Getting What You Wanted

So the kind readers of this blog may have noticed a common theme (ahem - total relationship upheaval) over the last couple of months. And some readers may be wondering how I am doing.

Why, I'm glad you asked; I am fine. Giddy, actually, busily flirting with a new feminine preoccupation.... Thank you.

The tumultuous affairs that plague my metamours do not directly affect me, although it'd be disingenuous to suggest that I'm far removed from their affects. It'd be hard for anyone, I'd think, to be emotionally withdrawn from his two best friends as they endure any form of pain. I hate to see my friends hurt. It's in our human nature to comfort our friends and to say the things that bring hope and encouragement into this moment of their lives. And consciously, considering my role as PF's secondary, there's a risk of creating a schism that places me squarely on one side of the argument. That's both dangerous and unfair.

So I shall say this: I love both of my friends. I support whatever changes they wish to introduce into their lives and confront whatever closure they need. I wish that both can find happiness, fulfillment, and compromise. I will do everything I can to see to it that both of my friends are secure in who they wish to be. Yet, I cannot play mediator, and I cannot help to solve problems that are exclusively between them. And above all: it is okay. They are both loved, and it is okay.

It's a very Western view to look at time as a sequence of frequent starts and stops. We move forward, adapt, and grow comfortable, and then "change" is introduced and we're forced to "embrace it", adapt, move forward, and grow comfortable again, so life figuratively becomes this sputtering traffic jam of incremental experiences, and right now, there's a lot of road range.

I'd like to think of polyamory as an experiment in "living" change. Polyamory embraces a more fluid sense of change and, hell, we encourage it. It's a tenant of polyamory that we don't wish our partners to stagnate and we actively promote their growth, development, and maturing as individual people. We want our partners to flourish and to be unconstrained... alas, even if that means they grow apart from us. If you refuse to accept that the freedoms we enjoy in polyamory may produce this seemingly undesirable outcome, then you will likely wallow in selfishness and misery for a time, perhaps repeating the same unfortunate habits again and again, until you realize (again) that love isn't ownership. A person and their feelings aren't your property. And there is no exclusivity clause in any arrangement. There is just ongoing, thoughtful, directed evolution of self.

So it's okay. It's okay that my girlfriend's husband is sad, and that he's confronting the crap in his past so it'll reshape his future. And it's okay that my girlfriend and her husband are addressing the issues between them, because maybe dealing with those problems will make a stronger and more intense bond. And it's okay that my girlfriend's husband's girlfriend has grown emotionally and found new passion for others and for a new life. And it's okay that my girlfriend's husband's girlfriend's husband has also embraced a new life where he is comfortable and where he can thrive.

It's okay. Everybody got - and still has (and this is really the key thought here) - everything that they wanted. Polyamory.

s1m0n