More on Polyamory
I’ve mentioned in the past that I’m intrigued by the concept of Polyamory, the relationship choice where you love whoever you feel like loving, rather than the ‘one at a time’ love that western society seems to dictate. While I’ve not had the opportunity to practice it yet, it’s a lifestyle choice that fits what I feel is absolutely right. 
I was reading something about my Myer-Briggs personality type (INTP) and Polyamory, and the following part of the discussion caught my interest:
I think polyamory is a relationship style that may have specific benefits for INTPs…
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Traditional relationships are based on exclusivity, paucity and ownership. Even if brides are no longer bought and sold in most cultures, the underlying paradigm has changed little. And it is simply cruel to our biology.
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If one isn’t comfortable with the tradition, if the whole idea of exclusive emotional and sexual possession just doesn’t sit right with you, what are you left with? That term Forsaken… why should anyone be forsaken.
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Anyway, I think INTPs are one of the types most likely to be least comfortable with being anyone else’s possession, or with having the sole responsibility for another’s happiness. I know I’m not. I need to ignore people for long periods of time. I must be responsive to my own needs.
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I want my independence and I want to live within my own space on my own terms. I want to take responsibility for myself. Why should that exclude me though from having satisfying sexual relationships.
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Living in a sexually possessive society that is flagrant in it’s encultured abuse of sexuality… all the double-standards, all the deceit. Bleh. If for no other reason than polyamory is at least honest and accepting of our nature, and more reflective of the innate INTP nature particularly, I hold it in high regard.
Who woulda thought that my interest in Polyamory was related to my personality type? I guess it goes without saying, really, but I just never thought of it that way before.
So I can sort of understand now why so many other personality types are dead-set against it. Those personality types that require formality and ‘ownership’ would be very much against having more than one loving partner, since they wouldn’t be able to ‘own’ their partner. It violates everything that they think is right.
And so we have the conflicts that would occur between those who believe in ownership, and those who believe in freedom.
But please, don’t tell me that marriage is not about ownership. You have a ‘contract’ between two people that is legally binding by the government! Just like you have a contract for owning any other kind of asset, like a house or a car, or even a business contract.
I was having a conversation about polyamory with a friend of mine recently, and it was his adamant and vehement opinion that anyone who even considers loving more than one person at a time should be castrated, if not outright executed.
I couldn’t grasp how killing someone would be preferable to having them love more than one person. I still can’t. How is their death better than them loving more than one person? And yet so many people feel this way. They would rather kill people than let them live a life of their own choosing, loving people, and hurting no one. But apparently they deserve to die for this.
What a society we live in. Honestly, it disgusts me.
Anyway, Steve Pavlina has discovered that polyamory is a concept that resonates with him too:
What appeals to me about polyamory is that it’s a way for people to learn to share love and connection without trying to possess each other. It feels a lot more free and open to me than a closed marriage situation.
He, too, has experienced the negative feedback from those around him. And considering he has an audience of millions of people per month, the feedback he gets is multiplied beyond anything the rest of us might get:
Most of the negative feedback … is so far out of sync with reality, I can’t even relate to it. There’s just no shred of truth to grasp because such feedback has nothing to do with us whatsoever. The best response I can offer these fear-mongers is a eye roll. Maybe for good measure, I can add, “Oh, please. Get real.”
What I’m interested in seeing is how our society is going to change over the next few months or years as a result of such a high-profile individual exploring polyamory for himself. He’s a leading personal growth expert on the internet, and has millions of people reading his every word. With him saying ‘hey, this is ok!’, we’re probably going to start seeing a lot more people exploring it too.
This is good for a single guy like me, looking for other open-minded women to spend my time with, in whatever capacity that might end up being.
Just as an example… Deidre and I still love each other, and still share hugs and occasional kisses. We remain very fond of each other, and there is definitely a lot of love still there between us. But we’re not intimate, we’re not partners, and we don’t plan a life together any more.
We’ve discussed the fact that anyone that comes into our lives in the future will need to understand and accept that we still love each other, but we don’t have any ‘ownership’ claims on each other. And our feelings towards each other will be the same even when we’re with other people.
Well, actually… I guess time will tell. My feelings have been the same when Deidre has gone out dating, but Deidre’s feelings haven’t been tested that way yet.
Her personality is one where ‘ownership’ is what feels right to her, and it’s entirely possible that she subconsciously thinks that ownership is still there because I’m not seeing anyone else. How will she react when I do, and she actually understands she doesn’t ‘own’ me any more?
