Question: When speaking about the relationship between man and woman, you described the “mirror principle,” according to which I see a reflection of myself in my partner since I radiate my egoism onto him. What does this mean? If it seems to me that my husband does not value me, does it mean that I do not value myself?

Answer: Why do you demand more recognition from him? In essence, it is your egoism that requires this fulfillment. And what do we gain if we rise above egoism and do not make such demands?

First, by doing so we will not suffer from feeling undervalued by our partner. Second, we thereby acquire a new quality. The demand for respect and power reveals its opposite: by overcoming a certain egoistic quality and beginning to rise above it, I receive a quality opposite to it. This allows me to gain a new tool, a new attitude toward the world.

For example, if earlier I demanded attention and respect from my partner, now I become more modest in my claims. After all, I already understand that if I look objectively, he treats me quite normally, it was simply that my egoism inflated the bar of expectations. So let us concede, let us reduce our egoistic demands.

I want my partner to be attentive, considerate, and to keep promises, I want to stop his endless “offenses” in everything concerning household matters, neglect of my interests, lack of signs of love and care. After all, with the years the husband calls his wife less and less to ask how she is doing, takes less and less care of her. And so, if I lessen my complaints, if I do not keep count of grievances and work hard on myself—because for me this is still very important—then I annul the former, spoiled connection between us.

I rise above the inflated demands and relate to my partner with love, like a mother to a child. Even if on his side there still remains “crime,” despite my efforts, I hold to the principle: “Love will cover all crimes.”

How do I thereby help my partner, considering that he also has joined into the framework of our course? I give him an example, and also awaken a readiness for the same reciprocal relation in him. Thus, here lies an invitation to a new life. In essence, I open myself in order to receive a new attitude from my partner. And I check this attitude not egoistically; on the contrary, what matters here is that we both mutually develop our relationship above egoism and support each other.

By my example I help my partner to rise above egoism. I make efforts, I speak with him about how good life will be if we rise above our natural, base, egoistic impulses. And as a result, mutual example and mutual support lead us upward.

Moreover, each of us now looks at the world correctly, sanely, with readiness to yield. Again and again, I see the world in comparison with myself as something perfect. The new outlook allows me to see it as perfect nature. It is no longer only about my partner, the whole world becomes my mirror.

This is a kind of psychological training, a psychological method of the highest order, which allows a person to ascend to a new perception of reality, of the world, of family, and of relations with the partner; it is a perception that we did not have before.

Of course we must first practice this in the family, and in the end, we will build a new world, new relationships. And here mutuality is necessary. We both must understand that we represent something like a small “laboratory” in which two egoists strive to use the egoism that has developed in them correctly. In our generation it has grown to such an extent that it destroys everything, and we want to use it as a lever and build healthy relations above it that will allow life to continue. Otherwise, only ruin awaits us.
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From the 32^nd conversation New Life 32 – New Kind Of Relationships, 7/11/12

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