Author: Oligotropos

Sturm aus der Tiefe

Es ist Dezember geworden – und vermutlich sollte ich nun über etwas Harmonisches bLoggen, stille Schneelandschaften, Stunden am Kamin und Glöckchenklänge.
Doch die Welt ist just nicht sonderlich harmonisch, so scheint mir – und vor allem: Sie bleibt auch zum Ende eines Jahres ja dann doch nicht stehen, sondern rotiert munter weiter direkt in die nächste Runde, was da auch kommen mag.

So ist es auch mit der Polyamorie, die sich fortwährend weiterentwickelt und differenziert; manchmal in nicht so ersprießliche Richtungen, die selbst mich zu deutlicherer Standpunktbehauptung herausfordern, wie im vorletzten Eintrag geschehen – aber manchmal gibt es auch eine bemerkenswerte Synthese an Erkenntnissen – gewonnen an verschiedenen Orten – die zu mehr Weitsicht im kunterbunten Universum der Mehrfachbeziehungen verhelfen.

Solch ein Ereignis der letzteren Art ist in der Weise eingetreten, daß ich mein bLogbuch, welches ich hier seit bald sieben Jahren getreulich führe, aktualisieren möchte – Euch da draußen zur Unterstützung und für noch bessere Gespräche miteinander.

Einer der Dauerbrenner im Kontext der Polyamorie ist sicherlich das Thema „Eifersucht“; ob es diese in polyamoren Kontexten überhaupt geben dürfe, wie – falls doch – damit umzugehen sei, und wie davon betroffene Hilfe finden könnten…etc. pp.
Und weil es eben doch ein Dauerbrenner ist, habe auch ich bereits auf diesem bLog zwei Einträge dazu verfaßt, einmal zur Eifersucht selbst – und einmal zum Thema Neid, um bestimmte Gefühle von Zurücksetzung und Konkurrenz besser von der „klassischen Eifersucht“ zu differenzieren.

Und dann ist da die berühmt-berüchtigte „Bindungstheorie“ nach J. Bowlby und M. Ainsworth, die spätestens seit dem Erscheinen von Jessica Ferns Buch „Polysecure – Bindung, Trauma und konsensuelle Nicht-Monogamie“ im September 2022¹ noch einmal erheblichen Einfluß auf die Betrachtungsweise von (romantischen) Verbindungen in Mehrfachbeziehungen genommen hat. Was ein relevanter und notwendiger Schritt war, denn „gegrummelt“ hatte es im (Mehrfach)Beziehungshintergrund dazu bereits ohnehin seit langer Zeit – so daß selbst auf meinem bLog die Bowlbyschen Ideen bereits im Juni 2019 in Eintrag 14 rund um die Qualitätsmerkmale verbindlicher Liebesbeziehungen Erwähnung gefunden hatten.

Um diese Ideen an einem Ort zusammenzutragen, verfaßte ich in diesem Jahr im April den etwas ausufernden Eintrag 112, in dem ich, so kurz und komplett es mir erlaubt war, noch einmal schnell die Hauptlinie der Bindungstheorie darlegte – was auch Jessica Fern in ihrem Buch ebenso getan hatte.
Und in diesem Eintrag möchte ich darauf verweisen – was Euch als Lesere*innen schlimmstenfalls zu etwas hin- und hergelinke bewegen sollte – aber zumindest davor bewahren, daß ich es hier noch einmal in der dortigen Tiefe ausbreite.

Nähern wir uns also der Synthese:
In meinem Eifersuchts-Eintrag 36 benutze ich in Übereinstimung mit der Schweizer Psychologin Verena Kast auf meinem bLog erstmals das Wort „Ressentiment“ (von französisch re-sentir „erneut fühlen“) als „das wiederholte Durch- und Nacherleben bestimmter Beziehungserfahrungen“, zu denen Frau Kast ergänzt: „Die Ohnmacht des Handelns, die zu einer Entwicklung des Ressentiments geführt hat, wird deutlich sichtbar. Die Menschen fühlen sich ausgeliefert, gefangen, wehrlos.“

In der Bindungstheorie nach Bowlby und Ainsworth postulieren diese beiden Forscher*innen wiederum, daß jene von Frau Kast zitierten „Beziehungserfahrungen“ allerdings bereits zu einem äußerst frühen Zeitpunkt gemacht (und abgespeichert!) werden, und zwar mit den Anfängen unserer Kindheit in Hinsicht auf unsere dortigen allernächsten Bezugspersonen. Bowlby und Ainsworth konnten über ihre 4-Faktoren Matrix der Bindungsstile (siehe Eintrag 112 oder „Polysecure“ oder Wikipedia – HIER) nachweisen, daß aufgrund dessen vermutlich nur wenige Erwachsene über eine optimale sg. „sichere Bindung“ verfügen, sondern viele von uns vermutlich mit „vermeidenden“, „unsicher-ambivalenten“ oder geradewegs „desorganisierten“ Bindungsstilen durch den Alltag und unser Beziehungsleben gehen.

In Übereinstimmung von Bowlby/Ainsworth mit Jessica Fern – was bedeutet das gleich nochmal?
Nichts Geringeres, als daß wir in uns frühkindliche Erfahrungen tragen, gemäß denen unsere einstigen Bezugspersonen in einem für uns überlebensnotwendigen Moment entweder abweisend/distanziert gehandelt haben (in dem sie z.B. physisch schlicht nicht da waren oder einen Umstand heruntergespielt haben [„Bleib ruhig, ist nicht so schlimm…“], sie lediglich ambivalent und daher unberechenbar mal mit Lob, mal mit Tadel oder „Bedingungen“ ihre Zuwendung zur Verfügung stellten (oft: Anspüche an Äußerlichkeiten, Verhalten, Leistung) oder uns sogar aus ihrer (Macht)Position als (Liebes)Zuwendungsquelle über die Grenze kindlichen Ertragens hinaus haben traumatisches Leid zuteil werden lassen.

Gemäß weiterer Untersuchungen durch den Psychologen und Psychoanalytiker John Bowlby tragen wir die Auswirkungen der oben aufgeführten Bindungserfahrungen – einschließlich ihrer möglichen Verletzungen und Einschränkungen (aufgeführt im zweiten Teil meines Eintrags 112 oder auch in „Polysecure“) – schließlich in unser Erwachsenenalter, wenn wir dort irgendwann selbst auf die Suche nach einer (odere mehreren) „Bezugsperson(en)“ gehen, mit denen wir unser Leben teilen wollen. Die deutsche Wikipedia ist bei ihrer Definition von „Bezugsperson“ recht knapp: »Eine Bezugsperson ist die Person, zu der ein anderer Mensch eine besondere persönliche Beziehung hat. Vertrauen, Identifikation, Liebe und Zuwendung prägen eine solche Beziehung. Auch Körperkontakt, wie z.B. Streicheln oder Kuscheln, kann dazu gehören.« Doch selbst der Personenkreis, mit dem man innerhalb eines monogamen Modells diese Voraussetzungen teilen würde, wäre sicher eher knapp bemessen.

Für die Polyamorie ist es daher wiederum Frau Fern, welche dort die maßgebliche Bedeutung des Themas der „Bezugsperson“ erkannt hat. Den dritten Hauptteil ihres Buches leitet sie in Kapitel 7 mit folgender wichtigen Differenzierung ein:
»Bis zu diesem Punkt habe ich überwiegend den Oberbegriff „Nicht-Monogamie” verwendet, wenn ich über Menschen mit mehreren Partnern gesprochen habe, aber wie wir in Kapitel Vier gesehen haben, können Menschen, die nicht monogam sind, sehr unterschiedliche Arten haben, wie sie das Leben mit mehreren Partnern gestalten. Im weiteren Verlauf der Diskussion darüber, wie man polysecure [also in sicherer (Ver)Bindung mit mehreren Partner*innen] sein kann, spreche ich speziell über Menschen, die Polyamorie leben. Polyamorie wird gemeinhin als die Lebensweise definiert, in der romantische Liebesbeziehungen zu mehr als einer Person geführt werden, und wir können hinzufügen, dass es sich dabei auch um eine Form der Nicht-Monogamie handelt, in der Menschen mehrere romantische Bezugspersonen haben.«

Einigen meiner eifrigeren Leser*innen mag nun bereits die Bedeutung dämmern, welche die Anwendung der Bowlbyschen Bindungstheorie auf das multiple Bezugspersonenmodell der Polyamorie dadurch hat.

Spielen wir es in Beziehungssituationen also durch:
– wenn sich mein Lieblingsmensch einer weiteren Person zuwendet
– wenn eine weiter Person zu einer Gruppe bereits verbundener Menschen (und „Gruppe“ können auch zwei sein) hinzukommt.

Plötzlich springen sie da mit unbegreiflicher Intensität hervor – die eingangs erwähnten „Ressentiments“: Überwältigende Gefühle (und bitte denkt dran: ich verwende auf diesem bLog „Gefühl“ als Kombination aus „auslösender Emotionsreiz“ plus „Bewertung im Gehirn“) von Verunsicherung, Wut, Trauer oder Angst. Erschütternde Impulse, die sich als Zurückgesetztheit, Mißgunst, Kränkung, Minderwertigkeits- oder auch Verlustempfindungen äußern kann. Sogar bis hin zu körperlichen (Stress)Reaktionen, einschließlich des Empfindens von physischem Schmerz. Die einen könnten ein Loch in die Wand schlagen, manche davonlaufen – wohingegen andere sich wimmernd unter der Bettdecke verstecken wollen…

Kommt Euch etwas bekannt vor?
Genau! Es sind die von Bowlby und Ainsworth beschriebenen (kindlichen) Auswirkungen auf nicht verläßlich handelnde Bezugspersonen.²
Obwohl wir also vielleicht in einem Beziehungsnetzwerk (und auch das können bloß zwei Personen sein) eventuell konsensuell ethische Nicht-Monogamie ganz bewußt vereinbart haben, kann unser somatisches System beim Eintreten eines weiteren „Beziehungsfalles“ unbewußt auf Rotalarm höchster Stufe schalten: DAS ist ja genau wie damals, als unsere Bezugspersonen a)nicht für uns da waren, sie b)inkohärent/unberechenbar gehandelt haben, c)wir durch sie, obwohl Quelle unserer Liebe, Leid erfahren haben!
Und in seiner beschädigten Logik hat dieses System ja sogar Recht: Zwar sind wir heute erwachsen, aber möglicherweise erleben wir eben ganz buchstäblich, daß sich unser Lieblingsmensch jemand anderem zuwendet, bisher gelebte Routinen aufgebrochen werden und wir vielleicht temporär schmerzhaft mit weniger 1:1-Liebe auskommen müssen, als zuvor.

Einschub (und damit der Eintrag nicht wieder zu lang wird):
Das sensationelle an dieser „Erkenntnis-Vernetzung“ ist für mich, daß es da draußen also vermutlich durchaus eifersüchtige (besitzanspruchsdenkende) und neidische (mißgönnende) Menschen geben wird. Aber wahrscheinlich in einem extrem geringeren Umfang als bisher angenommen; und wenn, dann vermutlich in Zahlen in etwa so viele wie z.B. auch narzisstische (selbstbezogene [hier nicht pathologisch verwendet!]).
Der wesentlich größere Anteil von „eifersüchtigen“ oder „neidischen“ Ressentiments, insbesondere jener, die in romantischen Liebesbeziehungen erlebt werden, wird jedoch wohl weitaus eher auf das Konto von beschädigtem Bindungsverhalten gehen; den ungünstigen Mechanismen, die wir daraus für weiteren (intimen) Bindungsaufbau in unser Erwachsenenleben mit hinübergenommen haben – sowie den Schwachstellen, die diese ungünstigen – also „nicht sicheren“! – Mechaniken haben (wodurch nämlich schon ein einzelner „Trigger“ sehr schnell zu massiver Seelennot führen kann).

Eieiei, da sitzen wir also mit unserer „neuen Erkenntnis“…
Was aber können wir tun?

Das Wichtigste scheint mir, uns allen aufgrund der Erkenntnis mit noch mehr Verständnis für einander zu begegnen. In polyamoren Kontexten sind Eifersucht und Neid (oft „nicht gönnen können“ genannt) ohnehin schon sehr rote Tücher, es sind on- und offline seitenweise Ratgeber verfaßt worden, in die auch ich mich eingereiht habe.
Die Erkenntnis beweist aber einmal mehr, daß es sich eben nicht um plan-, bzw. absichtsvoll böswillige, destruktiv mastermind-artig ersonnene Verhaltensweisen von uns oder unseren Liebsten handelt.
Vielmehr sind gar nicht mal so wenige von uns liebes- und beziehungstechnisch schlicht ein bißchen arme Schweine – und leider etwas beschädigt. Und dafür können die Betroffenen am allerwenigsten selbst etwas – weswegen mich das in der Polyamorie noch zu häufig geschwungene „Das ist dein Problem – daran must DU arbeiten“-Schwert regelmäßig sehr erschreckt und traurig macht.

Wir können nämlich durchaus zusammen etwas tun. Und das habe ich in Eintrag 112 zu den Bindungstypen schon angedeutet: Wir können defizitäre Bindungsstile stabilisieren, vielleicht sogar ändern, indem wir heute andere Beziehungserfahrungen sammeln, als sie uns in der Vergangenheit zuteil geworden sind.

Jessica Fern benennt als zwei wichtige Merkmale, über die „sichere Bindungen“ verfügen sollten, die Begriffe „sicherer Hafen“ und „sichere Basis“.
Ein „sicherer Hafen“ ist eine Beziehung, wenn sie für uns ein Platz zur Einkehr ist „genau so wie wir sind“. Dort, wo wir geliebt werden, getröstet werden, wo wir uns aussprechen können und Zuspruch erfahren, wo wir uns fallen lassen können (und gehalten werden), wo unsere Nerven zur Ruhe kommen können, wir nicht beurteilt werden und zurückgespiegelt bekommen: Es schön und wichtig, daß es Dich gibt!
Eine „sichere Basis“ ist der Ort, wo wir ermutigt werden, z.B. indem unseren Visionen und Projekte unterstützt werden, wo wir unsere Pläne ausprechen dürfen und positiven Input bekommen, wo Menschen uns sagen, was für Fähigkeiten und Optionen wir haben – vielleicht auch, wo sie uns nach unseren Fähigkeiten anspornen oder bremsen, ohne es an die große Glocke zu hängen…

Mit „sicherem Hafen“ und „sicherer Basis“ möchte Frau Fern auf das hinaus, was ich in der Oligoamory seit Beginn dieses bLogs als „Verläßlichkeit“ und „Berechenbarkeit“ bezeichne.
Denn noch einmal: Ziel sollen ja die Merkmale sicherer (Ver)Bindung sein, in der ein Mensch (siehe Eintrag 112) über sich sagen kann:
„Es fällt mir relativ leicht, anderen emotional nahe zu kommen.“
„Ich fühle mich wohl dabei, mich auf andere zu verlassen und dass andere sich auf mich verlassen.“
„Ich mache mir keine Sorgen darüber, allein zu sein oder dass andere mich nicht akzeptieren.“
Einen verläßlichen „sicheren Hafen“ und eine berechenbare „sichere Basis“ vorausgesetzt, wird eine solche Person nicht an ihrem Selbstwert (oder gar an ihrer Überlebensfähigkeit) zweifeln, auch wenn eine Bezugsperson sich für einen gewissen Zeitraum abwendet. Sie wird an den ihr gegenüber aufrichtig gemachten Informationen nicht zweifeln, diese nicht permanent überdenken und nicht in Micromanagement verfallen. Und falls ihr tatsächlich so etwas wie Leid widerfährt, kann sie es direkt ansprechen, die Quelle identifizieren und für sich eintreten.

