THE NATURAL BORDER ZONE

The question is: with whom or what do you feel at ease? A place where you can be yourself, even if not part of your own home, is a treasured location. So I am somewhat disturbed by one of the customers of an establishment in the downtown who both 'courts' the opposite gender there, as well as introduces them to the place if he found them elsewhere.
Once when he wasn't there one of them came looking for him.
He had already broken up with her by then.
It was... "uncomfortable".


Reasonable people should assume that there are boundaries as far as private, personal, and public space is concerned. And while people might be allowed into all of those compartments, it makes sense in the early or superficial stages to limit their access to just one of them.

For example, your psychotherapist or tax accountant may be a 'private space' person, because of the nature of the relationship. But it is private "nut space" or private "business space". Their presence is, quite logically, circumscribed, with boundaries shutting them off or out. You would rather not see them when you are in the public sphere, or taking a nice long bath.
Maybe you want your wife there instead.
Much more "comforting".

The people with whom you socialize can graduate to home-visit status, but that should take a while to happen, and is by no means a foregone conclusion. Similarly, your emotional involvements should be kept out of the public living room until there is a permanency about the relationship, and a level of trust has been established.


It's not whether they feel comfortable being there that matters so much as whether you feel comfortable with them there.

The same goes for them.



I've often wondered at people who have casual affairs, especially if nothing is kept private. What an extraordinarily low level of trust does there have to be for such a thing to be possible?
And how much alcohol was involved?
Or misplaced lust?

Sometimes I'm also baffled by people who have "committed" relationships.

Some of the men I know didn't really know their spouse till long after the marriage, when they finally realized that she did not share their grand passion for sports or cars, and that they themselves were ignorant of and had absolutely no interest in any of her obsessions. That they met, started seeing each other, dated, and eventually tied themselves in knots had nothing at all to do with the peculiarities that made them unique, but with the general adherence to standards of expectation.

They wanted the other person to see in them those characteristics that spoke to the common pattern. And both of them struggled to make precisely that real to the other, though their editing may have been unconscious.
Please, no threatening weirdness! And no deviation from the norm!
I won't bother you with carburetors provided you don't.
If both of us act blond, no one will know.
Last of all, either of us.



Everyone I consider a friend is so because they have good character, and interesting facets to their personalities. Perhaps similar interests, more often admirable knowledge sets and a common language of the mind. We get along because we enjoy exploring each other's quirks.
Exposure to insight sharpens mental focus.

There are few among my friends that I would hesitate to have accompany me to my favourite places. Whether they would feel entirely at home there might be an issue.


It's all based on how well one knows someone. Casual acquaintance has a more limited realm, whereas someone who is a friend, a life-mate, a boon companion, a co-conspirator, or just proven to be a very decent person, whom one wishes to know better, is given fewer boundaries.


I would feel comfortable with them in a variety of environments. Whether they might feel as comfortable is not certain, but I would hope so.
At least comfortable enough.


Doors open over time.




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