Théun Mares on Relationships - Our Greatest Challenge Today
In this interview Théun Mares talks about the reasons why relationship issues are so important in the world today, what it means to resolve the past in order to move forward, and his approach in guiding people to a deeper understanding of their relationships, including their fundamental relationship with themselves.Elizabeth: In terms of relationships then, is humanity evolving, or are we going backwards?
Théun Mares: Again, this is not an easy question to answer, because people can so easily misconstrue what I might say now. But let me talk about evolution, the evolution of awareness.
It is very seldom that the evolution of awareness proceeds unencumbered when everything is peaceful and everybody is happy. The reason being that when everything is working well, and people are happy, and they are totally at peace with where their life is at, they tend to fall asleep, and they become complacent, and they no longer think about, "Why am I here?" Why should they? Life is working wonderfully well just as it is.
So, often, in order for evolution to be given a boost, we have to go through very troubled and difficult times.
So we can look at the world situation today, and we can say that we are going backwards, which in one sense is perfectly true. But we are not actually going backwards, in the sense that we are now getting the biggest boost that we have ever had in this century. When we will really know that we are going backwards is if, now that we have got this boost, we continue to get ourselves fired, and our relationships fall apart, for then we'll know that we have become stagnant. And if that doesn't help us, even knowing that we have become stagnant — if that doesn't help us and matters still continue to get worse, well then we'll know that we have really missed the boat, and therefore we are going backwards.
But it is my hope that before we start going backwards, we'll actually wake up.
Elizabeth: So, do you believe that is humanity's biggest challenge at this time? The need to wake up?
Théun Mares: Indeed. But to wake up to the reality of what is actually transpiring in your lives, the reality of what it actually means to be alive on the physical plane.
Elizabeth: So then, do we actually have to resolve the past before we can make any real progress going forward?
Théun Mares: From a technical perspective it is impossible to really make progress in terms of moving forward, unless we resolve the past. But I might also add that it doesn't actually work like this in practice. And I'll explain what I mean by this.
Our past is brought about, or if you like created, by a particular mindset that we had at that time. That mindset is dependent upon how we perceive life, so it is dependent upon a perception. Now, in order to resolve the past, we need to first change that mindset, otherwise, how are we going to change it? We need to change our whole level of perception before we can resolve the past. If we don't do that we will simply be re-enacting our past folly. We will simply be doing the same thing like we've always done it.
So yes, technically speaking, we do have to resolve the past before we can really move forward. But in practice — in practice — we first have to change ourselves at least sufficiently so as to be able to perceive the past in a completely different way to how we used to perceive it, before we can actually resolve the past. Does that answer your question?
Elizabeth: Is that commonly called turning yourself upside down on your head?
Théun Mares: Very much so!
Elizabeth: You have written a number of books that would relate to what you have been talking about now. In terms of humanity's biggest challenge, which book do you believe has the most relevance to where we as humanity find ourselves at today? Where would be a good place to start?
Théun Mares: We have just been speaking about relationships, and I have just said that all of life is but a system of relationships. And therefore I honestly believe that if anybody is new to the Toltec teachings, then before they need to worry about anything like, "What does it mean to be a warrior?" "What does a Path with a Heart mean?" "What does the Warrior's Path mean?" "What do the Toltec teachings mean?", something everybody can relate to is relationships, and it is something which they can immediately understand. And in this respect, if it is my books that you are referring to, I would advise anybody who is new to the teachings to start with what was originally called, "This Darned Elusive Happiness," which today has become Part One of Volume III.
The two books which follow on from that are now Part Two and Part Three, in Volume III, and those books were originally called, "The Quest for Maleness," and "Unveil the Mysteries of the Female." Those three books are actually one trilogy.
"This Darned Elusive Happiness," deals with relationships in general. Whereas the male and the female books pertain to relating to ourselves and the world around us as male and as female respectively.
Elizabeth: We humans tend to make our lives very complicated, so is this where we will find a simple approach to tackling our relationships and meeting this challenge of what you call waking up?
Théun Mares: Very much so. Especially in the book, "This Darned Elusive Happiness," or as it is now published, Part One of Volume III, because in that book I really spell out to the reader, if you like and without being derogatory, in layman's terms, how relationships really work, what the fundamentals of relationships are, and how they can truly find happiness and fulfilment in their life, in a very easy to read, easy to understand manner.
So, I purposely avoided technicalities in that book so as to make it as easily readable and as easily understandable as possible.
Elizabeth: So if I am wanting to make a lasting change in my life, are you saying that relationships is the key? That's what you're saying is the most important?
