Read Online The Ethical Slut by Dossie Easton - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Dossie Easton
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share with a partner when you choose to have one. Single sluthood has its own joys and challenges, which is why we’re going to deal with it at much greater length later in this book.
Single people can play the field in a variety of ways. One distinguishing dimension is how separate you keep your lovers. So one form of sluttery for the single involves multiple partners who have no interaction, indeed no information, about each other; this avoids complications at the cost of limiting certain kinds of intimacy, such as opportunities for mutual support and the development of community.
Or you may choose to introduce your lovers to each other, perhaps over Sunday brunch. This may sound wild, or impossible, or like a script for disaster, but don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it. Your lovers have a lot in common—you, for example—and they may very well like each other. Introducing your lovers helps prevent one of the scariest aspects of jealousy, which is the part where you imagine that your lover’s other lover is taller, thinner, smarter, sexier, and in all ways preferable to funky old you. When you meet that other person or when your lovers meet each other, they meet real people, warts and all, and so often wind up feeling safer.
Introducing your lovers to each other also makes possible the development of a community, or an extended family of people, who are intimately connected through sexual and personal bonds. As more people connect to each other in a variety of ways, including sexual, networksform, and something reminiscent of a clan or a tribe may evolve. Then the question of introducing your lovers can become obsolete, as they may already know each other.
If you are a single person in any open sexual lifestyle, you must pay attention to how you are getting your sexual, emotional, and social needs met. You can do this in an infinite variety of ways. The important thing is to be
aware
of your needs and wants, so you can go about getting them met with full consciousness. If you pretend that you have no needs, for sex, for affection, for emotional support, you are lying to yourself, and you will wind up trying to get your needs met by indirect methods that won’t work very well. People who do this often get called manipulative or passive-aggressive—terms, in our opinion, for people who have not figured out how to get their needs met in a straightforward manner. Do not commit yourself to a lifetime of hinting and hoping.
When you figure out what you want and ask for it, you’ll be surprised how often the answer is “yes.” Think how relieved you might feel when someone asks you for support, or a hug, or otherwise lets you know how to please him. Think of how competent and just plain good you feel when you can truly help another person, whether it’s by offering a shoulder to cry on or that just-right stimulation that leads to the perfect orgasm. Give your friends the opportunity to feel good by fulfilling you too.
Partnerships
There are multiple forms of open relationships for the partnered, including serial monogamy, where one’s various partners are separated in time, and the ever-popular nonconsensual nonmonogamy, otherwise known as cheating. We can think of these lifestyles as unconscious free love, but your authors feel both freer and safer when we love right out in the open.
It is axiomatic that open relationships work best when a couple takes care of each other and their relationship first, before they include others in their dynamic. So the slut couple needs to be willing to do the work we will describe later in this book to communicate well and to handle jealousy, insecurity, and territoriality with the highest consciousness. Couples need to know and communicate their boundaries, to makeand keep agreements, and to respect their own and each other’s needs. Couples also need to make sure to nourish their own connection to keep it happy, healthy, and fulfilling.
Couples can have a secondary
Single people can play the field in a variety of ways. One distinguishing dimension is how separate you keep your lovers. So one form of sluttery for the single involves multiple partners who have no interaction, indeed no information, about each other; this avoids complications at the cost of limiting certain kinds of intimacy, such as opportunities for mutual support and the development of community.
Or you may choose to introduce your lovers to each other, perhaps over Sunday brunch. This may sound wild, or impossible, or like a script for disaster, but don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it. Your lovers have a lot in common—you, for example—and they may very well like each other. Introducing your lovers helps prevent one of the scariest aspects of jealousy, which is the part where you imagine that your lover’s other lover is taller, thinner, smarter, sexier, and in all ways preferable to funky old you. When you meet that other person or when your lovers meet each other, they meet real people, warts and all, and so often wind up feeling safer.
Introducing your lovers to each other also makes possible the development of a community, or an extended family of people, who are intimately connected through sexual and personal bonds. As more people connect to each other in a variety of ways, including sexual, networksform, and something reminiscent of a clan or a tribe may evolve. Then the question of introducing your lovers can become obsolete, as they may already know each other.
If you are a single person in any open sexual lifestyle, you must pay attention to how you are getting your sexual, emotional, and social needs met. You can do this in an infinite variety of ways. The important thing is to be
aware
of your needs and wants, so you can go about getting them met with full consciousness. If you pretend that you have no needs, for sex, for affection, for emotional support, you are lying to yourself, and you will wind up trying to get your needs met by indirect methods that won’t work very well. People who do this often get called manipulative or passive-aggressive—terms, in our opinion, for people who have not figured out how to get their needs met in a straightforward manner. Do not commit yourself to a lifetime of hinting and hoping.
When you figure out what you want and ask for it, you’ll be surprised how often the answer is “yes.” Think how relieved you might feel when someone asks you for support, or a hug, or otherwise lets you know how to please him. Think of how competent and just plain good you feel when you can truly help another person, whether it’s by offering a shoulder to cry on or that just-right stimulation that leads to the perfect orgasm. Give your friends the opportunity to feel good by fulfilling you too.
Partnerships
There are multiple forms of open relationships for the partnered, including serial monogamy, where one’s various partners are separated in time, and the ever-popular nonconsensual nonmonogamy, otherwise known as cheating. We can think of these lifestyles as unconscious free love, but your authors feel both freer and safer when we love right out in the open.
It is axiomatic that open relationships work best when a couple takes care of each other and their relationship first, before they include others in their dynamic. So the slut couple needs to be willing to do the work we will describe later in this book to communicate well and to handle jealousy, insecurity, and territoriality with the highest consciousness. Couples need to know and communicate their boundaries, to makeand keep agreements, and to respect their own and each other’s needs. Couples also need to make sure to nourish their own connection to keep it happy, healthy, and fulfilling.
Couples can have a secondary
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