D/s and Guilt
• Psychology Of Domination
Guilt, that little arrow people fire at you to try and make you bleed, was one of the cornerstones of the abuse I feel I recieved as a child. What guilt does is make you feel you have done something that marks you as somehow bad or evil. Even if it was an accident, the guilt may try to convince you you somehow wanted it to happen.
If your head is an apple, guilt is a worm eating it from the inside. A residual level of self-regulated guilt keeps us in check and in control of ourselves, but when somebody else starts turning the Guilt knob (especially if they are clever) it can seriously mess with your emotional calibration.
One of the few ‘solid theraputic benefits’ I could list that the pretty, pervy band-aid called D/s offers me is a way for me to look my guilt in the eye and then shoot it dead. On occasion I have wondered “Do I really want to make this wonderful man eat the crap off of my shoes?”. Again it’s that little quasi-moral voice babbling on and trying to get you to change.
But obviously, with D/s we know the risks are minimal. Evidently, shoe dirt just isn’t that harmful. The only sensible conclusion, and most everybody agrees with me on this, is that I’m helping Richard.
So during this whole iteration I have summoned the Guilt only to stomp on it yet again. Believe it or not, I used to suffer from a slight guilt complex, but things like being challenged for my cruelness on this site and defending my actions help me to grow wiser and only take heed to the small number of guilt voices that deserve my attention.
Comments
You know that you’ve never done anything to me for which you should feel guilty but it doesn’t hurt to repeat that.
And what you’ve done to me has been very, very good for me indeed.
Posted by: Richard | January 31, 2006 8:45 PM
“Guilt” I love the movie Bull Durham were Susan Sarandon says religion just leaves me with to much guilt.. Yes guilt is a bad and evil thing, but I have come to understand that by the way society thinks I am a bad and evil person, and you know I kind of get off on that in a dark way. At times I have forced my slave to call me evil mommy during a scene Now other guilt’s yes I’m still dealing with them also along with that vicious self-esteem. That’s the cool part of BDSM and life we keep growing and learning! However I don’t look at it as you do and that’s ok, but I would like to say I don’t view it as “I do for my slaves good” What I do is for my pleasure and happiness and he is to take it. The 2nd part is that in making me happy he is happy. So it becomes a very deep bond between us. His happiness comes at a price.
Good bloging
Posted by: Bossy | February 1, 2006 5:52 AM
Bossy, if I gave the impression that I do D/s mainly for Richard’s benefit, then I may have made some mistake with my writing, or you’ve misunderstood it perhaps. There are certainly many ways in which I’m thinking of my pet’s needs, and there’s lots of multi-level reasoning for some of my actions, but overall I think we are 50/50 in terms of benefit.
I get more psychological benefit from D/s than I suspect most do, for my own personal reasons. In addition to a small self-improvement value, there is of course a selfish need, which is essential for any kind of sadism I think.
There comes a point (I think this about Music too) where words and explanations get in the way. But please don’t stop responding - It’s wonderful to hear from likeminded people :)
Posted by: Alexandra | February 3, 2006 8:06 PM