Oh, and these are considerations that are important to me because I still do love her (without needing an intimate relationship with her), and we’re still living together as flatmates. Any emotional impact on our living arrangements and the relationship we currently share is going to be important.
Like anything in relationships, communication is the key. If there are any issues, we’ll talk about it at great length. She’ll either accept it and hold onto the love, or she’ll realise her love can only ever be conditional on ‘ownership’, and the love will fade.
It would be very sad if it did fade, but that’s the way life is.
Back to the topic at hand, that my personality type is more suited to polyamory because of my desire for individual freedom, and open, honest love.
I guess my ideal partner(s) in the future are going to be very similar to me in terms of personality. They’ll enjoy time to themselves, while appreciating those times when they can share their lives with whoever they’re with, and they’ll have no interest in ‘owning’ their partners.
Jealousy will be alien to them, as it is to me, because they’ll understand that since they don’t own a loved one, they don’t actually lose anything when that loved one also loves someone else. As long as they’re getting some love too, of course. If not, then they’re more likely to be annoyed than jealous, and rightly so!
Interesting times. This is going to be a great year for my growth, experiences and adventures!
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Comments
I think it could work for some people. Mainstream society’s limited range of acceptable relationship types has never sat well with me. I’ve had emotionally intimate relationships with more than one person at a time – drawing the line at physical intimacy seems a bit arbitrary. As you said, I think it all depends on the people involved and whether they feel a sense of ownership or need for exclusivity.
Most people seem to want restrictions and controls in their lives, and marriage fits right into that.
Got to say, I’d absolutely hate the idea of somebody I was seeing having a concurrent relationship with somebody else, and I don’t think that I’d enjoy having multiple relationships myself (I have a very single track mind, Keeping track of more than one person would not be my kind of experience , And thats from both an emotional and a physical intimacy point of view. I’m happy for other people to have whatever relationship structures they want, but I’d run a mile personally.
And this isn’t because of any ‘Western Standard’, But rather my own understanding of my reactions and what makes me happy, I couldn’t care less about social rules and titles (thats all a bit complicated for me anyway, I prefer to cut directly to the chase and avoid the structured rules).
I think while _some_ people truely do believe in and want a polyamorous relationship, many (not all) who would practise it, in fact just have committment issues, or want to ‘Have their cake and eat it too’. I’ve never really had a problem with temptation of any kind, which i suspect is not entirely true of many ‘polyamourous’ individuals.
I’ve never been a ‘grass is greener’ person, And I actively dislike ‘complications’ (I like to understand exactly where I stand from one moment to the next), Which its quite possible Polyamoury would deliver in spades. I would feel unvalued if somebody I was dating, or in fact, had dated, didn’t feel jealous if I expressed feelings for somebody else. I guess that means we’ll never be competing for the same girl
What you term ‘Ownership’, I guess i’d term ‘Value, Identity, Sharing, Security, belonging’, probably a technicality..
(quick Test says i’m INTJ by the way)
Hi Alan!
Its Ryan, formerly ‘The Common Ryan’ of Cheerful Megalomaniac and now radicalyffe on Twitter and Wordpress.
Long time no see!
Hope you are well.
Thanks for letting us know how you feel about it Damian. I find it interesting that you, like many others for that matter, think that wanting to share love is a ‘commitment issue’.
I would have thought that those who run to one partner after another have more of a commitment issue than those who decide to share their love with those that they feel like it, working on all the communication issues that arise.
I can imagine that it would be much harder to ‘manage’ a multi-person relationship than a single-person (eg. one other person) relationship, so there would need to be a far greater sense of commitment to LOVE than what might be seen in a monogamous relationship.
But your statement is quite significant, that you feel polyamoury would be complicated, and you wanted to avoid complications.
I guess monogamous relationships aren’t that complicated either?
Hm.
When you said that you would feel ‘unvalued’ if someone didn’t feel jealous that you might express feelings for someone else, I guess that means you would feel exactly the same way if they expressed feelings for someone else too.
What would it mean to you if they wanted to love you AND someone else?
To me, if somebody wanted to love me and somebody else, I’d tell them to choose, because what i ‘really want’ involves the picket fence dream, and if I can’t have my dream, whats the point?, I might as well be single.
I’m not sure how children, shared mortgages and financial/leave considerations, like shared holidays work into this, at the least, you aren’t going to get to have as many leave days with your partner if you are also spending some with somebody else.
I guess I also don’t believe in any emotion that exists outside of our inner monologue (I’m a very ‘NLP’ person, a viewpoint which my psych study reinforced), The concept of being ‘committed to love’ doesn’t really resonate with me, My worldview runs more around individual tangible actions and interactions rather than any grand ideals. (You could perhaps call me a cynic).
