we learn from any and everything. That makes us grow each moment of life. Every conversation with the partner is an opportunity to grow and learn. We enjoy discussions for hours on each aspect of life. In the process, we both get to know and grow.
Ideally, all our relationships should fall in the fourth category. It is quite natural to believe that in a world where there are billions of galaxies, with each galaxy having billions of stars, we naturally don't know so many things. Where does that feeling of "I know" or "You know" come from? When we do not work hard to understand life, we tend to acquire some meaning of life, as told by our parents or society, or as we read in a book or hear from some Guru. Since we never examined its reality, we are not confident of the same at the core of our hearts. However, at the same time, we have structured our entire life around that and all our decisions are based on that meaning we have made. That's why we somehow want to prove that we are right. That's why we become so aggressive. Some of us are still confused about the meaning of life, and these people get easily targeted by the "big mouth," and they become fans of the people who can boast of knowing the meaning of life. "I don't know" attitude requires constant enquiry and awareness. Most people somehow want to be certain and therefore develop all these complexes and make their lives limited.
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