Submission a Gift or What?

[BiaTcHiNFiRe]

I also don't believe everyone is fortunate enough to find a partner they can experience this with, but I sure wish they could as it really is divine bliss.

Agreed.

Find someone who will mesh with you that good is hard. Explain to people around you all the bliss you feeling when you're near him is impossible as well I guess. I do understand what you say cuz I feel the very same way about my own Sir and just as you I can just wish them to experience this blissful feeling once.

 

[catalina_francisco]

It's funny that you mention handmade gifts, because I'm about to go make my living today at a craft fair selling lovingly handmade jewelry. Anything someone wants is a commodity. Taking a trait in isolation, whether it's submission or great tits and going "wow, this is super desireable, I better give it out only to people who deserve it" is a commodity mentality.

In your mind perhaps, not in mine or many others. I don't buy the capitalist ideal fortunately where everything has a price, even life itself. Try buying love...might seem possible for awhile, but it is only a pale illusion of what love really is as there is no price on love and loving another unless that is how you view the world. So perhaps we should all just submit to whoever we trip over as if it is a commodity, it matters little who we give it to even if they are a HNG.

Catalina

 

[nh23]

Really? They're not healthy models for relationship, not sustainable? And yet you are not familiar with the genre you say but you feel you know what they are about and like? LOL, only if you read the Mills & Boon variety which I avoided all my life like the plague after reading 2 and just about throwing up in the short 5 minutes it took to read them...historical romance of the higher calibre (well at least the ones I read which were best sellers when I was in my teens-20's) OTOH have many highs and lows, historical fact, and usually the realisation or hint a couple are in love is only the beginning of the whole story. It always amuses me that people have this view that romantic storylines are low quality stories, writing, acting which they must avoid any contact with at all costs in case they are mistaken for being ignorant, lower intelligence or something.

What is so frightening about stories based on love, or love itself as opposed to killing, hatred, greed, finacial domination, betrayal, and invading aliens? Some of what are considered to be the best novels and writing in the world are romantic stories of love won and/or lost. Some of the greatest people in history have great love stories of their own which were all too real and the backbone of their lives and success. If there was more love in the world there might not be so many people mourning their dead sons and daughters/spouses/paents, so many people filled with hatred and bitterness, so many obsessed with money and all it can buy, and so many unable to accept you can love another for all their imperfections and it can actualy enhance you and your life, not poison it.

As to it being unsustainable, I disagree because I am living it and we are going on for our 6th year now with more passion, love, intensity and desire every year, every day (and we are not the only ones doing so)...and why I say I could not do poly without losing this as yes, it is unsustainable if you are involved with more than one partner as it is simply physically, time wise, psychologically and emotionally impossible to give to and receive so much from more than one person and relationship...it takes energy, it takes commitment, it takes time, and it takes patience and understanding, not to mention tolerance of another's idiosyncracies which may not always perfectly match your own, but like the saying goes, for me 'a bird in the hand is worth way more than 2 (or more) in the bush...I need the intensity, I need the passion, I need the love.


Catalina

I'll say this much. Being Poly I don't agree. I won't comment further though because I don't want to hijack SKL's thread. And this is a whole other topic.

 

[Netzach]

In your mind perhaps, not in mine or many others. I don't buy the capitalist ideal fortunately where everything has a price, even life itself. Try buying love...might seem possible for awhile, but it is only a pale illusion of what love really is as there is no price on love and loving another unless that is how you view the world. So perhaps we should all just submit to whoever we trip over as if it is a commodity, it matters little who we give it to even if they are a HNG.

Catalina

Did I say that?

If I view my submission as not a gift to be given but as an intrinsic part of myself which will only make sense in a fit with specific other people/person and their brand of Dominance that's not exactly slutting it around or being stupid with it.