Those who run from one partner to another may well have commitment issues, I’ve always felt you should be completely separated from your last relationship, physically and emotionally before even thinking about starting a new one, at least that’s my approach to life.
I’ve never really seen Monogamous relationships are ‘complicated’, sure they might not work out, but interactions between people are really fairly basic, most people do act in predictable ways, Other people really are the only ‘unknown variables’, which makes it much harder to predict…. (Can you tell I’m a programmer?).
I’m not quite sure why anyone would ‘Want’ to manage additional complexity around their love life.. I don’t like anything that has to be ‘managed’. I’m also totally risk-adverse (I’d never place a bet, on anything) and in my mind, Polyamoury raises the risk of unwanted consequences (when practiced by either party)
Again, others are welcome to do whatever they want on this world, I don’t follow any political view strongly, I don’t believe in any religion and I generally have no allegiance to any ‘establishment’ or traditional viewpoints, so I’d never have a problem with somebody else doing as they choose (Although i might counsel them against the potential for jealousy, distress and heartache).
It just doesn’t fit into my desires for my life, and why do anything you don’t want to do?
I think a lot of people also confuse love and lust perhaps more than they should. Perhaps I’m unusual in that sex simply isn’t that important to me, its fun, sure and I enjoy it a lot, But its just not that important. Without the sexual component, aren’t you just being friends?
first up, why would they have to choose who they love? I see that as such a selfish attitude, I’m sorry to say. “I don’t want you loving who you feel like loving, I just want you to love one person – whether that’s me or them, it doesn’t matter, you just have to love only one person.” Really, what right do you have to tell them how they should love people?
I suspect you don’t get what polyamory is. You don’t love one person one day, and then the other person the next day, and then the previous person the following day… You love each person equally, and could very well spend your time with all of them at the same time, rather than one after another. Your holidays would not then be spent with one person after another, but with all of them equally. Of course, that’s just one way of managing such a relationship; there are many ways, and spending time with each of them, one after the other, could certainly be a valid relationship method.
Being a programmer as you are, I can understand why you see the world in terms of variables with which you need to predict and manage. I can imagine how you might feel when you have variables you can’t predict. You would probably feel overwhelmed and out of control. Such open relationships probably wouldn’t be good for someone of your personality type.
Which leads me back to my earlier realisation that INTP’s seem suited for polyamorous relationships. Being more perceptive than judgemental seems to allow for a much more open acceptance of variables than someone who judges. I find that with a lot of judgemental people, where they categorise and classify, and are usually very rigid in their adherence to categorised values.
You don’t need sex to love someone, but you make it seem that without sex, you’re just friends. Can you not love without sex? Is it actually that important to you? Would you fall out of love with someone who was unable or unwilling to have sex with you? That’s a shame. But then, I’ve also become aware that other judgemental people in my life have conditions attached to their love….
I find personality types and values fascinating. It makes it clear to me that we’re all different, and yet, if we want to be with people who share our values, we need to be with people who fit our own personality types and values.
“Really, what right do you have to tell them how they should love people?” — None. However, I’m not telling them that, I’m just telling them that i’m not interested in that being part of my life, after all, I can always go out and find somebody who does more closely match what I want from life, in the same way you might choose not to be with someone in future who would not be happy with you having multiple partners. And is that not all ‘love’ is once the two year chemical surge has ended?, purely an interlocking of traits and behaviours that enhance our lives?
“Would you fall out of love with someone who was unable or unwilling to have sex with you” — my definition of ’sex’ there includes kissing/cuddling etc, and yes, if thats not happening, then i don’t see what the difference is between that relationship and those with my other close friends or with my family. If love consists of Sex, Compassion, Generosity, Trust,Caring & Connection.. then I have all of those but sex with many people in my life.
This is where perhaps, it is the words and definitions that fail, Love can be defined to mean sexual love, or familial love, or love in friendship, among many other meanings. Therefore ‘polyamoury’, if not about sex, is either not a ‘meaningful’ concept to me, or it applies to almost everyone. Is this not what a ‘Platonic’ relationship is?
I think that even if one was in a relationship where both people claimed to be ok with polyamoury, there is a chance that one of them is lying to keep the other person in their life, even though they are being hurt by the situation. I personally could never risk causing distress to someone I love purely for sex (with reference to the paragraphs above).