Das klingt jetzt an dieser Stelle für einige von uns sicher sehr ideal. Und glaubt mir, ich weiß selbst als unsicher-ambivalente Person, daß es das wahrhaftig ist.
Unser Gehirn ist allerdings wirklich etwas Bemerkenswertes: Die Forschung ist sich mittlerweile sehr sicher, daß manche dort eingefahrene „Dellen“ leider in der Tat nie wieder weg gehen; sie können auch nicht wirklich „überschrieben“ werden, wie manche Lehren versprechen. Aber alternative Erfahrungen können dank der neuronalen Plastizität und unserer lebenslangen Lernfähigkeit bis zu unserem letzten Atemzug gestärkt werden, bis diese an Unfang mögliche alte Narben in ihrer Intensität locker übertreffen (in Eintrag 36 benutze ich dazu das Bild unterschiedlicher “Pfade”, denen entweder die Nutzung entzogen wird – oder die neu beschritten werden).

Wenn bis hierher noch jemand genau aufgepaßt hat, dann könnte man mir nun die Frage stellen: „Wie war das mit den anderen Menschen und der Bedürfniserfüllung in Eintrag 118? Wirklich glaubhaft für unser System kann es doch niemals sein, wenn die anderen Beziehungspersonen für uns ‘sicherer Hafen’ uns ‘sichere Basis’ sein sollen – müssen wir diese Kraft nicht in uns selbst finden?“

Dann sage ich: „Na klar!“ Deshalb spricht ja auch Jessica Fern bereits davon, daß die Beziehungen – an denen wir ja Anteil haben! – diese Merkmal aufweisen sollten, wodurch wir aktive und verantwortliche Mitgestalter*innen der Häfen und Basen wären, die es da zu errichten gilt (die anderen Beteiligten wollen ja auch bei uns „einlaufen“ oder „starten“…!). [Im 3. Teil ihres Buches setzt sie dazu dann auch eine Reihe hilfreicher Impulse , denen ich hier auf dem bLog nicht vorgreifen möchte.]

Ja, und letztlich… …gibt es da natürlich durchaus einen etwas wehmütigen Teil der Aufgabe, den tatsächlich nur jede*r an und mit sich selbst verrichten kann. Damit ist das gemeint, was ich mit den Worten der Traumatherapeutin Maria Sanchez in Eintrag 98 die „innere Selbstbegleitung“ nenne³. Es ist der Weg, trotz der erlittenen Beschädigungen in der Kindheit durch unaufmerksame oder selbstbezogene Bezugspersonen nach und nach in Frieden mit dem eigenen kleinen Orchester an inneren Kritiker*innen, Diktator*innen und Verführer*innen zu leben. So wie mit alten Bekannten, die immer noch in der selben Straße mit einem hausen – aber heute stellen wir das Fahrrad trotzdem da ab, wo wir es wollen. Und da wir ja schon damals nicht verkehrt waren, steht es heute garantiert goldrichtig… Genau diesen Frieden in uns gilt es ebenfalls zu stärken, insbesondere da wir nun noch besser wissen, wie sehr unsere Bindungsfähigkeit „nach innen“mit unserer Bindungsfähigkeit „nach außen“– also vor allem zu unseren Lieblingsmenschen – zu tun hat.

Einen ruhigen Jahresausklang 2025 – hoffentlich im Kreis Eurer Liebsten (wie groß oder klein der auch immer sein mag) – wünscht Euch dafür Euer

Oligotropos

¹ Jessica Fern:„Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Non-monogamy“, Scribe UK, 2022;
Deutsch: „Polysecure: Bindung, Trauma und konsensuelle Nicht-Monogamie“, divana-Verlag, 2023

² Beobachtungen von Ainsworth und Bowlby belegten, daß eben z.B. ein Baby oder Kleinkind mehr oder weniger nur zwei Reaktionsmöglichkeiten hat: freeze/flight – also seine Bemühungen einstellen und „einfrieren”, bzw. katatonisch werden (da eine „Flucht” aus der Situation ja meist physisch unmöglich ist), um (Über)Lebensenergie zu sparen oder fight/intensify – also „kämpfen/intensivieren” („kämpfen” scheidet physisch wieder aus), um die Chance auf wahrgenommen-Werden doch noch zu erhöhen.

³ aus: YouTube: Transgenerationstrauma, Maria Sanchez im Interview mit Simon Rilling (25.10.2022)
Zusätzlich Dank an Frau Sanchez für ihr therapeutisches Onlineangebot, aus dem ich in meinem Eintrag auszugsweise zitiere (für den Zugang zu den betreffenden Inhalten hat mein Haushalt ordnungsgemäß bezahlt).

Auch andere Autor*innen betonen die Ermächtigung durch “innere-Kind-Arbeit”, sehr bekannt derzeit im deutschsprachigen Raum u.a. Stefanie Stahl „Das Kind in dir muss Heimat finden”, Kailash 2015

Danke an Jason Hudson auf Unsplash für das Foto!

That’s my freedom, and I’m allowed to… right?

There’s nothing new anymore in November? Not at all: hashtags such as #NoShaveNovember, #Movember, #NovemberRain, #NovemberNights and (especially) in the USA and Canada #ThangsgivingNovember prove that this is not the case.
So it’s time to stage something new on Oligoamory.org in November as well: my first guest post! And since I, Oligotropos, am already a little more mature, this text is also a few years older, at 6 years old, in a sense, a fully-fledged polyamorous schoolchild – but above all, one from whom I can still learn myself and one from whom I hope we all may still be able to benefit.
Therefore, I also see this guest contribution as a kind of “rescue mission“ and “recalling“ of the pending text, as the thoughts expressed in it are among the famous “shoulders” on which my own Oligoamory actually rests today.

In the spring of 2016, Yaniv Barinberg (then still going by his deadname, “Inna”) started a blog called »POLYPLOM – From the daily art of managing polyamorous relationships«.
Yaniv is an author, trained systemic relationship coach, couples counsellor and also holds a master’s degree in philosophy. He writes from the perspective of a queer, white person with a Jewish migration history.
On his blog, he wrote in the »About me« section:
“I live in two loving relationships and want to share my intimate, funny, sometimes absurd and sometimes enriching experiences from my live as a polyamorous person with you.
Alas, I don’t have all the answers and wouldn’t describe myself as an expert on polyamorous relationships. For this reason, you won’t find any ‘I know everything better and want to teach you a lesson’ posts here. Instead, you will find honest, funny, angry, euphoric, sad and hopeful texts here. I write about open relationships, jealousy, kids in poly families, outing, antisemitism and a lot more.”
Yaniv’s online project was active for almost five years, with his last anglophone blog entry appearing in February 2019.
However, Yaniv did not quietly fade away from the polyamorous stage at all: in September 2020, his book entitled »Mehr ist Mehr – meine Erfahrungen mit Polyamorie« (More is More – My Experiences with Polyamory) ¹ was published, which has become a great compendium of previous blog posts and further supplementary texts. You can find more information about it on the edition assemblage website.

Yaniv personally gave me permission to use this earlier blog entry from January 2019 for his guest post, which you can also find as a distinct chapter in his book.
As a blogger, I deeply appreciated Yaniv for his broad, intersectional perspective, as well as – and almost more so – for his questioning, personal and thoughtful writing style, which has always been guided by the small but important word ‘ethical’ in ‘ethical multiple relationships’ such as Polyamory.²
So. And now it’s high time to get started:

The topic “freedom and polyamory” has occupied me again and again in the last months. Especially after I was on the road a lot, gave lectures and workshops. Again and again people have approached me who had the feeling that they were failing polyamory because they didn’t process their feelings well enough or fast enough or simply didn’t know how to deal with a situation. Often the fear of losing a relationship person or overwhelming them with their own feelings was in the foreground. And again and again such conversations revolved around a concept of freedom, which I can’t understand well or where I find it difficult to understand why this is used as an argument in polyamorous relationships. Very often these concepts were expressed in sentences like “You restrict my freedom”. This means that someone wants to feel free to have relationships and/or sexual contact of any form with others at any time.

I would like to try to explain why I have my difficulties with this.

On the one hand it was very often cis women who came to me and told me about their dilemma. Their relationship persons, very often cis men, were the ones who pronounced the sentence in various variations. Why does gender play a role here? Because to be socialized as a woman constantly means to be educated in relationship and emotional work. I get angry at such moments because the sentence leaves no alternative but for the Cis women to take on exactly this role and emotional work. Sentences that allude to the fact that someone has a fundamental right or claim to something are often paralyzing in a certain way. After all, they leave no room for discussion or confrontation. Instead, they create a great deal of room for guilt, because the participants usually remain alone with their feelings or no longer dare to talk about them with their relationship person. Introducing a freedom argument can only work for one person at a time, because if it were introduced by two or more people at the same time, it would be unnecessary. This makes it a one-way street for one person.

On the other hand, freedom as an argument does not give the possibility to actually allow feelings. Instead, any feeling is branded as bad and undesirable. I find this quite unfair, because after all – at least frequently – it should not be a question of forbidding an action, but of having a discussion about different needs. This argument can be tricky, I admit. Sometimes one person has to take more distance than the other, sometimes someone feels disadvantaged and sometimes one or more people are afraid that responding to feelings might mean practicing monogamy for an indefinite period of time because there is no room to live polyamorously/openly. Ultimately, however, it is a question of negotiation and rapprochement.

For me, having open/polyamore relationships does not mean being able to do what I want to do at all times. Says: “If my relationship person(s) should have difficulties with this, it is their problem, I am not considering stopping whatever.” This kind of relationship is not mine. And I also find it hard to give people any form of advice or tip when they ask me what they can do when their relationship person refuses to listen to their feelings. I find it unfair and selfish, in a negative way, that only a person’s needs remain in the foreground. For me, a relationship of any kind means a joint project, something that two or more people create together and develop out of and together with these people. That is why it is so difficult for me to understand that people use this knockout argument. For me, that no longer has much to do with mutual shaping.

I do see the difficulty(s) when it comes to negotiating and reconciling different needs. When my relationship person and I opened our relationship from monogamous to open for physical experiences with others, I refused for a long time. I was afraid that everything would change between us, I was afraid of rejection and I did not (yet) want to face this new experience. That’s why I kept putting it off, giving her the feeling that I needed more time, but time wasn’t the problem.

That’s why I know very well that sometimes it can be difficult to talk about needs and find negotiations or compromises, because sometimes it doesn’t seem clear from what feeling or motivation someone is asking for more time. Sometimes it also means that one or more people will be dissatisfied for a while, but that’s how compromises are, they’re not always fun. I think it’s important not to forget that compromises are a small “sacrifice” for everyone involved, sometimes more, sometimes less, and often nothing they would decide for themselves if it were just their needs. This means that everyone has to take a step towards each other. If, for example, I agree to call my relationship person after a date with another person, then I do so because I know that it is important for them to hear my voice and thereby experience security and affection. For me, it’s no big deal to make a call, but maybe this seemingly small thing means a lot to my relationship person. Depending on the situation, the call may even be a compromise between “see you right after the date” and “don’t hear you at all”.

By this I mean that I like to make compromises and try to take the feelings of my relationship person(s) as seriously as possible. For me, this does not mean that I immediately take every one of my needs into account instead of or only the needs of my relationship person(s). But it can mean that I don’t want to go from 0 to 100 immediately. For example, if I would like to sleep at my date’s place, but my relationship person(s) do not feel so comfortable with it, it may mean that we are slowly moving towards it. Step by step we would get closer to staying overnight. So my original need is not rejected, its satisfaction is simply adapted to our common pace.

In the end, I think it is clear that a person can theoretically (I’m choosing theoretically because practically people can’t do everything they want considering capitalism and all sorts of inequalities in our society) do everything they are able to do. This is not a question of freedom. It is not at all about the sentence “This is my freedom and I am allowed to do this”, but about the addition that is not pronounced, namely “and you can’t do anything about it”. And that’s what I find so difficult to understand, because it just doesn’t fit with my understanding of polyamory (and relationships at all) and often Cis-woman – as described at the beginning – are confronted with the emotional work behind it. I’m not saying that people of any gender can’t make this argument. I have only noticed recently that many Cis women approached me with this problem. I don’t want to have the right to something in a relationship, regardless of the consequences. It is not a matter of winning or being right on principle. I want to find solutions and ideas together, at least that’s how I understand relationships. And for me, a knockout argument is anything but constructive or helpful.

¹ “Mehr ist Mehr – Meine Erfahrungen mit Polyamorie”, German language only, by Yaniv Barinberg, Paperback 144 pages, 140 x 205mm, 978-3-96042-089-7 / 2-973, 18,00 Euro, Publication date of current edition: 26.02.2024, with illustrations by Carina Büker

² I refer to the above blog post in my own related Entry 28 on the topic of freedom in ethical multiple relationships.

Special thanks to author Yaniv Barinberg for granting personal permission to use his former blog post and current book chapter.
Also thanks to Ankush Minda on Unsplash for the cover photo, which also adorned the original post!

Yaniv, – I miss you in the blogosphere! ♥

Need-ful Things

In my previous Entry, I expressed my regret – as I have done several times before on this bLog – that, in my view, a “misaplied model of needs“ is too often utilised to support one’s own desire for a life of multiple relationships and Polyamory. That is why I have also addressed the underlying interpretation of needs from time to time in various Entries in this bLog.
However, since this complex seems to me to be a recurring and central topic in Polyamory, I would like to use this entry to summarise my opinion on the matter once again.

First, I would like to take another look at what specifically is meant by “needs“ – and how they have found their way into the concept of Polyamory.

According to the English Wikipedia, “A need is a deficiency at a point of time and in a given context. Needs are distinguished from wants. In the case of a need, a deficiency causes a clear adverse outcome [….]. In other words, a need is something required for a safe, stable and healthy life while a want is a desire, wish or aspiration.“

Scientifically, however, “needs“ first became a substantial focus of psychological research in the first half of the 20th century, when American psychologists and psychotherapists Abraham Maslow and Carl R. Rogers addressed the self-concept and associated inner motivations, drives and inclinations of their patients in the development of modern Humanistic and Positive Psychology (Maslow since 1954) as well as genuine, Person-centred therapy ( PCT – Rogers since 1957).
Abraham Maslow ultimately structured the findings from this research into what later became known as “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs“, through which he was able to demonstrate that there are certain degrees of necessity within human needs – for example, that essential basic needs for sustaining life must first be met (breathing, warmth, water, food, sleep, shelter) before a person could aspire to fulfil its social needs (e.g. belonging, communication, community, etc.) or even those of self-actualisation (e.g. independence, freedom, creativity, etc.).

In cooperation with a student of Carl Rogers, the psychologist and communication researcher Marshall B. Rosenberg, this approach ultimately revealed the quality of human needs to be universal (common to all), independent of time (epochs/ages), place (regions, cultures) and persons (subjectivity).
Needs thus appeared as the expression of underlying, fundamental feelings which indicate that needs are being met or rather feelings indicating that this is not the case.

During the second half of the 20th century, no one was probably as consistently concerned with this identified source of needs and its effects on human coexistence as the aforementioned Marshall Rosenberg¹. Rosenberg noted that the communication of needs plays a fundamental role, particularly in interpersonal interaction, but that individual attempts to express these needs often contributed to misunderstandings and crises due to unfavourable, socially established patterns (e.g. language use).
As a possible approach to resolving and potentially preventing such crises, Rosenberg developed his life’s work from 1963 onwards: the concept of “Non-violent communication (NVC)“ – A communication process based on mutual consent, aiming to develop human relationships in such a way that those involved spontaneously and willingly contribute to each other’s well-being.

With that last sentence in mind, the path from there to Polyamory was relatively straightforward. From the 1980s onwards, numerous community- and cooperation-oriented initiatives increasingly turned to ‘non-violent communication’ as a tool to support participants in their personal development. Through its use in educational institutions, counselling, therapy, mediation and coaching, it eventually became also a part of the “polyamorous toolbox“ in the mid-1990s – particularly as an element of a conversational culture based on equality and respect concerning multiple romantic relationships.