Try loving someone who DOESN'T deserve it , earn it, or acknowledge it, and you have agape. Anyone can fall in love with someone who is madly in love with them, love your enemies is a lot harder and actually can improve them and improve the world. Submitting to an HNG isn't necessary, but the loving thing to do might be talking to them, taking two seconds out of your day and maybe trying to teach them something. They may take it and run with it and not be such an HNG. In fact I will bet that over 90 percent of the Doms whose asses get kissed all day long on this board started out a lot less clueful, self included.

If you're sitting there guarding and polishing your gift and freaking out over it you will probably dismiss a lot of perfectly decent and incompatible folk as unworthy assholes. We never see that happening in the SM community. You don't have to submit to everyone, but honestly, a lot of people with their super special GIFT spend more time shitting on the "unworthy" than anything else.

 

[nh23]

In your mind perhaps, not in mine or many others. I don't buy the capitalist ideal fortunately where everything has a price, even life itself. Try buying love...might seem possible for awhile, but it is only a pale illusion of what love really is as there is no price on love and loving another unless that is how you view the world. So perhaps we should all just submit to whoever we trip over as if it is a commodity, it matters little who we give it to even if they are a HNG.

Catalina

I may not be on the same page as Netzach here..but that's not the way I took it. I think we should be selective about our partners, just as we would in a vanilla relationship. But, I don't seem my submissiveness as being something so special that only God almighty himself is worthy of me. It's a part of who I am. I am far from perfect. I don't expect a partner to be any different.

 

[nh23]

Did I say that?

If I view my submission as not a gift to be given but as an intrinsic part of myself which will only make sense in a fit with specific other people/person and their brand of Dominance that's not exactly slutting it around or being stupid with it.

Try loving someone who DOESN'T deserve it , earn it, or acknowledge it, and you have agape. Anyone can fall in love with someone who is madly in love with them, love your enemies is a lot harder and actually can improve them and improve the world. Submitting to an HNG isn't necessary, but the loving thing to do might be talking to them, taking two seconds out of your day and maybe trying to teach them something. They may take it and run with it and not be such an HNG. In fact I will bet that over 90 percent of the Doms whose asses get kissed all day long on this board started out a lot less clueful, self included.

If you're sitting there guarding and polishing your gift and freaking out over it you will probably dismiss a lot of perfectly decent and incompatible folk as unworthy assholes. We never see that happening in the SM community. You don't have to submit to everyone, but honestly, a lot of people with their super special GIFT spend more time shitting on the "unworthy" than anything else.

*cheers*

 

[Homburg]

I've had one relationship of Romance novel intensity ever. An illicit affair. Because without the will/we won't/we tension you have something else altogether.

They're not functional healthy models for relationships. They're juicy because they're not.

Total agreement here. Unhealthy, but hot.

Note: Mine was not an illicit affair, per se. It was simply an unhealthy relationship with some illicit overtones, as it was my first, and only,serious foray into poly. The unfamiliarity after 16 years of strict monogamy meant illicit overtones were unavoidable.

 

[Netzach]

Really? They're not healthy models for relationship, not sustainable? And yet you are not familiar with the genre you say but you feel you know what they are about and like? LOL, only if you read the Mills & Boon variety which I avoided all my life like the plague after reading 2 and just about throwing up in the short 5 minutes it took to read them...historical romance of the higher calibre (well at least the ones I read which were best sellers when I was in my teens-20's) OTOH have many highs and lows, historical fact, and usually the realisation or hint a couple are in love is only the beginning of the whole story. It always amuses me that people have this view that romantic storylines are low quality stories, writing, acting which they must avoid any contact with at all costs in case they are mistaken for being ignorant, lower intelligence or something.

What is so frightening about stories based on love, or love itself as opposed to killing, hatred, greed, finacial domination, betrayal, and invading aliens? Some of what are considered to be the best novels and writing in the world are romantic stories of love won and/or lost. Some of the greatest people in history have great love stories of their own which were all too real and the backbone of their lives and success. If there was more love in the world there might not be so many people mourning their dead sons and daughters/spouses/paents, so many people filled with hatred and bitterness, so many obsessed with money and all it can buy, and so many unable to accept you can love another for all their imperfections and it can actualy enhance you and your life, not poison it.

