8515 Penfield Ave
Winnetka, CA 91306

Founded in 1987 by Terry Brussel and Brian Gitt

Based on the philosophy of Family Synergy,

Founded 1971 by Hy Levy and Pat LaFollette

LIVE THE DREAM FOUNDED 1987

UPCOMING EVENTS

Saturday August 15 11-12:30

Herrad Experiment and Proposition 31 by Robert Rimmer:

Couple Meets Couple, They Fall in Love and Get Married BY ZOOM

IMPORTANT MESSAGE

Saturday September 19, 2020 is Rosha Shana.

Terry will not be doing this meeting.

Would YOU like to present it on Zoom?

Please let us know by calling LTD hotline 818-886-0069

Large Private Room for rent with en-suite full bath available in poly group house West San Fernando Valley. Part time job with 30 second commute also possible with room. (coaching/hypnotherapy career opportunity) Call 818-886-0069 See page 5 & 6 for info

Note:  Items marked with an * are not Live the Dream events.

Live the Dream                           August and September 2020

Unless otherwise noted, all events are at 8515 Penfield Ave Winnetka 91306.

Group house- home of Terry, Craig, John, and Rita.

For all events: RSVP/more info call the LTD Hotline (818) 886-0069

Please visit the Live the Dream website at www.livethedream.org to view current events, past articles, etc.

Terry Brussel-Rogers is a Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist, Life Coach, & a 4th generation Matchmaker.

We provide poly relationship counseling, hypnotic jealousy release, success coaching and other services.

See www.acesuccess.com or call (800) LIFE MATES (543-3628)

Live the Dream is an education and support group for those who, originally inspired by the writings of Robert Heinlein, Robert Rimmer, and Marion Zimmer Bradley, are now ready to LIVE such alternative lifestyles as cooperative living, open relationships, and group marriage. Many of our concepts on multiply committed relationships come from Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land and Moon is a Harsh Mistress.  Live the Dream also sponsors a nest of Church of All Worlds, the real life, over fifty-year-old spiritual movement inspired by Stranger in a Strange Land.

EVENTS

All Live the Dream LIVE events are 11am-4pm on 3rd Saturdays at 8515 Penfield Ave in Winnetka, Ca. 91306 (unless otherwise specified).

Donation for 3rd Saturday 11-4 events: $10 for nonmembers, $5 for members. Bring something healthy and delicious to share for the pot luck lunch

Topic: Live the Dream: Harrad Experiment and Prop. 31
Time: Aug 15, 2020 11:00 AM  to 12:30 PM  Pacific Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83636404153?pwd=ODFrK094cTVUVDZadXdWMHVreDZkdz09

Meeting ID: 836 3640 4153
Passcode: heinlein

Silver lining of Safer at Home experience: From now on all our meetings will be available on Zoom for those who can’t get to us in person.  Some will be hosted by speakers in other areas, too. We had hoped to be offering something in person for those who wanted to come by now, but with rising numbers of Covid 19 cases and hospitalizations we are continuing to play it safe.

Saturday August 15 11-12:30 Herrad Experiment and Proposition 31 by Robert Rimmer:  Couple Meets Couple, They Fall in Love and Get Married

 (BY ZOOM?)

Robert Rimmer wrote many fictional books on multiple committed relationships from the dating stage to the group marriage stage. Herrad Experiment takes place at a supposedly fictional university (except that we had a housemate who went there) which features co-ed rooms, classes on sex and love and co-ed naked gym classes. There is a lot of excellent instruction in this on how to handle polyamory as the college students who deal with the usual jealousies involved in dating more than one person deal also with the complications of one of them being your assigned roommate to whom you are expected to make love. It eventually evolves into a six-way group marriage. Proposition 31 starts with what looks like a familiar relationship train wreck as a married man impregnates his married lover leading to the threat of divorce of both marriages. Except it winds up with the kids from both marriages getting a new sibling and extra parents instead of losing those they had. The wife who did not get pregnant attempts to get group marriage legalized as the story proceeds…not a bad idea when you look at the alternative.  

Robert Rimmer himself was in a four-way group marriage which lasted 25+ years but was kept secret due to his co-husband’s work situation until the man passed on. Bob claimed throughout that his stories were fictional. He was an honorary member of Live the Dream and gave us a couple of meetings by speaker phone after all this was no longer secret.

Live the Dream, founded by Terry Brussel and Brian Gitt in 1987, carries on the philosophy and traditions of Family Synergy, founded by Hy Levy and Pat Lafollette in 1971.   Robert Rimmer was one of their inspirations.

THE BEGINNINGS OF SYNERGY:

Excerpt from Fifty Years of Polyamory In America

Through Our Eyes

by Glen Olson and Terry Brussel-Rogers

(Sources: taped interviews with co-founders Hy Levy and Pat Lafollette, other members)

Synergy-Noun: the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects. (combined: Free Merriam-Webster online/Webster’s unabridged Dictionary of the English language, 1978)

An intense but quiet man, thoughtful and well spoken, Hy Levy and his wife Joyce were looking for something different. An engineer in his thirties, he recalls he and his wife were not looking to join a commune to make a political statement about planetary resources or create a model for co-operative living- things that others were looking for. He was actually inspired by the utopian novels

of Robert Rimmer (The Harrad Experiment, In Six), an author who proposed that group marriage, built of couples finding other couples and marrying them could work and be a powerful and joyful lifestyle.

