Where do I fit in? Or BiBunny's Proxy thread

[Homburg]

I understand why the same questions, asked over & over, deter one from responding multiple times. But actually pointing out that the question has been asked ad nauseam seems both unnecessary and a deterrent to the posting of queries from the inexperienced or new.

I've noticed that, and was bothered by it. Doubly bothered when the Search function seems about as reliable as a Magic 8-Ball. Having used the search once or twice for threads that I patently knew existed, and still came up with naught, I am more understanding when I see someone else posts a topic that appears redundant.

 

[Kajira Callista]

As KC wrote:



Change "girl" into "boy" and you have me... couldn't have said it better.

I don't really fit into any BDSM community. Have very few experiences. My relationship is pure vanilla - rich, full flavored, but still vanilla. But still, I like to hang around and learn; mostly because if I was to move towards an "alternative lifestyle", it would be something along the lines of some kind or an other of BDSM. And because over the years I've found some food for thoughts from some conttributors.

As for fitting in ... I'd rather remain silent and have other think I'm dumb and stupid than speaking up and make certain I'm dumb and stupid.

maybe the same but for opposite reasons

 

[Sir_Winston54]

... the language barrier is always there ...

Language barrier? You have trouble deciphering our misuses of English?

(Because there's nothing of substance wrong with your use of the language!)

 

[Sir_Winston54]

There is always always always someone whose SM experience level blows yours out of the water. No matter who you are. You will never be an expert in every single thing there is to be an expert on. I never considered myself an A level Domme, maybe a B+ level Domme if you stuck to the things I know well otherwise a B and even a C if you threw me in with a trampling and CBT hardcore person. No one does everything perfectly.

I think it's a *good* thing that I can still find people whose skills I'm madly jealous of 10 years into it.

AMEN x infinity! Sing it, Sister!

 

[chauderlos]

The receptiveness of this board to the inexperienced seems to come and go in waves.

At certain times, and for reasons that are not always readily apparent, various people here will respond to questions with more or less polite versions of: "Good grief, we've been asked that a thousand times already, go read in the library (duh!) and come back when you've got something interesting to ask or say."

I understand why the same questions, asked over & over, deter one from responding multiple times. But actually pointing out that the question has been asked ad nauseam seems both unnecessary and a deterrent to the posting of queries from the inexperienced or new.

That's what I wanted to point out when I said I'd rather stay hidden. I don't really care if people around here consider me "fitting" or "not fitting", but taking flak for some misplaced question or misuse of language is a deterrent, yes. I remember once being chastisied by a PYL because I used "kink" instead of "lifestyle"...

Ohh, and

maybe the same but for opposite reasons

May I still stay in the dark corner?

 

[Kajira Callista]

May I still stay in the dark corner?

nods and makes some room

 

[Sir_Winston54]

... taking flak for some misplaced question or misuse of language is a deterrent, yes. I remember once being chastisied by a PYL because I used "kink" instead of "lifestyle"...

Hopefully, you told that PYL to shove his/her "lifestyle" where da sun don't shine...

And I prefer to use "culture," because "lifestyle" implies that it's a choice, whereas "culture" implies that it's something inherent in one's person/personality, e.g., being Irish-American, etc... but that's my preference, and others can call it whatever they damn please as far as I'm concerned. (But then, language is important to me - probably more important than it should be - and I try to say things as clearly as possible to avoid misunderstandings, or having to explain myself. Unfortunately, I still often have to explain myself because I sometimes assume more common ground with words and their usages, and with experience, than exists. <Sigh>)

 

[CutieMouse]

*****

 

[DeservingBitch]

There are two constants to every damn marginalized/deviant communities:

First, they don't 'fit in' the mainstream, and in many ways, what holds the community together is its sense of not 'fitting in', of being different.

Second, because this difference from the mainstream is central to this sense of community, but also because said difference is the very reason for the attack/non-acceptance from the mainstream, protecting this difference becomes a question of survival: if we (whoever the 'we' is) don't police carefully the boundaries of what makes us 'us' (ie, our difference), then 'we' disappear.

LGBT, BDSM, immigrants diaspora/communities, leftish activist groups, etc.: i've seen the above in all marginalizedd/deviant communities i've been part of and/or worked with.

It's understandable, but alienating for most people. Because at one point or another, everyone is going to feel not queer enough, not D/s enough, too assimilated, not activist enough, etc. for the standards of the community, and too queer, too freak, too foreigner, too idealists for the standards of the mainstream.

The way out is for those communities to stop defining themselves against the mainstream. Easier said than done however, since the mainstream is surprinsingly efficient at not allowing much space to think outside of its own boundaries.

Until The Revolution comes though (yeah right), I always find that it helps to remind myself that the problem is larger than me. I don't fit in because we live in a fucked up world where only a very few people are given the privilege of 'fitting in'.

 

[Homburg]

Random rambly thing...

I've noticed there are people who will comment on how they are "newbies to the lifestyle", but sometimes the people saying that have several years of a D/s relationship under their belt, which makes me wonder is there some magical point at which one stops being a "newbie"? It's always caught me off guard, because I have far less experience than most who claim "newbie" status, but I see myself as inexperienced, rather than seeing myself as a "newbie"...

Excessively complex response...

I consider myself to be a beginner, newb, inexperienced, what-have-you. When people ask how long I've been involved in the lifestyle, I answer "a coupla years". "v" and I entered into it in 2002, so technically it has been five years, but we took some time off during that. Well, I did, because, bluntly stated, I lost my mojo. When I rediscovered my mojo, we jumped right back in swinging, and haven't looked back. So, technically, I've got experience. And I can honestly say that 2002 was just the official entry. We've had bondage and spanking and such as part of our sex lives ever since we've been together (16 years). But I still consider myself a beginner.

There's a couple of reasons for this. The first is that, damn, when I look at guys like Sir Winston, my experience is minimal, and that is being kind. Second is that I want to retain the Beginner Mind as long as possible. It's a concept that picked up from an article written by a powerlifter I like. (Yeah, a powerlifter, big fat guys that lift mind-blowing weights through very short ROM. Woo.*) Still, he talked about how beginners make the best gains of anybody.

When you first start out in something, you are tabula rasa, and are ready for your slate to be filled by experience, instruction, etc. When you have some experience, your slate has been scribbled on, and you have set ideas. It becomes harder to learn because your preconceived notions get in the way, and you view everything through the lens of what you already know.

By keeping that Beginner Mind, I try to avoid letting my notions get in the way of what others can teach me. Am I a newb? Not really. Don't feel like one. But I am a Beginner, and am happy to consider myself such. I'll keep on considering myself a beginner until it is patently obvious that I'm not.

Luckily, I am a beginner, so it's not tough to claim that status


* - I lift like a powerlifter. I train like a powerlifter when I'm not being a slack-ass. I am a big, fat guy that lifts not-quite-mind-blowing weights through short ROM's. Being part of said subgroup, I can make jokes on said subgroup. Don't get pissed at my comments if you powerlift. Instead, PM me, call me a jackass, and we'll talk training or something. =)

 

[Luna_Wolf72]

Goddess bless, I love this thread. Reading through other people's thoughts about not fitting in has helped me put some of my own thought processes in order. For that, I thank you all (but most especially ADR and BB) Things have been exceedingly weird for me, for the past 2 years and really tipped over in the past month or so...*shrugs* Needless to say, I find that I am once more in need of therapy to work through all the new shit I have discovered about myself.

The few people here who really know me, and accept my weirdness are more important to me then they will ever know, but I find that the longer I am a part of this community, the more I hope to one day be the type of person who no longer has to worry about fitting in. Those of you who already have that thought process are luckier than I can say...

One day, (with the help of my therapist and kinked friends) I may be able to reach that plateau. Wish me luck.

 

[ecstaticsub]

There are two constants to every damn marginalized/deviant communities:

First, they don't 'fit in' the mainstream, and in many ways, what holds the community together is its sense of not 'fitting in', of being different.

Second, because this difference from the mainstream is central to this sense of community, but also because said difference is the very reason for the attack/non-acceptance from the mainstream, protecting this difference becomes a question of survival: if we (whoever the 'we' is) don't police carefully the boundaries of what makes us 'us' (ie, our difference), then 'we' disappear.

LGBT, BDSM, immigrants diaspora/communities, leftish activist groups, etc.: i've seen the above in all marginalizedd/deviant communities i've been part of and/or worked with.

It's understandable, but alienating for most people. Because at one point or another, everyone is going to feel not queer enough, not D/s enough, too assimilated, not activist enough, etc. for the standards of the community, and too queer, too freak, too foreigner, too idealists for the standards of the mainstream.

The way out is for those communities to stop defining themselves against the mainstream. Easier said than done however, since the mainstream is surprinsingly efficient at not allowing much space to think outside of its own boundaries.

Until The Revolution comes though (yeah right), I always find that it helps to remind myself that the problem is larger than me. I don't fit in because we live in a fucked up world where only a very few people are given the privilege of 'fitting in'.

This comment plus some issues my middle school aged daughter is going through brings something up in my head.

Maybe, MOST everybody doesn't fit in. Everyone is different, very different. I'm frustrated as hell this morning because it seems that my daughter thinks being different and not fitting in should give her special consideration and permission to be a bitch. Well, it doesn't. No one person's "difference" makes them more special or grants them permission to be a bitch or to be rude or any more special than the rest of us. Because we all have issues and differences.

I can understand why some people have the need to fit in and the need to be accepted. I've thought about this all morning. I need to talk to my daughter (and her therapist) but I don't let my "differences" define me. I don't think my daughter should either.

If we look around and instead of trying to fit in because of our differences, maybe we should concentrate on those things that are the same. Maybe everyone in the world would get along a little better if everyone did that, too.

Or maybe not...lol I hope I didn't offend anyone by this--anyone who has been through middle school or has a middle school daughter -you may understand..

 

[Netzach]

Not only do I not fit in, if you take a lot of social contexts, but I am wary of people who can navigate the mainstream with ease. Maybe it's an unfair bias, but I resent the power that gives them, and I'm assuming they've divorced themselves from most of their wants and needs in order to do it, or have no concept of what's really important, because the mainstream pretty much is:

get lots of stuff, numb yourself to the fact that you die.

I'm ok with having other priorities.

 

[DeservingBitch]

I'm certainly biased too (although I'm not convinced that I am being unfairly so) toward people i see negociating smoothly their 'fit' in whatever communities they are part of, and probably more so in the mainstream. To me, such people are that comfortable either because they are one of those very few people who benefit from our fucked up world on the back of everybody else, or because they somehow manage to be completely out of touch with their selves and their own alienation. Both are suspicious to me.

 

[the captians wench]

Excessively complex response...

I consider myself to be a beginner, newb, inexperienced, what-have-you. When people ask how long I've been involved in the lifestyle, I answer "a coupla years". "v" and I entered into it in 2002, so technically it has been five years, but we took some time off during that. Well, I did, because, bluntly stated, I lost my mojo. When I rediscovered my mojo, we jumped right back in swinging, and haven't looked back. So, technically, I've got experience. And I can honestly say that 2002 was just the official entry. We've had bondage and spanking and such as part of our sex lives ever since we've been together (16 years). But I still consider myself a beginner.

There's a couple of reasons for this. The first is that, damn, when I look at guys like Sir Winston, my experience is minimal, and that is being kind. Second is that I want to retain the Beginner Mind as long as possible. It's a concept that picked up from an article written by a powerlifter I like. (Yeah, a powerlifter, big fat guys that lift mind-blowing weights through very short ROM. Woo.*) Still, he talked about how beginners make the best gains of anybody.

