When I wrote that Russell and I decided to transition our relationship, many people asked what marriage means to me. Beneath that question, I heard a belief that marriage means a commitment to work through everything and stay together no matter what.
That’s not what marriage means to me.
After this past week at Eden Unplugged and the completion ceremony that took place there, I can better speak to my understanding of marriage.
Russell and I married at Burning Man. He asked me on Tuesday and what was to be an engagement celebration that Friday night turned into our wedding.
It felt perfect for us to wed at Burning Man because I do not see marriage as simply a commitment and union between two people, but instead a declaration to the community of an intention to learn, grow and evolve together. I see it as a call and request to the community for support around the union.
Doing relationship in isolation is simply not sustainable. At least not for me.
Looking back at my marriage to Todd (the father of my children), I can see that part of what doomed our marriage was that we were desperately trying to do it all alone. The pressure was far too intense and ultimately the relationship imploded.
So, my Burning Man wedding was a strong call for something else – the support of a community who would help us work through the inevitable conflicts, the pressure of raising children, the evolution of our souls, together.
But, it was the wrong community to ask for that support. The Burning Man community Russell and I stood before during our marriage was not our core community. There were members of each of our individual communities present, but we had not created a container with this group of people that could help us sustain our relationship once we returned home.
Back in Colorado, we tried to create that container here.
We invited in Jolette, Craig, Tyson, Martha, Timothy and a few of the men from the Men’s Leadership Training. And yet, we did not really know how to do it. It was sloppy. We were messy.
In the end, we broke down around the creation of agreements, our communication structures, and the realization that our respective soul’s would be more served by us being apart than by us continuing to try to make it work together.
The transition of our relationship happened at the same time we were bringing together Eden Unplugged. For a time, I did not know what to do — could the event go on? Could I back out at such a late date? Could we still do it together? What would happen?
Finally, I surrendered. And a community came together that may not have coalesced had Russell and I not made space for it with our separation. It was no longer an Alexis and Russell event. Eden Unplugged belonged to the community. Craig, Rebecca, Joy, and the Sacred Service Team stepped in and ultimately Russell stepped out so he could be with his own process.
On the last night of Eden Unplugged, Russell showed up at Eden to attend the Epic Eden event starting the following day.
My heart skipped a beat when I saw him. What would happen? Would there be drama or conflict? Could we use this as a space to bring more love and more resolution?
Ultimately, we did. I wish I could describe to you in detail how that resolution came about, but of course it was one of those “you had to be there” kind of things. Suffice it to say, things were heated, then they weren’t. we spent time in the hot springs, we connected, we communed and it all happened while the Eden Unplugged community danced the night away to the sounds of Porangui and Zang, and Elijah & the Band of Light.
Then, at the very end of our Eden Unplugged closing ceremony as I sat before our community with tears streaming down my face at what had been created, I looked up and saw Russell standing across the tent.
Craig and I invited him in to our circle and I stood between these two men who midwife’d the birth of a community that can support all of us so that none of us ever has to do relationship in isolation again.
And then, as we moved outside to take our Eden family photo, Russell stood before our community, the community that was born as a result of our marriage and he set us all free.
Russell and I got married at Burning Man, divorced at Eden and in the process gave birth to a community that will support us individually, in relationship as we move forward, and in all of our future relationships.
So what does marriage mean to me? It’s a call to the community to support the creation of something greater than it’s individual parts.
Is your relationship supported by a community? If so, how? If not, how can you allow for that going forward?
15 Comments
Thank you so much for sharing Ali. I feel so honored to have shared in this experience of community with you (I really really hate that I missed the closing ceremony.) So much learned, so much experienced, so much loved, so many edges met. Thank you for birthing it. I know there were labor pains but the result was miraculous and pure beauty!
That is quite a remarkable way to frame your marriage and the birth of a new community! Very insightful. I appreciate your courage to act on the truth despite the social morales that tend to negate freedom and ethical individualism. I also appreciate your willingness to share so we can all begin to learn as people like yourself break out of the hardened imaginations and expectations. As we listen to what arises out of the unknown and unfamiliar in our own soul – she can guide us in ways we couldn’t have imagined.
I love your conception of marriage as a call to community to support the creation of something greater than its individual parts. So in this context – it seems your marriage was really consummated at Eden – in freedom – in spirit- as it dissolved from the traditional role of marriage. ?
I’m grateful Elisha Celeste (my daughter) was able to be at Eden with you. Her father and I have definitely had our ups and downs, separations, and re-joinings, trials, breakdowns and breakthroughs. We have been together now for 33 years. Married for 30. Mostly I have learned that there is a greater “being” that has been created that lives and weaves between us – that reveals our ugliness, our beauty, our love, and our pain. It is definitely an ongoing initiation process for both of us as we to continue to “work with and transform” this “being” so we can create a better life for our family and our community.
We are grateful to have a few good friends we can call on for perspective when we really need it. Our best friends support us individually in the relationship rather than support the relationship in spite of individual needs. I cherish all the lessons and everyday it is a new choice with a slightly different voice.
I enjoy being on the path with you.
You are such a beautiful example of emotional maturity and love. Thank you for being the gift that you are. I’m so grateful you had that clearing in Eden, I care so much about your spirit, mind, body! Amazing how different a paradigm of love is without a title, entitlement or ownership…so much more space for love when its sandwiched between freedom and truth!