I have met a number of people in ‘open relationships’, and, it might seem judgemental, but many of those people have either had a clear ‘I must be different to everyone else’ mentality, which, to put on my Freudian hat, probably stems from some inner distress, or have been desperately unhappy people trying to change everything around them in the hope that will make them happier (Which, in my world view, is doomed to failure as happiness is internal). [To be DEEPLY politically incorrect and probably alienate 93% of the known universe, this is my view on homosexuality as well] . I suspect there is a greater than random intersection between the sets of Borderline personality spectrum disorders and people in open relationships
There is also the trade-of to be considered, were you in love with someone spectacular, would you risk the possibility of losing them?, It seems akin to gambling, religion, drinking or drug taking. Born of a lack of satisfaction with what one already has.
I actually disagree about personality types and values, I’m a strong believer that we are in fact all more similar than most people believe and that the apparent differences are just the filter of our experiences and our learned inner monologue. (Hence the success of Discoursive therapy techniques, Hypnosis, NLP…) I think anybody can ‘reprogram’ themselves to be any ‘personality type’ they choose by merely changing the wording of their interior recording. I have always felt that I can ‘convince myself’ of the merits of any morality or viewpoint and then take that as my own, with concious choice. (To use the unscientific process of introspection )
Which might be why i get a different answer everytime I do a myers briggs test
Although my nature of playing devils advocate (translation : argumentative b*******) belies it sometimes, I like to surround myself with people of vastly different personality types and values, how else I am I to add new material to my life?
— What you pretend to be for long enough, you will become.
When you can so easily change your personality type and get different results on the tests, I can only suspect that you’re simply not being your true self. I wonder if you actually know who you really are.
But thank you for such a response, I appreciate the time you’ve taken to write it.
I actually think i know who I am very well! ..
I’m an academic cynic who dislikes authority, who recently overcame extreme arachnophobia, because my need not harm a huntsman spider was more important. Enjoy talking with others more than anything else in the world, but have a constant fear of rejection and some seperation anxiety (My father left when i was 2). Tied into this, my most crippling trait is a level of social anxiety, where I’m at times, almost pathologically afraid of ‘looking silly’. (Either the cause of, or because of being bullied as a child – ironic as I could now probably lift the bullies up by the ankles with one hand . I have a tendency at times to be ‘people pleasing’. It would appear i’m naturally good at programming/mathematics/academia, but the most enjoyable aspect of work for me is meetings (weird, i know). I’m frequently empathic and rapidly comes to appreciate and believe in the viewpoints of those I’m around, although I’ll frequently argue, purely for the emotional response. (I’m not ‘passionate’ about anything, so I have no underlying reason to argue). I prefer control and as a child I had temper issues related to this, this is simply a defense mechanism however, as is my desire for sureity and security, probably also born of my father leaving when I was young. Ironically, many of my traits are caused by, but lead towards my greatest fear, which is of being alone/outcast.
Different results are due to imprecise questions in my view, I can often see what the question is ‘trying’ to ask, but the terminology/wording doesn’t match the way i think (or my answer is “yes, but” for many questions). So I give the same answers to the same questions, but the same question asked in different wording (in another test) may well prompt a different answer, as it may match more closely with my personality. (I’m very much a behavioural scientist when it comes to Psych, I’d prefer unbiased external measurements)
Introversion/Extroversion questions are a perfect example, as you mentioned on the other post, Introverts should gain energy from being alone, which is patently not true in my case.
eg. When with a group of people, once past the shyness stage, I’m the loudest and most frequent talker, I have heaps of energy and always want to be ‘doing’ things. When by myself, I tend to either do nothing or click mindlessly on endless websites.
but the tests attempt to determine this by asking questions that may be affected by other variables.
ie…
I haven’t been to many parties because of a lack of invites, not a lack of desire! but the test doesn’t capture that. Tests ask if i enjoy reading, yes, but only on the train or in the hours between going to bed and sleeping when there is nothing else to do!
Many of the ‘Do you do this’ type questions asking about solitary pursuits I answer ‘yes’ to, not because I would prefer to be doing those, but because I get rapidly bored and there are no other choices!
Interestingly I often saw my shyness as introversion and tried to surround myself with solitary interests, only to discover that that in no way made me happy, so I tried another approach, challenging myself to beat my shyness, step by step, through which i have definately improved my perceived quality of life.
Damian, thanks for sharing so much of yourself. There’s simply too much there for me to comment on, so I’ll just say I appreciate your candour, and will certainly take into account those things in any further interactions or comments about you or with you. I also apologise to you if I offended you in any way. Cheers!
Well written and thought-provoking post!
Stu (fellow INTP)