How I Have Happy and Safe Relationships

I invent a boyfriend. He's either completely made up or based on someone "real", maybe a character from a film or a television show or a novel. I've found it's safest not to base him on someone I actually know; therein lies confusion and heartbreak. Or it can be a real person, but someone I'm VERY unlikely to encounter in actual life and who (whom?), if I did encounter, probably wouldn't be as appealing to moi as he was prior to the encounter. (Jesus, that was a sentence you don't want to be reading everyday). I then attribute character/personality qualities to this person - qualities that I would find appealing in a boyfriend. For example, my current "boyfriend" is James from Metallica (see here for an example of my delusion). In reality, James is married with 3 children and lives in San Francisco (I live in Australia), he owns way too many cars and goes hunting (2 things I'm not so keen on), he also seems to have a Darwinian/Capitalist approach to life. In my fantasy I am able to completely overlook his Darwinian/Capitalist views, he has given up hunting due to the bad karma, he still owns too many cars but he doesn't drive them as often as he used to, and he still has 3 children but one of them is mine (WTF??). And I'm living in San Francisco, which is kind of fun.

Interesting, I seem to have incorporated quite a bit of real life into this imaginary relationship. Perhaps my mind is gradually moving towards a more reality based existence. Hmmm...not sure if this is a direction I want my mind to take.

One of the really great things about imaginary relationships is that if things start to go badly or we become bored with each other, there's no messy break-up. I can just stop fantasizing about him. Though, if I want to, I can imagine a break-up. It could be a "good" break-up, where no-one gets hurt; maybe we both meet other people at exactly the same time or, perhaps, we both want time alone. Or, if I'm feeling a little bitter and vindictive, I might imagine that he's miserable without me, even though he broke it off! Bastard! But it's all okay since no-one is actually hurt due to no-one actually existing (well, yes, I do exist but imaginary me exists only in my imagination - I think - and is usually a little altered from real me - whoever that is!). And, after the break-up, no-one gets stalked or harassed or runs into each other at parties (although I rarely go to parties) or weddings (sometimes I go to weddings) or the supermarket (I'm frequently at the supermarket).

I wonder if I my Imaginary Relationship technique could be incorporated into an Imaginary Workplace protocol and, by corollary, an Imaginary Income scheme.