So far, so good.
At this point, I would like to add a brief disclaimer on my part: several decades later, there emerged justified criticism of both the methodology of NVC itself as well as on the personality of Marshall Rosenberg himself. In detail, he was certainly not a saint above reproach, nor was he free of own pretensions. As a tool, NVC is a mode of communication that, like any psychological-interpersonal medium, requires attention, training and practice – otherwise it may allow for manipulation and abuse. I am fully aware of this, having studied the approach myself over many years. However, the scientific principles of the underlying theory of needs according to A. Maslow and C. Rogers are valid, as is the inherent consistency when applied mindfully.

OK. So, already with the blossoming of Polyamory in the last decade of the 20th century, we thus have the notorious “needs“ involved – as well as engaged in our conversations with one another…
Which is actually good news, when – as mentioned above – we realise that we all share the same needs and can communicate our feelings through them. Rosenberg himself once said, “Needs are the life seeking expression within us“.

However, two basic aspects are very important here:
Firstly, we must understand the difference between preferences, wants, desires and strategies on the one hand, and needs on the other.
And secondly, we have to understand how needs are the “smallest common denominator“-building blocks of our own self-expression.
These two key points are extremely important if you want to fully comprehend what I mean by the “misunderstood or misapplied needs model“ that I mentioned at the beginning.

Thus, when we sense an intention, a desire, or even a strategy (i.e. an approach) within ourselves, it is of utmost importance for the viability of the process – and in order to avoid being manipulative – to determine what lies beneath it at the most fundamental, genuine level of need(s).
Take the example from my last Entry (which I seemingly like to use…) “kitesurfing“.
But of course there is no such thing as a “need for kitesurfing“… However, “kitesurfing“ fulfils a whole range of related, genuine needs², which could include, for example “Movement“, “freedom“, “strength“, “courage“, “spontaneity“, “happiness“, “empowerment“, “passion“, “activity“, “self-confidence“, “heedfulness“, “lightness“ and “pleasure“. And if we even practice it together with others, it may also fulfil “belonging“, “company“, “friendship“, “community“, “trust“, “tolerance“, “understanding“, “openness“, “open-mindedness“, “reassurance”, “enthusiasm”, “support“ and “cooperation“…
Wow! Kitesurfing can do all that for us???
Quite right – correctly phrased: kitesurfing can contribute to all of this on your part.
Or to put it yet more precisely: you can accomplish all of this for yourself when you go kitesurfing with your friends!

And this is exactly the point why I have been virtually annoyed with authors Dossie Easton and Janet Hardy since 1997, who, in their otherwise quite useful book on sluthood³, were the first to spread that unfortunate as well as misguided narrative on a large scale, …that nooooooo single other person (as in the pooh-pooh exclusive monogamy) would ever be sufficient to fulfil one’s own needs… A narrative that, with its unbearably stereotypical redundancy, has since found its way into even the latest publications and guidebooks on the subject of Polyamory (most recently also in Jessica Fern’s “Polysecure“ ª) – and which is also frequently used in interviews and online videos because it seemingly appears to be so coherent (also adopted by Esther Perel in several of her relationship-talks, among others).

“All right, Oligotropos…“, one could argue. “it may well be that we are able to fulfil some of our needs regarding individuality and self-realisation while kitesurfing. But surely Polyamory is about people and their relationships with each other. What about all those social needs you listed? For this, we need the other people (and relationships) when kitesurfing, so that they can fulfil our needs that you mentioned, such as belonging, company, friendship, community, trust, tolerance, understanding, openness, reassurance, support and cooperation – after all, we couldn’t do that on our own, could we…?”

Yes and no. Which in turn brings us back to strategies. Because, as we can conclude from the sum of the individual needs it serves, kitesurfing is definitely such a strategy. Instead, we could have gone to aunt Fanny for a cup of coffee and experienced company, friendship and reassurance there. Or attended a meeting at the local library dedicated to tolerance, openness and open-mindedness. Or simply have a chat with the guy next door to ensure at least a sense of belonging in our neighbourhood.
Fun fact: For this reason, by the way, “sexuality“ (which is often invoked in many discussions as an absolute basic need!) is also considered a “strategy“. That’s because sexuality also fulfils a whole range of needs that may be involved, such as “liveliness”, “closeness“, “affection“, “warmth“, “tenderness“ and “love“. And since the keyword “basic need“ was mentioned, it would be more appropriate to look at its baseline function and admit: “Okay, the underlying, initial basic need was originally ‘reproduction/(genetic) legacy‘…“.

In order to meet our needs, we can therefore choose different strategies, several of which can help us achieve our goal in different ways. And especially this, too, is of great significance with regard to the aforementioned “unfortunate and misguided narrative“.
Rosenberg himself commented on the subject: “Even we ourselves never know what we exactly want – until we get it.“ A highly important statement – because he also added on another occasion that all other fellow human beings would otherwise “need a magical mind-reading ruby in their foreheads“ to know exactly what we would require. But they don’t have that – accordingly even we ourselves must wait and see what effect our own preferences and strategies have on us before we can determine whether we have chosen correctly, whether they truly contribute to our needs – or not.
That’s precisely why no one but we ourselves can choose whether we’d rather visit aunt Fanny or go kitesurfing with our friends – we weigh up for ourselves where we assume we’ll meet the best possible fulfilment-balance regarding our inner needs – and then cheerfully plunge into the wet and windy adventure.
And when we’ve finished kitesurfing, we would have to return to our emotional level to assess whether our needs were actually met or not: How do I feel now? Happy? Euphoric? Annoyed? Sad? Or even ashamed? Don’t think! Feel!!!

For Marshall Rosenberg, it was therefore important to be able to express needs in terms of requests. He called this “drawing attention to our needs“. It was likewise important to him that, ideally, such a consultation would normally enable the needs of all parties involved to be met.
He therefore identified the biggest pitfalls in how we receive from other people what may be beneficial to our own needs. In a moment of neediness, the underlying, unspoken message would often be, “I am suffering because one of my needs is not being met.“ However, because no one but we ourselves can actually feel our true emotional deficiency, other individuals present would usually only develop an involuntary urge to “fix that person“ – which would often result in misinterpretations, misunderstandings, as well as unfavourable strategies of contributing.

Unfortunately, especially in the latter case, I regularly experience in discussions and conversations among polyamorous people how this emotional pain is exploited to induce the other participants involved in the process to contribute. Suddenly, the desire for certain sexual practices and even the pursuit of Polyamory itself become turned into a “need“ (like “kitesurfing“…) – unfortunately, usually with the intention that by presenting one’s own request as a “need“ in the manner of an inalienable fundamental right, it becomes an indispensable obligation for the other parties to fulfil it. What – if you have followed my lines of argument thus far – is precisely a violent reversal of the actual responsibility concerning the fulfilment of needs. At the same time, however, this clearly shows what unconscious, emotional pain carried into a relationship might provoke.

And there is one more thing that is triggered by the Hardy-Easton narrative. A phenomenon that unfortunately fits very well into our present day – but which I, as Oligotropos, creator of “committed, sustainable multiple relationships“, also consider worrisome.
By putting forward the responsibility-reversing thesis that nooooo one person can ever be sufficient to fulfil all our needs, we are indirectly encouraged to engage in what I have been calling “Pokémon Polyamory“ since Entry 2: To seek for “one companion for each occasion“ in order to ensure that the contributions of different individuals can cover the widest possible range of our needs.
I have criticised this behaviour several times on this bLog because I regard it as a risk for utilitarianism (purpose-oriented ethics of utility) and compartmentalisation (splitting into separate [pleasure-oriented] aspects) of our lovers and loved ones.

However, I perceive another problem – and this concerns precisely the criterion of oligoamorous sustainability: As we have seen, there is no universal human need for kitesurfing. Nor is there a universal basic need to “drive through Paris in a sports car with the wind in your hair“. There is just as little of a “need for BDSM“ as there is one for “winning the Nobel Peace Prize“. Thus, there is also no entitlement concerning the fulfilment of such ‘needs’, if only because it would otherwise be deemed utterly unacceptable to lead a decent, humane life… Because needs are (only) a living expression of our inner emotional landscape, not vouchers of entitlement.

The narrative of misapplied need fulfilment seduces us to an extremely consumer-oriented thinking – precisely because of the reversal of responsibility described above – and the conviction that this existence, the world in general and all other people in particular ( especially, of course, those who claim to be closest and dearest to us!) somehow owe us the realisation of these things. That it would therefore only be a question of finding the right combination of getting our needs met, that all these possibilities would lie within our reach…
Hogwash!
That is simply not the case. As has been shown, such entitlement thinking is wrong both in terms of the basic approach and in terms of the allocation of responsibility – and for our planet, it is precisely the catastrophe that has begun to unfold.
Nevertheless, it is true that we all in our human family have the same needs, yes. But that we all usually will be able to have each of them completely met is (apart from the basic needs, hopefully) as unlikely as it is unrealistic – and also in no way feasible for Mother Earth.

For the sake of all our wellbeing, for ourselves, our loved ones and all the rest of this wonderful world – I appeal to all of you out there: Allow yourself to feel your feelings. Feel them fully. Recognise the needs that arise from them and face up to the responsibility of taking care of yourself and those needs. Also draw attention to your needs – because only you can truly perceive them, both in terms of their nature and their extent. Then mutually contribute to their fulfilment, by means of trial and error – to the best of your abilities.
But please choose strategies that are sustainable; not those that project an insatiable desire into an infinite outside – but those that are based on inner growth and understanding, that strengthen the ties to yourself and others and bring forth harmonious coexistence. Approaches that aim at finding inner contentment and self-acceptance within yourselves. Choose opportunities that create genuine connections and – instead of satisfying material needs – keep focusing on communication and empathy.

¹ One of Marshall Rosenberg’s best-known live lectures on ‘’Nonviolent Communication‘’ is available on YouTube, divided into short chunks. Rosenberg talks about needs in the NVC system from part 2.1 onwards. I have linked some excerpts here:
2.1 – Needs Part 1
2.2 – Needs Part 2
3.1 – How to receive
3.2 – What is alive?
4.3 – The urge to fix a person
4.4 – The shift of responsibility
4.5 – How to contribute

A short description regarding the concept of Nonviolent Communication is already available on this bLog in Entry 20

² A more detailed list of feelings and needs for self-description can be found HERE, for example (NVC Academy).

³ Sluthood: The queer community has embraced this word, which originally carried negative connotations (in the sense of ‘’immoral behaviour’’). Today, it is used as a (self)description by individuals who do not fit into the heteronormative, monogamous, gender-stereotypical spectrum, in particular promiscuous, sex-positive folk who decide autonomously on their sexuality.
Janet W. W. Hardy & Dossie Easton: “The Ethical Slut – a guide to infinite sexual possibilities“, Greenery Press 1997
German edition: “Schlampen mit Moral: Erweiterte Neuausgabe: Warum es an der Zeit ist, Sex und Liebe neu zu denken – wie Polyamorie, offene Beziehungen und andere Abenteuer gelingen können“, mvg-Verlag 2020

ª Jessica Fern: “Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Non-monogamy“, Scribe UK, 2022

Thanks to TANYA LAYKO on Unsplash for the photo and Mike Oldfield for his iconic song „(Never going to get) To France“ (1984)

How was that about Polyamory? – or –
Why Oligoamory was created

Sitting on the beach of the remote island of Oligoamory, I regularly gaze out at the tides of the vast ocean of relationships that wash around the numerous isles of the versatile archipelago of Polyamory. Boat traffic out there has actually increased a little lately – I now regularly spot rafts, canoes and entire ships bearing the identification “CNM“ or “ENM“ under their nameplates. It took me a little while to figure out that these abbreviations, which usually indicate where the vehicle is registered – essentially “under which colours“ it is travelling – stand for “Consensual Non-Monogamy“ and indeed even for “Ethical Non-Monogamy“.
“There you are“, I think to myself, “here’s a development in the making – more guests in the archipelago!“
Curious as I am – and blessed with quite a bit of leisure time on my island – I observe the colourful crowd of new arrivals with my usual inquisitiveness. After a while, however, I begin to notice patterns that make me wonder whether the crews of these little crafts have really consciously set course for the waters of Polyamory – or what the actual reason for their presence here might be. For there is something so peculiar about their vessel’s movements that, although it is still discernible that what is happening on board is more or less explicitly a form of “open relationship“, the situation appears to be significantly less certain in terms of consensus or even ethics – at least from my perspective as an observer.
For a while, I keep thinking: “Hey, these are modern times, and they’re young people in the prime of their lives. It’s understandable that they need to ride the polyamorous wave in their own way.“ And, after all, I’ve written often enough on this bLog that multiple relationships should also fit into one’s own day-to-day life…

But then again, when the first near-collisions and injuries inevitably occur out there, I am actually tempted to light a beacon, perhaps improvise a few buoys from some canisters, to at least give the people out there some indication of how they could better stay on course. And then it occurs to me that I possess hardly any maritime training myself and have primarily come to this placed to be a researcher and observer, which limits me to what I have been doing with some tenacity for over six years now: calling attention to the island of Oligoamory and entrusting messages in bottles with Entries from this bLog book to the high seas.
Well, so be it.

Two styles of travelling that I am increasingly observing – and why I consider them to be an unfavourable course to follow:

1) ‘Serial Polyamory’
The phenomenon of serial Polyamory was already described by E. Rickert and F. Veaux in their 2014 book on Polyamory, ”More than Two” ¹. Actually, the two terms already seem to sound paradoxical when used in context with each other. Couldn’t serial relationships also be pursued within a monogamous environment? Or rather: that’s practically more or less monogamish, isn’t it? Yes and no. Rickert and Veaux refer to this type of non-monogamous relationship in the chapter where they discuss the termination of relationships. Which, after all, can also happen within multiple relationships, since everything in life is ultimately finite.
However, personal identification with a lifestyle of ethical multiple relationships now theoretically allows for an approach that would enable all romantic relationships one has ever entered into to continue to exist side by side ad infinitum (in contrast to “serial monogamy“ which would essentially represent a chain of individual relationships ‘strung together’ one after another).
But (unfortunately), this would also make it possible to never really deal with the end of a relationship once it has been entered into!
Such “circumvention“ is often justified to one’s own conscience by combining it with the misapplied “needs model“ that I have so often criticised, thereby easing one’s conscience: Since loving relationships are added to fulfil various needs (…because no one single person can eeeeeeever fulfil all your needs… [my criticism of this approach runs throughout this entire bLog!]), you never know when you might be seized by a longing for trips to East Africa, kitesurfing, fusion cuisine or BDSM – so even if your own interest in one of these areas (and the attached loved one with whom you pursued it) is currently waning: Stick it on the shelf, in case you ever feel the “need“ for it again at some point in your life – after all, such a waste – and you’d be pretty stupid to banish that person from your life entirely. “We’ll stay in touch, you know we’re in a polyamorous relationship, but right now I’m deepening my relationship with XYZ (insert current interest and associated accomplice here), so it’s cool that you’re still one of my favourite people, remember…?“ is what it says at the end – which, cleverly played out in this way, doesn’t represent a straightforward ending – even though that’s most likely what it is in reality.
Additionally, you can skilfully manoeuvre your way around treating your partner, who has been “put on the shelf” in this way, with respect and as an equal – and also, what is even more important for the psyche of those involved, around the oh-so-annoying grieving process when times, things and commonalities come to an end.
Speaking of “shelves“… Incidentally, this phenomenon already has a name, which was ironically diverted to describe a certain monogamous dating behaviour: It is called “benching“ and means something like “to send someone to the sidelines” / “to put something/-one on the back burner“ (the metaphor originally stems from the sporting world). Because, honestly, that’s just what it is: “Before you commit yourself forever, check whether you can find something better“, as the saying goes – and “benching” is precisely the tactic of sticking a (merely) reasonably interesting person “into the penalty box” or rather “on the shelf“ (and keeping them there “in store“) while hopefully continuing to search for someone even more compatible. Serial Polyamory is exactly the same approach, translated into the world of not-so-ethical multiple relationships, a place where the “many loves“ never have to end…

2) ‘Parallel Polyamory’
Even more frequently than vessels travelling on the serial course, I have recently encountered an increasing number of crafts navigating on parallel courses. There, too, I repeatedly encounter the aforementioned ”(pseudo)needs model” as justification: “Why take Fritzi along kitesurfing when Fritzi doesn’t like kitesurfing? I go with Skylar, have a good time – and Fritzi can pursue other interests during that time – it’s basically a win-win-win situation…“
However, that is not where it ends:
“And Fritzi doesn’t nag me and Skylar about our kitesurfing in this way – and when I hang out with Fritzi in the basement later, tinkering on our model railway project, Skylar in turn knows that there will be a few hours of radio silence because it’s not really any of his*her business what we’re doing in there.“
Inquiering into this status quo the answer often sounds somehow like that: “Well, if Skylar would really try to impose herself during model railway time, that would be a severe sign of some kind of jealous power play…“ “Yeah, quite needy and a distinct touch co-dependent…“
But no problem – parallel Polyamory can take care of that too: to nip something so unnecessary in the bud, the people involved simply don’t even need to know each other! A quick check at the Wikipedia page on Polyamory to ascertain whether this would still be hunky-dory: Cool, yes, it just states something about “mutual agreement” (i.e. “consensual”) and a bit about „communication“, “honesty”, “non-possessiveness” and “compersion”.
Great, so everything done right: I had agreed with Skylar at the time that we wanted to open up our relationship to other romantic partners (✔️Check: consensual!).
AND when I started my romantic relationship with Fritzi, I informed Skylar that I was now in a romantic relationship with Fritzi as well – and of course, when I fell in love with Fritzi, I immediately told him*her that I was already in a romantic relationship with Skylar (✔️Check: communication, honesty, and a first-rate chance to express non-possessiveness and compersion!).

