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Having Integrity in Your POlyamorous Relationships
PolyNYC Meeting facilitated by Julio Cortés
October 18, 2006
Part 1 Intro - Who I am and Why I am doing this Talk
I am a poly speaker and activist who has been active for over 18 years, including being on shows like Beyond Monogamy in Canada, Penn and Teller: Bullshit!, Montel Williams. I am married, have a primary partner, a few secondaries and other important relationships, and have a lot of experience dealing with this topic. I, like many others have had many problems in making things work well, and have come to see Integrity as one of the core issues in this and many other relationship styles.
Part 2 Invitation
I presented an invitation given in the form of a poem called the Invitation, by Oriah Mountain Dreamer. We had a discussion about the poem, what it meant, how it related to polyamory and what was it saying about integrity.
THE INVITATION
It doesn't interest me what you do for a living.
I want to know what you ache for,
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.
It doesn't interest me how old you are.
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love,
for your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon.
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow,
if you have been opened by life's betrayals or
have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain.
I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own,
without moving to hide it or fade it or fix it..
I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own;
if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful,
to be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn't matter to me if the story you're telling me is true.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself,
if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul.
I want to know if you can be faithful and therefore be trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see beauty
even when it is not pretty every day,
and if you can source your life from God's presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine,
and stand at the edge of a lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, "Yes!"
It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up after a night of grief and despair,
weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.
It doesn't interest me who you are, how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.
It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself,
and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.
–Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Indian Elder
Part 3 Integrity
We had a large group discussion on the topic of integrity. What it was, how did they feel about it personally and what if anything did it have to do with polyamorous relationships. As a group we developed a working definition of the word integrity: it is the quality where we honor our relationships by being true to our commitments ourselves and others. We need to remember the "I" in integrity, and selfishness may be good sometimes in relation to helping us stay integrous.
Part 4 Getting Deeper Understanding - Small Group Work
We broke into small group to discuss further these ideas. We took time to share and discuss our rules in relationships, for us and others, and looked at how often we don't follow our own rules and how easy it is to make being out of integrity for ourselves and our partners ok. We discussed how easy it is to let societal norms and our attachment to being liked or in a relationship dictate. I shared the Boys and Girls Rules. Finally, we shared what learned in small group with the larger group and had a discussion, applying our understanding to hypothetical situations presented.
Part 5 - Tools
I left the group with two sets of tools. The Five Levels of Listening and The Levels of Openness.
Five Levels of Listening
1 I Don't Hear You - Turn Away
2 You Are Wrong - Turning Against
3 Let Me Tell You How It Is - Turning Against
4 Tell Me More - Turning Toward
5 This Is What I Hear You Saying and Feeling - Turning Toward
Levels of Openness
1 (-1) Unaware
2 (0) Withholding
3 (1) You Are (Blaming)
4 (2) Towards You I Feel (Naming My Feeling)
5 (3) Because (Giving reasons why I feel the way I do about you and what you did)
6 (4) The Story I Tell Myself (Revealing what I imagined and felt as a result of what happened, admitting that I may not be correct but just making up a story)
7 (5) About Myself I Fear (Revealing what is the real reason I am upset here, how your being or behavior triggered me and made me fear something about me that I don't like or want to look at, and admitting this to you)
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