Dance of the two spirals

Bijay J Anand | August 8, 2016

I came back after a 45 day intensive tapas from Rishikesh four years ago with a flowing white beard, flat stomach and glowing skin.

One evening a couple of days upon my return, we went out for a party. Somehow, she suddenly became aware of a lot of lady attention that was coming my way on account of how I had transformed due to the detox.

Next morning at 7am she was at the Pilates studio and signed up for a thrice-a-week schedule. Next, she called up her old yoga sir who used to come home and signed him up for the other thrice-a-week routine. Sundays she announced, were for going to the club for a swim or workout. Or both.

As I watched this sudden flurry of (physical) activity in my wife’s life with some amusement, I realised the truth about the two spirals in a relationship.

Often when we go for a morning walk and our minds are free to notice such inanities, we see that couples are usually the same size. By and large, a slim wife would be with a slim husband, an overweight one with an overweight one and an obese with an obese. (As with all things in life, there are of course, a few exceptions to this rule).

So what does this mean you might ask!

Well, its really quite simple if you think about it.

As spouses, we spend so much of our time with each other that we become the greatest influence on each other’s life.

I have a student whose son was very unhealthy on account of his horrid lifestyle choices. When she brought him to me for counseling, I spoke with him and realised that he was very much set in his decadent ways. The only suggestion that I had for my student was to get her son quickly married to a very health conscious girl.

And it worked. Like magic too…

The girl this guy married was into yoga, nutrition, organic food, nature treks and was a teetotaler and a vegetarian. Her son changed overnight. Madly in love with his beau, he turned into a new leaf. A healthy leaf! Both lived happily ever after… (it’s been two years now).

And the converse has also happened before my eyes. A guy or a girl who is reasonably healthy has married into an overweight spouse and taken to their habits and fallen into a downward spiral of life.

This is what exactly ‘The dance of the two spiral means’.

It is not that my wife got insecure with the attention I got at the party. Our love, trust, faith and belief in each other is too strong for such childishness. She saw clearly from someone else’s perspective, how I had ‘moved up’ health-wise and spiritually and she just didn’t want to be left behind.

Numerous times have friends and now students, come to me and told me about their spouses having affairs or about how their spouse has simply stopped finding them attractive.

I have had to very politely make these complainants look at the mirror. By virtue of having lost interest in their own well-being, health, looks and figure they have allowed their lives to be caught in a downward spiral. This negative outlook is not appealing to God even, how do you expect a human spouse to be attracted to you thereafter?

The key to keep a relationship beautiful is not to try to make your spouse better at anything. The secret is to work on your own self. Because the more radiant you become and the more you glow, the more beautiful your aura becomes. You not only become an inspiration to those around you, like your friends and family, you also attain the power to inspire your spouse to follow in your healthy footsteps.

When you sign up for your yoga routine or hit the gym, please don’t make the mistake of coaxing your spouse to join you. That never ever works in the long run.

Remember, to just keep working on your own self; until, you become an inspiration worth emulating.

Be beautiful, be radiant and be blessed always,

Sat Nam

This article was first published in the August 2016 issue of bonobology.com