On the subject of Love

[JamesR]

http://hushmagazine.ca/sex/love-is-not-enough/

http://blog.carsieblanton.com/post/8214 ... asual-love

[enigmaT120]

Yeah. I really liked the second one. "I love you. No big deal."

[7Wannabe5]

Of course, I mostly agree with both of the articles. However, I've never really completely liked the lover-should-be-best-friend mindset. I think having a best friend or several very good friends who are not your lover can be a significant upside for your sexual-love relationship(s), because somebody has got to tell you that your breath smells like an 18th century sewer, and somebody has got to tell you that you look like a box of candy, but maybe the same person(s) shouldn't have both of those jobs. Etc.etc.etc.

Also, I have never like the use of the word "casual" to describe the wide variety of sex (or love!) one can experience outside of the hope and/or expectation of a Disney movie rise to climax of wedding and/or offspring. For instance, "casual" and "erotic" seem to be almost antonyms to me, yet it is quite possible to share high eroticism with a near stranger with whom you have null expectation of further relationship. OTOH, the most recent addition to my circle told me that he really enjoys being with me because "it is like being in high school", because we aren't attempting to engage all the edges of our giant mid-life puzzles. I think maybe it has less to do with "casual" vs "serious", and more to do with "expectations" vs. "standards." I have very different feelings and thoughts about the three men with whom I am currently involved (and back-at-me) , but I think they are all great. Due to lifelong conditioning, I waver a bit in my commitment to the practice of polyamory, so the other day I made a little chart in which I predicted 1 year, 6 year and 20 year outlook for all 3 relationships under conditions of polyamory or monogamy, using a simple positive, neutral or negative, and the results very clearly indicated that polyamory was the way to go. IOW, if one of my partners were to insist on monogamy, I should let him go, and stick with the other two and the option of whatever might be found behind another new door. Of course, I've only been seeing #1 for around 9 months, #2 for around 6 months and #3 for a few weeks, so...?

[Ego]

Yeah, one of the reasons work is a good place to meet a partner is because you get to see how (and if) they operate.

Do they work well with others?
Do they crack under stress?
Do they flake when things get hard?
Can they keep a secret?
How do they treat the people who can do nothing for them?
How do they treat the people who rely on them?
How do they react when people treat them poorly?
Can they adapt?
Can they keep focus on the long-game when faced with short-term temptations.....

Love is important. But it is not everything. Love can fail to be enough when times get tough. It is good to see how the person navigates some of those tough times before taking the plunge with them.

[BRUTE]

diversification is just about the only free lunch there is in investing, isn't it?

[7Wannabe5]

@Ego: Very good list, but isn't there something underlying that is more essential, along the lines of "devotion to mission?" or maybe just "shared values?" For instance, at one juncture in my brief corporate career, I was at the lowest level of management that was informed of the "secret" that many people, some of whom I considered to be good friends, who had been with the organization for many years were going to, shortly with no warning, be informed of a "like it or lump it" change in the terms of their employment. For some reason, probably just good-girl training, I did not share the "secret", but I did quit my own position with little notice within a couple weeks because I couldn't stomach it.

The summer I was 14, my boyfriend was the de facto leader of our teen gang. We would sneak out of our houses at night and run about creating minor mayhem. One time he had us all cross arms like The Who and sing "Talking About My Generation" as we walked down the middle of a road. I was a bit mad for him. I did not object in the least when he spray painted some lyrics on the side of a school, but on the occasion that he started ruthlessly ripping the branches off of some newly planted trees on a playground, and he completely ignored my protests, he lost me in the follow.

The first man I had sex with after my divorce was a devoted Buddhist. He had a tiny art house on his property, and it was occupied by a visiting Tibetan lama. So, I had the rather surreal experience of accompanying a man, whom I found sexy due to the accent and manner he retained from growing up in the exact neighborhood of West Side Story, back to his place with clear intent, and then being introduced to the tiny robed lama, who was helping himself to a midnight snack in the main house kitchen. Anyways, his wife of many years had left him to live in isolation as a Buddhist nun on some island. So, sometimes following truth or purpose or mission, even one that is mutual, can transcend a relationship.

OTOH, I think it is very difficult, if not impossible, to tweak out self-interest from acting in accordance with values. It's just that when a person behaves in alignment with their values, it is more like they are exhibiting a higher level of complexity in acting in accordance with their own self-interest. For instance, it was laughably apparent to me, even at the time, that more than half the reason I quit my corporate job was that I do not like working or commuting through deer country. The weak-azz idiot-level-thoughtless behavior of the current management wasn't just an excuse, but....? Therefore, I sometimes think the best question to ask yourself regarding a potential partner might be something like "Will this person act in accordance with his own self-interest in a self-aware manner, even if that means no longer being in relationship with me?" The self-interest being given, but the self-awareness being key.

BRUTE said: diversification is just about the only free lunch there is in investing, isn't it?

Not free due to likelihood of increased transaction costs which must be taken into account. The economic reality that my affluent Western female peers are only very slowly comprehending is that they are getting ripped off if/when they "pay" the price of monogamy. IOW, as we all learned in the article on the history of money, the practice of dowry is an exception to the general rule of bride price, that only made economic sense under very specific circumstance, but the romantic mythology associated with this exception (novels of witty, spinster Jane Austen, etc.) still permeates our culture. I did not have to read the article on the history of money to learn this because I spent 3 years in monogamous contract with a former polygamist who did not immigrate to our Western culture (although he did read our fairy tales as a child) until he was 16. So, I was in a relationship in which "bride price", literal but somewhat token, was paid to me. Therefore, it was made very clear to me that I could have demanded higher bride price if I did not insist on monogamous contract, and this had less to do with the fact that the majority of men crave variety in sexual partners (see "Coolidge Effect") and more to do with the fact that "for her wealth/property" is one of the quite acceptable reasons offered in the Qur'an for why a man might choose a wife, another being "her beauty", another being "her rank", with "for her devotion to Islam or her character" being the obvious recommended decision-maker, even within the context of being free to take up to 4 wives.

[BRUTE]

makes sense. 1 devout wife, 1 rich wife, 1 hot wife, 1 for increasing rank and status. that should cover everything.

brute thinks that if with increased number of relationships, the strength and cost of individual relationships were accordingly decreased, this would actually make a lot of sense. this is what he meant by diversification. it's much easier to find 1 attractive partner and 1 friend and 1 mechanic than to find 1 person who's all three.

[7Wannabe5]

BRUTE said: makes sense. 1 devout wife, 1 rich wife, 1 hot wife, 1 for increasing rank and status. that should cover everything.

Right. I think either hot wife or status/rank wife is probably the best job. I can be good at devotion, but it's a suck job (pun not intended, but noted.) I can't imagine who would ever consider me for the rich wife position unless I borrow my sister's car and start picking up hitchhikers in prison zones. To give my recent-ex some credit, he really didn't understand why lonely middle-aged American career women didn't often want to marry young desperate-to-immigrate men.