He recalls that in those days, the late 1960’s, early 1970’s, many utopian groups were trying to form, some advocating every form of sexual freedom, but after attending meetings put on by numerous groups, he and his wife realized they were looking for something else. They already had two small children and they were not teenagers trying to change the world, they were people looking to enrich their lives and the lives of others they cared about.

 “In those days it was very hard to meet people,” he says, “the only way to contact other like-minded people was to put an ad in the LA Free Press and wait for someone to answer it, or answer someone else’s ad.”

Eventually, after answering a large number of ads and putting in one of their own they met Pat and Ann Lafollette. Hy remembers, “We met each other, we liked each other, in fact Pat and I got along fabulously well.”  The LaFollette’s had also read Robert Rimmer and were looking for the same things the Levy’s were.

A deep friendship developed. It became clear that the two couples, though looking for the same thing, were not quite the right mix to build a marriage together, so they went as a foursome to a number of discussion groups on communes.

About that adventure Hy states, “We blew people away because all they wanted to talk about is who takes out the garbage, or how to decide who takes out the garbage- and we wanted to talk about being in a place where people cared about each other. The reason for being there was not political or economic, it was to live with someone you cared for… We ended up getting attacked a lot, because our views were so dissimilar to those of the rest of the room.”

The men were so dismayed at the reception they were getting they decided to put in an ad of their own, advertising a meeting to discuss the philosophies of Robert Rimmer. The meeting drew a group of about a dozen people and was supposed to be about three hours long.

But the idea caught fire. At the end of the discussion period no one was ready to leave so they adjured to a local restaurant for dinner and returned to continue the discussion.

 Sometime late in the evening they decided that they should do more than just talk about the ideas of Robert Rimmer, it was time to do something about it. So they formed a steering committee, composed of everyone who was at the meeting and resolved to go forward. Of course, the group had no name, a problem which would need a solution sooner than they realized.

One of the new steering committee members mentioned that Robert Rimmer would be in town the following month, giving a talk at a convention. He proposed they attend the convention to hear Rimmer speak- and to advertise their existence to any like-minded people.

Now came the problem- they had a group, what to call it? In trying to define what they were looking for Pat LaFollette and Hy Levy had often stated they were looking to build a “synergy” in their lives, create stronger, vital relationships based on their marriages and to provide a stronger family experience for the adults AND the children.

 It hit Hy, and perhaps Pat also at the same time they were talking about Family. Obviously, the organization should be called Family Synergy. Later they would invent the term “extended family” to denote those adults and children that you spent a lot of time with and did family activities with, who were family, but who did not happen to be related to you by blood.

The Levy’s and the LaFollette’s attended that convention the following month and met Robert Rimmer. They remember finding a way to get invited up on stage with him and made their announcement. Pat recalls, “At that time I was an artist and had a huge artists loft in the skid row area of Los Angeles. It was four or five thousand feet. We held the next meeting there just in case we got a good turnout.”

In fact, fifty or sixty people showed up- and Family Synergy was in business. “The organization never had a formal structure in the early days,” said Pat LaFollette.

 “We continued with the steering committee concept. Anybody who was willing to put in the work of keeping Synergy going was automatically on the steering committee. The only people who got to vote on what Synergy would do were the people who put in the work. That system, adopted from other utopian groups of the same period worked really well for many years. We kept it until the mid or late eighties before… enough people started demanding a more rigid structure. Eventually Synergy developed bylaws, elected positions, all that stuff. I never noticed the organization functioning better because of it.” 

People kept coming to the meetings which were held monthly. Family Synergy proved to be an enduring organization, partly because of the era and the ideas, mostly, Pat Follette believes, because of its structure. They never intended to grow the group into a national organization, but people kept getting involved and that turned out to be what people wanted.

“We would get people driving in from San Bernardino County,” (a community about fifty miles from LA) states Pat, “and they would complain about how far they had to come. So we’d say ‘start your own chapter’, and they would.” After that attendees started groups in San Diego, etc, etc

Pat recalls, “The only requirement we had for someone to start a Synergy chapter was they already had to be members of Family Synergy and that was a requirement that was really unenforceable. The only money we collected from the chapters was dues to help pay for the newsletter.”

Remember that the original goal of Family Synergy was to discuss the possibilities of group marriage based on already married couples coming together with other couples, how to grow those group marriages and how to sustain them.

Hy recalls, “After a year or two we began to wonder if we were doing something wrong.” No group marriages had formed from the group, and they hadn’t heard of any forming anywhere else.

Although something interesting was happening and it was a little unexpected. A number of people started joining the group who were already in committed long term relationships- but they weren’t built from four people- they were three.

“We started off advocating group marriages built from four party or multiple couple… we had never thought of triads, It was a totally new idea. Over time we moved to the concept that any kind of multiply committed relationship was ok”. 

