POLYAMOROUS PODNERS:Poly Pod Pt 2 by Janet Kira Lessin worldpolyamory@aol.com
When I was a child, couples of my parent's generation, the
World War II era, married in their late teens or early twenties and
stayed together till their deaths approximately fifty years later.
The traditional family was a nuclear one–Mom, Dad and 2.5 children.
Divorces were rare and full of shame. And if, heaven forbid, parents
divorced or remarried, stepparents were demonized in movies and
literature as "evil"and something to be feared or hated.
This reality, dominant in the 1940s and `50s, began to erode
in the `60s until now, fifty years later (I'm now 54) single parent
families dominate and there are more households with a single adult
than couples or families. Most couples nowadays are unmarried and
many couples are of the same sex. The nuclear family is practically
non-existent. Stepparents co-parent, raise and support children and
siblings, blood and adopted--of all races, colors and creeds. Society
experienced a wide variety of extreme and often horrendous birth
pangs leading to the creation of this new, modern family. We've
adjusted to a new, formerly non-conventional family system that seems
to work and have created a new cultural "norm".
How long will this structure of ad hoc living groups last?
Based on what's come before and how much we've changed since WW2,
what's next?
Hidden in the dark recesses of human society are the highly
feared, politically predicted members of the dreaded "slippery
slope", the fall-out from legalizing same-sex marriages, the POLYS.
Polys, polyamorous peoples-- those who love more than one in an
intimate relationship-- are the logical, next-step, progression for
our new, non-traditional extended families. Now, as a society, we
have fallen in love, made babies with partners, divorced, mated,
married, made babies with more partners and are coming together to
sort out our feelings and relationships to one another.
We're ready to question the cultural assumption that we must
stop loving those we love in order to love those we love? What an
insane concept, so far from the "reality" of what actually happens.
Somewhere in my early twenties, when I was NOT mature, grown up or
far-from spiritually sophisticated, it dawned on me that I was living
a culturally induced lie. I thought, I believed I had to stop loving
my early, childhood lovers in order to love my husband whom I had
recently married. But, when I looked inside my heart, I knew, I
realized that I still loved Kenny, Keith and others that made my
teenage heart soar. The lie was what I had told myself in order to
move on and live a socially imposed concept that now, since I got
married, I could only love my husband. What bull! With that
realization, I was set free! My heart could now be true to itself.
Now, if only I could tame the shame and blame part of myself, then I
would be fully free to be who I truly was.
POLYAMORY: THE HEATHIEST NATURAL RELATIONSHIP STRUCTURE
Fast forward to today. I now live polyamorously. I live the
subconscious dream Americans have been acting out unconsciously.
Polyamory, I affirm from my research and from my direct experience
as a participant, is the most healthiest and natural relationship
structure ever. Polyamory follows the natural formation and ebb and
flow of tribes and families.
The culturally imposed conditioning of limiting love, shaming
and blaming individuals away from following their hearts and natural,
body biorhythms, attractions and impulse led to the deterioration of
our families, mass confusion and family dysfunction with offshoots-
crime, violence, illness, death, destruction and ultimately, war.
I live and love in a poly POD–a lovers' group--my
relationship style of choice. I enjoy a primary relationship with my
husband, Sasha, as well as a close, secondary relationship with
another man, Shivaya. Sash, Shivaya and I are a TRIAD; we love to
make love together. We're also part of a poly pod, six to twelve
adults who come together on a regular basis and share love, intimacy,
sexual energy and relate to one another in ever-changing ways. In the
pod, we have no sexpectations. We simply enjoy the natural rhyme,
rhythm and reason of our bodies, hearts, souls and minds.
Within our poly pod, besides my triad, there are two couples.
The rest are singles; we have two new single men and one new single
woman. We remain open for others to join us, but are complete
inasmuch as we are and not desperate nor necessarily actively seeking
new members. We follow the natural flow of our group energy and as it
feels right and we discuss bringing new people into our group when
someone super cool comes into our lives.
We don't want to shock anyone, so we make sure we interview
new members thoroughly. We desire to maintain the integrity of our
group, so all activities, members' identities and meeting places are
confidential. We usually screen carefully so we don't put a damper on
our gathering with those who are not ready for such deep relating and
intimacy.
