Freedom from "in"

I've often struggled to reconcile the incredibly varied types of connections/relationships I can have (and would enjoy!) with people, against what I've been taught is prudent, acceptable, appropriate, etc. Over time, I have simply suppressed my own expression in order to conform to societal rules (or what I thought the societal rules were).

I have recently been working very hard at identifying which aspects of my expression are results of conditioning, and addressing them consciously. However, last Saturday, through a strange circumstance, I gained access to unconscious conditioning that I had not previously been able to see, much less discard. It took me a day and a half to process it, and I came out on the other side a new person. Now I am free from those dictated ways of relating because I have the clarity to see that it's purely up to the individuals involved, and includes being aware, honest, respectful, and conscious. The past five days have been a miraculous, validating whirlwind of meaning, clarity, opportunity, love, and joy.

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So I'm toying with the concept that being "in love", "in a relationship", or "in a marriage" is as confining as the very word "in" suggests. To be "in" something is to assume that there is some inherent boundary that separates, or limits, what is contained within and without. And the thing with boundaries is that they must be agreed upon to avoid some level of conflict. In the realm of feelings, the proverbial "line in the sand" leads a much more unpredictable existence than its physical counterpart due to its nature of having a plethora of factors and conditions that affect every aspect of it, at any given time.

I can relate with someone. I can feel love for someone. But do I ever want to be "in" something? I know it’s semantic, but I actually think that it’s the existence of these "predefined" sets of boundaries (and what they are presumed to contain) that create the expectations and obligations that, although accepted, are not actually reasonable in many cases.