I guess for me, one thing that I notice, is that I love change and to change – so a healthy long-term relationship is one that would allow me to grow and for my partner(s) to grow. I put (s), because I have been a serial monogamist, and after a while I realized that “forever” and long-term is often only possible if you allow the relationship to change in the direction where both people benefit the most – that is where it can serve each person’s highest purpose. Not everyone is in touch with their highest purpose, and if one thinks that a relationship should supercede one’s life purpose – there is a problem.

Pardon me about all the vagueries – but I am looking more and more favorably at relationships that have NO definition at all. In the last 16 years, I have had 3 long-term over 10 years each relationships with 3 different men. But when I say “relationships” they were never defined. In fact, there was never any agreement reached as to us being any particular thing to each other. One was a very romantic and only slightly sexual friendship, another was an overtly sexual friendship that turned into a business partnership, another was a soul-friendship – truly I can and have told him anything that has had its sexual meanderings … and each of these men, I have remained very close to … when I say close – we still are active in each lives as friends and/or business partners, confidantes … and I have seen other women in their lives come and go, come and go … It isn’t that I am a doormat. If I am pissed at them I let them know. And in the case of #2, I officially ended our sexual relationship about 3 years ago, but we continued to speak to each other daily at most or at least weekly since then. We even lived together happily last year, while he was dating various people, and I had shifted my interest to someone else.

What is odd – is that when I am with somebody whether it is “official” boyfriend/girlfriend or it is open, I am not much interested in seeing other people. And as long as I know that they are WITH me in the moments that we are together – I didn’t much care what they did with their time or bodies when they weren’t with me. Thing is – I like to have a LOT of independence and time to myself, and really don’t want to be thinking about my relationships all the time. I am an on and off person, at my best in a relationship – that means, when I am with a guy – my focus is concentrated on us – but I need my time alone, separate without worrying about another person.

BUT, now, I have these three different men in my life, whom I love, and would never sever my relationship with them, because they are too much a part of my life as it is now. But I am not at all interested in standing in the way of them starting “official” relationships, in fact I have celebrated healthy relationships for them … I REALLY want them to be happy.

So, if and when I am faced with the “opportunity” of an “official” relationship, I know I will have to be with a man that is secure enough about himself and me and us – to let things unfold naturally – Because as far as I am concerned, those other men … my dear friends have already become healthy long-term relationships … it’s just that they didn’t keep the same form — the love and commitment to caring and being in another person’s life has remained steady – only the container changed.

I guess, we all pick what challenges we want to face – I prefer to be flexible in attitude, and steady of heart – so I can keep people I love in my life, but this wasn’t always the case. I only started this practice after my mid-30’s. And now 51, I feel that I love men more than ever, because I am seeing them for who they are rather than what I imagine they “should be” in reference to me and how they relate to me.

I am sorry if this riffing on “undefined” relationships seems to be a sidetrack to the conversation. But for me I have spent so much time in these types of relationships after years of being in “defined” serial romances. And I believe over all, I have had less heartache these past 15 years in compared to the prior 15. It has seemed the more I loosened my grip on thinking how things “should be” and let them be … the closer they came to what my heart and soul actually needed in relationships – which have all become healthy and long-term … and I am grateful for however they will last into the future.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 5 months ago by Liza Davis.