Once you are married, you must be faithful. You have vowed to be faithful. You and your wife understand that concept to mean that you can only be intimate with each other.
The problem is that two factors complicate that simple declaration: humanity and modern technology.
Let’s start with your humanity. Your humanity is multidimensional and complex. You are devoted to someone, but other parts of you can have feelings for others.
You may also be a fun person who likes to express yourself freely and interact with others. You enjoy flirting because it’s fun and allows you to enjoy the parts of yourself that can have a positive impact on others. What do you do with that part of yourself? Do you hide it and pretend it doesn’t exist? Do you act it out and call it “breaking your vows”?
The problem with hiding is that you feel more limited and less alive (and resentful). The problem with acting out a secret is that keeping it can have a devastating effect on your partner, who discovers (usually inevitably) that you’ve been hiding a secret.
Perhaps more importantly, it’s unfair to keep secrets from your spouse. Because once your spouse knows the truth, they may make a different decision. To me, that is robbery/theft/theft that robs a person of their right to make choices based on knowledge and truth from their lives.
Another issue is technology. Today’s technology makes it easy to do things you don’t want to share with your partner. These behaviors include intimate text messages, live engagement online for intimate reasons, online videos, emails, direct messaging on social networks, and booking online or in person.
There are even online groups that encourage and help you secretly cheat on your spouse. (This same technology makes it relatively easy to get caught if you have a suspicious partner who has access to your online “information” or your phone).
Faced with temptations from our humanity and the modern technological environment, we need to be proactive as a couple. So how can we be proactive and honor our vows and our complex human nature? How can we stay true?
Here are five ways to keep your relationship cheat-free and exciting.
1. Know your complex self
This is not just the part of you that wants to keep your vows to the letter, but the other part as well. If you like attention from the opposite sex (or the same sex, if you’re gay or lesbian), admit it to yourself.
2. Accept that your partner’s psychology doesn’t revolve solely around you.
It is normal for him to have feelings for others and a desire for physical affirmation from others.
3. But please understand that #1 and 2 have nothing to do with the action.
Expressing these feelings and keeping them secret is a completely different and toxic issue that doesn’t work in a committed relationship.
4. Let your partner know about this “shadow” side of you from time to time.
Talk about how you want attention and how you like to flirt. Find out what’s okay for your partner and where you need to draw the boundaries. No, it’s not a black and white situation.
For example, some couples talk about flirting with each other (not secretly) and are fine with it as long as it doesn’t go any further. However, one or both partners may not be okay with any cheating.
5. Come up with an agreement you can both keep.
If the boundaries feel too loose or too strict for one party, you should communicate about it further. For example, my wife and I have clear boundaries that we’ve never crossed, but I’ve had lunch with other women for business reasons or even if she was a colleague or old friend of mine. It is undesirable to be prohibited from doing so.
That would feel too restrictive.
What is adultery? Infidelity involves and implies secrets. Secrets can range from text messages to being intimate with someone (and everything in between) to things you don’t tell your spouse about.
Adultery is no good. Cheating is a gray area that needs to be discussed with each spouse to find a place where boundaries are clear, the relationship is sacred, and it’s not too restrictive.
Every couple is different and every couple must decide as a couple what works for them. I define secret cheating as infidelity because it’s not so much the act itself as the secret that destroys the relationship.
But healthy, innocent flirting, communicated and accepted by couples, can be vibrant and fun. Being as open and transparent as possible actually gives your partner more room to play with the other gender, in a way naturally and organically.
My comments here come from decades of working with couples, and I believe that the gray areas of a relationship can be great if viewed and dealt with creatively. I learned that there is.
tod krieger Marriage and intimacy therapist, author, and speaker.
This article was originally published at: Todd Krieger’s website. Reprinted with permission from the author.