One of the most important teachers in my life has been Raphael Cushnir, who introduced me to the practice of Emotional Connection. This work is about turning toward what we’re feeling in the moment, staying present with it, and allowing that connection to speak to and transform us.
Raphael’s work has shaped not just how I understand feelings, but how I stay present with what’s real in me. One of the many things I love about him is that he values spiritual teachers who are willing to be honest about where they struggle. That’s stayed with me. It’s something I value deeply too, and it’s part of what I hope to live and share through my own work.
I’ve seen how easy it is for teachers and guides to separate themselves from those they support. Someone touches something real and then slowly, almost without noticing, they begin to speak from a place that says I know and you don’t.
That’s never felt right to me. What feels true is something much more human. I live from and as what’s beyond the personal, but I’m also fully human. I still feel hurt. I still get confused. I still long to be met.
This experience has been showing me that in a real way.
There’s someone I worked with in an office setting who, at the beginning, seemed open and engaged. We connected not just around the work, but around life. That’s how I naturally move toward people. I want to know what matters to them. I want to share what matters to me. It’s not a strategy. It’s just how my heart works.
But over time, something changed. She became more distant, more formal. The parts of me that bring warmth, humor, and care didn’t seem to be of any interest to her.
At one point she called those qualities superficial. She said she’s not a superficial person. I could feel something in me tighten when she said that, even though I tried to stay open.
Little things began to add up. She stopped using my nickname. Sometimes she wouldn’t use my name at all. In meetings, when there was space to check in as people, she would stay silent.
For a while I kept trying to reach her. I thought maybe if I stayed open enough, something would soften. But it didn’t. Eventually I stopped trying in that way. I met her where she seemed to want to meet, in a more professional and limited space.
I’m still not sure if that was the right choice.
What I do know is that something in me closed down. Not all the way, but enough that I could feel it. There was a kind of guarding, a pulling back. And underneath that, there was hurt.
It touched something older in me. A fear that maybe what I bring doesn’t have value. That maybe the parts of me that feel most alive aren’t wanted.
From a nondual perspective, I can see that all of this is happening within awareness. The sensations, the thoughts, the story about her and about me, they arise and pass in something that isn’t hurt by any of it. There’s a real freedom in seeing that.
But that’s not the whole truth of my experience.
I’m also this human being who felt a kind of ache when I was around her and who still feels a knot in his stomach when her name comes up. And if I try to skip over that by going straight to the transcendent, something gets left behind.
What’s been helping me is seeing this through the lens of Martin Buber’s I and Thou. When I first met her, there was a sense of Thou. A meeting between two people who were present to each other. Not perfect, but real. Over time, the relationship shifted into something more like I and It. Functional. Task oriented. Defined.
At first I thought she made that shift. Now I’m starting to see that I did too.
When I felt unseen, I began to see her less as a whole person and more as someone who doesn’t get me. Someone who doesn’t value what I value. In subtle ways, she became an object in my mind. And from there, it was almost inevitable that my heart would close.
So what am I learning from this?
I think I’m learning that being open doesn’t mean insisting on connection. It doesn’t mean trying to bring someone into a way of relating that they haven’t chosen. There’s a kind of humility in letting people be where they are, even when it’s not where I would prefer to meet them.
I’m also learning that my sensitivity isn’t a weakness, but it does need care. When something touches an old place in me, I can acknowledge that without building a story around it. I can feel the hurt without turning it into a conclusion about the other person or own my worth.
And maybe most importantly, I’m learning that an open heart isn’t the same as a constantly extended one. Sometimes an open heart includes boundaries. It includes meeting someone in a simpler way, without closing them out entirely.
I don’t have a clean ending to this. There are still moments when I look back and it hurts. There are still times when I notice that contraction in my body. But there’s also more understanding now. More space around it.
If I’m going to walk this path in a way that feels true, then reflecting on my own past and present hurts is part of it. Not just the moments of clarity and connection, but the moments where I lose my footing and find it again.
And maybe that’s what allows me to stand with others.
Right here, in the shared experience of being whole and fully human.