AH: Sometimes in relationships, especially today, you hear people say, 'I'm looking for a girlfriend or boyfriend that I hope will turn out to be a wife or husband.' There are two possible kinds of relationships: long-term relationships and short-term, recreational relationships. In the latter, there aren't a lot of rules. Anything goes and you have no right to expectations because what you're looking for is a good time. But there is bound to be some chaos because you cannot have expectations without rules.

 

By contrast, what is a long-term relationship, a committed relationship? Basically, it's a marriage. It's not enough to say, 'I'm in a long-term, committed relationship' because the next question is going to be, 'Are you married?' And you say 'no.' So what determines the commitment? Saying that suggests that there is some wiggle room there.

 

But if someone who finds you attractive approaches you at a party and is told 'I'm married,' that's it. Hard stop and they move on to the next person. Energetically, marriage is more than just a piece of paper. So the lesson is: if you are looking for a husband or a wife, you have to go looking for a husband or a wife, not for a boyfriend or a girlfriend.

 

LL: How long should people wait after a break-up before getting into a new relationship?

 

AH: There are varying opinions on this. It depends a lot on the level or depth of the past relationship. The reason for this is that, when we experience any feeling of lack, our tendency, our nature, is to try and fill it ASAP. It's sort of like when you're starving and you don't have the patience to wait to get home to dinner. So you stop and snack on the way home. The problem is we ruin our appetite.

 

Spiritually, it works the same way. If we want to draw into our lives the things and people who are more right for us, we must not come from a place of lack or neediness. This is sure to result in a vicious cycle of going from one relationship to another. That's why they call it rebound. One needs to know and learn to make the distinction between what's good long-term, and what's good for the moment. Rarely are they ever the same.

 

LL: At the risk of being overly simplistic, much of Kabbalah's teachings sound like plain old common sense, something my grandmother might have advocated.

 

AH: Well, it may look that way (chuckles) but you know what they say: Common sense isn't all that common. And even though there are many universal truths right in front of our faces that we know are true, we don't necessarily know how to put them into a formula for life. That's something that Kabbalah does very well.

 

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