Shaya
New member
I've been wondering about the way in which NRE and jealousy interact in an established relationship when a new third is added. For simplicity's sake, let's keep the discussion to a V configuration.
In the original pair, jealousy may develop in the one who did not start a new relationship, whilst NRE may develop in the one who did. Jealousy and NRE are both strong emotions that may lead to conflict between the original couple. I imagine jealousy pulling one person one way, whilst NRE pulls the other in the opposite direction on issues in which the couple are conflicted upon. Examples of issues may include boundaries, division of quality time, timing of family outings, etc. Over time, I imagine the conflict can show deep differences in philosophy and be interpreted as incompatibility in the original couple, leading to a separation or breakup.
There are few resources in the monogamous world on how to manage jealousy or NRE-type emotions.
Polyamory promotes a whole host of resources on understanding and managing jealousy. Although jealousy is typically thought of as being an unwanted emotion that needs to be managed, some people have pointed out that jealousy can serve as a healthy warning trigger to a situation with inherent danger (posts 5 onwards). NRE on the other hand is in some ways the opposite - it tends to be thought of as a positive emotion to be experienced, though there are certainly ways in which it can impact an existing relationship negatively. The difference however, is that I don't see nearly as much on how to manage the negative impact of NRE, though I suspect the concept of polyamoryville to be a humerous attempt to explore this. There is also an article on poly hell that peripherally explores the issue but I feel the article falls a little flat.
I see jealousy and NRE as heightened emotional states that exert a cognitive bias (clarification at post 27) on our logical thinking . As jealousy and NRE fade, we can sometimes reflect back and wish we had acted differently had our thinking be less cloudy at the time. We often say not to make any major decisions whilst in the throes of NRE or jealousy, and I see this advice as the practical application of recognising that heightened emotions can play tricks with our logic.
In summary, both NRE and jealousy can impact our relationships in positive and negative ways. NRE is generally thought of as a positive emotion to experience whilst jealousy is generally thought of as negative emotion to contain. However, we also recognise that NRE can have a destructive aspect to existing relationships and jealousy can be useful when it serves as an early warning system. The destructive aspects of jealousy seem to be relatively well studied in polyamory, but I feel that the negative aspects of NRE are less well explored.
I would like this thread to be mainly about NRE. Thoughts that focus on just jealousy could be posted over in a jealousy thread perhaps?
In replying to this thread, I was hoping experienced polyamorists could share the following:
Thank you guys, for helping me to understand more in my ongoing exploration of polyamory. Look forward to hearing your opinions and reading your suggested resources.
In the original pair, jealousy may develop in the one who did not start a new relationship, whilst NRE may develop in the one who did. Jealousy and NRE are both strong emotions that may lead to conflict between the original couple. I imagine jealousy pulling one person one way, whilst NRE pulls the other in the opposite direction on issues in which the couple are conflicted upon. Examples of issues may include boundaries, division of quality time, timing of family outings, etc. Over time, I imagine the conflict can show deep differences in philosophy and be interpreted as incompatibility in the original couple, leading to a separation or breakup.
There are few resources in the monogamous world on how to manage jealousy or NRE-type emotions.
- Jealousy in monogamy: I tried to summarise my thoughts on how jealousy impacts and is handled by monogamous relationships in post 2 here.
- NRE in monogamy: Monogamy divides NRE-type emotions into wanted and unwanted, with the wanted subtype called "falling in love" and promoted in a billion pop songs, whilst the unwanted subtype classified as limerence or lust. Wanted or unwanted usually seems to be based on whether one is already in an established relationship and I otherwise see only small differences between "falling in love", "limerence", "infatuation" or "lust".
Polyamory promotes a whole host of resources on understanding and managing jealousy. Although jealousy is typically thought of as being an unwanted emotion that needs to be managed, some people have pointed out that jealousy can serve as a healthy warning trigger to a situation with inherent danger (posts 5 onwards). NRE on the other hand is in some ways the opposite - it tends to be thought of as a positive emotion to be experienced, though there are certainly ways in which it can impact an existing relationship negatively. The difference however, is that I don't see nearly as much on how to manage the negative impact of NRE, though I suspect the concept of polyamoryville to be a humerous attempt to explore this. There is also an article on poly hell that peripherally explores the issue but I feel the article falls a little flat.
I see jealousy and NRE as heightened emotional states that exert a cognitive bias (clarification at post 27) on our logical thinking . As jealousy and NRE fade, we can sometimes reflect back and wish we had acted differently had our thinking be less cloudy at the time. We often say not to make any major decisions whilst in the throes of NRE or jealousy, and I see this advice as the practical application of recognising that heightened emotions can play tricks with our logic.
In summary, both NRE and jealousy can impact our relationships in positive and negative ways. NRE is generally thought of as a positive emotion to experience whilst jealousy is generally thought of as negative emotion to contain. However, we also recognise that NRE can have a destructive aspect to existing relationships and jealousy can be useful when it serves as an early warning system. The destructive aspects of jealousy seem to be relatively well studied in polyamory, but I feel that the negative aspects of NRE are less well explored.
I would like this thread to be mainly about NRE. Thoughts that focus on just jealousy could be posted over in a jealousy thread perhaps?
In replying to this thread, I was hoping experienced polyamorists could share the following:
- Resources that explore the positive and negative aspects of NRE. Please don't post resources that only explore this with one paragraph. I'm looking for something more engaging.
- Resources on how to manage NRE.
- Resources that contrast the pull and push fight in a relationship due to NRE and jealousy.
- A philosophical debate of why polyamory articles seem to focus more on containing jealousy but less so on NRE, especially since unchecked NRE can be the driving force behind jealousy?
- Finally, given how much "air time" jealousy receives, if your answer is merely about jealousy, please post it over here instead. This thread is primarily about managing the negative aspects of NRE and to contrast NRE with jealousy.
Thank you guys, for helping me to understand more in my ongoing exploration of polyamory. Look forward to hearing your opinions and reading your suggested resources.
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