LovingRadiance
Active member
What an excellent analogy! I think that is an awesome way of looking at it! May I quote you in my blog?In a lot of ways, IMO, this experience is like learning to float on your back in the water. You have to relax and let go in order to open up to new experiences. If you are coming into the situation predisposed to a fear of drowning, it's really hard not to panic and thwart your own best efforts to learn.
The people in these groups can act as hands holding you up in the water until you learn to trust your own buoyancy. If you don't trust those hands, if you aren't comfortable with their touch, then they may be adding another layer of anxiety rather than lending support........
The way I see it, she tried to jump in the deep end before she'd learned to swim. Her first experience was frightening and overwhelming, as near-drowning experiences tend to be. Now she has the additional burden of overcoming that, as well as still needing to learn to keep aloft in poly's sometimes turbulent seas.
I think she is very brave to keep trying.
I don't really fit our local poly group either. There are a lot of people in it that I just don't get. They are great and all, but their idea of poly doesn't seem to be similar to mine and/or their position in it is different. I still go though. I have learned a lot about what I don't want from them and care about the journey they are on. I have invested in my community now.
I also don't "mesh" well with our local poly-group. It's small and primarily made up of people who are not in poly-fi dynamics. While my dynamic isn't perfectly poly-fi, my end of it is. It's hard always having to explain to people that while I am poly-I am not interested in more lovers. That just seems to confuse and baffle the group as well as leaving them uncomfortable with my presence...