We've been pretty successful in choosing appropriate people,
but every once in a while we invite someone who's a bit of a dud and
freaks out in some fashion and can't handle our vibes. We deal with
them emotionally and psychologically, try to see what's been
triggered within them and help them heal, learn, grow and expand. If
they don't enjoy being with us, we don't invite them back and they
don't want to come, so that's a win/win. We're learning the hard way.
We are pretty unattached, so if something doesn't work out, we don't
try to convince someone to stay and work it out. But if we find a
great, new connection, that's awesome and we celebrate our new
beloveds to the max.
While we sometimes have guests, for the most part, our group
has a pretty secure core group which has been meeting on a regular
basis for about six years and others who come and go around us. Our
coming together is about sharing love, sensuality, massages, intense
conversations, laughter, healthy food and intimate connections.
Sexual intimacy varies over time with the individual participants.
Each time we meet, sexual intimacy between individual members is up
for negotiation.
While our gatherings are mostly about sharing love, intimacy,
sensuality and sexual energy, raw sex does happen. So be prepared.
When I get going. I love to have tantric orgasms for hours on
end. Others podners catch my orgasmic energy wave and the whole
atmosphere gets very electric. We make pulsating puppy piles. We
have our cake and eat it too. It's all good.
Several of our podners have birthdays in July. This year, we
let one of our members invite a couple of newbies and weren't as
thorough with our screening as usual.
So there we were in the middle of our July birthdays love-in
when Cassandra, one of our female invitees, freaked out when my triad
wanted to engage sexually in the middle of the living room floor.
We'd been making love in the center of our group for over six years
now. Our lovemaking's become of a pod tradition. We begin our
lovemaking ritual and everything else, from massage to music to other
configurations and couplings goes on around us.
Just as Sash and Shivaya started connecting sensually with
me, Cassandra suddenly protested. She shocked me out of my erotic
spell. I realized we were being challenged. Bad as that was, worst
of all, for some reason, I allowed myself to be stifled and took my
triad back into my bedroom to make love.
In the bedroom, I enjoyed myself with my men but I felt odd.
After a while, I got pissed at myself for allowing Cassandra to
stifle me. After all, this is my home and we were celebrating my
husband's birthday party. I was confused. I wanted to honor
Cassandra's requests and please her. Yet at the same time, I wanted
to celebrate like there's no tomorrow because after all, it was my
honey's birthday. And, besides, I hadn't really cut loose and had a
day off in a month of Sundays and I just wanted to hoot, holler and
rock and roll in endless waves of tantric orgasms.
Next day, in our sharing circle, I tried to relax and get in
the spirit of it all. Most of our pod members were glowing. We had a
super time, were laughing for hours. But once again, when it came to
Cassandra's time to share, she criticized, scolded and chastized my
triad for getting sexy in the living room. Dah, I thought that's what
this was about. Anyway, I realized Cassandra was far too sexually
wounded to be a part of this gathering. How'd she get past Fagen, our
bouncer? But I guess, every party has a pooper, that kind of thing.
But we got to the bottom of it all and figured out the misconceptions
and expectations and apologized and compromised and vowed to never do
whatever it was we did "wrong" again.
We continued sharing our experiences from last night's love-
in. Sonja shared how she had wanted to make love in the center of
the group with her new lover, though she wasn't ready to share him
sexually with anyone. Sonja and Sam are a new pair and still in a
monogamous stage. But she enjoys group sensuality and likes to be in
the erotic energy and enjoys being watched. So, when Cassandra
complained last night about my triad, Sonja felt bummed, stifled and
thought of going off to go to one of the breakaway rooms to make love
with Sam. She said she felt pulled back into the group as she tried
to leave because she didn't want to be away from the incredible group
sexual energy I and my lovers were creating.
I listened to Sonya and all the others who shared and despite
repeated interruptions by Cassandra, I stuffed it for a while. Then
I grew impatient after nothing any of us said or did seemed to be
sufficient to satisfy Cassandra. When it came to my turn to share, I
said, "Hey, we have orgies here. That's what we do. And, I must say,
they're damned good ones. But next time we'll screen better and have
all participants sign a waiver at the door so that they clearly
understand that our party's a red tantra party, that means sexy
party. From here on out, we're going to make love and play like we
want for it's my party and I'll make love if I want to."
So, that's my report on our July 08 pod love-in. The moral:
be true to yourself. In the end I ultimately spoke my personal truth.
But I spoiled a good part of the evening for myself by not being
authentic and sticking up for me and my lovers and allowing myself to
be tortured with internal shoulds and attempts at being polite--which
I'm never very good at that anyway.