Indeed, just recently, one of the boats that came dangerously close to a reef off the coast of the oligomeric island – and whose crew I urgently advised that, for heaven’s sake, all crew members should get to know each other for the benefit of better communication – that very crew yelled back at me: “Where does it say that everyone has to know each other? Nothing dictates that…!”
And, blimey: they were right, as they turned into the increasingly blustery gale – and I stood on the beach, wringing my hands, studying the confirming facts on my rain-dripping tablet – even still desperately calling up Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart’s polyamorous debut manifesto “A Bouquet of Lovers” ª from 1990, where – how could that be true??? – as it happens there was nothing about it either…

I had to sit back in my biosphere with a hot cup of Earl Grey in my hand and a towel wrapped round my shoulders (and surrounded by my loved ones) before I could sort out my thoughts.
Because, of course, there was nothing about it there.
Because Morning Glory and Oberon Raven-Zell would not have considered it necessary to lose a word about it.
For throughout their lives, they were surrounded by community, by their loved ones and cherished people. Everything they thought, did and implemented took place within a context of togetherness, belonging and community – that in their minds dated back much further than the concept of Polyamory itself.

Since my 26th Entry, I have been lamenting, along with anthropologist Jean Liedloff² and educational scientist Daniel Hess³, the modern “Reality of Separation” in our Western industrial society. In which we “compartmentalise” our essentially comprehensively constituted existence, i.e. divide it into individual aspects, in order to make it more manageable for us in everyday lives. But already in Entry 6, I attempt to use a symbolic story to illustrate that in the realm of romantic loving relationships, we repeatedly encounter the threshold of the original “continuum”, which reveals that there are aspects of being human that simply cannot be readily subjected to such kinds of “splitting”.
Morning Glory and Oberon Raven-Zell were well aware of this. Morning Glory had experienced this in her spiritual, neo-pagan ritual circles, Oberon through the books of science fiction author Robert Heinlein (see in particular my Entry 49 on the “History of Polyamory”): People in relationships are no longer autonomous islands or solo instruments. They unite to create a consonance, stepping back from their individuality to work together to achieve something that ultimately exceeds the sum of its parts.
For Morning Glory, this experience came from activities in her witches’ covens, where the generated group energy could literally change (existing) reality under the words “Perfect Love and Perfect Trust” (even in very practical ways, such as campaigns for women’s freedom or the blockade of a nuclear facilities).
For Oberon, it was Heinlein’s compelling descriptions of how living beings in adverse environmental conditions put aside trivialities such as ethnic origin, privileged upbringing or level of education in order to grow together in the face of shortages and obstacles, to develop a sense of belonging and affiliation – thereby generating astonishing added value.
When he and Morning Glory finally founded their first own kind of collective in 1962 with the “Church of All Worlds“, they even adopted some of Heinlein’s phrases from his novel “Stranger in a Strange Land“ (1961): The “water brothers” (a quasi-family of choise, with whom one literally shares the necessities of life), for example, and the “nests” as a generic term for the emerging group structures. And in general the word “nest” is usually associated mainly with a reasonably secure and cosy structure containing some cute chicks – but it’s verb form “to nest / being nested” it goes much further, as it means something like “interwoven/intertwined”.
Which brings me full circle back to the idea that we connect and intertwine our lives with each other in romantic relationships. How much more true is this with regard to Oligo- and Polyamory, those truly “ethical” multiple relationships, if they deserve to be called that?

Anyway, when Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart (see also Entry 113) therefore eventually used the word “polyamorous” concerning multiple relationship contexts for the first time, “connectedness”, “belonging” and “knowing each other” were already inherent characteristics. For Polyamory was intended to be a “facilitator” precisely for such cases – as I have already mentioned on this blog – when, in circles, groups or “nests” – in which all participants already knew each other and acted collectively – romantic relationships began to blossom between “more than just two” participants (or between more than those who were perhaps already legally bound).
Thus, in my interpretation and understanding, “knowing each other” or at least “getting to know each other” is – and always has been – another cornerstone of Polyamory, closely linked to the aforementioned mutual consent, compersion, trust and, therefore, honesty.

In my view, parallelism is therefore a hapless substitute: on the one hand a surrender to the fate of our (separative) present – but on the other hand also often an unconscious complacency towards the call to improve our self-concept, which, according to Morning Glory and Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, was actually meant to be part of their Polyamory by means of self-actualisation as described e.g. by Abraham Maslow.
Equality, mutual respect, tolerance, empathy and solidarity? Those are important polyamorous virtues that need to be applied to our loved ones as well as reflected back on us as part of the same (multiple) relationship, so that everyone involved benefits from them. Originally incorporated into the polyamory framework incidentally as values of humanistic psychology with the recognition that in striving for the ideal self, everyone needs help to achieve their full potential (Carl Rogers: “On Becoming a Person”, 1961).

And it is precisely this help that is provided to us in the shape of our loved ones, who bring out the best in us.
For it is only together that we can surpass ourselves and create a world full of love and understanding for us all.

¹ Eve Rickert and Franklin Veaux: “More Than Two: A Practical Guide to Ethical Polyamory”, Thorntree Press 2014

² Jean Liedloff: “The Continuum Concept: In Search of Happiness Lost”, Penguin 1989

³ Daniel Hess: „Glücksschule – Glücklich leben & freudvoll lernen“ (“School of Happiness – Live Happily & Learn Joyfully”), [German version only] Novum Verlag, 2014

ª The text of the “Bouquet of Lovers” is available HERE.

Thanks to Eila, Rosalie and Stefan for the inspiration – and to Elsemargriet on Pixabay for the photo!

Performance and Participation

About 5 years ago, in November 2019, I recorded my 33rd Entry in this bLog book, which centred on the “inclusivity“ of ethical multiple relationships.
At that time, Mrs Angela Merkel (CDU) was still German Chancellor, having formed a so-called “grand coalition“ with the CSU and the SPD; the AfD had entered the Bundestag for the first time with a share of 12.6% of the total vote.
That is why the aforementioned entry also dealt with politics, precisely because at the time it served as an extremely fitting example of the limits of the “willingness towards inclusivity“… But today, five years and a pandemic later, I am tempted to say, “If I had only known what was to come…“ (and I sincerely hope that I will not have to reaffirm this in another five years).

Because I don’t really fancy turning political again, as this blog is supposed to be about (multiple) loving relationships; but our loving relationships don’t exist in a virtual environment, they are part of this world, which means that – as has been mentioned several times before on this blog – the famous quote by feminist theorist Carol Hanisch still applies: „The personal is political and the political is personal“. The connection between personal experiences and political structures simply cannot be dismissed – or, more precisely, that political structures have the power to influence our personal experiences.

The late Scott Peck, the “father of community building (processes)“ had already recognised this in an almost prophetic way in the late 1970s. Especially in his two pioneering books, which later became fundamental literature for numerous small-scale collectives, communes and ecovillages, notably “The Road Less Travelled“ from 1978 and, in particular, “The Different Drum“ from 1987, he impressively phrased the ‘‘question of inclusion“and therefore the very idea of inclusivity, in the following way¹:
“Is there any reason why someone shouldn’t participate?“

This approach to inclusivity was and remains somewhat revolutionary because it reverses the burden of proof, as the non-inclusive form of the question is usually phrased as, “For what reason should someone be allowed to participate?”.
Which brings me to the present day, where it seems to me that inclusivity is in a much worse state than it was five years ago.

As ever, I still read complaints in many forums where polyamorous people discuss why we continue to encounter such strong resistance to our lifestyle and relationship philosophy. On top of that, people often lament how monogamy is still seen as the desirable norm and ideal state of relationship life – to the point that even in long-term romantic relationships, it is considered entirely untouchable.
Then I often sigh inwardly and think that, strictly speaking, it is unfortunately not just a problem of communication or agreement between the ‘relationship inmates’ affected, but that, in order for this view to really change significantly, we would obviously also have to rethink our mental entanglement with our economic practices and our social system in the Western world. Yes, even on a truly personal level.

This is because the general trend is currently leaning increasingly towards “non-inclusivity“. Or, at best, towards “conditional inclusivity“.
And that is, to put it mildly, somewhat bizarre – and, at worst, worrying – because Homo sapiens, in other words: all of us, are genetically and epigenetically (i.e. in terms of our conditioning, which in turn influences our genes) wired for togetherness and community.
Thus, Stefan Fritze, senior physician at the Central Institute for Mental Health in Mannheim, even emphasises this in an article published this year by the German news programme “Tagesschau“ on “World Friendship Day 2025“²: »In prehistoric times, it was almost impossible to survive without close contacts. Short-term loneliness (as stress) therefore seems to be a warning signal from the body that something needs to change.«

However, in order to become part of a community and be allowed to participate in it, a “performance component“ is increasingly being added to the equation, which is intended to provide an answer to the non-integrative form of the question of inclusiveness:
“Why should anyone be allowed to participate?“ “Because he*she*it contributes something!“
And this principle applies to everything – beginning with the citizenship in our state and our economic community and ending within our smallest private units, our (romantic) relationships, especially when these are based on a literal mini social contract like a marriage (in Germany since 2017 also available to same-sex couples).

In the magazine Max Planck Research (issue 2|2025), science journalist Tobias Beuchert (on the occasion of the book presentation of Petra Pinzler’s current political assessment “Hat das Zukunft oder kann das weg?“ [“Does it have a future or can it be discarded?“], campus 2025) issues, that »Every (political) measure has a social component and therefore needs to be supported by people.«
However, such social components also have a repercussion in that we, as “those affected“, will orientate ourselves accordingly along the larger context:
When, as is currently the case in Europe, more and more doors are closing to new arrivals and barriers to the cross-border movement of goods, services and people are increasingly being raised – and at the same time, new arrivals and long-established residents alike are being asked to contribute more and more in order to be allowed to continue participating fully in the greater whole – then this has an impact on our view of the world – and thus also on our private conditions.
Because we experience it in our everyday lives: the “outside world“ sets the tone. The answer to the question of how and why someone should be allowed to join in and participate is increasingly being answered with: “Performance first – then participation!“.
That way, we are gradually subjecting even our romantic relationships to this dictum, whereby ‘love’ or ‘relationships’ must increasingly be thought of in terms of progress, success and gain, a principle that Eve Rickert and Franklin Veaux in their 2014 book on Polyamory, “More Than Two“, referred to as the “social escalator“³ – on which one should always move forward and, above all, upward.
And this is an increasingly critical situation, because Scott Peck’s originally integrative, community-promoting question of why someone should NOT participate is increasingly perceived as unreasonable: ‘‘How so? Just like that?’’

In his aforementioned review, the journalist Tobias Beuchert uses a maritime metaphor in light of this growing reluctance both in society as a whole and among individuals, stating: »Nevertheless, there have been ships that set sail into rough waters with courage, hope, and ideas, and reached their destination. Perhaps it was because on board, things were fair, everyone took responsibility, and felt involved in decisions.«
Accordingly, we currently seem to lack courage, hope and ideas. We do not feel that we are trusted to take individual responsibility, but rather experience that we are often patronised. And we don’t perceive ourselves as being involved as a result – which is a vicious circle, because in order to be involved, we first are expected to contribute something…

In accordance with this pattern, our dating profiles are beginning to resemble “purchase order reports“. The space that other people could occupy in our hearts is gradually becoming more limited – and, in any case, distinctly outlined.
And this also applies to our existing relationships – the question of the respective contribution and overall benefit is increasingly pushing itself loudly to the foreground, becoming the yardstick for the ‘quality’ of the underlying relationship – and a constant source of thoughts regarding comparison and competition.

This is, of course, extremely detrimental to the quality of our external and internal relationships, because by shifting the legitimacy of atachment to the performance level, we lose sight of the actual significance of interpersonal connections for us.
And please don’t get me wrong: I’m not advocating arbitrariness here either. Personally, I don’t believe at all that we can enter into a relationship with just anyone, especially a friendly or even romantic one (otherwise I wouldn’t be Mr. Oligoamory, arguing here at length for “relationships with a select few participants“). What I am actually referring to are the famous “meaningful (personal) relationships“ that I have already written a three-part series about on this blog ( 1 | 2 | 3 ).

I would like to reiterate to the above statement made by Stefan Fritze from the Central Institute for Mental Health in Mannheim. He adds: »It is not the sheer number of relationships that matters, but their depth. At its core, loneliness is based on a lack of meaningful social relationships. Authentic friendships, on the other hand, which are based on trust, reliability and mutual interest, can compensate for this lack and act as an emotional safety net.« In the corresponding interview, he also specifies that the value of these relationships is based specifically on aspects that cannot be quantified according to performance standards: »High-quality friendships are characterised by prosocial behaviour. This includes things such as encouragement, support in difficult times, reliability, emotional closeness and loyalty.«²

So what can we do? Especially in times when the political ‘outside world’ increasingly wants to link participation in such an ominous way with performance, making it increasingly difficult for us to remain sufficiently receptive even in our private lives – and thus to treat our loved ones with an oligoamorous anti-performance attitude of solidarity, equality and appreciation?

Recently, I came across an inspiring text on social media by author and yogini Moksha Devi (Verena Maria Rottmar), which seems to offer an initial answer to how we might find our way back from the current “rugged individualism“, as Scott Peck once called it, towards a “gentler individualism“ – and which I would like to share with you today, at the end of this Entry:

We live in an era of withdrawals.
Not out of calmness – but out of caution.
Not out of clarity, but out of fear of imposing ourselves, being too little, or too close to something that could bring change.
“No“ is on the rise.
Not the gentle, honest, tentative “no“. Not the “no“ that is essential to life and healthy.
But the reflexive “no“. The one that wants nothing more to do with anything.
No conversation. No encounter. No deviation from one’s own course, however narrow it may be.
“That’s not my way.“
“I don’t feel any impulse there.“
“Thanks, but no.“
And that’s okay. Of course it’s okay.
But sometimes – this “no“ is a protective shield against closeness, against the risk of discovering new paths together with someone and allowing yourself to be surprised.
People who dare to build bridges know this feeling:
You offer something, not to change someone, but to invite them.
A shared experience.
A conversation.
An evening full of possibilities.
An experience that promises no certainty.
An opinion that is not set in stone.
And instead, you get a clear, impenetrable, cold “no“, or a passive-aggressive explanation that tries to pull the wool over your eyes.
Not out of malice.
But out of a strange logic: “I’ve got to protect myself.“
And don’t get me wrong… often that is exactly what is needed!
But sometimes we forget that genuine connection doesn’t just happen on its own.
It happens when someone takes a step, even if the ground is still shaking.
When someone says:
“I don’t quite understand. But I’ll go along with it.“
“I don’t want to shut myself off from this, just give me a little more time.“
The world doesn’t become richer when everyone only does what they already know.
It becomes richer when people allow themselves to be surprised by the lives of others.
Not to lose themselves – but to remember more deeply who they could still be.
And sometimes the greatest gift is:
A small, hesitant “yes“.
Whoopee…
And then, boundaries shift – bridges are built.
In small ways.
In human ways.
In the courage not to immediately dismiss everything that doesn’t fit in 100%.
Because sometimes the miracle lies not in the perfect match,
but in the willingness
to be present anyway.