As to it being unsustainable, I disagree because I am living it and we are going on for our 6th year now with more passion, love, intensity and desire every year, every day (and we are not the only ones doing so)...and why I say I could not do poly without losing this as yes, it is unsustainable if you are involved with more than one partner as it is simply physically, time wise, psychologically and emotionally impossible to give to and receive so much from more than one person and relationship...it takes energy, it takes commitment, it takes time, and it takes patience and understanding, not to mention tolerance of another's idiosyncracies which may not always perfectly match your own, but like the saying goes, for me 'a bird in the hand is worth way more than 2 (or more) in the bush...I need the intensity, I need the passion, I need the love.


Catalina

They're really switched up the genre then to include things like jobs illness children all that bullshit. I obviously am totally ignorant of what constitutes a "Romance Novel" but I don't read stuff that bored the shit out of me after 2 or 3 tries.

 

[the captians wench]

I'll say this much. Being Poly I don't agree. I won't comment further though because I don't want to hijack SKL's thread. And this is a whole other topic.

I don't know, I can see cat's point.

I mean, you have work, home obligations, hobbies/passtimes/relaxation/personaltime, sleep, grooming, family, at this time of year holiday hub bub, then relationship a, and on top of that relationship b. There just isn't enough time in the day/week/month to fit everything in with the kind of intence passion cat is talking about. Something has to give sometimes, and it's been my experience that it's usually the relationship that isn't in your face 24/7.

Now I'm not saying that it can't be passionate, loving, and fulfilling, no I'm not saying that at all. What I am saying is that as hard as it is to imagine having a relationship so full of passion that they write novels based on it, it's even harder for me to imagine that with two relationships going on at the same time.

 

[Netzach]

I don't know, I can see cat's point.

I mean, you have work, home obligations, hobbies/passtimes/relaxation/personaltime, sleep, grooming, family, at this time of year holiday hub bub, then relationship a, and on top of that relationship b. There just isn't enough time in the day/week/month to fit everything in with the kind of intence passion cat is talking about. Something has to give sometimes, and it's been my experience that it's usually the relationship that isn't in your face 24/7.

Now I'm not saying that it can't be passionate, loving, and fulfilling, no I'm not saying that at all. What I am saying is that as hard as it is to imagine having a relationship so full of passion that they write novels based on it, it's even harder for me to imagine that with two relationships going on at the same time.

I can't imagine cold fusion. It seems however to exist. The limitations of what works for me fortunately does not keep any of the great monolithic island of two couples in the world from doing their thing. And I'm happy to report that I have three disparate relationships with passion and intensity in ways that are not interchangeable. I don't have to go without thing A because person A isn't into it, and ergo I'm happy enough to be present in toto for person A AND B instead of shorting myself and everyone else.

Unlike everyone else I don't feel the need to point out that Jesus, you're REALLY missing something if you don't live my life.

 

[the captians wench]

I can't imagine cold fusion. It seems however to exist.

I didn't mean to imply that it can't exist, netz. Only that I could see how it would be hard to imagine that it could exist. Just as it's hard to imagine any one could have a relationship like romance novels 24/7. Same dish, different cook.

The limitations of what works for me fortunately does not keep any of the great monolithic island of two couples in the world from doing their thing. And I'm happy to report that I have three disparate relationships with passion and intensity in ways that are not interchangeable. I don't have to go without thing A because person A isn't into it, and ergo I'm happy enough to be present in toto for person A AND B instead of shorting myself and everyone else.

Unlike everyone else I don't feel the need to point out that Jesus, you're REALLY missing something if you don't live my life.

Forgive me Netz, but I totally agree.

