Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Love or Loves?

"Never love two loves, baby. This kind of love is driving me crazy."
This is a line from an Orbital song. Since this track is so pretty, I've never really thought about what it might be referring to, until recently. Someone very close to me once had an affair and told me, "I don't know if it's possible to be in love with two people at the same time but if it is, I am."
It has been argued that humans are naturally monogamous creatures; that we are monogamous due to socialization, etc.
I don't believe that I've ever experienced jealousy until the last couple of years. That may have something to do with the fact that it's only been recently that I've been more invested in my relationships and that I have been more geographically settled.
The funny thing is, I have forged intimate relationships within the same time frame of each other and I have never once compared them. Each human interaction has been completely unique. I absolutely honor every person that I have shared intimate space with and have never lied to them or devalued our exchanges on any level.
After I did first experience some jealousy, I examined it carefully. After all, I had heard so much about it and was curious as to it's origins. I believe every situation to be unique but for me jealousy was a questioning of my self worth and some comparison of my own. I realized that if I felt like I could believe and trust the person I was feeling jealous about, the jealousy basically disappeared.
The Ethical Slut, a book about sex, intimacy, and basic human relations states that when we have feelings, they are always ours and it's our job to own them and work them out however we need to. If that means confronting the jealousy inspirer for support, mirroring, or anything else we might need, so be it. If jealousy can be used as an opportunity to expand, understand ourselves, and heal some fears, then it seems that having multiple loves could be not only something acceptable but something desired.
As for me and the application of these concepts to my actual life, I'm undecided and uninvolved. I'm open and unattached. I think if honesty, unconditional love, and truth came along, dressed as a human, I couldn't say no, no matter what the situation looked like.

No comments: