January 16, 2011 | 3:25 pm

Polyamorous Dating Machine

Posted by  Merissa Nathan Gerson

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For help on dating too many at once, study ABC's "The Bachelor"

Dear Yenta,

I am currently seeing 3 people, I like them all for different reasons, and I am having fun.  Although, I do feel cheap at times, and like I am using people.  I don’t know what to do. I spend a lot of time keeping these relationships going and am running out of my own personal time.  I would also get bored if I stayed with just one. I don’t want to hurt anyone and there has been no talk of commitment, but something just doesn’t feel right.  Do you have any advice.

Your avid reader,

Morgan

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Dear Morgan,

Seems to me that there are two ways to approach this: 1) look at you 2) look at the people you are choosing.  You either choose people who are one-dimensional, and are therefore unsatisfying on their own, or you are diverting attention from yourself so you don’t have to be more than one-dimensional to begin with.

Yes, it is the dimensionality of this dilemma that concerns me.  There is no law about dating one person, and no law about intimacy being a must.  The only rule I would set for dating is your own happiness, and not harming others in that pursuit.  You sound unhappy and like you are harming yourself, using dating as a diversion from sitting still with your insides.

If you find yourself bored and feel cheap, thirsty, and like a user, then you are engaging from a funny angle.  Maybe it is the nature of engagement that is the trouble, and not the choice of partners.  Are you sleeping with them quickly?  Disclosing large secrets about yourself to each one?  Is it too much too soon?  Or are you running too hard towards each other, leaving not enough breathing room?

Dating is a matrix and only you know your own point of entry.  Take a breather, maybe a night off or a morning coffee break if you can’t handle life without the dates.  Look at the different components of this situation.  A)  Who are these people you are dating?  Do you actually like them?  B)  How do you engage them?  With your genitals? Your mind?  Your heart?  All of the above?  C)  What would your ideal partner look like, the person that wouldn’t leave you bored?  D)  What is wrong with you?  Seriously.  Why are you feeling so thirsty and at once so un-sated?  Are you maybe too old for “fun,” in the traditional lacking depth concept of the word?  What are you using these dates to avoid?

Just hunker down and figure your junk out.  It should be easy, then, to decipher a battle plan.  Maybe you need five partners, maybe you need none.  Maybe you need to talk more, hang out less, stop snorting drugs on your dates: change whatever it is that keeps things from feeling interesting.  When life gets dull there is ALWAYS a way to liven things up.  More often than not, though, that dullness comes from within us, a sounding board reminding us to stay on course.

Meditation could help, anything to assist you in turning inwards and finding your answers.  For more on dating multiple partners, read “PiggyBack Dating” on ASKYOURYENTA.com.

Ask Yenta an anonymous question!  Send an e-mail via www.send-email.org to merissag[at]gmail[dot]com.

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