The Vulnerablilty of Dominants

[rosco rathbone]

Betrayal I think is one of the most painful things. When you realize that the thing you liked this whole time was fake, thats not a good experience. Feels totally powerless, belittled, humiliating, played... fooled.

Perfect.

I guess I have this bogus idea of doms in my head where you'd never get "played" and, if you did, you'd never admit that it bothered you.

 

[ataxia.girl]

So true.

PMS should really just be seen as another form of entertainment.

i don't think i would have found this funny back when i actually used to get PMS.

i my patch

 

[Homburg]

I've never really understood the idea of hiding away vulnerability, and producing fronts in an attempt to show some robotic, unnassailable front. Nothing in the world seems more fake to me. The people that I know that are always in tip top emotional state are the ones that are the least stable, least able to handle real emotional change, tec. In short, they're weak people that try to hide their weakness, and the result is a facade that advertises that weakness for all to see.

The only person I know that really is that unnassailably strong is more of a dead fish than anything. He puts up no front, he simply doesn't feel. When he does, it gets dangerous. So, sure, not everyone with that 200ft granite wall around their emotions is hiding some secret pain, but that is usually the case in my experience.

With me, I recognise my vulnerability, and make no secret of it. Why should I? Anyone truly worth being in a relationship will figure it out anyway, so why set up a falsehood on a foundational level? I'm not trying to produce a fantasy, I'm trying to produce a functional relationship.

So, in my case, admitting that I am human is "best practice". I fear no misjudging that way, and fear no one "finding out". Hiding that sort of shit takes energy, time, and makes you look like a fake to anyone with an ounce of perception. Not worth it, in my opinion.

--

Edit:

An additional, if separate thought:

It all comes back to fantasy versus reality. I don't have some fantasy of being the leather-clad, unfeeling, uber-dom, and I don't wish to portray that fantasy. I'm just a forceful guy that likes to hurt the people I'm fucking. I don't need to put on a show in my own bedroom.

 

[rosco rathbone]

I talk the talk of communication, openness, and so forth pretty darn well, having learned all the boilerplate in therapy. When it comes to walking the walk, though, I find that I'm super-uncomfortable without a majorly tight grip on my emotions, and I'm positive showing much of anything will be equated with weakness.

 

[Homburg]

Well, when I was younger, I was a wee bit more tightly wound. The breakthrough for me came when I realised that I could hold something in my hand without hiding it, and that I could control without suppressing. Unfortunately that realisation happened when I was fairly young, so I honestly don't recall the thought processes that got me there.

I will say that I still absolutely fucking hate it when I cry in front of anyone. It happens though. Thankfully infrequently, but it still occurs. I think I'm healthier for admitting it. Then again, I'm fond of being human, even with all the mess that the title implies.

Now if I could only get more comfortable with pissing in public restrooms, I'd be set.

 

[rosco rathbone]

I will teach you to piss if you teach me to cry.

 

[ataxia.girl]

I'm positive showing much of anything will be equated with weakness.

i find more and more that i can smell and recognize the fear in PYL's who refuse to show emotion. Experiencing emotion, displaying it, and acting on it is not all one thing. Sometimes displaying it is acting on it and sometimes it isn't. i do believe too many people try too hard not to experience difficult or painful emotion. i'm kind of learning to just let myself go ahead and feel whatever i feel, without feeling guilty about it, and then just roll through it to the next emotion. Fighting it without any kind of expression seems to actually prolong it.

i have to say i have very much appreciated the times i have been beaten in controlled anger.

 

[ataxia.girl]

I will teach you to piss if you teach me to cry.

i've taught a few men to cry. i'm sure they are better for it.

 

[rosco rathbone]

i find more and more that i can smell and recognize the fear in PYL's who refuse to show emotion. Experiencing emotion, displaying it, and acting on it is not all one thing. Sometimes displaying it is acting on it and sometimes it isn't. i do believe too many people try too hard not to experience difficult or painful emotion. i'm kind of learning to just let myself go ahead and feel whatever i feel, without feeling guilty about it, and then just roll through it to the next emotion. Fighting it without any kind of expression seems to actually prolong it.

i have to say i have very much appreciated the times i have been beaten in controlled anger.

I guess it depends on the emotion. Some don't seem as shameful as others.

 

[rosco rathbone]

i've taught a few men to cry. i'm sure they are better for it.

The offer stands.

Teach me to cry and I'll have you pissing in public in no time.

 

[Homburg]

I will teach you to piss if you teach me to cry.

That is the single most unexpected statement ever in my time on these boards.

I'm honestly not sure how. From about seven years old, the only time I ever cried was when I was so enraged that I was ready commit murder. Then it was tears coming out because I'd clamped down so tight that nothing else could get out. The first time I cried in public for non-anger-related reasons was at my grandfather's funeral.

I was in the house when he died, and it didn't really affect me. He was a shattered wreck from black lung and too many strokes, and was a tortured shadow of the brilliant, engaging Man that I grew up knowing. So when he died, I saw it as an end to the indignity that he hated with a passion. It was long coming too, so everyone knew it, expected it, and no one was surprised.

My grandmother didn't cry. She didn't cry when he died, when the hearse came, anything. She didn't cry during the service or the viewing. As the viewing was winding down, Gram went outside, telling everyone she needed to smoke (a habit that killed her). I was so damned sick and tired of the funeral home that I went out a few minutes later.

