Non-Exploitative Relationship

Today a book fell open to the exact page I needed.

Let us imagine, for instance, that we meet someone, whom after a while we start to like. The question arises: why do we like them? The answer is: we like them because they satisfy a need in us. This need may be conscious but it is most often unconscious.

Usually...we do not try [to find out what the unconscious need is]. Instead we rationalize the situation and say "I like them because they are kind and considerate," ...or "I like them because they are interested in Buddhism as I am." Whatever it is that we say, the real source of the liking is, in most cases, something quite different. That particular person...satisfies a cerain need--perhaps a very deep need--in us....

If someone has started to satisfy a need of ours...then we shall naturally want our relationship with that person to continue; so long as our need continues, we shall continue to want it satisfied. The best way for us to ensure that someone continues satisfying our need is to find out what that person needs, and then satisfy that. This is what we usually do, whether consciously or unconsciously....

In this way they become dependent on us for the satisfaction of their need, just as we have become dependent upon them for the satisfaction of our need.... Thus there arises mutual dependence and mutual exploitation, which together form the basis of most human relationships. It is as if a mutual but largely unconscious bargain is struck between two people.... Neither person...questions whether either need is a real need which ought to be satisfied, or is an artificial need which were better not satisfied--the whole process is more or less unconscious.

At this point someone might well ask, "Should we, then, never take what we need from another person?"

The answer to this is found in the verse from the Dhammapada: "Let the sage live [literally, 'fare'] in the village as the bee goes taking honey from the flower without harming colour or fragrance."

We may take what we need from another person, whether what we need is material, psychological, or spiritual, but we must take it like the bee, without harming the flower, i.e. without harming the person from whom we take it. In other words, we must take non-exploitively.

[The simile can be extended if you consider that a bee also pollinates the flower, benefitting the plant. By the same token, a natural, uncalculated and joyful relationship enriches and enlivens the participants. --S.]

We may say that there are two kinds of relationship: one based on exploitation, the other free from exploitation. We usually find that a relationship based on...mutual exploitation, either terminates catastrophically (when one person, for whatever reason, is no longer prepared to meet the need of the other) or settles down into a routine of ever-increasing boredom (if two people are involved in a relationship where they are giving to the other because the other is giving to them... [E]ventually this becomes very repetitious and boring indeed).

On the other hand, a relationship in which the satisfaction of need is more conscious, more aware, and which is not based upon any sort of bargain or exchange but upon...a full and free mutual giving without any tought of return, can go on continually deepening, becoming more and more meaningful.

Reprinted from Sangharakshita's A Guide to the Buddhist Path (Windhorse Publications, 1990)