I wouldn't change what I have been able to experience having multible strong relationships in my life. Person A is a sentualist, and can take me to complete orgasmic bliss, while person B might be a sadist that can feed my hunger for pain until I hunger no more, and then person C could be some one who nurtures me and spoils me like a pampered house pet. Each one brings something different to the table, and giving up one would be like giving up a part of me, and I would be less happy for it. (not that I have 3 relationships going on at this time, but you get my point) I may not have that romance novel passion with all of them at one time, but the passion I feel for each one, and the completion I get, would be more than enough to compensate for not being imortalized.

 

[nh23]

I don't know, I can see cat's point.

I mean, you have work, home obligations, hobbies/passtimes/relaxation/personaltime, sleep, grooming, family, at this time of year holiday hub bub, then relationship a, and on top of that relationship b. There just isn't enough time in the day/week/month to fit everything in with the kind of intence passion cat is talking about. Something has to give sometimes, and it's been my experience that it's usually the relationship that isn't in your face 24/7.

Now I'm not saying that it can't be passionate, loving, and fulfilling, no I'm not saying that at all. What I am saying is that as hard as it is to imagine having a relationship so full of passion that they write novels based on it, it's even harder for me to imagine that with two relationships going on at the same time.

I gotcha..and I see your point wenchie. I guess the difference is I'm ok with having the passion, loving, and fulfillment I get from being poly. I don't need a storybook romance. I'm very happy with what I have. Honestly I wouldn't be happy in my life if I was stuck in a box and couldn't be poly.Even if it meant having a relationship that novels could be written about. It would not be fulfilling to ME. So I can see the point there, and I agree. It's just not for me. It doesn't bother me that others can be happy that way. I guess I was just missing the point there.

 

[Netzach]

I didn't mean to imply that it can't exist, netz. Only that I could see how it would be hard to imagine that it could exist. Just as it's hard to imagine any one could have a relationship like romance novels 24/7. Same dish, different cook.

If they really do include things like dirty dishes, kids and aching joints I am forced to agree with you.

 

[nh23]

If they really do include things like dirty dishes, kids and aching joints I am forced to agree with you.

Ah, thank you. This was the point I was trying to get across yesterday. Life can't always be some romantic story all the time. Life gets in the way. That's reality, not being cold. That's just the way it is.

 

[Netzach]

Ah, thank you. This was the point I was trying to get across yesterday. Life can't always be some romantic story all the time. Life gets in the way. That's reality, not being cold. That's just the way it is.

The same people who are freaking out over the dismissal of romanticism now are the first in line to laugh at newbies who are caught up in silly story of O brain fantasies and point out how very very complex and serious slavery is, so I'm confused, actually.

I think love and romance can totally absorb and handle the entirety of everyday life, and do it in intense fashion. I don't think they transform dirty dishes though and I don't think that kind of love is written about. The dirty dishes are where the narrative drops off. I mean in the giant story that is the narrative of me and M I don't *remember* the night we watched South Park and had leftover chicken 8 months ago, I remember when he proposed. We edit our own reality even.

I can sit around and also lay claim to my love for him being as great as Solomon and Sheba, Diarmud and Grainne, Bonnie and Clyde - and if you look at the parts that are so mundane as to be below notice the same relationship is watching paint dry. It's both. It's all that stuff.

 

[nh23]

The same people who are freaking out over the dismissal of romanticism now are the first in line to laugh at newbies who are caught up in silly story of O brain fantasies.

*nods*

 

[nh23]

The same people who are freaking out over the dismissal of romanticism now are the first in line to laugh at newbies who are caught up in silly story of O brain fantasies and point out how very very complex and serious slavery is, so I'm confused, actually.

I think love and romance can totally absorb and handle the entirety of everyday life, and do it in intense fashion. I don't think they transform dirty dishes though and I don't think that kind of love is written about. The dirty dishes are where the narrative drops off. I mean in the giant story that is the narrative of me and M I don't *remember* the night we watched South Park and had leftover chicken 8 months ago, I remember when he proposed. We edit our own reality even.

