- Apr 24, 2007
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Okay, lol, fine. Here's a more fleshed out example. Now, mind you before you start going down the road of "but that's sin", I'm not saying it isn't. I'm saying it fits within my scenario/question.
I think we all can pretty much recognize that there are a lot of people within the faith that have an unhealthy relationship with sexual issues. The boards on here are rife with people that have inappropriate contentography addictions, have unhappy marriages because they wonder if the grass is greener elsewhere, many married prematurely in order to "avoid sin" and are now dealing with the (often foreseeable) consequences of a rash decision, blah blah. It's my contention that a huge percentage of that is due to the focus on chastity/fornication issue.
In a lot of respects, I kind of view my life as having two parts. There's the period of when I was a kid until my late 20's (my formative years leading up to my first marriage and then divorce), and then my late 20's until present.
In the first "half" - I had a more conventional (religiously inspired) view on sex. While not completely in line, I had only been with one person. I hadn't slept around, I married the person I lost my virginity to, I viewed sex as something of sanctity between two loving people, etc. Or at least that was how I behaved.
But that's not to say that that the time was not fraught with problems. As I discussed in a different thread on here, my girlfriend/spouse hadn't been a virgin before us. She's been with around 10 people before me. That reeked a lot of havoc within me during the early stage of our relationship, but I learned to live with it and put it out of my mind. I also would say that I wasn't 100% content with my decision. I wondered about what it would be like to have sex with other people. I wondered if sex was different with other people. I struggled with all sorts of thoughts like that - in a way very similar to what you see often on this board.
Now, I've always had a reasonably disciplined mind, so I was able to train myself not to allow those thoughts to get out of control or create detrimental situations. For the bulk of that 8 year relationship, it was pretty happy, albeit with those lingering thoughts in my head/wonderings/etc.
BUT...I have to admit...I wonder how things would have been with respect to that once the marriage started to unravel - and say I'd stayed with her...ya know? I mean sure, I could put those things out of my head because the relationship seemed happy...but what about once things started becoming miserable as they did? Would the discipline I had to keep myself from wandering into more dangerous areas of thoughts have remained once things just started to really suck? While she was out there doing things that I found revolting?
Honestly speaking - I don't know. I don't think so.
So, I divorced her. And in a lot of ways - divorcing her gave me the liberty to start thinking about what was right and what was wrong about that previous relationship. The fact that I wondered about other people, that I desired other people, that I had thoughts about other people even while happy bothered me. The fact that I felt insecure about the fact she had been with other people and I had not bothered me. There were a ton of things that bothered me about that first relationship that I had a chance to really sit back and evaluate/think about...because I did not want them again.
The more I thought about it - the more I came to the conclusion that every single one of those things revolved around one central idea. I wondered about things that I did not know. I saw other people not remaining chaste, and I envied them and their knowledge of the subject. I weighed the odds of me ending up with someone else that had not remained chaste - and saw a very high chance I could end up in exactly the same predicament again.
So, I made a decision. I'm not going to operate in ignorance and wonderment anymore. Fornication was no longer going to be an issue for me. If I want to sleep with someone, and they'll have me, I'll sleep with them. If I want to carry on with someone, I'll carry on with them. I want to find out - and let's see where this goes. Was sex better with this type of person than that type of person? Was there really a difference? Were there these possible differences going on that I had envisioned? Were there these distinctions that I was unaware of that did plague me to some extent or other throughout the 8 years of being with that one person?
That's what I did for about 4-5 years after getting divorced. I dated around. I sampled the waters. I got to know the answers to the things that I'd wondered about. Now, I wasn't REALLY promiscuous - I mean we're not talking huge numbers, but the sample group is pretty decent.
And ya know, once I did meet someone else that I wanted to settle down with, I settled down.
I can honestly say that I think that was a good decision on my part. None of the thoughts that plagued my inner dialogue are an issue any more and have not been. I don't feel like maybe I was premature in my decisions or that I could have had something better had I just waited a little longer. I don't wonder if other people might be better. I don't wonder if other people might be different. I'm not operating from a place of conjecture any more - I'm operating from an informed position.
And - not having those types of inner monologues and wonderments does make me a better spouse in my opinion. How can it not? I can honestly say that in both thought and deed - my relationship with my spouse is far more righteous now than it was with my ex-wife...and that it's entirely the consequence of that decision I made. If I were to weigh/predict how things would have evolved had I stayed with my ex-wife given EVERYTHING (her behaviors, my insecurities, my wonderings, etc) - against what I experience now - there is no comparison.
I don't carry the baggage you see plaguing lots of other people. I don't watch inappropriate content. I don't wonder about others. I don't have inner turmoil over my partner's past. I don't wonder about sex with other people (lust after them). Granting myself 'sin' in order to find out about those things - and understanding how that played out in my own psyche - fixed all of those other things.
Now that's not to say I don't carry other baggage around...lol...but the types of things you see other people unable to seemingly fix ain't it.
---
So there's a more concrete example. Now, once again, I'm not interested in going down the road of "fornication is a sin". For all intents and purposes - I'm agreeing with you and granting that in this conversation. What I'm saying, is at least within my own example, that one "sin" taken on willingly/temporarily had the consequence of a far more righteous state of being after with how I view/behave with/relate to my wife.