¹ Scott Peck, “The Road less traveled – A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth“; Arrow Books 1990 and “The Different Drum – Community-making and peace“, Arrow Books 1990

² The complete article (and interview) on World Friendship Day 2025 can be found in the Tagesschau archive HERE (German language only)

³ Eve Rickert and Franklin Veaux: “More Than Two: A Practical Guide to Ethical Polyamory“, Thorntree Press 2014

Thanks to Markus Spiske on Unsplash for the photo!

And above all, thanks to Moksha Devi (Verena Maria Rottmar) and her personal permission to use her touching text “We live in an era of withdrawals“ (found on her facebook page).
All rights remain with the author!

Longingly

»Imagine if the sober just once took a taste, they would leave everything and sit down with us at the table of longing, which will never be empty.«¹

Someone recently wrote to me that “…there is far too little talk about longing in Polyamory”. I actually think so too – and would therefore like to dedicate this month’s bLog Entry to this emotional state.
I say “emotional state” – and thus immediately confess that our “longing” is one of those famous “curry mixtures”, i.e. a “multi-component feeling”, as I had already phrased it some years ago, for example, for jealousy and envy, which are not only related in terms of terminology, but also in implications – as we will see.
After all, in longing, too, there is not just one main predominant emotion, but depending on the occasion, it consists of different proportions of feelings such as melancholy, yearning, sadness, hope, devotion, renunciation and even pain, delicately seasoned with personal wishes, dreams and projections.

Why is it important to also focus on longing when it comes to ethical multiple relationships?
Now, looking at the above list, almost most of its components – or, strictly speaking, all of them – belong to the great, wide contextual field of romantic love. With the important restriction, however, that longing, explicitly considered, very often represents a kind of “meta-stage”, since it does not necessarily require a real, currently existing interpersonal connection – and thus also arises to a certain extent “one-sidedly”, as can also be the case with infatuation, desire, grief or envy, for example.

Thus, we have to sort things out a bit if we want to approach the role of longing in oligo- or polyamorous matters – and that is not so easy, because, excitingly, there have been very few attempts at an approach at all from the scientific side, to date. And this despite the fact that people all over the world can experience longing for people, places, things, yes, even periods of time and accompanying circumstances.

At least Paul B. Baltes, former director of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin², for instance, identified the phenomenon of “threefold-temporality” as an important characteristic of longing.
What is meant by this? Well, nothing less than that we can experience longing for something lost in the past, something consistent in the present or for something not yet fulfilled with regard to the future. So I can mourn a Polycule that I was once part of (past), miss my current romantic partners because they might be currently in a different place than me (present) – or long for another favourite person for a multiple relationship that I still hope to encounter (future).
What all three time levels have in common with regard to longing is that they all deal with a state that is felt to be currently unattainable: I cannot regain the past, I lack something specific in the present (of which there is no lack under “normal conditions”), I still have unfulfilled wishes and ideas concerning my future.

With specific reference to this, the group of researchers led by Paul Baltes² defined another inherent characteristic of longing, which is that of “bittersweet feelings”. We can already conclude from the expression “curry mixture” above that longing contains both positively and negatively connoted sentiments. In other words, ”longing” has the peculiarity that in it we can experience joy and pain at the same time: For although the past is over (painful), longing as a reminiscence brings us into contact with the experienced or remembered joy of that time (joyful). This is also the case for the present, because longing makes us aware, for example, of the just-not-present (painful) nature of a circumstance, because in comparison we know exactly how its presence (joyful) feels. And it is the same with the future, for in our projection we dream of an enriching state (joyful), which is not realized at the present time (painful).

And even after these few paragraphs, almost all the relevant parameters for the ambivalence of longing in multiple relationship contexts are already included – and further surprising parallels to jealousy emerge:

Similar to jealousy, longing can reach a level that may become unhealthy for the individual and its relationship(s). In the English language, for example, there is no direct equivalent to the German concept of “Sehnsucht” (like “Weltschmerz” or “Leitmotif”…). The most closely related terms “desire”, “craving”, “yearning” and “longing”, on the other hand, emphasize a lack or respectively a want. However, the step from “I have a want of fresh rolls…” to “I want fresh rolls…!” is not only small in terms of language – but changes the energy and strategy of the pursued endeavor (especially for the bystanders) quite significantly…
When it comes to “emotional tempering”, we humans are therefore often a little shaky, especially when hormonal (self-)rewards are also involved. This applies above all to any bygone past, in whose retrospectively evaluated “ idyllic world” we can lose ourselves unrestrainedly, and also to the future, for which we conjure up one unattainably over-idealized castle in the clouds after another – and both projections thus keep us as reliably as tragically from our present existence in the oh-so-banal present.

Which immediately brings us to another characteristic that longing and jealousy (and also envy) share: the (downward) comparison.
Especially because longing contains the component “subjectively perceived”, it can unfold so much power that we sometimes feel it almost like a tug in our chest. But the comparison with the present need not be realistic at all – either “everything was better” in the past anyway or what is yet to come will easily surpass the present – at least in our imagination… And according to the proverb “What you feel is always right – but not always true…” ³ we unfortunately also might loose ourselves in such a labyrinth of comparisons if we are no longer able to return to a realistic assessment of the situation on our own.

In the previous two paragraphs I spoke particularly of the past and the future – but what about the present ?
In my opinion, this is where the real potential of longing lies – just like that of jealousy. In my Entry at the time, I referred to the latter as the “engine control light of a relationship”: A (rather) general warning signal, whose precise cause must be determined more thoroughly in case it blinks on.
In my opinion, this role is also attributed to longing when we feel it in our everyday lives – but not so much in respect of our outward relationships, but above all with regard to the relationship with ourselves. Especially when applied to the state of our awareness in terms of our own reality compared to our expectations – thereby generating a kind of “self-care-inventory”: Am I actually on the right path? What is missing in my life? Where do I want to go? Are my life goals still in alignment with my needs?

So it is in the present that longing really comes into its own, because there it serves as an impulse for increased attentiveness, from which our emotional intelligence can benefit – and that in turn would actually be a real bonus in terms of our interpersonal relationship skills.
Which could turn the multi-component feeling of “longing” into a really strong curry, as a drive to really get closer to our innermost desires on this level.

Personally – and as the author of this bLog – I would also like to point out another component of any longing, which is the awareness of transitoriness contained in it (which is also what made it once so attractive for Romantic literature…).
And this again contains both aspects, because of course transitoriness and the constant reminder that some proceedings are finished forever and the realization regarding our temporal finiteness are painful.
At the same time, however, this is precisely another joyful strength of longing, because in this way it can become a strong incentive for us to seize potential opportunities in time.

More than six years ago, when I conceived this bLog, I wrote the following lines on my main page about the description of the Oligoamory symbol, which I am still deeply convinced of in connection with the hopeful aspects of longing in reference to multiple relationships:

»Human beings like us are existing spatiotemporally in a both finite as well as transitory world. Our resources and our energies, our sensory perceptions, our time, and therefore also our relationships and even our lifespan is limited and finite.
Exactly this finiteness – and the dawn of the 21^st century makes it quite obvious in so many ways – immediately suggests a more attentive and sustainable husbandry regarding our available treasures of substantial as well as ideational nature.
Our awareness in respect of the ubiquitous finiteness has always evoked in human groups the fascinating aptitude of distribution, shared use, and optimisation of the available.
In the course of this, it becomes globally as well as in the smallest companionship apparent that we have always been particularly successful, if we thereby moved from mere distributional justice towards individual needs-based justice.
Oligoamory wants to invite to a mindful adoption of these vital values into ethical and loving multiple relationships.«

Bearing this in mind, my overall conclusion today is still positive – which is hardly surprising for a romantic and idealist like me:
Longing is an extremely intense mixture of emotions that often reminds us of our innermost wishes and dreams. It can both hurt and inspire us, spurring us on with both impulses to explore new paths and experience life in all its fullness. By ultimately recognizing and acknowledging our longings, we open ourselves up to the possibility of finding what we are looking for in different ways – and remaining flexible in our strategies.
Because ultimately, it is the journey through longing itself that teaches us to appreciate the here and now and to embrace the present joys of life.

PS: Try putting “being polyamorous” or “being oligoamorous” in this last paragraph instead of “longing(s)”…

¹ from “Hymne”, written in 1800 by Friedrich von Hardenberg (1772 – 1801), known as Novalis, published in Geistliche Lieder, as No. VII, first printed by Friedrich Schlegel and Ludwig Tieck in 1802 (all gentlemen were Romantics, of course…)

² Scheibe, S., Freund, A. M., & Baltes, P. B. (2007). “Toward a developmental psychology of Sehnsucht (life longings): The optimal (utopian) life.” in Developmental Psychology, 43(3), 778-795.
The “6 core characteristics” of longing were again specifically named in this article by Baltes’ colleague Prof. Dr. Alexandra M. Freund from the Psychological Institute of the University of Zurich (German language only).

³ Incidentally, this quote comes from the author and coach Tim Schlenzig, who founded the personality development platform myMONK.

Thanks to Muse Nina for the inspiration behind this Entry and also thanks to Smiln32/Carla Bosteder on Pixabay for the AI-generated photo!

Wait a minute!

When it comes to multiple relationships such as in Poly- and Oligoamory, there is a phenomenon that we are confronted with surprisingly regularly: Waiting. Waiting, for example, for our loved ones (regardless of whether they are currently travelling to us or, as usual, three people are in each other’s way in a far too narrow cloakroom corridor when we set off…), having to wait and see how our relationships with each other will develop and hopefully strengthen – but of course also often: waiting to discover whether a multiple relationship situation will ever occur in our lives.

A few years ago, on the subject of the podcast “Zeitfragen” on Deutschlandfunk Kultur, the authors Andrea and Justin Westhoff have created a contribution¹ in which they address many relevant aspects of waiting and show how the associated patience, endurance and perseverance have very different sociological and psychological dimensions. Among others, they quoted the sociologist Dr Andreas Göttlich from the University of Constance, who explained in detail: »Waiting is an “experience of time” – and of course depends on external circumstances, on how and what you are waiting for. In general, we can say that it is a phenomenon or a form of behaviour that is rarely actually value-neutral. So waiting is often emotionally charged, and “hoping” and “fearing” describe just such emotional charges of waiting, which of course depends on how we subsequently evaluate the expected.«

With regard to multiple relationships, I consider the keyword “the expected” to be particularly worth mentioning here. After all, in interpersonal contexts involving poly- and oligoamorous relationships, people now often talk at length about those famous individual needs for which entering into several relationships with different people could possibly help to hopefully fulfil them better. This narrative is heard and read so regularly in multiple relationship settings that it has long since become a regular “expectation” in itself being embedded in the overall approach.
And “expectation” is actually a rather amusing objective, as we humans are trying to actively gain the upper hand over a circumstance to which we are in reality passively at the mercy of. “Expecting”, that almost sounds like “executing” – to realise a longed-for state that we strive for by waiting, that we want to make sure to bring it about in this way…
The problem? We all know it: when people don’t fulfil our expectations, it’s almost the worst thing they can do to our minds, because high personal expectations almost inevitably lead to the experience of frustration, which I already define in Entry 22 with the help of the Brockhaus dictionary as an “experience of (actual or perceived) disadvantage or denial that arises as an emotional reaction to an unfulfilled or unrealisable expectation (disappointment), e.g. as a result of the failure of a personal plan or the partial or complete lack of satisfaction of primary and secondary needs.”

In this day and age, and especially in Western industrialised nations, this is mostly due to the fact that we have difficulties with the passivity of waiting, which is often perceived as being externally imposed. After all, we live in a society in which individuality, independence and autonomy are strongly emphasised characteristics, almost internalised basic values. Thus, “having to wait” – even for our loved ones – is something that we quickly perceive as a power imbalance to our own disadvantage. This is a delicate circumstance for multiple relationships, because nowadays we mainly experience “having to wait” in public spaces where hierarchies exist, for example: At work, at government offices – or when it comes to specialised personnel (e.g. in healthcare or the employment of skilled craftsmen). And – on the other hand – no matter how equal we would like our personal relationships to be: They will probably never be completely free of delays and waiting.

However, when we engage in romantic relationships – and possibly even in more than one – there may well be times when “waiting for each other” does not necessarily have to do with mere impatience or even power issues. Sometimes it’s simply the case that you don’t know what’s coming and you can’t influence it – and then you start to worry as a result of the fear of the unknown; a state that the psychologist Kate Sweeny, professor at the University of California in Riverside, has even termed “toxic waiting” ².

The extent to which each of us suffers from such situations – or copes with them with a relatively pronounced composure – depends on our individual “waiting ability” to varying degrees.
The most famous experiment is probably the world-renowned psychological “marshmallow experiment“, which the US personality psychologist Walter Mischel conducted in many variations with preschool children at Stanford University in California between 1968 and 1974. Mischel actually wanted to research free will, and impulse control via ”reward deferral” seemed to him to be a good measuring instrument for this. In fact, it became a multi-layered waiting experiment, because it not only recorded the time that each individual child was able to resist the temptation – alone in a room with a marshmallow (!) – but also documented their waiting strategies. The children were also promised that they would receive an additional marshmallow if they waited successfully, thus doubling their reward. The little ones were left alone with the coveted sweet treat for a maximum of 15 minutes and were kept under (covered) observation: One in four ate the sweet immediately, 30 per cent managed the full time. Each of them tried to distract themselves somehow; some ran around, some tried to cheat.
What was more fascinating, however, were the results of follow-up observations of the successful test subjects decades later: those who waited patiently proved to be more stress-resistant overall in their later lives and, above all, showed greater social skills.

In 2014, sociologist Bettina Lamm from the Lower Saxony Institute for Early Childhood Education and Development at the University of Osnabrück repeated the experiment with children from Germany and a comparison group of children from Cameroon, in which she confirmed Mischel’s result of 30% “test winners” for Germany – whereas the Cameroonians, however, scored a sensational 70% of “patient” children. How did this come about?

The German children reacted in a predominantly “normal-squirrelly” way while waiting – just like we adults probably would. The children from Cameroon, on the other hand, all started with an additional social restriction: Due to their adult peers, they were used to the fact that promises were usually not kept. Therefore, they should have internalised that “it’s not worth waiting (anyway)”. However, when they were shown the second marshmallow before the test, the aforementioned high percentage waited patiently, playing, singing or chattering until the test was over, promising success.
Evaluations showed that the small gesture of “previous marshmallow showing” had obviously demonstrated enormous reliability on the part of the experimenters, to which the children responded with a high level of pre-confidence.
Socially speaking, this is actually an impressive promise of commitment: Look, I am prepared/ready and willing to contribute to your needs in a moment. If I am worth your time, we both gain something.

