The seven stages of intimacy

What is intimacy?

When you want to meet something in your life in order to get to know it or to learn or receive something from it, it is important that you discern and sense the different stages that you go through as you engage in that meeting. It always begins at the moment you first realize that something is there, that something exists, and it continues until you are intimate with it. These stages are energetically strongly connected to the values of the seven most elemental life energies (chakras).

By recognizing the different stages, you will become aware of how each phase of your life process manifests within you, which will enable you to respond more adequately to the challenges and the attraction of that which you wish to know more deeply and to meet truly and intimately. These seven stages of intimacy apply not only to the way you meet people, nature, or yourself, but to anything you wish to know more deeply, including experiences such as pain, light, peace, rejection, and the like. Only by entering into deep intimacy with everything that is there, by closeness, by tasting it, and opening yourself to it, can you get to know it as it truly is.

Simply studying everything in life is too rational and distant, and if we respond to it based on our personal preferences, it is too emotional and too strongly determined by our conditioning. So there is nothing left to do but to allow our meetings with it to become so intimate that, on the one hand, we fully meet that which we want to get to know, and on the other hand, we open ourselves up so much that we also meet the depth of ourselves in it. Intimacy literally means being together with something “in” the “innermost,” “in” the “most trusted.” Intimacy is an invitation to let everything you experience come into contact with your inner self, your being, your soul.

Nowadays, intimacy is mainly associated with the experience of sexuality, but from a spiritual perspective, your soul, your being, rather than sexuality is the most intimately familiar and trusted part of you.

The longing to awaken spiritually invites you to let everything in life come so close to you, that by being together with it from within, you can know its true nature and truly meet your essence.

1.

Meeting life deeply

Do you believe in your being, in your essence, in your soul, when I refer to being as "the good"? The good, not as the opposite of evil, but as the benevolent, supportive and serving fundamental force of life. The word "believe" is used here in its true meaning of praise, honor, and love. Whatever you praise and love automatically becomes greater, and whatever you ignore becomes smaller or even disappears.

If someone does not believe in the essential, the good, then he believes in something else, for example that existence is threatening or something similar, because everyone believes in something, praises something, even if it is nothing. To experience something, you have to believe in it, because what you do not believe in, you do not experience. Either because you have never really opened yourself to it and therefore do not know it, or because you deny it and thus push it out of your perception or erase it.

What someone experiences as their world of experience is made up of what they have believed, what they have opened themselves to in one way or another. They have believed and honored it, and as a result the experience of it, that is, its existence, has become greater and clearer in them.

If someone believes in the Essence, it will become a larger and larger part of his experience, and if someone does not believe in his Essence or his soul, for example, because he believes that life has no Essence, the Essence and the soul can disappear completely from his experience.

When someone does not believe in something, he does not recognize its existence as valuable and does not give it space to exist. It is then difficult to talk to that person about it, and it is even more difficult to open them up to it or teach them its value. People are always shaped by what they have believed. You too are being shaped by what you have believed in your life so far.

Therefore, in order to meet something in your life or to know it deeply, it is important that you recognize what you believe and what you do not believe. What you do not believe you can never know deeply, and it will not help you to open up enough to know the depth of yourself. To experience this step, to deeply meet something, you could ask yourself where you give your attention and energy too and where you do not, so that it becomes clearer whether this is in line with your sincere longing to truly meet life, its aspects, and yourself, and thus get to know this more deeply.

This first step of intimacy is related to the energy of Muladhara, the grounding, base, existence, or root chakra: is something allowed to be, and do you give it the right to exist by opening yourself to it, connecting your energy to it, and experiencing it?

2.

Longing for authenticity

Do you long for the real you and all that exists? Do you long for authenticity, for your soul as the core of what is real, what is true? Are you attracted to feeling your soul, to experiencing what is essential within you? All these questions are designed to help you feel whether you are really longing for contact with the essential, your soul, or whether you want to use it as a spiritual solution to your problems or to compensate for your feeling of inner poverty.

Longing means that you want to shorten the distance between you and what you are longing for. If your longing for the essential, for your soul, is your sincere and affectively based desire, then you want to be closer to your soul, you long for a deeper contact or a more intense connection with it.

However, if you want to use your soul as a solution, you are just hoping to get rid of something unpleasant, and there is actually no truly felt longing for a deeper connection with the essential. The essential can only be encountered when you accept physical reality. You can't look for someone unless you know where they live, or you can't feel someone's love unless you open yourself to their humanity. So if you banish unpleasant experiences from your life, you will no longer be open to knowing the substance of life and yourself.

To connect with this stage of intimacy, you might ask yourself whether you are sincerely longing for a more deeply felt connection to your essence, or whether this question makes you aware that you have been primarily focused on solving your problems of insecurity and emptiness. Even if the latter is your experience, this awareness can shake you out of an unconscious habit and bring you back into contact with your sincere longing for the fulfilling value of authenticity. There is no point in trying to sweep away your discomfort with enthusiasm, when it is this very attempt that makes the fulfilling substance of the soul inaccessible to you.

