Nature of Attraction, Renouncing Desire

I've got a crush on him, that's what it is. Since he's declared himself to be "polyamorous" and can't see anything wrong with it, I can't act on this crush because I don't accept his terms. What we are is collaborators. Magnificent collaborators - and I often catch myself thinking that he's a magnificent person, when he's speaking, usually about being fully embedded in the experience of living and treasuring it, but also when what he says demonstrates compassion for others and insight into the human experience. And when we talk together it's just magical, sometimes, we make so much progress, and I feel smart and vibrant (and young and pretty) and truly alive. Also like life is worth living. I think the whole thing has in fact saved my life, more than once.

But there are negatives. Like, I was trying to suggest some extra-curricular meetings recently. I think I was assuming that, since he seems to enjoy my company in the structured environment, he would enjoy it outside the structure, and because he's polyamorous he could ditch his wife and kids (I don't know that he has a wife and kids, in fact I know he doesn't have kids because of the stupid things he says about how you should raise them, and I suspect he doesn't have a wife either but may have a main girlfriend or two, but anyway) he could ditch whoever else and could spend as much time as he liked with me because he's polyamorous. But my suggestions have been met with, "Hey, yeah, sounds great, maybe, sometime," and then no follow up. Classic sign that he's just not that into me.

Damn.

Here I thought he was a sure thing.

And like I said, I don't even want to sleep with him. So you'd think I could thereby avoid all possessive or jealous feelings, but no. I've seen how he looks at other girls who come to Philorum. It makes me feel baaad. I feel bad thoughts toward the other girls, and here I should be having solidarity of the womanhood, especially doing philosophy and because there are so few women in the group anyway. I end up comparing myself to them and feeling bad about how I compare and angry. I am jealous that he might share some of what we have with someone else. (And if what he's actually thinking of sharing with the other one is something more crass and physical, that's even worse.)

Why do I want to sleep with him just because I like talking to him? And I don't really want to sleep with him, (contemplating how the actual physical act would be I suspect it would be horrible, I don't think we'd be well matched physically at all and he's bound to be one of those "sensitive" "sensual" hippy boys which I just hate). I just want him around all the time.

What I was is his attention. The things recently that have made my heart sing is once when I sent a very rambling email, the kind of thing for which I usually expect a response like, "Yow, crazy bitch, stay away!", but he said, "Love your rant, I can hear your voice in it." My voice! Of course my voice comes through because I wasn't holding back or censoring the prose at all and I'm a really good writer (cough cough, y'all blog readers are free to disagree in your minds strongly right now!), so I can express myself really effectively with the written word. And the other time was just last night, when we were babbling about exams like the Myers Briggs and I burst out, "I'm thinking of so many stories I don't know which one to tell!" The kind of blurt for which I expect the response, jeez, who is she who thinks her stories are so interesting, who cares what she thinks, maybe if I keep talking and change the subject I can cut her off. But he, no, he cleared the floor for me and got everyone's attention and turned it my way (shone it on me) and said, "What is your first story?" And then when I finished it he said, "What's your second story?" Oh, swoon! He not only listened and heard that I had some stories to tell, but remembered how many I had, and cleared the floor of the whole group to give me as much space as I wanted to tell them!

The opposite of the usual woman-silencing behaviour that everyone else engages in.

And I know he's committed to the freedom for women to speak because we've talked about it, and how to encourage women to contribute in the Philorum format.

So, since it's him, I can detangle my attraction and try to pull it apart and then manage it, so I don't feel bad if he's perving on some other female form than mine.

And what it is is his attention that I delight in and crave. And makes me feel young and pretty and smart and alive, etc.

And attention is finite. Which might be why polyamorousness doesn't work - it has to do with the desires of the recipient (the victim). And which is why it's asymmetrical to a parent's equal love for several children. What a child wants from a parent is approval, but approval isn't finite or time-constrained - you can sort of do it once and it lasts forever, like granting a PhD. I still rate a PhD now even 14 years after I got it, and as many people can have PhD's as can earn them.

But attention, that's finite. You can only give that to one person at a time. That's what I want from him, that's what I want heaps more of than I get, and that's what makes me feel bad if he is giving it to someone else. No, just some other girl, it doesn't bug me when he gives attention to some other boy - but then it's not pervy female-directed attention, is it?

My thought while I was watching him talk and thinking him magnificent was, I've been thinking I need a new boyfriend. But what I really need is to not feel like this any more. I need to not feel like I need a new boyfriend.

Man, that is going to be a challenge.