When you first start out in something, you are tabula rasa, and are ready for your slate to be filled by experience, instruction, etc. When you have some experience, your slate has been scribbled on, and you have set ideas. It becomes harder to learn because your preconceived notions get in the way, and you view everything through the lens of what you already know.

By keeping that Beginner Mind, I try to avoid letting my notions get in the way of what others can teach me. Am I a newb? Not really. Don't feel like one. But I am a Beginner, and am happy to consider myself such. I'll keep on considering myself a beginner until it is patently obvious that I'm not.

Luckily, I am a beginner, so it's not tough to claim that status


* - I lift like a powerlifter. I train like a powerlifter when I'm not being a slack-ass. I am a big, fat guy that lifts not-quite-mind-blowing weights through short ROM's. Being part of said subgroup, I can make jokes on said subgroup. Don't get pissed at my comments if you powerlift. Instead, PM me, call me a jackass, and we'll talk training or something. =)

What I find funny is that when I called myself a newbie, I had a lot of people telling me there was no way. *giggles* I was fortunit in that I had friends who were more than willing to help me explore...fresh meat has it's apeals especailly when it's eager and willing to trade costumes for experience. *giggles* I did gain a lot of experience fairly quickly when it came to the physical aspects of BDSM, but seeing as I only had either emotional, or physical experience with a person in this realm, and not both, I didn't feel like I had enough experience under my belt to feel well experienced. I still don't feel experienced and I have people in my life telling me "that's really great to hear coming from some one as experienced as you". wtf? My responce is always "I'm not that experienced really" Deffinitly not experienced enough to become some sort of guru to the kinky.

I was talking about this with a friend a couple of weeks ago actually. It seems like our personal ideas of how experienced we are, doesn't matter as much to other people as how experienced they feel you are. When I got involved in bdsm, my first experience was with knife play. I jumped in with both feet. With in 3 months I was having regular pain sessions, learning floggers, whips, and ropes with a hands on aproach, and was something of a model for weekly demos. Yet I felt like a newbie, but people looking at what I had experienced judged me differently and asumed that I had been doing this for years rather than months. I guess it just came naturally. She had much the same experience, tho on a different level admitedly.

As to the question of "where do I belong" and " where do I fit in", I'm finding that my answers are changing, and where at one point I was confident I knew, now I'm not as sure. And looking back, I notice that even when I was confident I knew, my answers changed a lot. I knew I was a sub and would be nothing else. I knew I was a slave, and could be happy being nothing else. I knew I was a pet and would for ever be. I knew I was monogimous and could never be happy sharing. I knew I alot of things, that I don't know so well anymore.

 

[intothewoods]

Not only do I not fit in, if you take a lot of social contexts, but I am wary of people who can navigate the mainstream with ease. Maybe it's an unfair bias, but I resent the power that gives them, and I'm assuming they've divorced themselves from most of their wants and needs in order to do it, or have no concept of what's really important, because the mainstream pretty much is:

get lots of stuff, numb yourself to the fact that you die.

I'm ok with having other priorities.

While I'm really not Ms. Normal FitsInEverywhere or anything, I do have a funny story on this.

There have been plenty of times when I come to my group's happy our event straight from the office, looking pretty corporate. Not that people come in fetish wear, but most people go home first and put on something sexy, or casual. I also have kind of a young looking face. Anyway, the host of the restaurant/bar where it's held will often look at me and ask, table for one? And then our usual waiter will tap him, laugh and say, no, she's upstairs.

Of course I always tease my friends in the group. YOU people are clearly freaks. Me? I'm totally normal. In fact, I obviously wandered in here by mistake!

 

[A Desert Rose]

This has been a really interesting read. It's amazing how we view ourselves and how differently we are viewed by others (judging only by my internal responses to some of yours.) In other words, I don't see some of you in the same way you describe yourselves.