No two pod gatherings are ever the same.
While the world may want to romantacize tantric love-ins we're real
people and shit happens. But shit creates SHIFT and despite it all
and because of it all, I wouldn't chose any other way of doing my
life. Each time our pod gets together, we grow exponentially. The
whole is much, much greater than the sum of its parts. We personify
that saying with revelations and love we gain through our intimate
connections. I highly recommend poly podding for everyone yet I
realize the world may not yet be ready.
I hope this article and others that I and my lovers write
inspire you, the reader, to expand and find love that really works
for you. Relationships are intense, difficult, profound and
rewarding. There's a cost to having successful relationships.
Relationshops need to be nurtured and take a lot of work. Each person
ultimately needs to go within and examine the programming creating
existential angst and projection onto partners, friends, families,
lovers and community.
If one relationship's hard, imagine what it takes to do
polyamory. Most young folks begin with step one, monogamy, before
they expand into more complex relationship structures, like
polyamory. Polyamory and lifestyles like swinging take maturity and
personal integrity, honesty and responsibility. In ethical
polyamory, you are candid and you also avoid hurting other people.
The internet offers tons of resources for those venturing
into polyamory. Local support groups and conferences springing up all
over the world. Explore this lifestyle with folks who live it. Since
our main cultural conditioning has been monogamy, it may take a bit
of studying and work to transition yourself, friends and family to
this new paradigm of relationship choice and ethical polyamory. The
gay/lesbian rights movement has blazed the trail. We are most
appreciative. Thank you also for swingers. You too have shifted
society and opened up some eyes (and minds). The slippery slope gets
slipperier. But where we're sliding to is a good thing, for it allows
each and every one of us freedom to chose who we want to be.
***
Janet Kira Lessin, Chief Focalizer of the World Polyamory
Association, is featured presenter at the annual Harbin Hot Springs
(CA) Polyamory & Tantra Conference September 11-14. She and hubby
Sasha offer a workshop entitled " RITUALLY EVOKING FEMALE
EJACULATION IN A POLY POD CEREMONY"at the Conference and leads
the panel discussion, HOW WE DO POLY. See
www.worldpolyamoryassociation.com for details.
When I was a child, couples of my parent's generation, the
World War II era, married in their late teens or early twenties and
stayed together till their deaths approximately fifty years later.
The traditional family was a nuclear one–Mom, Dad and 2.5 children.
Divorces were rare and full of shame. And if, heaven forbid, parents
divorced or remarried, stepparents were demonized in movies and
literature as "evil"and something to be feared or hated.
This reality, dominant in the 1940s and `50s, began to erode
in the `60s until now, fifty years later (I'm now 54) single parent
families dominate and there are more households with a single adult
than couples or families. Most couples nowadays are unmarried and
many couples are of the same sex. The nuclear family is practically
non-existent. Stepparents co-parent, raise and support children and
siblings, blood and adopted--of all races, colors and creeds. Society
experienced a wide variety of extreme and often horrendous birth
pangs leading to the creation of this new, modern family. We've
adjusted to a new, formerly non-conventional family system that seems
to work and have created a new cultural "norm".
How long will this structure of ad hoc living groups last?
Based on what's come before and how much we've changed since WW2,
what's next?
Hidden in the dark recesses of human society are the highly
feared, politically predicted members of the dreaded "slippery
slope", the fall-out from legalizing same-sex marriages, the POLYS.
Polys, polyamorous peoples-- those who love more than one in an
intimate relationship-- are the logical, next-step, progression for
our new, non-traditional extended families. Now, as a society, we
have fallen in love, made babies with partners, divorced, mated,
married, made babies with more partners and are coming together to
sort out our feelings and relationships to one another.
We're ready to question the cultural assumption that we must
stop loving those we love in order to love those we love? What an
insane concept, so far from the "reality" of what actually happens.
Somewhere in my early twenties, when I was NOT mature, grown up or
far-from spiritually sophisticated, it dawned on me that I was living
a culturally induced lie. I thought, I believed I had to stop loving
my early, childhood lovers in order to love my husband whom I had
recently married. But, when I looked inside my heart, I knew, I
realized that I still loved Kenny, Keith and others that made my
teenage heart soar. The lie was what I had told myself in order to
move on and live a socially imposed concept that now, since I got
married, I could only love my husband. What bull! With that
realization, I was set free! My heart could now be true to itself.
