What Does It Mean to Be Resourced in Relationship?

Claude Monet, The Artist’s Garden in Giverny

Hello, dear ones.

I’m back! After a month away, resting in the forest and dreaming by the creek, I’m happy to be returning to this little corner of the internet.

You might have noticed a little change around here. What was once Navigating Non-Monogamy with Aria Diana is now simply Nourishing Non-Monogamy, with a renewed intention:

Cultivating nervous system resilience and interdependent ecosystems of care.

I want more for us than merely navigating the challenges of non-monogamy. I want us to become more capable of staying connected through uncertainty, honoring our own needs alongside those of others, and building relationships that support our collective flourishing.

How do we stay connected to ourselves while making room for the autonomy and desires of others?

And what kinds of relationships, communities, and practices help us sustain that capacity over time?

From Understanding to Practicing

During my time away, I’ve been exploring some of these questions with a small, invitation-only group of humans in an experimental five-week online gathering called Resourced Relating.

Each week, we came together to slow down, reconnect with our bodies, explore the protective patterns that shape our relationships, and practice new ways of being with ourselves and one another.

We practiced noticing our needs before editing them to accommodate someone else’s preferences.

We explored what happens inside us when someone we love wants something different, and how to stay connected to ourselves while making room for their experience.

And we practiced being witnessed without needing to fix, advise, reassure, or rescue one another.

It was sweet, tender, sometimes vulnerable work.

And it reminded me of something I want to bring more fully into this publication:

Nourishing relationships aren’t created just by reading and thinking about them. We need repeated opportunities to bring what we know into our hearts and bodies, practicing how to navigate difference, receive support, and stay connected to ourselves, especially when our protective parts are activated.

We can understand attachment theory, differentiation, and nervous system regulation intellectually, and still fall into familiar patterns when we’re scared, disappointed, jealous, or uncertain. Building the capacity to respond differently takes practice, patience, and opportunities to experience something new.

And it’s made me excited to create more opportunities for us to practice together.

I’m considering offering the full five-week Resourced Relating cohort again in the future, potentially opening it to a wider community beyond non-monogamy. If that sounds interesting, you can learn more and join the interest list to hear when another cohort takes shape.

In the meantime, I’m taking one of my favorite practices from our time together and offering it as a standalone, 90-minute workshop so more of us can experience this work in community. More on that below!

What Does it Mean to be Resourced in Relationship?

The thing I’ve been thinking about a lot recently is what might become possible in our relationships if our sense of security, belonging, and support didn’t depend so heavily on what was happening with our romantic & sexual partner(s).

Imagine a partner making plans with someone else, and instead of spending the evening anxiously waiting for their attention, you have other places to turn for connection and nourishment.

Or making space for the big feelings of jealousy, disappointment, or insecurity that can arise, and having enough compassion for yourself to get curious about what’s happening inside before automatically reacting.

Or recognizing that you’re feeling lonely, overwhelmed, or disconnected, and knowing there are people, places, and practices you can turn toward for care.

This is what I mean by becoming more resourced.

Sometimes that means learning to turn toward ourselves with gentleness when a protective part feels scared or threatened, or asking a partner for reassurance, making a request, or naming a boundary. Sometimes it means reaching toward a friend, a community, or a trusted person who can offer another kind of care.

And it often means remembering that our belonging extends beyond our romantic relationships entirely, into our friendships, creative practices, relationships with the living world, and the communities we help cultivate.

A nourishing relational ecosystem is one where our needs have somewhere to go. We need to bring back the village.

Because the more places we can experience care, connection, and belonging, the less pressure we may place on any one relationship to meet all our needs. Expecting a single person to be our best friend, lover, co-parent, caregiver, adventure companion, emotional anchor, and entire support system doesn’t set anyone up for success.

And the more capacity we develop to stay connected to ourselves through difficult feelings, the more freedom we have to respond to relational challenges in ways that align with our values.

That’s what we spent five weeks exploring in Resourced Relating, and now I’d love to invite you into the practice, too. And you don't need to join a five-week cohort to begin exploring this. We can start by getting curious about the resources and relationships already available to us, and where we might want to cultivate more. Together, we can experiment with new ways of resourcing ourselves, strengthening our ecosystems of care, and building the capacity for more nourishing non-monogamous relationships.

