Hi Maria,

Lately I’m having a difficult living family life.

I’ve always been someone who loves time alone. I actually thrive on it.

However, I come from a family of 4 other siblings, and married late in life to a person with 2 children (grown now).

I sometime wonder if it was the right choice, although my spouse is a wonderful person.

I was wondering what are your feelings regarding responsibility to family and to oneself?

I feel ridiculously selfish most of time, as when I have free time, I don’t want to socialize really with anyone.

I work full time and am out of the house 12 hours a day. Obviously wanting to be left alone on weekends or when I have time off doesn’t exactly jive with family.

I’m looking into changing jobs, but there is something that has always been with me that resists the tight confines of family.

And if I say so myself, I am quite selfish with my time.

I know this isn’t a spiritual question, but was interested in your feelings about family.

♥♥♥

Ooh, I love this question!

Firstly because I totally get what you mean and can relate to it and secondly because I know that many people are having these same kind of thoughts and challenges because their family members don’t get their need for solitude and thus think they are weird because they want to be alone “all the time”.

Also, I want to mention that questions and topic request doesn’t have to be “spiritual”, there are no restrictions to what questions anyone wants to ask.

If it resonates with me and I’m inspired and intrigued to reply with an article, then that’s what I’ll do.

So there’s no limits at all to the topics.

Ask Away! 🙂

Okay, so your question is:

I was wondering what are your feelings regarding responsibility to family and to oneself?

I know this isn’t a spiritual question, but was interested in your feelings about family.

About responsibility;

I believe we only have responsibility to follow our own inclinations and flow.

If all people did that the world would function in a completely different way and there would be less obstruction to the natural flow of things (this does not exclude responsibility even if that sounds paradoxical).

I would not want to be with a man if he wasn’t true to himself first because I know that when he’s in flow with himself (and I with myself), then we’re in flow together. 

But most people just mindlessly follow the crowd and do what everybody else is doing without thinking for themselves.

An example from my own life;

When I was 15 years old I fell in love with someone who I thought was the love of my life and he felt the same about me so believe it or not but we actually got engaged at that age.

But here’s the thing; we didn’t really ‘think’.

I never saw it as a step towards marriage and I don’t think he did either.

I just think we were so in love and just followed ‘tradition’ by getting engaged and this was supported by our families too so it wasn’t like we were we rebelling against anything.

It was just a puppy love thing (not ‘just’ but you know what I mean), but it was very strong for us and we were actually together for 8 years before we split up.

We just grew apart for many reasons and we were more like siblings almost in the end, like brother and sister and not a couple.

Anyways,

My point is that we didn’t really *think* when it came to the engagement thing, we just did what people do when they are in love.

Thank God we never got married because I have never been into that sort of thing.

I remember when I met this guy that I’m talking about and when my parents saw that I was really in love.

My mom got really excited and started to talk about grandchildren really early on and I always told her that “there’s never ever going to be any kids born through this body, I don’t want children” but my mom thought that I would change my mind but I never did.

I have never been interested in family life and children.

I could not stand having children to be honest.

I’m not a mommy type of person at all, and I remember in the past when I mentioned this to another guy I’ve met he said something like “Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure you’d be a really good mom” and I was like “eh, no. You don’t understand; I don’t want kids, I don’t like being around them for too long”.

People have misunderstood me often because they are not used to women saying that they are not interested in children or family life.

I have even had other women been almost angry with me because I don’t want children.

Some have been condescending and said things like “Oh, you will change when you grow up” and again I’m like “eh, nope, I won’t. I don’t like being around children for too long, I find them annoying”.

Not all people are suppose to have kids, but people just seem to follow that path because everybody else does.

I know of people who I think never should have had kids but they had them anyway and probably because that was the way they thought life should go.

Most people don’t think, they just go along with whatever is laid up in front of them by culture, society, or what their families or other people around them expect of them.

As a young adult I quickly realized that I will probably always be outgrowing people as I saw this happening frequently and especially in love relationships but also with friends.

The main reason for any breakups I have had in my life (both friends and partners) have been for the reason that I have outgrown them and they have stayed in one stage of their development (they stopped growing).

So I left them.

I could never promise someone to love them “til death do us apart”. Never. I can love you now (and if I do I’m 100% loyal) but I don’t know if I will love you tomorrow, no one can really promise that to another.

A relationship would be a strain if I was ‘suppose’ to love someone but had simply fallen out of love, like a constant ‘trying to hold it together’ type of thing.

No thanks I’d say. If I grow and find myself falling out of love, I fall out of love and I move on.

I could also get married multiple times in my life just for the fun of it/the celebration (provided that my partner had the same point of view of course) so I don’t see anything wrong with getting a divorce if things don’t work out.

With this said, most of my relationships have been long ones, and I also believe in life long love (that would be wonderful, to grow old with someone you feel deep love and respect for), but I don’t believe in contracts when it comes to love.

People are differently created, we’re not suppose to follow the herd, only our own natural inclinations. 

So my feeling with you is that you’re coming more and more to yourself now and it’s a bit unnerving because the need to be alone and in solitude gets stronger and stronger and at the same time it goes against the ‘norm’ or how life is ‘suppose to be’.

But at some point a choice has to be made and the stronger the call for solitude, the closer you get to a breaking point of some kind and I believe you’re about to find out what that choice is about in the near future. 

