We want intimacy. In our culture, that word generally refers to physical intimacy.

Switching gears, we’ve often heard the phrase that “practice makes perfect.”

What’s the connection between intimacy and practice?

Not much. Why? We have learned an ironic truth: that the act of physical intimacy doesn’t necessarily lead to, or even involve, intimacy. (Please click here for past webpost entitled Is Sexual Attraction a Cosmic Joke?)

We also want a heart connection with others based on unconditional acceptance.  In this regard, I remember that my father told me as a young child “don’t wear your heart on your sleeve.”

My father often had good advice. But not in this case. For me, wearing my heart on my sleeve is part of basic goodness! (Please click here for definitions of this term.) It requires a great deal of courage because I am vulnerable when I wear my heart on my sleeve. Because it requires that I don’t intellectualize my emotions. Because it requires that I tell the truth. Because it requires that I dissolve the barriers between me and my heart.

The title of this post is “Intimacy – practice makes perfect.” What’s the connection between intimacy based on the heart and practice?

To summarize, this post:

• uses the word “practice,” not in the usual sense of doing something over and over again to get better or increase our skill, but to refer to spiritual practice;
• deals with emotional intimacy; and
  
• deals with the question “What is the relationship between so-called  “spiritual” practice and intimacy?
  

On the path that I travel, called Shambhala Buddhism,  we have a variety of different types of practice.

I’ll deal first with meditation practice, both individual and group.

 Meditation is the practice of facing yourself completely, cultivating intimacy with your breath [click here for song “Every Breath You Take”) and awareness. It is an intimacy that goes far beyond the companionship and gratification we seek from another. Keeping company with yourself can change the expectations you place on a relationship. Through a mindfulness practice, you see firsthand what it means to take responsibility for your own happiness and fulfillment, and you experience love of a different kind—unconditional love, which arises spontaneously as your true nature. <source: from the September 2011 issue of the Shambhala Sun; article by Karen Maezen Miller>

Doing group practice extends this intimacy with ourselves out to others.

When you practice formally with a group, you’ll have the opportunity to sit in silence for a day or more alongside someone you’ve never met. Eventually, your mind will grow quiet and your concentration will deepen. You will share proximity without the judgments and expectations we usually impose on those around us, and be in relationships that are not conditioned by what another person is doing for you or how they are serving you. This is what happens in a silent meditation retreat. At the end of the time together, you might be inclined to do what I do: turn to the stranger sitting nearby, smile, and spontaneously say, “I love you.” The thing is, I really mean it. Is it possible to love in this way? Yes, from the very bottom of your heart and mind, when everything else drops away, it is possible and it is effortless. <source: from the September 2011 issue of the Shambhala Sun; article by Karen Maezen Miller>

Besides meditation practice, there are other kinds of practices called deity practice. Again, what is the relationship between practice and intimacy?

In my perspective, intimacy only arises when one has undercut one’s solid identity. Vajrayana sadhanas create an environment for this to happen:

Your body is made of radiant white light. You have four arms and you are seated in meditation posture. You do not really exist, and this non-existence is marked by profound wisdom and boundless compassion. You are Avalokiteshvara. <source: Eric Holm on “The power of visualization practice to overcome ego and pacify obstacles.” Shambhala Sun, January 2002>

Your mind and the deity become one.

To me, this is an act of intimacy of the most profound kind because it involves surrendering one’s ego, one’s identity based on concepts e.g. “I-am-the-person-who-has-this-kind-of-career” etc. etc. etc. Again, to me, genuine intimacy involves offering one’s body, one’s speech and one’s mind.

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