Being in Love with Falling in Love: A Story of Compersion

​What's the opposite of jealousy? Compersion.
By: Kenna Cook Apr 24, 2017

Last month, I introduced long-term girlfriend to my part-time friends with benefits. I hoped that we would all connect (as I'd been planning a hook up to celebrate my friend's 30th birthday) but I didn't expect them to hit it off as good as they did. I could tell that they were crushing on each other, and instead of feeling jealous about the prospect of losing either of their attention or having to fight for affection, I was filled with excitement via osmosis.

​Compersion is the antidote of jealousy and it's what makes polyamory so much better than monogamy for me.

In our monogamy-centered society, we are taught to believe that jealousy and possession equals love and affection. These unhealthy relationship ticks are what caused years of pain in my dating life. I never learned I could have compersion until I tried poly. Picking up books like The Ethical Slut and More Than Two had me learning a whole glossary of new relationship terms.

Metamour

Triad

and then there was this revolutionary word ...Compersion.

​Compersion [noun] : The feeling of joy associated with seeing a loved one love another; contrasted with jealousy.

I know that I had felt compersion with friends, being so excited and engaged in hearing about their new crushes or new hookups, but hearing it from a partner always felt like a personal attack. Being scared that I was being replaced or there was now a new standard to live up to created a lot of anxiety. I've used poly to help me unlearn jealousy.

When I can hear about my partner's fun dates, about their amazing sex lives, and when they're truly connecting and falling in love with someone, I can show up for them as a whole person. It's true that you need to love all the parts of someone, even the parts that scare you. And one of the scariest things for me is the idea that something better than me will come along and I'll have lost out on someone I love.

It seems like with most of the monogamous people I've talked to, the practice of compersion is very difficult for to understand — at least at first. The number one complaint I hear why my mono friends could never be poly is that they just couldn't ever handle the jealousy. But what's really hard to handle is the envy.

The difference between jealousy and envy is this: Jealousy is the fear that someone is going to take away with you have. Envy is a desire to have what someone else has. When I'm feeling envious of my partner's new crush, I can check in with myself and ask my partner to help me meet my needs.

​Am I not getting enough one-on-one time with my partner? Am I disengaged from a new, exciting project my partner is starting? Is our sex life more ho-hum than vroom-vroom?

​Once I start identifying and communicating my needs, I can be more thrilled about how my partner is growing and glowing because they have the freedom to follow their hearts.

Practicing compersion has shown me that the more love my partners bring into their life, the more love they have to share with me. When my partners can see that I am truly elated for them to explore with their hearts, our love grows deeper.

So when I see my girlfriend get giddy over a new crush, I can smile and be happy knowing that all that love is going to come back to me tenfold.

Source: Medium.com