Interestingly, Bettina Lamm was thus able to underpin Walter Mischel’s findings on stress resilience and social competence with a further level, which in my view also establishes an important correlation for multiple relationships: In a way, “being able to wait” is already a preliminary stage of trust towards our attachment figures and loved ones!
In the words of Bettina Lamm:
»If you think about it, this ability to postpone a momentary need and resist the temptation to work on longer-term goals is definitely a skill that you need at many points in your life. When it comes to studying for an exam instead of pursuing a leisure activity or perhaps encountering problems in a relationship: dealing with them and not immediately breaking out of the situation. That means it’s definitely plausible.«

Personally, especially for romantic contexts, I would even go one step further based on this result.
In its passive quality, ’waiting‘ also has something to do with ’serving‘, which – for example – we can still recognise in the English language when using the words “waiter” or “waitress”.
And for me, this represents the beneficial counterpart to the somewhat active-aggressive ‘expectation’ mentioned at the beginning: When we “serve” a cause, we make ourselves a little smaller, become a little more dedicated, more receptive and softer than before. Yes, this also echoes the aforementioned hierarchy (which used to be a very real one when in the old days servants “waited tables”). In this case, however, it is a freely and willingly performed “service” for our loved ones, just as I already explained in Entry 34 that, in my view, »the core of the “romantic narrative” is the voluntary self-sacrifice performed for the community.«

And since “waiting” is about personally invested (life) time, this brings me full circle to the fact that the invested waiting time is a trusting gift in return for the demonstrated reliability, constancy and commitment of our other relationship partners.
The absolutely decisive key here is precisely the applied amount of free will that even Walter Mischel originally wanted to reveal with his “marshmallow experiment”.

Incidentally, Dr Andreas Göttlich from the University of Konstanz calls this the “gift exchange”, an important form of interpersonal synchronisation and therefore a social ability with an extremely positive dimension: »This is the only way to build trust, because if I immediately reciprocate every gift that is given to me, then there is actually no social bond. In this respect, it would be an example for a kind of social relationship that can only last if a certain amount of time is involved and if the people who are engaged in this social action can also wait, otherwise it is not a gift, but simply a transaction.«
This alone is certainly worth considering because, unfortunately, in the early stages of polyamorous relationships, events frequently occur too quickly or in too rapid succession, which often puts undue strain on the potential long-term development of trusting relationships – to the detriment of all parties involved.

Thus the German aphorist Georg-Wilhem Exler once stated quite appropriately that “waiting means that what you are waiting for is more important than what is now.”
In these words I recognise a lot of precisely the oligoamorous added value that I always refer to on this bLog as “more than the sum of its parts” – and which I describe in Entry 9 as the concentrate of a joint emotional contract, the “Implied acknowledgement and agreement – as a result of a mutually established emotional close-knit relationship – regarding the totality of voluntary yielded obligations, self-commitments and care which have been reciprocally contributed and are potentially enjoyable by all parties involved.”
After all, these “voluntary yielded oligations, self- commitments and care” are not something that you can put straight into your shopping trolley and consume immediately, as if you were buying them from a supermarket shelf. They are more like seeds and sprouts for a vegetable patch that need to be tended, nurtured, watered and regularly cleared of weeds by everyone involved so that the result ultimately provides sufficient nourishment for all those involved. Until that point is reached, we have to wait time and again, investing mutually and devotedly our time, thereby trusting (in advance) that there will literally be a fruitful, shared reward.
This is precisely what makes the ambivalent virtues of patience and the ability to wait so valuable for a polycule, especially when it comes to several participants gradually gaining confidence in a new, previously unfamiliar situation with each other.

In my opinion, the German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer provided the most beautiful summary of today’s topic with another harvest metaphor, which I would like to share with you in conclusion:

»Waiting is an art that our impatient age has forgotten. It wants to break the ripe fruit when it has barely set the sprout; but greedy eyes are all too often deceived by the fact that the seemingly delicious fruit is still green on the inside, and disrespectful hands ungratefully cast aside what has brought them such disappointment.
Those who do not know the bitter bliss of waiting, that is, hoping while being deprived, will never experience the full blessing of fulfilment.
He who does not know how one feels, who anxiously wrestles with the deepest questions of life, of his life, and waits, longingly watches until the truth is revealed to him, can dream nothing of the glory of this moment in which clarity shines forth, and he who does not want to court the friendship, the love of another, waiting to open his soul to the soul of the other until the latter arrives, until it finally arrives, to him the deepest blessing of a life of these souls in each other remains eternally hidden.
We have to wait for the greatest, deepest, most tender things in the world, things do not come in a storm, but according to the divine laws of germination and growth and becoming.« ³

¹ Deutschlandfunk Kultur: Soziales Alltagsphänomen – “Über das Warten” 04.08.2016 (Link only in German language!)

² ‘Two definitions of waiting well’ ; February 2016; Kate Sweeny, Chandra A Reynolds, Angelica Falkenstein, Sara E Andrews, Michael D Dooley

³ Dietrich Bonhoeffer: ‘Advent’ from ‘Barcelona, Berlin, America 1928-1931’, DBW Volume 10, page 529

Thanks to Maxim Abramov on Unsplash for the photo!

Ideal for what?

The protagonist Robin of Loxley roams exasperated through the dense forest in the 1984 TV series “Robin of Sherwood” (Season 2, Episode 2 “The Children of Israel”). He has quarreled with his companions and their current adventure does not seem to be progressing well. And because he is so preoccupied with his own thoughts and not paying attention to where his path is taking him, he suddenly encounters in a gloomy ravine a manifestation of his current spiritual advisor – the forest and hunting god Herne. Herne asks him why he has come – and the frustrated Robin admits that he has actually had quite enough and would almost like to break faith with him. After a short dialogue, however, the wise Herne dismisses Robin with the following words:
Herne: “Your arrows must be ready!”
Robin: “The target is to far – my aim is lost!”
Herne: “Then aim again.”
Robin: “To what purpose? To what end?”
Herne: “There is no end and no beginning. It is enough to aim.”

Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart, the godmother and originator of modern Polyamory, was an idealist. She drew her ideals from her belief in the socially transformative power of love – as perhaps only those who experienced her youth and young adult phase in California in the 1960s could have imagined –, from her neo-pagan, natural-religious world view – on which she orientated herself throughout her life – and from literature, especially the work of the American science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein.

Morning Glory, who at her beginning was still simply called Diana Moore, regarded love as the great changer and questioner of circumstances of which most other people assumed that they “simply had to be that way because they had always been that way”. And at the same time, love was also an incentive for her to always approach such circumstances with a measure of compassionate appropriateness and attention to the inherent dynamics of real life. For all the endeavours that Morning Glory later pursued on this basis, this was an important, both mindful as well as down-to-earth foundation, from which her new organic concept for ethical multiple relationships (yes, Polyamory!) benefited in particular in 1990.

However, Morning Glory originally encountered the topic of love as early as 1965, when she embarked on her own spiritual quest and thereby turned to neopaganism and the new witchcraft movement, both of which sought to emphasise the words “Perfect Love and Perfect Trust!” in their core beliefs and ritual circles. Nature-spiritual neopagan witchcraft of the late 1960s combined a view of the earth as a living, energetic organism with feminist ideas that propagated an independently feminine, emotional-psychic and creative-empowering spiritual existence – and with this as a background, celebrated a world-connecting holistic concept of creation with a strong emphasis on responsibility for one’s own actions. The witches’ covens of her time constituted themselves autonomously, without hierarchical super-organisations, and aimed to be internally free of class conceit, social status or gender boundaries. Concepts such as “community”, “integrity”, “consistency”, “responsibility” and the aforementioned “trust” among each other were of great importance to them – as the key to a targeted and personally effective transformation of the existing reality by means of one’s own will.
Those familiar with the subject will easily recognise some of the elements that were incorporated into the formulation of Polyamory 25 years later…

Finally, in 1973 – Morning Glory had already experimented with an open marriage herself – she met during a neopagan convention her later long-term partner Timothy “Otter”/”Oberon” Zell, a member of the group “Church of All Worlds” (CAW), who ultimately introduced her not only to the self-actualising ideas of “humanistic psychology” according to Abraham Maslow, but also to the progressive ideas of the above-mentioned US science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein. In particular, two works of the latter, “Stranger in a Strange Land“ and “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress“ (see also Entry 47, last third), outlined fictional but plausible alternative models of society, characterised by equality, diversity, interdependence, inclusion and liberal sexual morals – mostly practised in small, accessible social units.
As the CAW tried to align their own local groups with this literary model, the nucleus of “Polyamory” ultimately emerged from a participation of this kind (since 1984 there was a “throuple” relationship with Oberon Zell and another woman, Diane Darling), from which Morning Glory finally gained the experience for her breakthrough with an article published 1990 in the CAW members’ magazine.

Having written these last three paragraphs for you to read, Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart almost seems to have been a kind of “Holy Hippie Mother Mary” of multiple relationships: Spirited, self-contained, full of ideals, passionate, yet determinedly on the path of becoming-self-realised (the “self-actualization” according to A. Maslow).
I suppose she was all of these things in a certain way. And at the same time, she wasn’t, because she was also simply “one of us”, which is always cheerfully recognisable in the interviews and stories by and with her.

Curious? Here are two better-known examples:
When she was about to become a member of a Dianic (i.e. dedicated to the goddess Diana) and therefore all-female witches’ coven at the age of 20, she rebelled against the requirement to practise celibacy – i.e. chastity – for the duration of her affiliation with the group. She expressed her protest as a sexually active and self-determined woman by choosing the name “Morning Glory” for herself – which indeed is also the term for the plant of the same name (and botanically derived witch names are not uncommon…) – but also the somewhat bawdy description for a well-known masculine phenomenon… She nonetheless proudly identified with this name from then on and kept it until her death in 2014.

In 1985, when she had already been married to Oberon Zell-Ravenheart for 10 years, they jointly developed a process for transforming goat kids into unicorns (yes, you read that right) – a technique that was successfully carried out several times on various kids thanks to the interweaving of the initially still very malleable keratin strands of the budding horns. Although the approach was even patented, Morning Glory eventually turned away from this form of “growth manipulation” after a few attempts, as she was ultimately unable to reconcile it with her nature-based religious values.

So Morning Glory was definitely someone with ideals, but she was certainly not a “saint” – if this is to be understood as a metaphor for a person who is “above all things”. How could she be, since from 1984 until her death she shared in a highly dynamic multiple relationship that fluctuated between at least three and a maximum of six participating loving partners over a period of 30 years.

Will one always be true to one’s ideals during such a long time? Never argue? Never feel inferior or neglected at some point? Never succumb to the temptation to dress up the truth in a more colourful cloak for one’s own benefit (to quote Walter Moers¹ at this point)?
I think that would be superhuman – and in my opinion especially and most of all Morning Glory’s “gift of Polyamory” proclaims to the world how much in particular profound humanity must have shaped a significant part of her values and ideals.

After all, the text “A Bouquet of Lovers” ², in which she used the word “polyamorous” for the first time in 1990 in the magazine “Green Egg“, is not intended as a manifesto of principles and rules – and it doesn’t read like one at all. It is rather a…, I would say, a written “enabling” of how a multiple relationship could be practised in an ethical way for all those involved.
For as I wrote already in Entry 49, Morning Glory was first and foremost a practitioner who was acutely quite aware of her own weaknesses and those of her fellow human beings. From her own observation and experience, as well as from Abraham Maslow’s humanistic psychology, she knew that people were perfectly capable of acting altruistically, consciously and intentionally (purposefully); but that they were also capable of exactly the opposite in terms of selfishness, thoughtlessness and impulsiveness – the latter in particular, the less pronounced their own degree of self-actualization would be, whereas the pressure of their own perceived neediness would be intense.
This is precisely why her polyamorous legacy contains no “Thou shalt…!” but all the more “Golden Rule” – which in itself is actually more of a golden “It would be best…” : “Treat others as you would like others to treat you.”

This is why e.g. jealousy and self-doubt also have a place in Polyamory. And that is why insincerity, lack of confidentiality and disloyalty can also occur in Polyamory – because those who want to pursue ethical multiple relationships are (only) human beings themselves.
Otherwise, Polyamory would also be a dogmatic and rather tyrannical relationship philosophy if its ideals were imposed in such a rigorous way that its sympathizers would regularly despair at the uncompromising and inflexible nature of its demands…

Ideals however, according to the US psychologist and psychotherapy researcher Stephen Hayes, who has already been quoted several times on this bLog, are rooted in our personal values. Values that are aligned with social standards, for example, or we hope that they will improve our quality of life, promote inner enrichment or even mature our personality.
Thus, in order for values to become ideals, we must take precisely that step in which we separate mere personal utilitarian thinking from an inner striving for meaning.
Because – in very practical terms in terms of Polyamory – I could otherwise lie to my partners in complete agreement with myself because I would be able to gain an advantage or quickly satisfy a need – whereby I agree to accept collateral damage, e.g. potentially causing suffering to other people involved.

However, Polyamory is also idealistic. It is – thanks to Morning Glory! – about a deeper meaning, an inherent ethic: How do we maintain a loving relationship with several people without inflicting involuntary or even arbitrary suffering – in which all participants are instead granted an extended relationship framework where they can benefit from jointly provided resources and shared joy?

Therefore, if we still keep bumping our heads against the ideals of Polyamory, there may be two reasons for this.

• On the one hand, it could be that our own values at the moment are honestly not in line with those of Polyamory. For example, we may place less emphasis on truthfullness, personal integrity and accountability in our path of need fulfillment than is desirable and necessary in a more complex, ethical multiple relationship philosophy.
At this point, we would have to put our current personal values to the test and adjust them if necessary – or admit to ourselves that we (for whatever good reason) have so far given our utilitarian thinking a more important priority over the above-mentioned gain in meaning. This is not necessarily a fault of Polyamory or of us – but perhaps we are simply not suited to each other at this particular moment.

• On the other hand, it may be possible that – without actually realising it – we have elevated our ideals so far above the values of our self-image that we regularly experience ourselves as failing to live up to them. And this is neither good for us, because we increasingly experience our own actions as deficient and/or inadequate (and this is considerably detrimental to our self-assessment in terms of relationship management) – nor for Polyamory, which at some point must seem to us to be such an ambitious and far-fetched endeavour that it leads to the familiar admission : “I tried, but it was too difficult…”.

Yet both of the above points unite in a much friendlier synthesis in which we and Polyamory can perfectly coexist, I would even say thrive:
Because it is allowed to fail! A bit like in the proverb falsely attributed to Albert Einstein: “It is allowed to fail. Only those who have never tried have really failed.” But it is actually meant to be even more gentle, much more human: not being able to manage everything properly (straight away) is an indispensable part of the experience of ethical multiple relationships.
At the same time, a certain amount of selflessness is expected at any rate. Remaining on the ground after the fall and either blaming “the others” and/or instead indulging in self-pity are not exactly ethical options. Instead, the visionary words of the Austrian writer Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (who has also been featured on this bLog on various occasions) – which can currently be found a thousand times as a meme on the social networks – apply: “Stand up, straighten your crown, move on!” Because no matter how they turn out, experiences require our courage to want to make more of them based on the surplus insight we have just gained.

Which brings me full circle (oh, how fitting!) to Robin Hood in my opening scene. Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart conceptualised her Polyamory in such a way that it is not (only) about hitting and achieving a particular goal, but above all about our intentions and the path we take in doing so.
In particular, the tiny word “ethical” in “ethical multiple relationships” emphasises that the process and the effort behind our actions are, strictly speaking, almost more important than the desired or hoped-for result.

To always want to exist in an ideal state, on the other hand, is simply unrealistic – it was also Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach who once reassuringly said “Ideals are guiding stars; they light our way and give us the strength to achieve our goals.”
The Oligo- and Polyamory would be – to stay with this image – orientation aids, signposts or maps for such a way, in other words, practical enablement.
But of course we still have to decide, choose the route and walk it all by ourselves.
In the words of Erich Kästner: Let it be love! ³

¹ Walter Moers “The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear“ (Volume 1 + 2), The Overlook Press 2006

² The text of “Bouquet of Lovers” is available HERE.

³ The quote “Let it be love” derives from the novel “The Flying Classroom“ (1933) by the German writer and publicist Erich Kästner and is spoken by one of the main characters, “Martin Thaler”.

Thanks to Sam from DGSstudios on Pixabay for the AI-generated image!