Now, if only I could tame the shame and blame part of myself, then I
would be fully free to be who I truly was.
POLYAMORY: THE HEATHIEST NATURAL RELATIONSHIP STRUCTURE
Fast forward to today. I now live polyamorously. I live the
subconscious dream Americans have been acting out unconsciously.
Polyamory, I affirm from my research and from my direct experience
as a participant, is the most healthiest and natural relationship
structure ever. Polyamory follows the natural formation and ebb and
flow of tribes and families.
The culturally imposed conditioning of limiting love, shaming
and blaming individuals away from following their hearts and natural,
body biorhythms, attractions and impulse led to the deterioration of
our families, mass confusion and family dysfunction with offshoots-
crime, violence, illness, death, destruction and ultimately, war.
I live and love in a poly POD–a lovers' group--my
relationship style of choice. I enjoy a primary relationship with my
husband, Sasha, as well as a close, secondary relationship with
another man, Shivaya. Sash, Shivaya and I are a TRIAD; we love to
make love together. We're also part of a poly pod, six to twelve
adults who come together on a regular basis and share love, intimacy,
sexual energy and relate to one another in ever-changing ways. In the
pod, we have no sexpectations. We simply enjoy the natural rhyme,
rhythm and reason of our bodies, hearts, souls and minds.
Within our poly pod, besides my triad, there are two couples.
The rest are singles; we have two new single men and one new single
woman. We remain open for others to join us, but are complete
inasmuch as we are and not desperate nor necessarily actively seeking
new members. We follow the natural flow of our group energy and as it
feels right and we discuss bringing new people into our group when
someone super cool comes into our lives.
We don't want to shock anyone, so we make sure we interview
new members thoroughly. We desire to maintain the integrity of our
group, so all activities, members' identities and meeting places are
confidential. We usually screen carefully so we don't put a damper on
our gathering with those who are not ready for such deep relating and
intimacy.
We've been pretty successful in choosing appropriate people,
but every once in a while we invite someone who's a bit of a dud and
freaks out in some fashion and can't handle our vibes. We deal with
them emotionally and psychologically, try to see what's been
triggered within them and help them heal, learn, grow and expand. If
they don't enjoy being with us, we don't invite them back and they
don't want to come, so that's a win/win. We're learning the hard way.
We are pretty unattached, so if something doesn't work out, we don't
try to convince someone to stay and work it out. But if we find a
great, new connection, that's awesome and we celebrate our new
beloveds to the max.
While we sometimes have guests, for the most part, our group
has a pretty secure core group which has been meeting on a regular
basis for about six years and others who come and go around us. Our
coming together is about sharing love, sensuality, massages, intense
conversations, laughter, healthy food and intimate connections.
Sexual intimacy varies over time with the individual participants.
Each time we meet, sexual intimacy between individual members is up
for negotiation.
While our gatherings are mostly about sharing love, intimacy,
sensuality and sexual energy, raw sex does happen. So be prepared.
When I get going. I love to have tantric orgasms for hours on
end. Others podners catch my orgasmic energy wave and the whole
atmosphere gets very electric. We make pulsating puppy piles. We
have our cake and eat it too. It's all good.
Several of our podners have birthdays in July. This year, we
let one of our members invite a couple of newbies and weren't as
thorough with our screening as usual.
So there we were in the middle of our July birthdays love-in
when Cassandra, one of our female invitees, freaked out when my triad
wanted to engage sexually in the middle of the living room floor.
We'd been making love in the center of our group for over six years
now. Our lovemaking's become of a pod tradition. We begin our
lovemaking ritual and everything else, from massage to music to other
configurations and couplings goes on around us.
Just as Sash and Shivaya started connecting sensually with
me, Cassandra suddenly protested. She shocked me out of my erotic
spell. I realized we were being challenged. Bad as that was, worst
of all, for some reason, I allowed myself to be stifled and took my
triad back into my bedroom to make love.
In the bedroom, I enjoyed myself with my men but I felt odd.
After a while, I got pissed at myself for allowing Cassandra to
stifle me. After all, this is my home and we were celebrating my
husband's birthday party. I was confused. I wanted to honor
Cassandra's requests and please her. Yet at the same time, I wanted
to celebrate like there's no tomorrow because after all, it was my
honey's birthday. And, besides, I hadn't really cut loose and had a
day off in a month of Sundays and I just wanted to hoot, holler and
rock and roll in endless waves of tantric orgasms.
