The Golden Third

I used to be a girl who never took risks. Two years ago, the most exciting thing I did was or go to the occasional Renaissance Faire or watch the Gilmore Girls while knitting.  And though I still love all of these things, they aren't exactly the highlights of my week any more.  In truth, I sometimes look around me these days and scarcely recognize my life—except that it's the life I fantasized about for ages but was too scared to seek.

I think a lot of polycurious folk hesitate to make the Poly Plunge because they're frightened of letting go of things that are comfortable and secure.  What if you become poly and all of your friends and family shun you for your renunciation of normalcy?  What if your stable marriage dissolves when the two of you fall in love with other people (or even the same person)?  I say: A wise person has to make risk calculations.  Are friends and family who demand your conformity the people you want to write the priorities for your life?  Would you rather have a marriage that drifts into dull and comfortable, or would you rather gamble for the relationship dynamic you really crave?  In every case, it comes down to the stakes.

For me personally, making the Poly Plunge would have been impossible if I'd had children, for example, because I could reluctantly choose to gamble my marriage, but not my family (I certainly don't mean to criticize people who would choose differently, though).  And when it comes to choosing between your family of origin and the life you want, well... I can't lie: I don't know many poly folks who have close ties to their extended families by birth.  Most poly folks I know vastly prefer their Chosen Families, and the Goddess knows, a successful poly life has no shortage of people, as I've blogged about previously.  But then, the topic of Out & Poly deserves its own post.

For me personally, becoming poly was part of a larger process of deliberately choosing to take more risks.  I started by spinning fire for the first time (I had been diligently practicing for years), which, if you've never done it, produces an incredible high.  A week later, I ended up in a public sex playspace.  From that point on, I've been trying to carefully choose the risks I consider worthwhile as I stumbled into a firespinning band and an increasingly complicated poly life.

Psychological research suggests that the people who are most satisfied with their lives are not people who live comfortable staid lives, or people who constantly seek out new adventure and thrills.  Because about a third of the population falls into this group, engineer William Gurstelle (author of Absinthe and Flamethrowers) nicknames this happy group of people who take carefully chosen risks "the golden third."  I aspire to count myself among them, even though I don't drink, smoke, or do drugs, I'm scared of heights, and I don't like crowds of strangers.  But the risks I've chosen--playing with fire, and having a husband AND a boyfriend—are risks that have thus far made me a much happier woman.

This, for me, is the golden third. Knock on wood.