EP25. Loving and Living without Attachment

This episode is number two in the three-part series “Loving and Living without Attachment,” recorded in the winter of 2002 on the Gold Coast, Australia. The complete series is currently available as a paid product, and it will also be available to stream through The Barry Long Archive soon. Keep an eye on the Archive for the streaming release and related updates. #BarryLong #LoveWithoutAttachment #EverydaySpirituality #BarryLongArchive ~ Summary of the episode: The talk opens with the statement to “lift the game” by becoming more intelligent about life, not by joining a spiritual path. There is no separate spiritual path, Barry says: your whole life—from birth to the split-second of death—is the only path. Intelligence is to ask the simple cause question: Why am I suffering? Because, Barry says, most emotional pain is home-made through attachment. We love and quietly demand continuity, so when death or parting arrives—mother, child, partner, even a pet—the pain is maintained by expectation and then cemented by the well-meaning sympathy of friends, cards, and condolences. Sentiment and sympathy keep sorrow respectable, even sacred. Barry pushes back against this cultural worship of suffering, calling it unintelligent because life itself demonstrates impermanence every day. To love without attachment is possible, Barry says, but rarely taught; instead, families model clinging, and religions canonise pain, turning it into a virtue. Physical pain deserves practical science and care; emotional pain dissolves only when its maker sees the attachment and lets it go. Becoming more intelligent therefore means noticing the reflex to dramatise loss, refusing consolation that embalms it, and facing the fact: if I attach to anything in time—work, money, lover, identity—I will suffer when it changes. This is not heartlessness but clarity: love can be wholehearted and steady without the chain of expectation. The spiritual task is not managing moods or collecting consolations but seeing causes, ending the inner cooperation with sorrow, and standing where life is actually happening–now. In that seeing, grief loses its authority: the heart remains open, the memory tender, yet the suffering reflex no longer runs the show, and intelligence, not sentiment, guides love. ~ About the series: The series presents one of Barry's most helpful teachings for man and woman who aspire to live together harmoniously. He covers many topics around a central theme - attachments, what causes them, why we suffer their effects and how to get rid of them. He is questioned by the audience on the implications for relationships, partnerships and marriage. He speaks about the folly of having beliefs, the familiarity that obscures our attachments and the heartbreak of having to put the truth first. And he shows us how to be more intelligent in our relationships and how to get rid of attachments and keep love alive. Link to series: https://www.barrylong.org/products/au... ~ About The Barry Long Archive: The Barry Long Archive is a repository of over 20 years of Barry Long’s teachings. The archive currently features more than 350 videos, the full podcast, and over 1500 audio recordings on the way – these will be added over time as the archive continues to grow. The archive offers two subscription options: monthly and yearly, with the longer plan offering concessionary rates. The subscription includes unlimited streaming of all available content for the duration of your access. Link: https://www.barrylong.org/archive Subscription: https://www.barrylong.org/subscriptions ~ Related topics from the archive: 🏷 Man and woman in love: https://www.barrylong.org/archive/top... 🏷 Practical advice for relationships: https://www.barrylong.org/archive/top... ~ Related articles from the archive: 📃 Love – as it truly is: https://www.barrylong.org/archive/art... – "Most women's lovemaking experiences are fraught with frustration. Most of the experience of men consists of arousal with the prospect of ejaculation. Between her underlying fears, her reservations and hopes based on past experience, and his dancing excitement, also based on the past, there is very little chance of making true love between the two of them in the now or present. It will produce more emotion than love." 📃 A love that endures: https://www.barrylong.org/archive/art... ~ Barry Long was a spiritual teacher who taught internationally from the 1980's up until his death in 2003. His spiritual teaching is grounded in practicality and addresses all aspects of modern day life. http://www.barrylong.org   / barrylongquotes     / barrylongnews     / barrylong.truerealandhere