My ‘style’ of relationship

I don’t need to refer to my style of relationship as “ethical non-monogamy” because making that delineation is making the presumption there are other formats of non-monogamy that people are choosing that AREN’T ethical?

I simply refer to it as an “open style of relationship” – a style of relationship where I interact with people fundamentally based on 3 things:

1. Unconditional love: my genuine wanting for my beloved’s happiness intrinsic to my own, whether or not I’m involved, and especially whether we sleep in the same bed at all. It’s a genuine wanting for their happiness even if it’s with a different person whom they’re sleeping. My ONLY concern is, “How can I help?”
2. Nonjudgmental acceptance: accepting every individual for who they are; their desire, mannerisms, preferences or non-preferences and non-desires.
3. Open communication: each individual’s ability to facilitate each other’s being able to communicate openly because there’s never a reason to hide anything [outside of professional or preferential reasons]. 

There are some people that consider this as “cheating” – even those in ‘ethical non-monogamous’ types of relationships…

The distinction they make is, “Hey, you can see other people, just not behind my back and not without my knowing.”

This, to me, still remains in the realm of a closed relationship style where all relationship problems lie – because they *can’t* take on the 3 fundamentals of successful relationships, which I outlined previously.

What is a ‘commitment’?

One of the ideas that’s the reason people consider an open relationship as cheating is the idea of commitment. Remember always that a commitment is any agreement you have with someone which you’re willing to pursue.

You can ‘commit’ to any format of relationship – yes, even open relationships!

But the most important bit is, that you commit to enforcing – really, facilitating – those 3 fundamentals of happy relationships: 1. unconditional love, 2. nonjudgmental acceptance, and 3. open communication.

So, what is cheating?

Cheating is when you go against – you betray – what you’ve committed to doing. 

When you say you’re going to do something and then betray their trust by not doing it in the way you said or meant it, that’s cheating.

So, as an IQ test, ask yourself: is open relationship cheating when you’re seeing other people? 

The obvious answer is no since it’s the commitment you’ve made to facilitate.