Next day, in our sharing circle, I tried to relax and get in
the spirit of it all. Most of our pod members were glowing. We had a
super time, were laughing for hours. But once again, when it came to
Cassandra's time to share, she criticized, scolded and chastized my
triad for getting sexy in the living room. Dah, I thought that's what
this was about. Anyway, I realized Cassandra was far too sexually
wounded to be a part of this gathering. How'd she get past Fagen, our
bouncer? But I guess, every party has a pooper, that kind of thing.
But we got to the bottom of it all and figured out the misconceptions
and expectations and apologized and compromised and vowed to never do
whatever it was we did "wrong" again.
We continued sharing our experiences from last night's love-
in. Sonja shared how she had wanted to make love in the center of
the group with her new lover, though she wasn't ready to share him
sexually with anyone. Sonja and Sam are a new pair and still in a
monogamous stage. But she enjoys group sensuality and likes to be in
the erotic energy and enjoys being watched. So, when Cassandra
complained last night about my triad, Sonja felt bummed, stifled and
thought of going off to go to one of the breakaway rooms to make love
with Sam. She said she felt pulled back into the group as she tried
to leave because she didn't want to be away from the incredible group
sexual energy I and my lovers were creating.
I listened to Sonya and all the others who shared and despite
repeated interruptions by Cassandra, I stuffed it for a while. Then
I grew impatient after nothing any of us said or did seemed to be
sufficient to satisfy Cassandra. When it came to my turn to share, I
said, "Hey, we have orgies here. That's what we do. And, I must say,
they're damned good ones. But next time we'll screen better and have
all participants sign a waiver at the door so that they clearly
understand that our party's a red tantra party, that means sexy
party. From here on out, we're going to make love and play like we
want for it's my party and I'll make love if I want to."
So, that's my report on our July 08 pod love-in. The moral:
be true to yourself. In the end I ultimately spoke my personal truth.
But I spoiled a good part of the evening for myself by not being
authentic and sticking up for me and my lovers and allowing myself to
be tortured with internal shoulds and attempts at being polite--which
I'm never very good at that anyway.
No two pod gatherings are ever the same.
While the world may want to romantacize tantric love-ins we're real
people and shit happens. But shit creates SHIFT and despite it all
and because of it all, I wouldn't chose any other way of doing my
life. Each time our pod gets together, we grow exponentially. The
whole is much, much greater than the sum of its parts. We personify
that saying with revelations and love we gain through our intimate
connections. I highly recommend poly podding for everyone yet I
realize the world may not yet be ready.
I hope this article and others that I and my lovers write
inspire you, the reader, to expand and find love that really works
for you. Relationships are intense, difficult, profound and
rewarding. There's a cost to having successful relationships.
Relationshops need to be nurtured and take a lot of work. Each person
ultimately needs to go within and examine the programming creating
existential angst and projection onto partners, friends, families,
lovers and community.
If one relationship's hard, imagine what it takes to do
polyamory. Most young folks begin with step one, monogamy, before
they expand into more complex relationship structures, like
polyamory. Polyamory and lifestyles like swinging take maturity and
personal integrity, honesty and responsibility. In ethical
polyamory, you are candid and you also avoid hurting other people.
The internet offers tons of resources for those venturing
into polyamory. Local support groups and conferences springing up all
over the world. Explore this lifestyle with folks who live it. Since
our main cultural conditioning has been monogamy, it may take a bit
of studying and work to transition yourself, friends and family to
this new paradigm of relationship choice and ethical polyamory. The
gay/lesbian rights movement has blazed the trail. We are most
appreciative. Thank you also for swingers. You too have shifted
society and opened up some eyes (and minds). The slippery slope gets
slipperier. But where we're sliding to is a good thing, for it allows
each and every one of us freedom to chose who we want to be.
***
Janet Kira Lessin, Chief Focalizer of the World Polyamory
Association, is featured presenter at the annual Harbin Hot Springs
(CA) Polyamory & Tantra Conference September 11-14. She and hubby
Sasha offer a workshop entitled " RITUALLY EVOKING FEMALE
EJACULATION IN A POLY POD CEREMONY"at the Conference and leads
the panel discussion, HOW WE DO POLY. See
www.worldpolyamoryassociation.com for details.
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