And thanks again to Oberon Zell-Ravenheart for personally providing the private photos of him and Morning Glory. All rights reserved by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, CAW.

Bad connection?
#Noamory

In Germany and many other European countries, the telephone code 112 is precisely the number that can be used to make an emergency call. I therefore consider it very appropriate that my 112th Entry ventures into territory that concerns the fainter and louder alarm signals in the otherwise happy realms of ethical multiple relationships.
Because just as there are of course many good and even wonderful reasons for the emergence of such multiple partnerships, there are unfortunately also some that are unfavourable or even potentially destructive in the medium term.

As with all close romantic relationships, multiple relationships are fundamentally about connection between people. Therefore, it is already important to pay attention to precisely this basis: How do these connections look like – and why do we enter into them – or why is it that sometimes we don’t?
Concerning this subject, significant scientific findings have been available since 1940, when the British child psychiatrist and psychoanalyst John Bowlby laid the foundation for what later became known simply as “attachment theory“, a concept that has been repeatedly expanded and refined by numerous psychologists and behavioural researchers right up to the present day. Bowlby himself documented his most important findings – which will also be the subject of this Entry today – between 1969 and 1980, and these became established as authoritative primarily because at about the same time the American-Canadian developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth succeeded in confirming his conclusions on the basis of practical observations in interpersonal relationships.

John Bowlby was a paediatrician and child psychiatrist, just as Mary Ainsworth was a field researcher investigating the importance of the mother-child connection. Both personalities initially investigated human attachment behaviour at its literal basis, the very first relationship that every human being enters into, even before birth, so to speak: the bond with the mother.
However, the fact that we are reading about their findings here today on a bLog about ethical multiple relationships and that the knowledge they gained has not been exclusively reserved for medical and paediatric experts is due to the fascinating fact that we humans are “learning beings”. Learning beings, as Bowlby and Ainsworth recognised, who, by means of this “first of all attachments”, would internalise essential principles with regard to each of their subsequent relationships.
To be specific (and as joyful as it is scary): The nature of the early caregiver-child bond* significantly influences our entire relationship behaviour in later life.

After this sentence, I thought for a while about whether I should include the following disclaimer right here or at the end of today’s Entry. I believe that after a statement like this, it’s a good idea to reduce the tension a little – so I would like to add two things straight away:
On the one hand: Continued research has shown that in average human biographies numerous hybrid types and nuances may arise, adding several facets to the subsequent theory so that a particular attachment type does not represent a lifelong judgement.
Because on the other hand – and this is certainly the really good news: attachment behaviour can undergo transformation and whats more, it can be actively changed – under the important prerequisite of becoming aware of our current (acquired) attachment behaviour and its consequences in the first place.

When it came to adults, attachment theory has for many years been one of the tools used by scientifically open-minded couples therapists and relationship coaches. In monogamous relationships, their services were and still are mostly activated in the case of difficulties – or as I wrote at the beginning of this Entry, in an emergency situation. Analysing the complaints of those affected or by own observations of the dynamics the way concerned parties interact with each other, it was and is possible to attribute eventual problems within a relationship to the respective attachment behaviour of the participants. In this way, therapists and coaches – as well as researchers – were also able to identify certain patterns that have become well known by now: Why certain patterns are regularly repeated both in behaviour and in the choice of partner – and in this way sometimes would lead to a recurring experience of seemingly identical conflicts.

But where and why do multiple relationships, Oligo- or Polyamory, come into play here? Surely if in such arrangements relationship problems were about to arise, one could simply turn to a support person who would be open to the corresponding relationship model?
Or do multiple relationships offer further challenges that transcend a mere monogamous war of the roses?
In my opinion as the author of this bLog, yes, although I don’t think the word “challenges” is entirely appropriate, and therefore I would describe it primarily as an effect of the extended dimension inherent to multiple relationships.
Because it is precisely this “extended dimension” that does not usually exist in monogamy: “whether“ or “why” a couple gets together is rarely questioned, especially once the two main participants have obviously successfully started out together.

Such a “starting out” may also occur in multiple relationships, for example when a mutual yearning arises among several participants at roughly the same time with regard to all the others who might become also involved in a joint subsequent relationship.
However, there is also the even more likely case that there is already at least one couple or group that at some point may be joined by one or more other individuals.
Anyway, this is precisely where the special case of the “multiple” relationship lies: is it possible to love more than ONE other person and be romantically involved with each of them at the same time?

Once more, the obvious answer on this bLog is of course “yes” – however, its emotional, rational and social justification is rather different from the one that applies to the normative and socially established two-person relationships of monogamy – where the mere “joining together” alone is usually not a fact to be questioned.

For ethical multiple relationships, however, precisely this question also arises – and the people involved, believe me, occasionally ask it themselves: Are we allowed to do this? And if so, what motivates people like us to pursue several romantic relationships at the same time?
The best answers to this would certainly be “Of course!” and “Obviously: For love’s sake!” or “Well, because they all want to be together with one another!”

Even Mr Bowlby and Mrs Ainsworth would be highly satisfied with these answers, as we shall see. But.
But the possibility of engaging in multiple relationships – and the courageous people who allowed themselves to be involved in this experience – gradually revealed that there were still more answers hidden in the romantic thicket of interpersonal affairs.

Because ever since the feminist Morning-Glory Zell Ravenheart first established the word “polyamorous” for ethical, non-monogamous relationships in 1990, more and more people finally gave themselves permission to follow her example and actually engage themselves romantically and intimately in “multiple” relationships. Over the years, some of them may even have worked with Bowlby’s attachment theory at workshops or other type of community meeting.
However, as far as I know, it was the American author Jessica Fern who in her 2020 book “Polysecure” ¹ was the first to emphasise the importance of our acquired attachment behaviour specifically for the polyamorous context. And in particular with regard to the above stated question of “why”, which can have a considerable impact on the arrangement of a multiple relationship network.

So, enough of the colourful context, but in order to remain comprehensible, here are the four “attachment types” according to John Bowlby as a super-concise short summary:

• Securely attached (according to Bowlby type B)

A securely attached child experiences sufficient sensitivity in its first years of life when its attachment behaviour system is activated. Its attachment behaviours were perceived and correctly interpreted by the attachment figure(s), whereupon prompt and appropriate action was taken. This means that the attachment figure is memorised as reliable by the infant, with the result that the child can largely predict the behaviour of its attachment figure. In the event of strong emotions such as separation, the child will show clear attachment signals such as crying, calling, etc. If a reunion occurs, the child will greet its attachment figure(s) and seek out their company, e.g. to calm down through physical contact. However, after a short time, a securely attached child will return to its original activity (playing etc.).²

Adults with this acquired attachment behaviour feel secure in relationships and are well able to balance closeness and autonomy. They have a fundamental trust in other people and can both give and receive emotional support. They perceive conflicts and differences of opinion as normal and resolvable.³

• Dismissive-avoidant attachment (according to Bowlby type A)

Such a child has not experienced its attachment figure(s) as sensitive during the first years of life. It has experienced that its attachment behaviours were either perceived and interpreted too late, not at all or incorrectly. As a result, the child begins to express attachment signals less and less frequently as it wants to avoid further disappointments. As a result, it is increasingly dependent on regulating itself in the event of strong emotions. When the caregivers leave the room, the child may look after them briefly, but will soon return to its own activities. In some cases, own strong emotions are compensated for with an increased urge to explore. When reunited, an dismissive-avoidant child does not seek closeness. If the caregiver takes the initiative and picks the child up, it will quickly make it clear that it wants to be put down again by turning its head away and changing its body posture: due to previous bad experiences, this child avoids openly expressing its attachment stress on a behavioural level.²

Adults with this acquired attachment behaviour tend to distance themselves emotionally and avoid more intense closeness. They may even find closeness/intimacy uncomfortable and often maintain a certain distance in relationships. They may have difficulty trusting their own emotional needs or relying on others.³

• Anxious-ambivalent attachment (according to Bowlby type C)

This child does not know how its attachment figure will react when its attachment behaviour system is activated. In everyday life, it experiences its caregivers inconsistently – sometimes sensitively and sometimes not. Due to this inconsistency, the child is unable to develop reliable expectations regarding the reaction of its attachment figure(s). The child therefore constantly seeks closeness to the caregiver(s), which has a negative effect on its exploratory behaviour: such a child will be reluctant to engage in other activities and reacts stressed, irritated or even irritable when separated from the caregiver(s). This can lead to very heterogeneous behaviour, especially when reunited. The child may strive for contact with the attachment figure, but at the same time show signs of anger and rage or even reject the attachment figure altogether.²

Adults with this acquired attachment behaviour often feel a strong dependency on others, long for closeness – and at the same time are afraid of rejection. They often worry intensely about whether their needs are being met and whether they are really important to others. They can quickly feel insecure or overwhelmed if they feel they are not getting enough attention.³

• Disorganised/disoriented attachment (according to Bowlby type D)

Such a child has either been neglected, abused, mistreated or traumatised by their attachment figure(s). The person who is supposed to offer the child security and protection is also the person who frightens it. Children with a disorganised attachment style are notable for their rapid succession of contradictory, incomplete or confused behavioural strategies. This means that the child may approach the caregiver, but then suddenly stops from one second to the next. If the caregiver is absent, the child may show direct signs of anxiety, but then rather seeks out the proximity of strangers instead of the caregiver. Another possible behaviour may even be a kind of “petrification“ as long as the caregiver is in the same room.²

People with this acquired attachment behaviour also show contradictory behaviour as adults. Although they long for closeness, this can also trigger fear or mistrust. They often avoid closeness or alternate between strong impulses to move closer and withdraw, as their early relationship experiences were characterised by insecurity and perhaps even trauma. This can be reflected in intense, chaotic relationships and, due to their traumas, they themselves often feel internally fractured and therefore frequently have difficulty establishing stable relationships at all.³

Enough of all the creepy stuff! (ok, except for the solid, secure attachments) – I would like to call out – but the thought-provoking impulses for successful or unsuccessful ethical multiple relationships start right here. With a little help from Wikipedia, I’d therefore would like to look at the effects of the attachment experiences listed above on us in adulthood – including the way we approach intimate romantic relationships.

►First, let’s look once more at the secure attachment as an “accident-free” and healthybehaviour pattern, since such a secure attachment style is evident in people who have internalised a positive self-image and a positive image of others – which is ultimately fundamental for establishing relationships of any kind.
Securely attached adults tend to agree with the following statements:
“It’s relatively easy for me to get emotionally close to others.”
“I feel comfortable relying on others and having others rely on me.”
“I don’t worry about being alone or others not accepting me.”
Securely attached adults therefore generally have a positive attitude towards themselves, their loved ones and their relationships. They often report greater satisfaction and involvement in their relationships than adults with other attachment styles. Securely attached adults feel comfortable both with intimacy and independence.

Okay. What else can I say? I think that such a person would feel at home in any type of relationship, whether mono, oligo or poly – and would probably also be well liked and appreciated. Of course, their relationships might also fail – but if they do, it won’t be because of the type of attachment.

►An insecure dismissive-avoidant attachment style is found in people who have a rather positive view of themselves but a negative view of others. They therefore tend to agree with the following statements:
“I am comfortable without close emotional relationships.”
“It is important to me to feel independent and self-sufficient.”
“I prefer not to depend on others or for others to depend on me.”
Adults with this attachment style usually desire a high degree of independence. They see themselves as self-sufficient and cannot imagine themselves as part of a close, day-to-day relationship. Some even see close relationships as relatively unimportant. People with this attachment style sometimes try to suppress and hide their feelings, and they tend to deal with perceived rejection by distancing themselves from the sources of rejection (e.g. their attachment figures, loved ones or relationships). Nevertheless, they still show strong physiological reactions to emotionally charged situations and content, which they then often try to divert and channel by concentrating on other topics.

In the world of ethical multiple relationships, the so-called “Solo Polyamory” comes to my mind in this section: People who cultivate several individual relationships with different people, but which in turn are not connected to each other. “Solo polys“ often live alone and socialise with their partners in a selective way, e.g. at weekends, at events, for certain activities or in special places.
Questions that arise accordingly would be, for example, why we would separate ourselves from our loved ones in this way, or why we want to keep them at a distance because of the chosen relationship model.
It also raises the fundamental question of whether we permit ourselves a choice of partners with this kind of “poly-Amory”, so that we obtain “a suitable pet for every plaisir” – thereby creating the possibility for us to quickly change the field of activity if the tension within a particular relationship increases – which is why we pursue all our relationships with a maximum degree of non-network parallelism anyway… What’s more, would there be any indication that we might start exploring new relationships when we can no longer stand the intensity in the established ones? And how do the pending partners feel about this? Do they feel sufficiently seen and valued by us – or are they at risk of only ever receiving a part-time investment from us?

►An insecure anxious-ambivalent attachment style is found in people who have a negative image of themselves and a rather positive image of others. They therefore tend to agree with the following statements:
“I want to be completely emotionally intimate with others, but I often find that others are reluctant to get as close to me as I would like.”
“I feel uncomfortable when I don’t have close relationships, but I sometimes worry that others don’t value me as much as I value them.”
Adults with this attachment style seek a high degree of intimacy (yes, this also includes speedy or intense sexuality), approval and responsiveness from their loved ones They sometimes value intimacy so much that they may even become overly dependent on such an attachment figure. Compared to securely attached adults, such people tend to have a less positive self-assessment. They can develop a feeling of anxiety that only subsides when they are in contact with a attachment figure. They often doubt their value as an individual and blame themselves for a perceived lack of attention from their partners. In their relationships, they can sometimes display a high degree of emotionality, anxiety or overcompensation.

I know this attachment style best myself, because unfortunately it is my own starting point. Within ethical multiple relationships such as Oligo- and Polyamory, it isn’t particularly rare rare because, in case of doubt, it is precisely the possibility of winning over a number of intimate attachment figures due to the increased need for closeness that makes multiple relationship models interesting for people of this disposition.
The problem with this attachment style from the outset is the endeavour to achieve the greatest possible closeness and emotional merging, so that the ‘impact energy’ is usually quite intense when getting to know each other – and often attempts are made to bring about this desired compatibility, e.g. by means of early-initiated sexuality. That way, the “groundwork” of a thorough getting-to-know-each-other process with the exploration of mutual preferences or dislikes can thus fade into the background, which can lead to potential problems if the relationship continues. Additionally, the NRE (“New Relationship Energy”) can be particularly powerful as a result, which can be rather unsettling for existing partners if everything else is dropped entirely for the sake of a new love.
Furthermore, such a high degree of closeness and attachment within multiple relationships occasionally leads to a blurring of individual boundaries, so that at some point it can be difficult, both objectively and emotionally, to work out which aspects of a situation can be attributed to whom, which has an unfavourable effect on the overall dynamics of the relationship. Insecure, ambivalent people tend to be particularly unhelpful in this respect by occasionally lapsing into a kind of “micromanagement” due to their inner dilemma, in which they try to put on a strained hybrid performance of “Wait, I’ll fetch you the stars from the sky…” and overbearing nagging (“No, no, we have to do it THIS way….” ) for their partner(s).

►Disorganised attachment patterns are exhibited by people who have an unstable and fluctuating view of themselves and others, which is predominantly negative in both cases. Losses or traumas (e.g. abuse) in childhood and adolescence can lead to agreement with the following statements:
“I am somewhat uncomfortable getting close to others.”
“I want emotionally close relationships, but I find it difficult to completely trust others or to depend on them.”
“I sometimes worry that I will get hurt if I allow myself to get too close to other people.”
Individuals with an anxious-preoccupied attachment style are characterised by a strong desire for closeness and intimacy in their relationships, but often experience a high level of anxiety and insecurity about the accessibility and responsiveness of their attachment figures. They therefore tend to feel uncomfortable with increasing emotional closeness. These feelings are linked to sometimes unconscious, negative views of both themselves and their loved ones. As a result, they often consider themselves unworthy of attention from their attachment figures and at the same time often lack trust in their partners’ intentions. Similar to the dismissive-avoidant attachment style, disorganisedly attached adults seek less closeness to their parters and often suppress and/or deny their feelings. For this reason, they find it much more difficult to express affection. Individuals with this attachment style tend to have a negative self-image and a volatile or split view of others, which can contribute to interpersonal dysfunction.

