Be Authentic

In the year 2003 at the age of 17 years, about two years after I had accepted Jesus as my Lord
and Saviour and been baptized, I said to one of my church sisters, Sis Cam, “I want to have two
wives.”
I was considered a good Christian ‘yute’, so you could imagine her surprise and confusion.
“Why would you want two wives?” she asked.
I don’t quite remember the explanation that I gave, but I remember that it was not something that
she could have understood, and the matter was quickly dismissed. Being baptized at the age of
15 years in April 2001, there were few things I was sure of; 1) that my sins were forgiven and I
had no reason to fear condemnation from God or man; 2) that no matter what had happened or
would happen, God would provide for my needs and work all things together for my good (still
my mantra to this day – Romans 8:28); 3) that I wanted to keep my virginity until marriage; and
4) I wanted more than one wife. As you can imagine, number 4 proved to be quite problematic.
For most of my young adult years, I struggled with this side of myself. I did not find it hard to
faithful to my girlfriends. It was that I found it hard to not fall in love with other women while I
was already in love with my partner.
I do not find that many people can relate to this. While many can relate to sexual interest in or
attraction to another person who was not their partner, my interest was more bonding personally
with other females – not hiding and running around like a cheater, but something open, honest
and consensual. This was something that I was taught was wrong, and I did not want to be a
fornicator. But how could I marry more than one woman? Bigamy is a crime, and having more
than one partner is frowned upon, at least in the Christian circles.
What resulted from me trying to deny myself was this dull emptiness, as if a part of me was
missing. I was not living my authentic self. With each potential love that I denied for propriety’s
and piety’s sake, I denied a part of myself. There was something missing. Until 2011. I fell
totally head over heels with Sammy.
I had supposed that I would never marry. I didn’t think it was possible to have what I wanted,
and for someone to complete me. But then Sammy turned my life around. I felt as if I could be
monogamous with her and needed to form no deep, close, personal, intimate soul-connections
with anyone else but her. However, with time, my poly tendencies started to tug at me, but not
enough to cause me to want to seek anyone else. I could get by with the occasional flirting –
nothing too serious. This allowed me to live a monogamous poly life with the woman I loved. It
was all about making Sammy happy.
But then a series of unfortunate events occurred and Sammy and I broke up. I was devastated and
was back to my poly self, however, I became a user and cheater. In my state of hurt, I hurt others
and it felt incomplete. Again, I was being inauthentic. Being poly was about being open, honest
and loving – it should be all about love. To find myself, I had to be myself; myself as I truly was.
I met Chrissy and she accepted me and my polyamory. I found out about polyamory and
accepted myself for what I was. Sammy and I got back together and she too, accepted this part of
me. Now, I am able to live at ease. I need no one else, because this, I believe, is how I am meant
to be, at least until God or the universe decides to instil a change in me.
Unless, we are authentic, living out our true selves and our true purpose, we can never truly be
happy nor can we be at peace. This applies not only to being poly or monogamous, but to every
aspect of our lives.
I have been a teacher for eleven years, but I hate teaching. I never wanted to be a teacher; I
wanted to make a living being a cadet officer. However, cadetting is voluntary. It doesn’t pay,
and the only way I saw that I could be involved in military activities while interacting with youth
and children was to become a teacher and reserve military officer. But I never wanted to be a
soldier, though I wanted to be involved in military activities, and I found the military to be a
miserable place. So the best option I saw at the time was to keep my job as a teacher and join the
Jamaica Combined Cadet Force; at least teaching kept me close to the cadets. But the universe
has a way of pushing you towards your true self if you allow it to (and to push you around, if you
allow it, too) and soon, the stress of being in a job I didn’t want, coupled with the stress caused
by the series of unfortunate incidents I talked about earlier, caused me to become sick. I left
teaching and started my own cadet organization and am now creating jobs through it. By
listening to myself, I have started to feel more complete. My salary is less than I had before and
less consistent, but it is worth it because I am following my bliss.

Follow your Bliss. This is Joseph Campbell’s advice in his book The Power of Myth. How do
you follow your bliss? First we find out what makes us happy, what makes us feel “free” and
“like ourselves”. Then we have to question who we really are. Joseph Campbell says there are
three things that prevent us from following our dreams and attaining self-actualization and
happiness; fear, desire and social duty. If we were not fearful of losing something/someone or
fearful of the consequences of our choices, if we did not yearn to attain some material thing or
position, and if we were not burdened down with guilt or the weight of duty to fulfil some
expectation or social responsibility, who would we be? What would be doing? What would we
want? If we can separate ourselves from our fear, desire/greed and obligations and identify what
makes us tick – what excites us, yet sets us at peace, then we have found our bliss and then we
have found our purpose – to be authentic and pursue our bliss.
Are you up to the challenge? My wish for you is that you listen to yourself and find what makes
you “you”, and find your bliss, then pursue it. Regardless of what the consequences are. It will
be worth it.