Lovin you
Marriage as an act and state of a community has long been its defining characteristic in many traditions. Two people can share a sense of commitment but it requires the blessing and reverence of the whole to make it continue. That’s the moment we say to the world, “I forsake all others and promise to love, honor, and cherish you above all others. In exchange, you do the same.” We make one person special and it can be undone by one reckless moment or an outside influence of less-than-admirable aims.
When Timothy and I get married this summer, we’ve both thought (and are thinking) long and hard about the promises we are going to make to each other. Ours will include physical exclusivity, the promise to remain together through thick and thin, in sickness and health, richer and poorer. This time around, I understand deeply what those vows mean more than I did the first time. They’ve stood the test of time and they remain the traditional vows for a reason. Because that’s what it takes to stay together, if that’s the goal.
We relying on our friends and family to help us remember the pricelessness of our relationship. So my question now is, how do we as a community support the marriages around us? Ali, you know how I support them, with the little services we give one another, the gifts of encouragement, a meal, nursing a sick loved one, talking, walking, care-taking. To me, support is in the details of daily life–making each and every day a little easier, a little more joyful, a little lighter. That is the sacred work I offer my family, my community.
I’m very grateful for your expansive views, my wonderful friend. You remind me to question reality and make up my own mind.
I absolutely love you Ally!!!! Saralise
Agreed!
Thank you Alexis. You are an example of a woman living in simultaneous time, manifesting as she evolves, evolving as she manifests. I have watched you unfold. Very beautiful.
My most recent evolution is to claim Mentor to the Soul of Business. I have been a relationship expert for many years. I have countless questions about what marriage is, and of course, it is unique in one way to each of us (despite what many may think). And to declare that marriage is call to community to support the creation of something greater than its individual parts, is something I have known and written about for a long time. We are constantly co-creating more, expanding, and transforming. There must be a compass—and you are a woman living from LOVE, which is the ONLY DIRECTION THERE IS.
You are a true sister. Bless you big!!!
Kathleen Hanagan, http://www.KathleenHanagan.com
I feel like crying… partly because of envy and partly because of my opening heart. When I hear your perspective of what marriage is, my heart opens as it mirrors so closely the ceremony and commitment my mother and stepfather took 30 years ago. It is poetic in it’s surrender to the experience. And judging not if that meant forever or a fortnight.
The envy comes from not being at Eden to be witness to a sacred ending. To be in celebration of gifts, to be in touch with all the places that discomfort lies, but love prevails. Love in the parting. Love in community.
Your commitment to live naked – so revealed and exposed – is utterly beautiful.
I feel like crying… partly because of envy and partly because of my opening heart. When I hear your perspective of what marriage is, my heart opens as it mirrors so closely the ceremony and commitment my mother and stepfather took 30 years ago. It is poetic in it’s surrender to the experience. And judging not if that meant forever or a fortnight.
The envy comes from not being at Eden to be witness to a sacred ending. To be in celebration of gifts, to be in touch with all the places that discomfort lies, but love prevails. Love in the parting. Love in community.
Your commitment to live naked – so revealed and exposed – is utterly beautiful.
While I love my husband and our marriage, we really do not have a community, a container, that supports us. That is something that I really would like to work on, and your post has inspired me to make a commitment to allow that to start happening NOW.
I lived in Senegal years ago where COMMUNITY and EXTENDED FAMILY are embedded into the culture. When a couple is struggling…the whole community sits with them and bears witness and gives support and advice….The whole community is invested in listening and sharing the wisdom of experience, truth telling. It is an extraordinary model compared to the isolation and separation in which couples often struggle in our culture. I learned so much about right relationship and true open heartedness living there. They also ask themselves..”Am I at peace with this person?” more often than they ask “Am I happy with this person?…knowing that happiness is transient while peace can be cultivated and sustained. So much to learn from other cultures.
Hello Alexis,
I doubt you take advice, who follows them right?
But I would bet 100$ that this should get your attention:
https://www.tonyrobbins.com/products/relationships/
Regards,
MH Risi Success certified coach
Bright Blessings to you both, Alexis! … and thank you for so gracefully sharing this oh-so-personal experience.
… A friend has recently asked me to perform her wedding ceremony, and you have deeply impacted my approach already ~ and re-reading this story-line will certainly change the color of my life-lenses, yet again.
Take good care of yourself and your youngsters ~ may they too feel the love, beauty and community that you are helping us all create!
Karen
I have been engaged four times, married twice (long term marriages) and buried my fiance who was a wonderful Shaman 2 1/2 years ago. Many inward journeys of healing…I love again. My heart is forever open and Spirit leads the way of my energy. I wish I could say at this point that it is a communitiy, a book, or some cookie cutter method that could make love and relationships work. I stay open, keep my soul at peace, my spirit remains free, love with an open heart and live in joy. Somehow I am able to meet whatever unfolds as life continues. I am in awe at how I simply keep learning to let go and accept as it all changes… always changing….Many Blessings and Much Love….
mmmmmmm Shamansgrl ~ big Zen Hugs to you (because you’re there and I’m here) for your losses and your healings and growings and sharings!
I’m following you on the journey of healing – and it’s glorious and painful and arduous sometimes, but soooo worth taking.
Bright Blessings to you, too!