I think the best I ever felt like I fit in was as a Rotarian. Well, actually it was the entire decade+ that I lived in a smallish town in Nevada. I was on at one time 4 different community/service based boards and organizations. (Salvation Army, School board, fair board... those types of things.) But I loved Rotary and still do. I was president of my club twice and it gave me an opportunity to do some real good works for our town.

And all the while I was a closet kinkster. ;-)

Living outside now, some family upheavels, leaving good friends behind and living in a kind of limbo, between my mother's in AZ and Las Vegas has left me very unsettled. Eventually, I will go back to Las Vegas for good but I can't make it permenant for a while, considering the medical issues my mother has.

I keep a couple of my jobs in Las Vegas so still feel like that's home. And I go to the NV Cancer Institue for all my medical care which also keeps me connected to HOME. Michael lives there. I don't see him moving from there anytime and especially not anytime in the near future.

But I can't make a long range goal that in 20__ I will be back there forever and permenantly. I'm a very goal oriented person and that leaves me kinda feeling at loose ends all the time. When I'm asked where I live, Las Vegas is always my response. I'm there half the time, anyway.

I try to make my life normal, as normal as possible and the fact that I have 2 kids (one living in AZ and one in Las Vegas) makes both feel like home to me, to some degree. It would be nice to have a HOME for them to come to for the holidays, though. I guess this year HOME will be gramma's and that will be okay. ;-)

I guess HOME is an important factor for me when it comes to feeling a fittment (in Homburg's words). It's the first place I think I would feel like I fit in... HOME.

 

[Netzach]

While I'm really not Ms. Normal FitsInEverywhere or anything, I do have a funny story on this.

There have been plenty of times when I come to my group's happy our event straight from the office, looking pretty corporate. Not that people come in fetish wear, but most people go home first and put on something sexy, or casual. I also have kind of a young looking face. Anyway, the host of the restaurant/bar where it's held will often look at me and ask, table for one? And then our usual waiter will tap him, laugh and say, no, she's upstairs.

Of course I always tease my friends in the group. YOU people are clearly freaks. Me? I'm totally normal. In fact, I obviously wandered in here by mistake!

I've often shown up in pretty Banana Republicky stuff, more so now than ever before. And somehow, it doesn't fool people much.

 

[BiBunny]

I've often shown up in pretty Banana Republicky stuff, more so now than ever before. And somehow, it doesn't fool people much.

That doesn't surprise me in the least.

 

[rida]

Language barrier? You have trouble deciphering our misuses of English?

(Because there's nothing of substance wrong with your use of the language!)

thanks
but the fact remain that it takes me double the time to read a thread and four times the time to write a post that still doesn't convey what I am trying to ...
on the other hand if I could just talk instead of typing ... I'd never shut up! LOL

 

[rida]

.....

I guess HOME is an important factor for me when it comes to feeling a fittment (in Homburg's words). It's the first place I think I would feel like I fit in... HOME.

This made me think about where do I think HOME is ... and I realized that, as corny as it may sound, I knew I was HOME when I met my now Hubby. If I am with him, I am HOME.

 

[Netzach]

thanks
but the fact remain that it takes me double the time to read a thread and four times the time to write a post that still doesn't convey what I am trying to ...
on the other hand if I could just talk instead of typing ... I'd never shut up! LOL

I don't think except for your having mentioned it, that I'd have the remotest idea you are not a native speaker, maybe if I really combed your posts.

 

[intothewoods]

I've often shown up in pretty Banana Republicky stuff, more so now than ever before. And somehow, it doesn't fool people much.

I just look different than what people expect, I guess. Lol, I don't fit in! I don't know - most of my friends have said I look like the Irish version of the girl next door.

 

[CutieMouse]

*****

 

[intothewoods]

Last munch I went to, I wore a black cami-tank, jeans and stilettos... everyone assumed I was a Domme.

Ohhh, I did get this too - I dress sexy librarian most of the time, but I think it was more my personality. I'm pretty outgoing and I like to crack jokes.