Sometimes when I’m with someone I feel very proud of my connection to them, I want to celebrate publicly the love I have with them and the partnership I have formed with them. Sometimes however I feel that I want to possess them. Keep everyone’s mitts off of them. Keep them in my realm where I can feel more secure in what I have. Or perhaps I want to tout them proudly about; Show off this great prize I have captured.
When I am claimed it can feel very secure. To know that someone has you in their care and desires you enough to say “you’re mine and I’m yours” is like being wrapped in a warm blanket. However it can also feel like being wrapped in chains, or having the blankets so tight they’re suffocating. I’m not a possession to be owned nor a beast to be tamed and captured.
Loving without claiming is both liberating and terrifying. In spaces of great freedom there is tremendous capacity for internal growth and exposure to a greater diversity of experience. Where such capacity exists there is also greater capacity for hurt and potential for anxiety. Without the security of being claimed one must learn to find security in other places.
Security in self requires having a broad base of friends and community. Knowing that you are supported by many not just one. It requires that you constantly look inward with love and seek to grow the places where you feel most scared and small, and that even if you build them with help, you still build them to stand on their own.
Security in partnership comes from truly knowing and being known. Creating a space that allows for everything to be shared without punishment. Creating a space that welcomes challenge and embraces it as an opportunity to grow together. Knowing that a commitment to grow, share and face adversity does not require a binding contract.
Loving and claiming must be done delicately. It can be powerful to submit and let your guard down. To have a moment of knowing you are truly in the care of another and can for that blissful beat not worry about holding your own ground. Claiming and being claimed can be erotic and sensual. It can be powerful to release to something or someone from which/whom we may deny ourselves.
Yet the balance can be tenuous. Partnership does not require claim to have its multiplying power, where you plus another can do more than any other two. In fact claiming can shut down a partnership. It can draw two people inward or pin one person in place. If the motivation is to seek fulfilment rather than celebrate connection the outcome rarely provides what the hungry heart desires.
In love, be careful what you claim.