I am back in Kingston — I drove up at night to avoid the traffic, from the PA Pike the the Jersey Pike to the Garden State Parkway to the NYS Thruway in under three hours. Those big interstates are awesome at night.
Poly Living 2010 was one of the best Loving More conferences I’ve been to in a long time. There was lots of young energy — a whole contingent from Minneapolis, connected with the Modern Poly website, flew in, after creating a fund raising campaign to get themselves there. The difference in tone was palpable, at a conference where half the crowd is 50ish plus. These young adventurers have a lot of ideas and energy, they are super organized, they understand technology and they are ready to go. They have ideas like putting together a wiki of every poly thing in the world; they are doing precisely that, among other projects.
We had a truly talented host of presenters, who put months of work into their presentations and whose ideas reflect not just advocacy but an evolving view of relationships and how to teach about relationships. The community as an entity seemed to understand that it was there to refine its ideas, strengthen its connections, and then return to our communities to continue the conversation.
To those who have been following my coverage of the conference, I’ve withdrawn two of my stories.
The out-and-open poly leadership story did not check out, on further investigation. Participants in the poly leadership summit are still allowed to use pseudonyms with one another, even though most are openly known to one another. While this is reflective of the fear level associated with being out about one’s lifestyle, my own feeling is that this kind of fear is part of what we confront on the way to leadership, but by the time we hold ourselves ready to set an example, we need to have addressed those matters. There is plenty of room for those who are afraid of being outed (for example, because they have kids, or work as teachers) to participate elsewhere.
I’ve also withdrawn the story about Gaia and the New Politics of Love controversy. After the conference was over I had time to speak with the leadership of Loving More with a little less rush, and I learned that there were several facts that basically obviate the controversy as it was explained to me originally. I am grateful that I was reminded about the alternative AIDS theory issue; I had just about forgotten that one, and it’s a really interesting scandal that goes to the heart of the medical-pharma-government incest that we live with all the time. To anyone looking for that article to reprint on your blog, please contact me directly and we can talk, and I’m retracting any prior permission to re-publish the piece. Thank you all for participating in such an exciting round of journalism.
So too is what I’ll call the Tantra Theme, raised in the book Gaia-Love by Serena. She is one of the few who is speaking about what is gained through skin-skin contact. This one gets a big blue bookmark.
There were some excellent reader comments on that post and I will move them out to the front of the site when I figure out how to do that effectively. Thank you for some excellent conversation this weekend. I love that I can bring this conversation to the front and center of Planet Waves and have it be treated with sensitivity. I think we have the best commenters on any site I’ve seen — there are so many considered, reasoned, well-developed comments, it’s really pretty impressive.
Stay tuned early Monday for the Oracle and Len Wallick’s Daily Astrology column.
Sharing masturbation is basic sex without touching. It is directly erotic but a reality shift from what we usually think of as sex.
With the overlay of penetration and touching subtracted, and a little less of ‘commitment’ and ‘love’ and ‘expectation’ piled on the equation of a relationship, the psychic fields open up and realtime comes a lot closer to dreamtime.
In other words, our perception of the physical realm and our experience of the fantasy world begin to merge, and one potential result is a new kind of intimacy. I am not suggesting (in this particular novel) that we replace sex with sharing masturbation, though it would be an interesting scenario. What I am suggesting is that we use it as a bridge to a more available space of shared awareness. With these particular fields open, the ‘old kind’ of sexual contact becomes really interesting in a new way, a more ethereal way.
We also began a brief conversation about consensual fantasy agreements last week. This too is another way of opening up the erotic-psychic realm as a relational space, a space of empathy. One of the ways you know you’re on the astral plane (approx. 4d) is that perception is polarized, which is a fun place to play (though at times scary, because fear can be really palpable), though we start to move to a space of merging and contact (approx 5d) — which we do literally with our thoughts and our feelings.
Opening up these fields starts with mirror exploration. As ’embarrassing’ as this may be, it’s a way to raise self awareness and begin to see the ego so we can begin to see through it. It’s a way to begin taking back the perception of ‘self’ onto ‘other’ and explore a space where selves relate to one another as selves. This is an evolution of thought and perception that will shape the way our relationships unfold, by creating a space where we move toward autonomy in those experiences — not total independence but what I think of as mutual independent relationship.
You can visualize this as starting with people holding a mirror for one another — rather than being the mirror.
And this: Here’s one: http://www.journeydance.com/ — Find a way.
Yep, I’m excited to create. My vag is tingling. We can talk about our genitals. And we can make love without touching. If we make love without touching, we might create more space for others to feel safe, say, dancing. Since our bodies can be off limits until we are warm, hearts open. My housemate is downstairs with our lover who I won’t go near since she’s attached, with cat like ferocity. Meow! And, to think, she’s the Virgo!
*When it was said be the change you wish to see in the world, I think it might have been more concise to say “be the change” and leave it at that. Sweet forgiveness lives here, only in this moment now (floating) And can die out quickly under slight pressure, sometimes under sheets or with the flipping tongue loose and lord knows, forgiveness makes a good lover.
So, to the point… the reason this polyamorous thing is important to talk about and feel into, well, is because it raises our senses. It makes us aware. It’s the next big conversation, I say. Marriage is taken for granted. Commitment, a whole other thing. Excuse me, I’m flowing over. My cup is full. Hopefully I haven’t spilled anywhere that a small kiss can’t make better. Oh, God, did I almost say fix? Forgive me, you savvy psychoanalysts.