As you feel your longing for the authenticity of your soul again through these realizations, you will notice how much energy, space and freedom you feel as a result. This step of intimacy is related to the energy of Svadhisthana, the sex, fertility, authenticity or identity chakra: May you long for authenticity, for the fulfilling and healing value of the real?

3.


Acting out of longing

Do you recognize those moments when you suddenly feel whole or more whole, when you suddenly feel, yes, this is how life is meant to be, this is fulfilling and this fulfillment makes it worthwhile? Moments when you feel, yes, this is how life feels through and through, and this must be the value of my soul, of my being?

Do you recognize in yourself the values that you affirm and strengthen, that make you feel closer to your being? Being is another word for “the good,” but also for essence, love, soul, light, heart or inner self. Do you recognize the essence as a kind of atmosphere in every conversation, in every meeting, in every occurrence, in every movement of life? Or do you mainly look at what is superficial, inadequate and personal?

When you believe in Being, the Essence, the Soul, and you praise and honor it and give it the right to exist, then this also means that you assume that everything is intentionally good and therefore not against you, but for you. That is why this phase is about recognizing what is the truth, the quality, the energy that makes you more open and brings you closer to your inner being. It is important that you recognize the essential, even if it is subtle, and that you can open yourself to it, because otherwise your life will not take the direction that will truly contribute to the development you so long for.

To connect with this stage of intimacy, you could ask yourself if you truly want to become aware of the consequences of your actions and ways of thinking. By feeling how certain things happen, but also how your thoughts or actions affect your actual openness to life and what you meet, you will immediately experience whether or not you are connecting more deeply with the value of what you meet or with the energy of your being. This gives you insight into which activities, thoughts, and behaviors bring you into alignment with your being, and which reactions of your thoughts or actions harden you, cause you to struggle, or otherwise distance you from your soul energy.

This step of intimacy is connected to the energy of Manipura, the manifestation, the power, the solar plexus or the stomach chakra: may you also begin to move, may you begin to give answers to your life and act from what you truly long for, from your longing for the essential?

4.

Exchanging value

As you open up more and more to what you recognize as real in a situation and in yourself, will you allow it to come closer to you, or will you create a buffer between you and it to keep yourself at a distance, to remain an observer, for example? Can the essence of what you believe in, what you praise, what you long for, what you recognize more and more and open up to more and more, can this real and valuable part also touch you, move you, or do you ward off its influence so that you keep its value at a distance?

As long as you observe something, no matter how detailed, you are not really touched by it and you can keep your distance, but as soon as something touches you, the distance is gone. When you hear a knock at your door, you are asked to answer. Life is no longer as noncommittal as it would have been if you had heard nothing, because now you have been touched and you can no longer deny that touch. When something real and therefore essential touches you, there's a real connection and it affects you. When something touches you, there is also an opportunity and an invitation for connection. Do you accept this invitation to connect, to relate, to engage with that which has touched you?

May that which touches you move you, and may you respond with a willingness to exchange? A more intimate exchange between your value, the value of the one being is touched, and the value of that which touches you. If so, this is your entrance into a deeper, more sensitive relationship. To feel this step of intimacy, you can ask yourself if you are willing to be in an open and sensitive interaction with what is happening, so that both the authenticity of the moment and the you being touched by it can be experienced more deeply. Whatever value you are experiencing, your willingness to relate to it, to engage with it, and to exchange value with it will allow you to feel more deeply whether that value brings you closer to your soul or further away from it.

This step of intimacy is related to the energy of Anahata, the love, compassion, silent center or heart chakra: allowing yourself to be touched and entering into an affective and sensitive exchange with everything.

5.

Allowing its influence

Now that you are willing to exchange the values of authenticity, to what extent do you allow these values to influence you? To what extent are you willing to allow the influence of that which supports a deeper connection to your being? Can you allow that which touches you, that which knocks on your door, that which you have found to be essential and real, to enter you and to influence you in a loving way?

As a human being you are always influenced by something because you are always experiencing something. You are always being touched by something, even if it is unconsciously. Now, in this phase of deeper connection, the question is whether you want to consciously feel, whether you want to open yourself up to the influence of the real that you have encountered in certain situations and within yourself. This influence, like all influences, will determine you, and everything that determines and influences you will shape your thoughts and actions. If something influences you, you will say things that are in line with it and you will express feelings that reflect your vulnerability in that area.

Out of habit, you are often completely unaware that you have always been determined by unconscious influences from your childhood, by the authority of your brain, or by the beliefs you hold dear. A person is full of the consequences of what they have allowed to influence them, or what they now consciously wish to be influenced by. Hence this invitation to consciously feel what influence you long for, and if it comes from your essence, whether you actually accept that influence. If you are afraid of being influenced, it often has to do with your fear of losing control, the familiar consequences of letting go of the influences you trust.

But if you want to develop, you have to accept new influences all the time, otherwise you will continue to cling to the influence you already know out of fear and remain stuck in the way this has made you into what you are. To experience this step of intimacy, you can ask yourself if you allow yourself to be influenced by the values of a particular meeting, instead of remaining reserved and clinging to your old habits out of insecurity.

This step of intimacy is related to the energy of Vishuddhi, the purification, communication, expression or throat chakra: are you allowing yourself to be influenced by what you recognize as valuable?

