On The Relationships That Transform Our Lives

What I learned from the wild ride with my therapist and best friend.

Sometimes you meet someone who turns your life inside out. And, sometimes those relationships come with lots of drama — intense love, crazy fighting, and healing all wrapped in profound life lessons.

When I was forty, I met a man who changed my life. He was many things to me — a sage, an enemy to battle, the older brother I never had, and the father I longed to understand me.

I loved him, fought with him, and then he disappeared.

This is our story.

He stood on the stage and commanded the room like William Wallace, Mel Gibson’s character in Braveheart. This was my first experience of a men’s-only event. Frankly, I don’t remember anything he said, but at the end, I introduced myself and said, I need to talk to you.

So began my twelve years, often tumultuous relationship with John Franklin, a Jungian psychotherapist.

When I walked into his 19th century stone farmhouse nestled in the cornfields of southeastern Pennsylvania, I was a recent refuge from a ten-year experience as a celibate monk where I developed a rich spiritual life. But now, I was married, my daughter had just been born, and psychologically and emotionally, I was anything but mature and well-balanced.

At the end of our first session, he gave me a big hug. I’d never been hugged by a man before, except for my father. It was a bit of shock, yet it felt good — the connection and the vulnerability with another man. John was a superb therapist — challenging, loving, and able to create a safe space where I could explore the deepest parts of myself. He could be as tough as a Marine drill Sargeant as well as profoundly tender and sensitive.

I’d never seen a man embody these seemingly opposite qualities so well before. I wanted to be able to do that.

After a few meetings, he said, “Here is my analysis: you have a lover inflation, a warrior depletion, and a magician leakage.”

He was referring to the fact that I had been a monk whose life revolved around worshiping a guru (lover), had…

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