Breaking Benjamin
Ok, there's a connection here. Breaking Benjamin's album Saturate (had to look it up btw) had a song called Polyamorous.
Last night I went to a party for the birthday of the husband of a woman I worked with at Wal-mart.
Go ahead and read that a few times to get all the connections. I know it's a prepositional phrase hell.
Let me try again. I worked with Jayleen at Wal-mart. She was among the people I spent my lunches with for the last few months I worked there, people I'd stretch to call friends but, since I still see them after leaving Wal-mart and look forward to those times, I don't know what better term to apply. Jayleen is married to Tommy. Last night was Tommy's birthday party, and I was invited to that.
Jayleen and Tommy are in an open relationship. They are a polyamorous couple, and while there is no second wife or second husband with them, that is only because they haven't found the right someone yet.
They also have elements of kink in their relationship, and are somewhat active in the BDSM circles I used to frequent when I had the opportunity.
The party started at 7 pm. I arrived around 8, 8:30. Clothing was officially deemed optional at 10pm.
Now, obviously, this is not a foreign environment to me. I didn't know what to expect with this group, but I have been to similar parties before. This one was somewhat more relaxed, more casual, than some I've attended, and was certainly more...platonic, for lack of a better word, than the clubs I went to briefly back in 2009. Short version is that there was ample nudity, a lot of open affection, flirting, and teasing, but no actual sex. Though it was a possibility with many people, and after I left it's likely that one couple who stayed did something before going to bed. I can't know and frankly it isn't really important.
I am not polyamorous. I've never identified as such, and I don't know if I'm capable of it. I have very strong inclinations towards jealousy and possessiveness that make multiple partners and open relationships pretty unrealistic.
Still, Jayleen and I talked some during the party, and she explained something to me. She said that she used to have those same tendencies, but she recognized that it wasn't working for her. She was not suited for monogamy, and so her jealousy and possessiveness became obstacles to her happiness.
So she changed it.
This is a part where I didn't get much detail, and I hope to talk with her more about it. But the way she put it, it seemed like it was just a decision she made one day and that was it. Sure, there was likely a period of adjustment, but...
I told her that I've tried a similar approach before. Trying to abolish my jealousy in the interest of a relationship working out or whatever. And that it didn't work. But as I've kept thinking about that conversation, I've had trouble deciding whether or not I have ever really tried. Generally speaking, I've accepted as immutable fact that I am monogamous, and that I always will be. That I cannot change that part of myself any more than I could willfully grow another pair of arms.
Is that true? Or have I simply never had the true desire to change?
It IS fact that every time I've tried to change it has been for someone. Autum, most notably. Changing for her didn't work. But then, changing anything about oneself FOR someone almost never DOES work. The change has to come from within. The desire to be different from what you were, or are.
I have trouble separating the physical and the emotional. I view those who engage in certain activities to have some kind of desire for each other, if only a temporary one. And a large part of me wants to keep it that way. I want sex to be meaningful, to be connective.
Is it not connective for Jayleen and Tommy? Having observed their behavior at the party, I can say for certain that the freedom they enjoy is borne of relationship. It springs from a connection they have with each other, an intimacy they share by being friends...being "lovers," a term I have trouble applying mostly out of the traditional meaning thereof. Does Tommy love the other girls he sleeps with? Does Jayleen love the other women and men she "knows"?
And I am forced to remember the bible study near Spring Arbor. There was nothing sexual about their behavior, or so they adamantly stated. And usually it was true. Usually.
But even when it wasn't, it was still a manifestation of the relationships. An expression of affection and love and caring and friendship and family.
Is it any different among this circle? Jayleen and Tommy are in love, they are married. They share their sexuality with others because they have separated the two; they see that sex is something you can share and enjoy with multiple people without losing anything between themselves and each other. The only difference is that what they share goes EXPRESSLY into the sexual. And that's the case because they do not have the religious restrictions experienced by SAUBS.
Mike and Shanna. Same thing. What they have is an emotional connection that cannot be breached or infested or weakened by contact with others.
Aubrey. Similar. She had multiple connections with sexual elements, and none of them interfered with each other. And while she tends to drift away from those, she still experienced them without any great difficulty.
...Mom and Dad, as a counter-example. The longer they are together, the closer they get to God, the more their desire grows ONLY for each other.
Is it enough just to say "it works for some people, and not for others"? Is it enough to just claim that "I'm not wired that way" and never challenge it? Is it enough to ignore the question just because I've never had a successful attempt, especially since I've never really, truly tried before?
I also can't forget that I HAVE had some experiences that suggest that I have polyamorous tendencies. And that while I haven't given them a great deal of thought, and haven't pursued more instances and experiences of the same, they were not necessarily unpleasant of their own right. It could easily be said that IF they were uncomfortable, it was because they were new, unusual.
I don't have any answers to these questions yet. I wish I did. I think I'll have to dig much deeper for them. And ask more questions along the way. Get input from people on both sides...especially people who know me.
But the questions are there, now. And while I don't know what may change in my life with the answers, I don't think I can ignore the questions out of fear of change. Whatever the answers may be, if I am seeking myself, I must believe that I will find myself. And thus, any answer I can find will only be better for me, even if it leads me into places I didn't think I'd go before.