A disorganised attachment style poses the toughest challenges for any form of genuine, intimate connection, yet unfortunately I have also found some traits of this type of attachment within myself.
The main problem especially when it comes to multiple relationships is that the person concerned has the ability to create for itself a mini-universe of several different people there, between whom they can emotionally ‘switch’ (back and forth) as required. For those in their environment, however, this behaviour can appear strangely inconsistent and sometimes even unpredictable – or at least unreliable.
Due to the network character of polyamorous relationships, however, a person with a disorganised relationship can often be “cushioned” for a while – as the diversity of relationships means that the inner conflict and contradictions of the affected person do not become apparent as quickly as it might in a strictly two-person relationship. Nevertheless, at the same time, it is precisely this “imposing” and “enduring” of disorganised symptoms in a multiple relationship that can, in turn, cause great suffering, precisely because of the variety of participants involved, long before the triggering person is ready to face up to their buried traumas. The danger of “disorganisation”, of course, lies in the fact that the effects – as a result of all-sided, sometimes contradictory compromises – may by then have already insidiously and irreversibly fractured the overall relationship for all those involved.

Phew. My conclusion from this important – and now almost too lengthy – Entry:
Additional studies have unfortunately shown that people with insecure or disorganised attachment styles are also more susceptible to psychological problems such as depression and anxiety disorders, they are more likely to have impaired self-esteem, and that it is therefore more difficult for them to develop healthy attachments in adulthood.
Observations have also shown that unfavourable attachment strategies and traumas in relationships even attract each other with above-average frequency – insecure-avoidant and insecure-ambivalent, for example, surprisingly (and despite seemingly quite different needs!) regularly find themselves together in the same “relationship boat”…

On top of that, multiple relationships usually “throw more than just two” people together, which can result in extremely unfortunate compensation strategies, especially if the degree of unconsciousness for one’s own biographical attachment experiences is (still) rather pronounced.
And to emphasise once again: in their early stages, ethical multiple relationships must, if only for reasons of self-preservation alone, very honestly face up to the question of whether the mere desire for “multiple relationships” does not actually stem from a lack of need, which unfortunately three of the four types of attachment covertly carry within them.
Because fear of loss, fear of commitment and possessive behaviour always cause unrest, suffering and drama in any relationship. And that’s something that we, as people who love so much, certainly don’t want to inflict on our favourite loved ones.

Nevertheless, with today’s Entry, which is certainly not just painful to scroll through ot to read due to its length, I would like to urgently sensitise people to reflect on these unhappier aspects of their own potential relationship- and attachment behaviour, very much like the above-mentioned author Jessica Fern. I also encourage you to explore this together with our partners and loved ones, who may be able to provide important impulses for us through their “view from the outside” – even if this kind of realisation will certainly not always be easy for everyone involved.
But it is precisely this process of awareness that can ultimately enable us all to actually change a possibly negative attachment style bit by bit.

In this sense – and in the best, securely attached way: Let it be love, genuine trust and truly feeling safe – and what’s more: because you all want to be together with each other from the bottom of your hearts!

*I write caregiver-child attachment here because it has been proven that in the sensitive phase of the first years of life, it is solely decisive how these main caregivers show affection – regardless of whether it is the mother, father, family members, foster parents, etc.

¹ Jessica Fern „Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Non-monogamy“, Thornapple Press (2020)

² Type descriptions created with references from the Master’s thesis by Nadine Madlen Blaßnig “Bindung im Erwachsenenalter: Eine Studie zum Zusammenhang von Alkoholkonsum, Mentalisierungsfähigkeit, Selbstwert und Bindung“, 2018 Alpen-Adria-University of Klagenfurt; quotes from Kißgen, J. (2009). “Diagnostik der Bindungsqualität in der frühen Kindheit – die Fremden Situation“; in Julius, H. et al. (eds.), “Bindung im Kindesalter. Diagnostik und Intervention”, Göttingen: Hogrefe (only in German language)

³ Description taken from “Attachment Disturbances in Adults: Treatment for Comprehensive Repair“ by Daniel P. Brown and David S. Elliott, WW Norton & Co (2016)

Thanks to engin akyurt on Unsplash for the photo!

Last but not least: There are numerous tests online to determine your own attachment type. Not all of them work in accordance with Bowlby and Ainsworth – but you can start there for a basic assessment. In any case, I think it is more effective to look directly at the type descriptions (on Wikipedia, for example, or here) and reflect on the relevant characteristics for yourself.

Because it’s close to our hearts

March has arrived – and with it some significant dates: on the 7th we committed “Equal Pay Day“, which at the achievement of equal wages among women and men; on the 8th we celebrated International Women’s Day, which campains for global visibility, entitlement and empowerment of female issues since 1921 – and very modestly, Oligoamory is turning a great 6 years old these days!

In this sense, March is a truly feminist month – entirely in accordance with the birthday of Oligoamory, which explicitly owes so much – indeed, everything – to women and feminism: After all, it was the feminist and neopaganist Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart who first established the word “polyamorous” within the context of ethical non-monogamous relationships in 1990 – which allowed me to promptly launch my own variety 29 years later, in the shape of my “committed-sustainable oligoamorous micro-communities”.

The two anniversaries mentioned in the first sentence of this Entry are particularly important to me in this context, which I realized especially when I was trying to come up with a headline for today’s article. I started by tinkering around with “Because we care”. However, the English word “care”, which comes across as so helpful at first glance, actually stands for a certain kind of burden, as it originally derives from the Old Germanic/Old Saxon word “cara”, which meant something like “lament” or “worry”… And I didn’t actually thought this analogy was all that exciting.
At the same time, nevertheless, in everyday life it is simply what it’s all about in the end: “care work“ is a euphemism of sorts used today to describe the mostly unpaid labour of providing and looking after, in which it is still far too often primarily women who deal with everything related to household and home, the people living in it, their health and, last but not least, procuring and preparing food.

Nonetheless, it goes without saying that things also have to be “taken care of” in ethical multiple relationships – and in Entry 93 I already tried to answer the question of who in poly- or oligoamorous relationships has to be responsible for handling tasks relating to the kitchen, housekeeping and potential children. For, of course, in relationships that consist of “more than two” people, caring for and looking after each other is one of the deciding core factors.

However, multiple relationships, which by their very nature consist of several participants, also present the challenge of increased complexity – especially with regard to the aspect of “care work” to be performed – precisely because it is not always obvious at first glance who is actually contributing and who is benefiting based on individual strategy. Or rather, at which point a relationship succeeds due to a high degree of joint cooperation and a pronounced sense of togetherness – or whether individual participants start to dominate the proceedings by gaining a growing advantage at the expense of the other contributors.

In fact, this process is so extraordinarily complex and – as we shall see – intertwined between people and, even more abstractly, between living beings in general, that various branches of science, from evolutionary biology to game theory, have been trying for decades to find out more and more about the background to this topic using increasingly sophisticated models.

Because as computer and programming technology increasingly got up to speed from the 1980s onwards – soon becoming capable of more than efficient analogue calculations in room-filling installations –, it provided further effective tools for mapping the patterns of interaction within larger groups without having to view and analyse hours of video footage from flocks of birds, pedestrian zones or flat-share kitchens.
Now small programs with certain attributes could be pitted against each other, which is even regularly organised competitively as an incentive by repeatedly calling on programmers worldwide to create software units that subsequently encounter each other within a virtual setting (e.g. ICPC or Kaggle competitions).
The tasks that programmes designed in this way have to tackle in this context correspond, for example, with the so-called ‘prisoner’s dilemma’ (which itself dates back to 1950 and was devised by Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher): Two prisoners are in custody, but each could gain an advantage in the length of their sentence by denouncing the other prisoner because it would shorten their own time behind bars – while letting the other one stew a little longer. So one could pull this trump card and get out faster – or keep quiet in the hope that the other party will also keep quiet (a kind of “win-win”) – because of course there would also be the possibility of being betrayed by the other side, which would either keep you in prison yourself – or indeed together – for longer (“win-lose” or “lose-lose”). Programming that proves its worth here advances to the next stage – whereas software that loses out too often due to incorrect assessment of its opponent will be ruled out.

In an article for Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR)¹ this January, Nikoleta E. Glynatsi, a mathematician at the RIKEN Institute for Computer Science in Kobe (Japan), explained that, from a mathematical point of view, such situations often seem straightforward at first: “Maths shows us that you should always act selfishly because it is costly to be selfless and one can never be sure whether this generosity will ever pay off.”
Interestingly, however, her continued experiments revealed that neither the most aggressive programmes nor those that relied on simple ‘tit-for-tat’ tactics prevailed. This was because some programs had a long-term memory (i.e. a kind of ‘remembering’) concerning the earlier behaviour of their counterparts – and how they had previously ‘dealt’ with other programs; in contrast, simpler programs mainly acted purely randomly. It became apparent that in the long term, the best results were not achieved through rigid approaches such as ‘never give in’ or ‘always co-operate’, but rather by using flexible strategies: “One should react to what the other person is doing and mirror their behaviour to a certain extent – albeit depending on the context.” explains Glynatsi.

In my last Entry 110, I quoted the neurobiologist Herwig Baier, who described how an organism needs to have its individual past, present and future in mind in the truest sense of the word in order to be able to carry out complex decisions in a useful way: It would have to be able to remember past events, focus on current requirements and, if possible, foresee the effects of its actions for the future.
The importance of this “memory of experience” mentioned above was now also confirmed in December 2024 in the recent study² by Mrs Glynatsi.
For human contexts, this immediately puts psychology back on board.
For example, the psychologist Felix Brodbeck from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich extracts this from Glynatsi’s research work:
“The longer the memory, the more likely it is that cooperation will be appropriate to the situation. I would even be tempted to say that without memory, cooperation is not possible at all. A longer memory makes it possible to incorporate past experiences into current decisions. This not only builds up trust, but also minimises the likelihood of conflict. In contrast, those who are only looking for short-term gains risk damaging long-term relationships, whether in their private life or at work.”
Or, as the journalist Doris Tromballa put it very aptly at the end of her BR article mentioned above: “Those who act flexibly reduce the risk of being exploited and at the same time avoid being perceived as selfish.”

Research such as that carried out by Mrs Glynatsi and her team is likely to become of far-reaching significance for our society as a whole.
After all, on the one hand, the processing power of super- and quantum computers is increasing several times over every year, so that the assessment, evaluation and prediction of human interaction will also prove increasingly accurate when mapped in virtual spaces. Where – on the other hand – this kind of data will most certainly be taken up and integrated by the rapidly developing parallel research in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). AI, by the way, that we already all interact with today, from search engines to graphics programmes!
Which in a way also points the way to the moment that has become known as “technological singularity” – and describes the threshold at which artificial intelligence could possibly surpass human intelligence in the future…

That is, as far as the potential of computer ‘brains’ that analyse and emulate (simulate) human interaction in this way are concerned.
But what about the ‘original’ – our own brains?
Indeed, the idea that we humans are capable of a similar ‘singularity’ on our own is not entirely new and was already popularised by the US thriller author Dan Brown in his 2009 book “The Lost Symbol”: The world’s human population is currently still growing demographically. In purely physical terms this means that ‘more brains’, more potential human minds, are being added day by day. But also Dan Brown already pointed out that brain mass alone wouldn’t be the decisive factor. As an optimist, he rather projected an accompanying rising learning curve of human consciousness, an accelerating increase in insight and knowledge, which could one day – by crossing its own ‘singularity threshold’ – catapult mankind to groundbreaking possibilities, creative talents, abilities, and achievements.

Humanity – as a kind of unified, biological supercomputer? God complex? Absurd tech fiction?
No, I don’t think so. But I do believe that for this we need something more than just literary optimism – and that brings us back to the anniversaries I mentioned at the beginning of this Entry.
Because in my opinion, we as humanity could perhaps have experienced our ‘singularity moment’ some time ago. Or rather: this would already be absolutely within our reach.
If – yes, if – we were to do as the programmes do – and exploit our entire human potential to the utmost.
However, as long as we continue, as we have done for centuries, to undervalue and put aside the female part of humanity (not to mention other sexes and genders…) and to continually disadvantage and set back people of other ethnic origins, world views, handicaps, ages or identities, it is as if we are, in a sense, severing a huge part of our great human spirit. Lest it become wasted, because the ideas, perspectives, impulses, experiences and inventions that the individuals oppressed in this way might otherwise have contributed to the greater whole evaporate unheard and unused – or rather, could never even arise in the first place due to a lack of educational participation.

But for our own ‘singularity leap’, if it is not to be realised first – or only solely – by an AI in the future, we need all of us! Really all of us, with the greatest possible, unlocked mental and spiritual potential. Integrative and inclusive.

Bold words. Which are certainly important to take to heart, even without ‘singularity’ as a goal…
Why am I still an optimist like Dan Brown – and what do multiple relationships have to do with it, after all, which is what this bLog is supposed to be about?
Once again, science has provided a clue to the answer.

In her latest book “Mother Brain – How Neuroscience Is Rewriting the Story of Parenthood”, science journalist Chelsea Conaboy³ dispels another prejudice about women, which is that pregnancy and the birth of a child puts their minds in a kind of ‘unpredictable limbo’, causing them even to lose their intellectual capacity (which for centuries also served as a male argument for excluding women from responsible functions and jobs).
In fact, Conaboy summarises scientific evidence that the brains of parenting mothers – as well as fathers, co-carers and other close attachment figures – really do change when caring for a child. What’s more, in a fundamentally beneficial way for the entire future life of these people!
In her book, she vividly describes how everyday “care work” is inextricably linked to certain interdependent neurobiological processes – precisely because we care.
The author further concludes that these results are rather obvious because of the human capacity for lifelong learning – due to the equally lifelong plasticity of the human mind – and would thus also have considerable significance for all other areas of interpersonal caregiving, providing and support.

In other words, when people enter into relationships, their brains experience a transformation. This effect has even been proven to be amplified by the ‘care factor’: What is “close to our hearts” promotes our ability to become, to be and to remain even better “care workers”.
This also confirms another benefit that medical experts have been emphasising for a long time. That even a single relationship – and the incentives we experience through it – boosts the health of those involved. And yes, in this case, ‘more is (even) better’ – especially if these relationships are a ‘matter of the heart’ in which we – corresponding to the words of the above-mentioned psychologist Felix Brodbeck – cooperate appropriately, minimise conflicts and build up trust.

By which I want to back up all you people out there in relationships today: Just one relationship can not only change your life – it fundamentally changes you; indeed, it is apparently enough to have been part of a caring relationship for a while in your past for this inner metamorphosis to stay with you for a lifetime.

So if it is ever suggested to you who are even part of multiple relationships that you “are wired differently”, then happily agree with that and feel proud that this corresponds with every single one of your loving connections – both as scientifically confirmed as well as an actual deep inner human truth that connects us with all other inhabitants of the world capable of entering into a relationship. Precisely because it is close to our hearts.
And by the way , it was the American astronomer, visionary and futurist Carl Sagan, who once said:

»Who are we, if not measured by our input on others?
That’s who we are!
We’re not who we say we are, we’re not who we want to be – we are the sum of the influence and impact that we have, in our lives, on others.«

¹ The article “Kooperation oder Konkurrenz – Was ist besser?” first published on BR on 15th January 2025 on Bayern 2 can be found in the ARD archive of the Tagesschau (only in German language) HERE

² Link to the study by Nikoleta E. Glynatsi, Ethan Akin, Martin A. Nowak and Christian Hilbe “Conditional cooperation with longer memory” from 6th December 2024 HERE

³ Chelsea Conaboy, “Mother Brain”, ‎ St Martin’s Press, September 2022

Thanks to Vonecia Carswell on Unsplash for the photo!