I found her standing on the stoop shaking and crying quietly. While I didn't feel bad for my grandfather, myself, or anyone else, in that one moment I saw a tired old woman who was facing the day without the man that had woken up beside her for the past almost fifty years. I could feel how damned lost she was. I put my arms around her, mumbled something, and stood there cying, tears just running down my face.

To this day I don't cry easily for myself. It's not in me to weep over my life's vagaries. But I am sometimes all too aware of the pain and loss in others. So epmathy will cause it in me. Honestly, why cry for myself? I'd rather spend that emotional capital fixing whatever is wrong with me. But others that I deeply care about? Well, sometimes I just can't help them, and that is what tears me up.

I think it was standing there crying and realising that it was okay, that anyone would understand they saw me, let alone knew why. I think that was what did it. That moment of understanding that sometimes it's okay. Hell, my grandfather had just died, and I was holding my weeping grandmother.

I think it was also getting comfortable with me, with the decision to not sweat the opinions of others in this area. If I really was as strong as I thought I was, then it wouldn't matter if I showed some weakness here and there. I would still be seen as strong because I was, plain and simple, and it wouldn't matter, in the end how I was seen anyway. Perfection is a lie. Character is built on a foundation of flaws first, and competencies later.

 

[rosco rathbone]

That is the single most unexpected statement ever in my time on these boards.

I'm honestly not sure how. From about seven years old, the only time I ever cried was when I was so enraged that I was ready commit murder. Then it was tears coming out because I'd clamped down so tight that nothing else could get out. The first time I cried in public for non-anger-related reasons was at my grandfather's funeral.

I was in the house when he died, and it didn't really affect me. He was a shattered wreck from black lung and too many strokes, and was a tortured shadow of the brilliant, engaging Man that I grew up knowing. So when he died, I saw it as an end to the indignity that he hated with a passion. It was long coming too, so everyone knew it, expected it, and no one was surprised.

My grandmother didn't cry. She didn't cry when he died, when the hearse came, anything. She didn't cry during the service or the viewing. As the viewing was winding down, Gram went outside, telling everyone she needed to smoke (a habit that killed her). I was so damned sick and tired of the funeral home that I went out a few minutes later.

I found her standing on the stoop shaking and crying quietly. While I didn't feel bad for my grandfather, myself, or anyone else, in that one moment I saw a tired old woman who was facing the day without the man that had woken up beside her for the past almost fifty years. I could feel how damned lost she was. I put my arms around her, mumbled something, and stood there cying, tears just running down my face.

To this day I don't cry easily for myself. It's not in me to weep over my life's vagaries. But I am sometimes all too aware of the pain and loss in others. So epmathy will cause it in me. Honestly, why cry for myself? I'd rather spend that emotional capital fixing whatever is wrong with me. But others that I deeply care about? Well, sometimes I just can't help them, and that is what tears me up.

I think it was standing there crying and realising that it was okay, that anyone would understand they saw me, let alone knew why. I think that was what did it. That moment of understanding that sometimes it's okay. Hell, my grandfather had just died, and I was holding my weeping grandmother.

I think it was also getting comfortable with me, with the decision to not sweat the opinions of others in this area. If I really was as strong as I thought I was, then it wouldn't matter if I showed some weakness here and there. I would still be seen as strong because I was, plain and simple, and it wouldn't matter, in the end how I was seen anyway. Perfection is a lie. Character is built on a foundation of flaws first, and competencies later.

I was just being silly, but your post is good.

I haven't cried from empathy, but mainly from feelings of guilt or shame. I've cried when it was pointed out to me irrefutably that I was the bad guy in this or that situation and I felt bad about it.

 

[Kajira Callista]

I was just being silly, but your post is good.

I haven't cried from empathy, but mainly from feelings of guilt or shame. I've cried when it was pointed out to me irrefutably that I was the bad guy in this or that situation and I felt bad about it.

You need someone to bake you a pie uncle rosco.

 

[bridgeburner]

I talk the talk of communication, openness, and so forth pretty darn well, having learned all the boilerplate in therapy. When it comes to walking the walk, though, I find that I'm super-uncomfortable without a majorly tight grip on my emotions, and I'm positive showing much of anything will be equated with weakness.

I'm a past master at hiding the hurt for just that reason. Even my closest friends generally think I do that sort of thing because I'm being gracious and don't want the perpetrator to feel like an ass. Little do they know it has nothing to do with putting the jerk at ease and everything to do with appearing invulnerable and unassailable.

Like Michael says - everybody hurts....but they only win if they KNOW they hurt me.

 

[rosco rathbone]

Like Michael says - everybody hurts....but they only win if they KNOW they hurt me.

THat's exactly how I feel, too.

 

[Netzach]

Perfect.

I guess I have this bogus idea of doms in my head where you'd never get "played" and, if you did, you'd never admit that it bothered you.

Wasn't I saying this back on page one? That when we get hurt, it's not just the hurt it's the obvious lack of control of situation that really really stings.

 

[Homburg]

I was just being silly, but your post is good.

Good show. I really do hate to piss in public restrooms though. Not so much that I can't do it, just that it takes a second or two to get it going, and I hate that I can't just make the damned thing work when I want it to.

I haven't cried from empathy, but mainly from feelings of guilt or shame. I've cried when it was pointed out to me irrefutably that I was the bad guy in this or that situation and I felt bad about it.

I'm pretty much limited to empathy or rage. And, really, both are just extreme frustration that I can't pound the dickens out of whatever has enraged me or fix whatever has triggered the empathy.

--

Wasn't I saying this back on page one? That when we get hurt, it's not just the hurt it's the obvious lack of control of situation that really really stings.

Right in one. Damn.