I think we all can pretty much recognize that there are a lot of people within the faith that have an unhealthy relationship with sexual issues. The boards on here are rife with people that have inappropriate contentography addictions, have unhappy marriages because they wonder if the grass is greener elsewhere, many married prematurely in order to "avoid sin" and are now dealing with the (often foreseeable) consequences of a rash decision, blah blah. It's my contention that a huge percentage of that is due to the focus on chastity/fornication issue.
In a lot of respects, I kind of view my life as having two parts. There's the period of when I was a kid until my late 20's (my formative years leading up to my first marriage and then divorce), and then my late 20's until present.
In the first "half" - I had a more conventional (religiously inspired) view on sex. While not completely in line, I had only been with one person. I hadn't slept around, I married the person I lost my virginity to, I viewed sex as something of sanctity between two loving people, etc. Or at least that was how I behaved.
But that's not to say that that the time was not fraught with problems. As I discussed in a different thread on here, my girlfriend/spouse hadn't been a virgin before us. She's been with around 10 people before me. That reeked a lot of havoc within me during the early stage of our relationship, but I learned to live with it and put it out of my mind. I also would say that I wasn't 100% content with my decision. I wondered about what it would be like to have sex with other people. I wondered if sex was different with other people. I struggled with all sorts of thoughts like that - in a way very similar to what you see often on this board.
Now, I've always had a reasonably disciplined mind, so I was able to train myself not to allow those thoughts to get out of control or create detrimental situations. For the bulk of that 8 year relationship, it was pretty happy, albeit with those lingering thoughts in my head/wonderings/etc.
BUT...I have to admit...I wonder how things would have been with respect to that once the marriage started to unravel - and say I'd stayed with her...ya know? I mean sure, I could put those things out of my head because the relationship seemed happy...but what about once things started becoming miserable as they did? Would the discipline I had to keep myself from wandering into more dangerous areas of thoughts have remained once things just started to really suck? While she was out there doing things that I found revolting?
Honestly speaking - I don't know. I don't think so.
So, I divorced her. And in a lot of ways - divorcing her gave me the liberty to start thinking about what was right and what was wrong about that previous relationship. The fact that I wondered about other people, that I desired other people, that I had thoughts about other people even while happy bothered me. The fact that I felt insecure about the fact she had been with other people and I had not bothered me. There were a ton of things that bothered me about that first relationship that I had a chance to really sit back and evaluate/think about...because I did not want them again.
The more I thought about it - the more I came to the conclusion that every single one of those things revolved around one central idea. I wondered about things that I did not know. I saw other people not remaining chaste, and I envied them and their knowledge of the subject. I weighed the odds of me ending up with someone else that had not remained chaste - and saw a very high chance I could end up in exactly the same predicament again.
So, I made a decision. I'm not going to operate in ignorance and wonderment anymore. Fornication was no longer going to be an issue for me. If I want to sleep with someone, and they'll have me, I'll sleep with them. If I want to carry on with someone, I'll carry on with them. I want to find out - and let's see where this goes. Was sex better with this type of person than that type of person? Was there really a difference? Were there these possible differences going on that I had envisioned? Were there these distinctions that I was unaware of that did plague me to some extent or other throughout the 8 years of being with that one person?
That's what I did for about 4-5 years after getting divorced. I dated around. I sampled the waters. I got to know the answers to the things that I'd wondered about. Now, I wasn't REALLY promiscuous - I mean we're not talking huge numbers, but the sample group is pretty decent.
And ya know, once I did meet someone else that I wanted to settle down with, I settled down.
I can honestly say that I think that was a good decision on my part. None of the thoughts that plagued my inner dialogue are an issue any more and have not been. I don't feel like maybe I was premature in my decisions or that I could have had something better had I just waited a little longer. I don't wonder if other people might be better. I don't wonder if other people might be different. I'm not operating from a place of conjecture any more - I'm operating from an informed position.
And - not having those types of inner monologues and wonderments does make me a better spouse in my opinion. How can it not? I can honestly say that in both thought and deed - my relationship with my spouse is far more righteous now than it was with my ex-wife...and that it's entirely the consequence of that decision I made. If I were to weigh/predict how things would have evolved had I stayed with my ex-wife given EVERYTHING (her behaviors, my insecurities, my wonderings, etc) - against what I experience now - there is no comparison.
I don't carry the baggage you see plaguing lots of other people. I don't watch inappropriate content. I don't wonder about others. I don't have inner turmoil over my partner's past. I don't wonder about sex with other people (lust after them). Granting myself 'sin' in order to find out about those things - and understanding how that played out in my own psyche - fixed all of those other things.
Now that's not to say I don't carry other baggage around...lol...but the types of things you see other people unable to seemingly fix ain't it.
---
So there's a more concrete example. Now, once again, I'm not interested in going down the road of "fornication is a sin". For all intents and purposes - I'm agreeing with you and granting that in this conversation. What I'm saying, is at least within my own example, that one "sin" taken on willingly/temporarily had the consequence of a far more righteous state of being after with how I view/behave with/relate to my wife.
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