I can sit around and also lay claim to my love for him being as great as Solomon and Sheba, Diarmud and Grainne, Bonnie and Clyde - and if you look at the parts that are so mundane as to be below notice the same relationship is watching paint dry. It's both. It's all that stuff.

Yes, this is what Bunny and I were talking about yesterday. It's beautiful yeah, but it's reality. You take the good, you take the bad. When it's exciting, and when it's boring. It's life. Not a fantasy.*****.

 

[BiBunny]

Ok, I'm too lazy to go back and quote all the posts I want to respond to because this thread took off last night after Kitty and I went over to our friends' place to drink whiskey and play Risk. But I digress.

First and foremost, let's get this over with right now. No matter what I said previously in this thread about having been a submissive once before, that doesn't mean I have any desire to find "Master Right" or whatever the hell we're calling him these days. I don't just need to find the right Dom to change my mind about anything, thanks. I never felt a deep, burning need to submit before my one foray into submission, and I don't feel it now, either. Toppy-leaning switchdom with occasional bottoming to a friend who understands what "NO SUBMISSION" means is fine for me.

Secondly, I've only said this a thousand times before, but I suppose I'll say it again. Loving more than one person only takes time/energy/happiness/whatever away from the first (or second or third) relationship if you allow it to. It's funny how the people who claim to know so much about why poly is so "bad" are the people who've never experienced it. If it doesn't work for you, fine. But don't tell me that my choices aren't just as valid as yours just because I don't do things just the way you do. You never know where you may be in ten years. I can tell you I was seriously shaken up when I realized that it is indeed possible for one person to have more than one soulmate (if you believe in that sort of thing).

Finally, I don't think that the way I view things is cold at all. I can love incredibly deeply, and I doubt people here would even recognize me if they saw me around any of those aforementioned soulmates. I just have a healthy dose of cynicism and realism thrown in for good measure. "Love," just as an entity or emotion, can't heal everything. It's the things you do because you love someone that makes everything work out. I think often there's a big disconnect between what people say and what they do. It's the doing that counts. The saying, not so much.

 

[ecstaticsub]

I can have both..my reality and a fantasy life. If life was just dirty dishes, work, cleaning toilets, helping with homework and being alone while my husband was fighting a war and my Dom was with his wife 3 time zones away I would go crazy.

My reality is a mixture of the mundane and fantasy romantic elements with both my husband and my Dom. And I like it like that.

But I don't see where all that has anything to do with submission as a gift. I am not some great and perfect being to be given on a silver platter but my submission is something special. It is not necessarily romantic, it is simply what it is--at the time just an promise to obey and to learn to be what he would want me to be. Whoever said gifts had to be perfect? lol

 

[intothewoods]

It's the things you do because you love someone that makes everything work out. I think often there's a big disconnect between what people say and what they do. It's the doing that counts. The saying, not so much.

I think this often lately. Love is more than a feeling. In some ways, it's a choice. And actions do speak louder than words.

 

[BiaTcHiNFiRe]

I think submission is what you make of it. For me and my Sir it's a gift as we see it the same way and honeslty I don't care at all if others here see it the same way as we do. What matters to me is what my Sir think about it and the way he sees it. I am giving him all of me and he's giving me all of him.

We haven't meet IRL yet so some of you might call it fantasy, just words or whatever, but one day we will meet. I know we will cuz we both want it. I will wait months maybe years? I dunno and I don't care either, for me it's wort it, he's worth it. You call it fantasy - I call it love.

 

[nh23]

I think submission is what you make of it. For me and my Sir it's a gift as we see it the same way and honeslty I don't care at all if others here see it the same way as we do. What matters to me is what my Sir think about it and the way he sees it. I am giving him all of me and he's giving me all of him.