Last night I went to a party for the birthday of the husband of a woman I worked with at Wal-mart.
Go ahead and read that a few times to get all the connections. I know it's a prepositional phrase hell.
Let me try again. I worked with Jayleen at Wal-mart. She was among the people I spent my lunches with for the last few months I worked there, people I'd stretch to call friends but, since I still see them after leaving Wal-mart and look forward to those times, I don't know what better term to apply. Jayleen is married to Tommy. Last night was Tommy's birthday party, and I was invited to that.
Jayleen and Tommy are in an open relationship. They are a polyamorous couple, and while there is no second wife or second husband with them, that is only because they haven't found the right someone yet.
They also have elements of kink in their relationship, and are somewhat active in the BDSM circles I used to frequent when I had the opportunity.
The party started at 7 pm. I arrived around 8, 8:30. Clothing was officially deemed optional at 10pm.
Now, obviously, this is not a foreign environment to me. I didn't know what to expect with this group, but I have been to similar parties before. This one was somewhat more relaxed, more casual, than some I've attended, and was certainly more...platonic, for lack of a better word, than the clubs I went to briefly back in 2009. Short version is that there was ample nudity, a lot of open affection, flirting, and teasing, but no actual sex. Though it was a possibility with many people, and after I left it's likely that one couple who stayed did something before going to bed. I can't know and frankly it isn't really important.
I am not polyamorous. I've never identified as such, and I don't know if I'm capable of it. I have very strong inclinations towards jealousy and possessiveness that make multiple partners and open relationships pretty unrealistic.
Still, Jayleen and I talked some during the party, and she explained something to me. She said that she used to have those same tendencies, but she recognized that it wasn't working for her. She was not suited for monogamy, and so her jealousy and possessiveness became obstacles to her happiness.
So she changed it.
This is a part where I didn't get much detail, and I hope to talk with her more about it. But the way she put it, it seemed like it was just a decision she made one day and that was it. Sure, there was likely a period of adjustment, but...
I told her that I've tried a similar approach before. Trying to abolish my jealousy in the interest of a relationship working out or whatever. And that it didn't work. But as I've kept thinking about that conversation, I've had trouble deciding whether or not I have ever really tried. Generally speaking, I've accepted as immutable fact that I am monogamous, and that I always will be. That I cannot change that part of myself any more than I could willfully grow another pair of arms.
Is that true? Or have I simply never had the true desire to change?
It IS fact that every time I've tried to change it has been for someone. Autum, most notably. Changing for her didn't work. But then, changing anything about oneself FOR someone almost never DOES work. The change has to come from within. The desire to be different from what you were, or are.
I have trouble separating the physical and the emotional. I view those who engage in certain activities to have some kind of desire for each other, if only a temporary one. And a large part of me wants to keep it that way. I want sex to be meaningful, to be connective.
Is it not connective for Jayleen and Tommy? Having observed their behavior at the party, I can say for certain that the freedom they enjoy is borne of relationship. It springs from a connection they have with each other, an intimacy they share by being friends...being "lovers," a term I have trouble applying mostly out of the traditional meaning thereof. Does Tommy love the other girls he sleeps with? Does Jayleen love the other women and men she "knows"?
And I am forced to remember the bible study near Spring Arbor. There was nothing sexual about their behavior, or so they adamantly stated. And usually it was true. Usually.
But even when it wasn't, it was still a manifestation of the relationships. An expression of affection and love and caring and friendship and family.
Is it any different among this circle? Jayleen and Tommy are in love, they are married. They share their sexuality with others because they have separated the two; they see that sex is something you can share and enjoy with multiple people without losing anything between themselves and each other. The only difference is that what they share goes EXPRESSLY into the sexual. And that's the case because they do not have the religious restrictions experienced by SAUBS.
Mike and Shanna. Same thing. What they have is an emotional connection that cannot be breached or infested or weakened by contact with others.
Aubrey. Similar. She had multiple connections with sexual elements, and none of them interfered with each other. And while she tends to drift away from those, she still experienced them without any great difficulty.
...Mom and Dad, as a counter-example. The longer they are together, the closer they get to God, the more their desire grows ONLY for each other.
Is it enough just to say "it works for some people, and not for others"? Is it enough to just claim that "I'm not wired that way" and never challenge it? Is it enough to ignore the question just because I've never had a successful attempt, especially since I've never really, truly tried before?
I also can't forget that I HAVE had some experiences that suggest that I have polyamorous tendencies. And that while I haven't given them a great deal of thought, and haven't pursued more instances and experiences of the same, they were not necessarily unpleasant of their own right. It could easily be said that IF they were uncomfortable, it was because they were new, unusual.
I don't have any answers to these questions yet. I wish I did. I think I'll have to dig much deeper for them. And ask more questions along the way. Get input from people on both sides...especially people who know me.
But the questions are there, now. And while I don't know what may change in my life with the answers, I don't think I can ignore the questions out of fear of change. Whatever the answers may be, if I am seeking myself, I must believe that I will find myself. And thus, any answer I can find will only be better for me, even if it leads me into places I didn't think I'd go before.