Triads, a group relationship built of three people committed to each other eventually emerged over time as a very stable configuration. One known personally to the authors was that of Phoenix, two women and one man which lasted until the original couple passed on—30 years with the 2nd wife staying with the first after their husband died. Another was that of Pat, his wife Anne and their husband Joe who had two sons and were very OUT at PTA meetings etc. which the mother and both fathers attended together. There was some dissention from the other children…the boys from the triad had TWO fathers living with them and attending their school activities while many of the other kids did not have even one.    No four-way group marriages lasted long to our knowledge in Family Synergy. Phoenix actually started with two couples, but one of the men left during the first year. Not an uncommon beginning to a triad…


During Safer at Home mandates, we have continued to have these meetings on 3rd Saturdays as we have done since 1987.   11 am to 12:30pm, until the meetings are Live again

If you have a

“What do you do when?” question for us,

or any Poly related article for publication:

Please E-Mail to:  newsletter@mail.livethedream.org

Or mail it to 8515 Penfield Ave. Winnetka, Ca. 91306. 

We will take it with your solution or brain storm and give it one or more of our own.

 Let’s have fun with this and learn from each other.


LARGE PRIVATE ROOM WITH EN SUITE BATH IN POLYGROUP LIVING HOUSE

Full length closet and plenty of storage space!

AVAILABLE IN WEST SAN FERNANDO VALLEY, CALIFORNIA 91306

$1050/month rent (Couple $1250)(First & last month’s rent+$250 clean up deposit required)Utilities, Internet, shared washer/dryer, designated parking spot — All Included


Optional: You are welcome to dine with us—at least 4 shared dinners each week with access to kitchen+ food in refrigerator at any time–$70 a week includes food and such sundries as toilet paper, dish washer, laundry detergent etc.

NON-SMOKING

2 FELINES IN RESIDENCE

NO MORE PETS, PLEASE

Our home is a beautiful one in a nice neighborhood of the West San Fernando Valley. It has two fireplaces, a high-ceilinged grand living room, dining area and big country kitchen. Washer and dryer available. We have a clothing optional hot tub. We share good conversation, holidays, outings, special occasions, hugs… and household chores.

Imagine coming home to a beautiful house, a well-kept yard filled with flowers and trees. Space for a garden if you have a green thumb. The fire place may be lit if it is winter. You come home to the smell of something delicious being cooked by one of your housemates. Or perhaps you are the housemate doing that cooking—that nurturing. You share a good dinner with whoever is at home tonight. Afterward, you might go to the privacy of your room, soak in the hot tub with good friends, or join a lively discussion in the living room. Sound good? MAKE YOUR FANTASY A REALITY…

If you have an interest in living in a lovely home with warm, caring peopleCall Terry Brussel-Rogers (818) 886-0069

Meet Ups & Other Group Events

NONE OF THIS IS COVID 19 UPDATED. GO TO THEIR WEBSITES TO SEE HOW EACH GROUP IS HANDLING IT.

First Saturday of every month is Deborah’s meet up at Fuddr–uckers

 



 

 

221 N. San Fernando Blvd in Burbank at 8 pm. It’s a dinner and socializing meeting.

Go to: www.meetup.com/SoCal-Polyamory  for more info on this meeting

Also check out www.meetup.com/Loveopen  & www.meetup.com/loving-more

and other SoCal poly groups (40+ groups in the Greater LA Area!)

The Southern California Naturist Association Meetup http://www.meetup.com/nature-519  

This is the largest non-landed clothing optional club in California

Other Poly info: www.lovemore.com                       www.polyevents.blogspot.com

Other groups friendly to Polyamory

KARL HESS CLUB www.karlhessclub.org

meets on the 3rd Monday at Dinah’s Family Restaurant, 6521 Sepulveda Blvd. (at Centinela), Culver City. Phone: (310) 645-0456 West L.A.

Burning Man Festival August 30-September 7, 2020 for details www.burningman.com!

LTD DUES ARE $25.00 PER YEAR FOR ONE PERSON, $40 FOR A COUPLE, $10 EACH FOR ADDITIONAL PERSON(S) IN THE SAME HOUSE. DOUBLE THAT FOR FREE ATTENDANCE AT ALL REGULAR DAY TIME 3RD SATURDAY MEETINGS.  TO BECOME A MEMBER OR TO RENEW YOUR MEMBERSHIP, PLEASE COMPLETE THE FOLLOWING FORM AND EITHER E-MAIL OR SNAIL MAIL IT TO THE ADDRESS LISTED BELOW.  An E-Mail NEWSLETTER SUBSCRIPTION ONLY IS AVAILABLE FOR FREE.  JUST BE SURE TO PROVIDE US WITH YOUR E-Mail ADDRESS.  REGULAR MEETINGS ARE $5.00 WITH YOUR CURRENTLY PAID MEMBERSHIP CARD (FAMILY SYNERGY OR LIVE THE DREAM) WITHOUT MEMBERSHIP MEETINGS ARE $10.00.

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Live the Dream Newsletter August September 2020