We haven't meet IRL yet so some of you might call it fantasy, just words or whatever, but one day we will meet. I know we will cuz we both want it. I will wait months maybe years? I dunno and I don't care either, for me it's wort it, he's worth it. You call it fantasy - I call it love.

That's all that should matter to you. Your opinions are yours..mine are mine. We don't have to see things the same way. We may debate it and get a better understanding of each other's mindsets, but at the end of the day we both still feel the same way we did..and that's the beautiful thing about it.

My opinion of whether or not your online relationship is a fantasy or not doesn't mean crap. If it's real to you that's all that matters..and all that should matter. The only thing that I would caution is that fantasy does not always match reality. It's great that you love him so much and things are going good for you. I'm happy for you. I just wouldn't put so much into it that you could be crushed if you ever met and things weren't as they seemed. But, that applies with every relationship. Online or R/L. Until you really know someone, you're always taking that chance. And even once you do know someone people have been known to change.

 

[BiBunny]

If submission is what you make of it, then why do we have 6 pages of people saying that folks like nh, Netz, and I just need to "find the right man" to know what submission is? Ok, submission is what you make (or, in some of our cases, don't make) of it. End of thread.

 

[unfoundiamond]

hrmmm...

WOW this thread got wild...

HEY, I am just coomenting on some things I saw, NO person in perticular, I don't even remember who said what so if you said something and I comment on it, this isn't directed at you okay? Okay!

, I hate it when people tell me things like "you haven't met the right man"... its annoying for the fact I find it patronizing... and LIFE ISN'T one size fits all people... maybe it'll be Mrs Right... or formally Mr and now Ms Right, who fucking knows... but that's too presumptuous IMO...
Which is why I used "Master Right" nice umbrella term... use umbrella terms people!

Okay and,

Why is it such a crime to believe my submission is worth something, and seek out my perfectly complimenting match to give it to?

AND when I find this person (see, nice and general hehe *wink*)

Why can't I believe I bring something to the table and talk about it to other people(not the Dom/me) I wouldn't say to the person directly, I would show them. A lot of people say lots, but do very little, I personally believe people who talk a lot aren't the ones who really are about action, I preffer to show things, (like I show I am smart, rather than say it) the only exception is here, where I have to explain since we can only read each others words...

People keep saying submissives think their submission is such a big deal, and dangle it like a carrot... I think these statements give the connotation that submission is somehow less than... and I think people should know what they have to offer and have some pride about themself

There's nothing wrong with that. People who don't appreciate what they are and have to offer try to make others feel like they do... they try to make others feel small (I don't identify as a sub BTW)

I just think sometimes when you're not submissive in nature and you admire someone so much and want to learn from them and choose to give this person control on many levels, and I am talking even if you don't want to, or want to protest (in life, in sex) but bite your toungue because you see this person has a vision and you want to help make that come true, and you trust the person... and want to please them, and know you want to take on the personal lessons and growth at the expense of some pain and frustration in conditioning yourself to really be strong enough to hold your toungue and not be disrespectful or when you are told to do something and you might be a little scared and you take that leap of faith first step, and you heart is pounding.... Submission is amazing people and don't downplay it... Its diffrent than calling the shots, and I never said I didn't see my PYL as a gift... and I do,

So why does the tread have to be done,
Lets beat the dead cow! Haha Jk

 

[BiaTcHiNFiRe]

If submission is what you make of it, then why do we have 6 pages of people saying that folks like nh, Netz, and I just need to "find the right man" to know what submission is? Ok, submission is what you make (or, in some of our cases, don't make) of it. End of thread.

Well I said that cuz I do see submission as a gift yes. You see it as a attitude tho. Thats why I said submission is what you make of it. You see it this way, I see it that way and we won't ever agree cuz you won't agree with me and I won't agree with you either. I think it's personal and as I said only thing that really matters to me is how my Sir sees it.