I sincerely hope that you have a fantastic spouse that understands and respects your need for solitude. 

I chose a different route early on in my life when I let everybody know that I would never have a family. This disappointed my mom especially since she had really wanted grandchildren from me (I’m her first-born).

But that’s a long time ago and she eventually got her grandchildren! 

I have 5 siblings in my family and many of them have children now so my mom is happy! 🙂

And I enjoy them too!

Because I’m not a child-hater, I just don’t like being around them for too long and I have never taken care of my siblings children, they have always known that there’s no use asking me if I would babysit because I never would.

I like my freedom very much. I can play with my nieces and nephews and enjoy it but if any whining begins I leave and tell them to go to their mommy or something like that.

I don’t like whining and sulking, not with kids not with adults, it’s just annoying to me and I can’t stand it.

Back to the guy who once told me that “oh, I know you would be a good mom, don’t worry”, I remember thinking “of course I would, who said anything about that I wouldn’t”, because I know I would be a great parent, I just don’t want to be one, ever.

And it’s a funny thing now that I’ve been in India for a while; people here find it weird that I’m not married and ask me “but why aren’t you married..? ” and when I say I’m not interested I get this strange look back as if they just can’t grasp that, that it’s possible to not want to have a a family.

Another thing came to mind;

An old friend of mine recently said that “oh, you should go to an orphan home now that’s you’re in India and volunteer taking care of street children” or something like that and I’m like,

“..? What? You know I don’t like being around kids so I’m obviously not interested in taking care of them either” and he said (with a “spiritual” tone) that “oh, that will change when you’re in India. Remember; ‘One Love’” and then some new age gibberish of ‘all being one’ etc.

(He’s a very old friend of mine, we go way back, it’s one of those rare life-long type of relationships so I’m stuck with just having to accept his new age type of ideology at this time in his life 😀 ).

So again I had to say that I have no interest whatsoever in changing that about me and no country-visit will ever change that about me neither, it’s complete nonsense to even think I would want to change that about me. 

I’m quite free thank you very much, I don’t suffer from not adoring kids, but in his mind it’s “spiritual” to love everyone, especially children, and I think many people have the same type of beliefs.

Other people in the past have said things like “maybe you should spend more time with children, that would maybe change you” and again I have to say,

“NO. I’m not interested! My God! Why on earth would I want to change that about me?? I don’t suffer one bit from not adoring kids. I am very content and happy with the way I am and have never suffered from being like this”.

It’s like that in this world 🙂 When you are different, when you think differently, people want you to change and become ‘like everybody else’.

I’m not a group type of person, but that doesn’t’ mean that I’m asocial.

I too thrive in solitude, I actually enjoy it and prefer it, but that again doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy being around children in small doses at a time because I do, and I do enjoy the company of other adults too at times and I wouldn’t mind finding ‘the love of my life’ and spend my days with him. 

I love my nieces and nephews but I would never want to have any kids of my own; being an aunt is plenty for me and I’m fully satisfied with that.

So there you have it 🙂 My thoughts on family life. Hope it can be helpful to you in some way. 

And lastly just to throw in something “spiritual” here:

Buddha abandoned his family for his pursuit for Truth (he left his wife, kid etc).

He left everything for it.

Something to think about because he was “selfish” too in that regard.

Maybe Life is calling you to do the same, which would not be strange at all.

It happens all the time with people that they are feeling the bonds breaking to their old life as they go deeper and deeper into the awakening process (if that’s where you find yourself).

“Old life” meaning ‘the life they’ve always known’, like friendships, jobs etc, all crumbling and falling apart and we can either go with this deconstruction of the old (by following our inclinations) or we can stay and desperately try to hold it together and maybe even succeed doing that for a few more years.

But whatever we try to hold on to and ‘fix’; if it’s not of Truth, it will eventually die anyway.

So I would suggest that you really (with the uttermost honesty) feel into what is truly resonating with you at this point in your life;

What would it take to be able to follow your own true path (to be able to be true to yourself)?

Feel into what you’re inclined to do and be true to that come what may.

Sometimes families and partners can be understanding and give you more space to be alone but sometimes they won’t be understanding at all, so it all has to come down to you, what you want and need, so yes, you do need to be “selfish” too.

It’s your life, do what you need to do.

And we all know what that is when we start to look deep within with complete honesty.

The only obstruction to living our true life fully is the beliefs we hold or have accepted as true.

Flow comes from releasing those beliefs (by seeing through them) while holding on to them (emotional attachment and fear of how others will react) is what keeps the obstruction in place.

So the only ‘hindrance’ is you not being true to yourself (not you specifically but everybody).

You could be honest and open about your thoughts and share them with your partner and hope that s/he gives you the space that you need.

It could even bring the two of you closer (even if you’re already close).

What do you think about that, how would it be to do that?

And how would it be to not do that..?  

I believe that that could be a door you stand before at this point in your life (if what I say resonates with you of course) and from this moment on, from the choice you make, a new path and way could start emerging.

(Which by the way does not mean that it would exclude your partner, but then again, it could. It’s a risk that you need to take if you intend to go all the way with Truth).

It’s all in our hands; we all have the option of going with or against ourselves (Life).

What options do you see yourself having?

Usually the thing we fear the most is the thing we need to do.

UPDATE:

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