Théun Mares: Absolutely. Because at the end of the day, the whole of life, and the whole of existence depends upon relationships. None of us live in isolation from the world around us. It always comes down to relationships.
Elizabeth: Why is it so important that you reach as wide an audience as possible when it comes to relationships?
Théun Mares: Because I feel that that is where the greatest need of humanity lies today. Even for people who have never heard about the Toltec teachings or Toltec philosophy, who have never heard about lightbringers, or anything like that, what is the most pressing need in their lives, are their relationships. And invariably, this is not only relationships at home, or with their family, or with their friends, but also, and more and more so every day, their relationships at work. The issues surrounding relationships, and how to try and make relationships work has become a huge issue in the world, and it is becoming bigger every day. That's why I say that I feel this is where humanity's greatest need lies — in coming to grips with relationships, and learning how to handle relationships successfully.
Elizabeth: There are so many confusing messages out there about relationships, and particularly male/female type relationships — of all kinds, I am not just talking romantically. How are you sharing your knowledge, in what ways are you sharing your knowledge?
Théun Mares: I always come from the angle of, "Let's start with you as an individual. Irrespective of what your gender is, let's just start with you as an individual." And I'll ask you questions like, for example, "Are you happy?" "Do you feel fulfilled?" "Do you have a relationship? It doesn't matter what sort of relationship, but do you have a relationship that you look upon as being a good relationship, or as a bad relationship? If it's a good relationship, what makes it good? If it's a bad relationship, what makes it bad?"
And coming from that very personal and individual approach, I then guide the person concerned into understanding why he or she feels about him or herself, and about his or her relationships the way he or she does. And that's my approach. In other words, starting from the individual, from the particular, and then working out to the greater whole. Starting from the person, and then working out to that person's environment.
Elizabeth: There was a time when the individual seemed to be the only focus, it was very much the "me" time and the "me" generation. Has that changed? I mean, is that still relevant at this time? If you are starting off with the individual?
Théun Mares: It's undoubtedly exceedingly relevant today. I would say that where the vast majority of humanity today find themselves at, is how really first of all to be an individual in your own right, and I'd like to qualify that in a moment. But how to be an individual in your own right, and then secondly, how as an individual do you fit into the world around you?
So I would say that the individual approach, or the realisation of the individual, is by far still the greatest need in the world today.
We are busy moving on from that however. Because, realise that not everybody is in the same place. And why I mention this is that there are also people starting to come into incarnation, who have their awareness sufficiently evolved that they can actually start going beyond the needs of the individual to start addressing the needs of the group. And that is enormously important, not because those individuals are more important than the ones who have to work on individual realisation — no, that is not what I am saying, because in truth nothing and no-one in life is more important or less important than anybody or anything else.
But why I mentioned that group consciousness is so vitally important is that realise that all learning always overlaps. Therefore, if we take the example of a child, let's say, who is in grade 3 at school. Now that child will pass that grade with a particular level of expertise, and it will pass onto the higher grade, or higher standard. But it hasn't yet learnt everything it needed to in grade 3. So for the first part of the year in grade 4, although it is now being introduced to new knowledge, it is having to recapitulate and to fill in the gaps which it could not do in grade 3. That's why I say that all learning always overlaps. So you might now find yourself in grade 4, but for the first part you are still busy learning what you didn't learn in grade 3. And likewise, by the time you get into the second half of grade 4, you are already busy preparing yourself for grade 5. This is how life works. You don't finish this and then move onto the next — there is always an overlapping in learning.
So, whilst the greatest need in the world today is for the realisation of the individual, so already is the individual being prepared by those who are beginning to look to the well-being of the group. Because the individual must still look at how he fits into the world around him. And there's no better way really to do this than through the medium of the group. But he couldn't do that if there weren't already those that were busy fostering the well-being of the group.
Otherwise he doesn't have a group in which to complete his own learning and his own experience of life. So there is always this overlapping that happens.
So to go back to answering your question in a few words — yes, the greatest need today is still for the individual to come to a full realisation of him or herself, and how he or she then fits into the greater whole which we call the group.
But concurrently with this, there are also already those that are busy fostering the well-being of the group, and therefore not having the focus so much on their own individual growth, but rather on their growth as an individual through the medium of the group.
Elizabeth: Is this why you mention in your books that we are all equal, but different — in that for some people self-realisation may be what is meant for them in this lifetime, whereas somebody else may be a little further on down the line, and therefore they need to guide the people coming behind them? So the knowledge is different. Is that what you mean by, "We are equal but different?"
Théun Mares: Correct. Of course, it's not just in that respect that I mean that we are equal but different. I also mean it in terms of gender — male and female.