A Little Relational Practice for This Week

One of the sweetest parts of our September Field Notes experiment was hearing from so many of you about what you were noticing, practicing, and discovering in your relationships. I loved seeing the conversations unfold in our chat, and I’d love to invite us back into that spirit of shared exploration and community support.

This week, I want to invite you to experiment with finding nourishment and belonging beyond **your romantic and sexual relationships.**Find ten quiet minutes sometime this week. Maybe take your journal outside if it’s still beautiful out like it is here in the Bay Area, or make a cup of something warm and sit somewhere comfortable.

Begin by asking yourself:

1. What already helps me feel supported and connected beyond my romantic relationships?

Think about friendships, chosen family, community, your relationship with yourself, animal companions, and the natural world. Consider the people who support your well-being, from therapists and coaches to acupuncturists, bodyworkers, and other healing practitioners. What people, animals, places, practices, and experiences help you feel grounded, nourished, connected, and more fully yourself?

Think about the spaces where you gather with others: support circles, dance communities, workshops, like-minded groups, spiritual gatherings, or shared creative practices. Where do you experience connection, even with people you don’t know intimately?

Notice how different relationships, communities, and experiences might nourish different parts of you.

2. Where am I longing for more connection or care?

As you look at your wider ecosystem of care, notice where you might be feeling a little undernourished. Are there parts of your life where you’re craving more companionship, play, intimacy, support, or a sense of belonging?

Perhaps you’re longing for deeper friendships, more opportunities to gather in community, or spaces where you can be vulnerable without needing to caretake others. Maybe there’s a part of yourself you’ve been wanting to reconnect with.

What kinds of connection or care would feel especially nourishing in this season of your life?

3. What’s one small way I could strengthen my wider ecosystem of care this week?

Is there a friendship you’d like to tend more intentionally? A community gathering you’ve been curious about? A place in nature you want to spend more time? A practice that helps you feel connected to yourself?

Choose one small, concrete experiment. Maybe it’s reaching out to a friend, attending a community event (invite below!), spending an afternoon somewhere that nourishes you, or making intentional space to enjoy your own company.

Just notice where you might invite a little more nourishment in your relational ecosystem.

And then, I’d love to hear what you discover!

Let us know in the chat: Who or what helps you feel a sense of belonging outside your romantic or sexual relationships? And what’s one small thing you’re experimenting with this week to strengthen that part of your ecosystem?

Bring your field notes, discoveries, or questions to the chat. I love how much we can learn from witnessing one another's experiments:

You’re Invited Into a Deeper Practice Together

After two years of primarily working with individuals and couples navigating non-monogamy, I’m feeling increasingly called to bring more of this work into community.

I’m reminded of something psychotherapist Harville Hendrix wrote: “We are born in relationship, we are wounded in relationship, and we can be healed in relationship.”

So many of our protective responses developed through experiences of being in relationship with others. And while individual reflection and therapeutic work can be incredibly valuable, there’s something uniquely powerful about building new relational capacities through practice, with other people, over time.

So, as I shift more of my focus toward facilitating group experiences, I’m creating space for our wider community to practice together through a new series of live, online Resourced Relating Practice Labs.

Each 90-minute gathering offers a different opportunity to build relational capacity through guided practices, personal reflection, and meaningful connection with others. Depending on the theme, we might explore somatic resourcing, parts work, conscious communication, relational scenarios, or the simple but powerful experience of being witnessed and supported in community.

Our first gathering is November 11: Resourced Relating Practice Lab: When Freedom Feels Threatening in Non-Monogamy. And as a thank you for being here, paid subscribers will find a discount code below the paywall.

In this live, online community event, we’ll explore what happens when a partner’s autonomy activates our protective responses, and practice staying connected to ourselves when someone we love wants something different.

My hope is that these gatherings become spaces where we can feel less alone in our struggles, develop practical relational skills, and experience the nourishment of practicing alongside others.

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