6.

Let it come true

Now that you have accepted it, can the essence of a situation and the inspiration you are experiencing through your ever-increasing openness within yourself be allowed to work and influence everywhere within you?

This is not a task, but a consequence of your longing to be more intimate with it. You are moving in together, so to speak, and the question now is whether your partner is allowed to exert its influence everywhere. Not to be overwhelmed by the other person or the other thing or your inspiration, but to allow your longing for your feelings of authenticity to come together, to deepen the fulfilling experience of your togetherness and the experience of greater wholeness that you experience in the process.

The influence of the other person, the influence of something you want to know more deeply, the influence of the inspiration you are experiencing more and more clearly as you open up and allow it to work in all of your cells, is the natural consequence of your longing to become more one with what feels good, loving, and right. This influence is welcome. You want to experience this influence in everything. You gladly give space to that influence. This influence opens you even more as you release your fixed ideas even deeper. In order to allow this influence to become real within you, you have to let go of your identification with the way you have arranged things so far, in order to arrive at a form in which 'you' feel good together, can be together, will be together, and want to be together. Letting go of your identifications and feeling how the influence of the other or the essential is allowed to be everywhere and in everything is a celebration of liberation from your ego-orientation and becoming more and more deeply imbued with the quality you have been longing for.

From the longing to meet your soul, your essence, everything now flows with essence and inspiration as you continue to feel it, for otherwise you would not be able to enjoy this influence and experience that it is what you so intensely long for. Of course, at this time, you may also feel fear and want to hold on to your identifications and habits for fear of being overwhelmed and ending up in a kind of poverty by losing your identity. Everyone faces these fears because opening up so deeply in a vulnerable way affects your sense of stability. However, those who praise, honor, and celebrate authenticity will soon feel that it is actually an immense enrichment.

Essence and inspiration give you such riches that you no longer need to hold on out of fear of becoming impoverished. Just as a relationship gives you so much more support that you no longer need to be afraid of being alone when you come home. To experience this step of intimacy, you can ask yourself if, in your togetherness with someone or something other or the essential, you can continue to feel what it is like to be enriched by the influence of the real.

This step of intimacy is connected to the energy of Ajna, the command, insight, wisdom, third eye, or brow chakra: may every cell in you be profoundly changed by the influence of the essential, so that you see more and more clearly the true value of everything?

7.

Being together

May the influence of the other, of the different, of the essential, and your inspiration have taken place in such a way that you have come to live in this quality? And may this coexistence with the essential, with your soul, be so truly allowed and experienced that your togetherness is truth?

At the beginning of this meeting you became aware of something that you began to pay attention to, to praise, and in doing so you gave it the right to exist in your experience (1).

In your longing for fulfillment, for wholeness and authenticity, you found the longing to reduce the distance to that authenticity, and in doing so, you allowed it deeper into you (2).

This allowed you to more clearly feel what did and did not quite match the authenticity you longed for. You more deeply allowed what fits and you let go of what did not fit (3).

You responded to what did fit with your willingness to exchange the values of authenticity you recognized in it even more deeply (4).

You then also accepted the influence of that authenticity, allowing it in and saying yes to further engagement with that influence (5).

You moved past your fear of losing your identity and allowed the real you longed for to influence everything so that a loving togetherness could emerge (6).

For this togetherness with your inspiration, you opened yourself completely to be intimate with it, to be with it in your innermost being, so that this togetherness could be real (7).

In that intimacy, stillness arises naturally. In that intimacy, you know everything in its authenticity, in its dismantled state, in its pure and natural value. In this intimacy, what is 'within' is also reality and reality is also 'within', the being within you and the being around you are the same spheres of life, the same qualities of life. Are you allowed to be completely with your being, your soul, your inner self? To be together and not to be taken over by it.

To feel this step of intimacy, you could ask yourself if the soul, the essence within you, is allowed to use your humanity to shine through it. This creates the greatest intimacy, closeness and union possible in your human existence. Then the essence gives you inspiration and value, and you give the soul the space to be true through you, to be valuable. This is the intimacy that I mean when I talk about meditation. Meditation is being so close to your essence that you feel and know it almost seamlessly, and from there you give space to enlighten your humanity and your life.

This step of intimacy is connected to the energy of openness, the energy of Sahasrara, the crown, thousand-petaled lotus, infinity, or crown chakra: are you allowed to be with your inspiration, both in your way of living and with others, as well as in meditation and self-love? Are you allowed to be with your soul?

---

Translated from the Dutch text: Bezieling door Inzicht - 200 levensthema's voor innerlijke groei, thema: 151. De zeven stappen van intimiteit. (Only available in Dutch)

---

Anandajay (which means “blessing from the heart”) has been dedicated to integrating the spiritual essence into daily life for over 50 years. He has developed twelve teachings (spiritual practices), 50 music albums (mantras, pujas and ragas) and twenty books (written in Dutch) to bring you closer to the natural basis of your existence, your spiritual authenticity, and its wholesome, joyful essence, so that it can also be your shining, spiritual guide in your life. He expresses the core value of his work as: The Light of Being.