Change without loss

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Change without loss

In my column of links to the right of this post I have a link to The Submissive Guide. It's a very useful community for submissives where they can learn from each other, exchange questions and ideas and read a lot of useful articles on different topics. The latest newsletter "Changing for Master and Maintaining Ourselves" made me stop and think.

Is changing yourself for your Master inevitable? Yes, I think so.

All Doms/Masters have different rules, different views and different likes and dislikes. Different things have different meaning and is of differing importance -just like between any two people.

Even in "vanilla" relationships we change ourselves to accommodate the other, we act differently around different people. We act one way with a close friend, one way with a colleague and yet another way with a sibling or a parent, so of course we will also act differently for every person we enter into a relationship with too.

Now, in a D/s relationship that change may be more palpable, it isn't something that "just happens", it's deliberate and it's clearcut; "this is the way I want this, and this is the way I want that" kinda thing -it's rules of engagement rather than just a subtle change to accommodate one another.

In this newsletter the author had read from a submissive's blog where she had written about how she felt she had changed since she'd met her Master and how "she wanted to go back to the more outgoing, social being she had been before she met Him." She pointed out that after all, this was what had attracted Him to her in the first place.

The author (of the newsletter) reacted to this and pondered over how we change for our Masters/Dominants and whether it is a good or a bad thing.

She wrote "Could we lose ourselves in the process of becoming a better submissive/ slave? Or, could we lose what attracted the Dominant to us in the first place?"

Now, I am quite a playful cheeky person, which I struggled with greatly when I first met my Master, that's until I realized that that's one of the things He likes about me -with moderation of course! He doesn't want to change it ( but maybe curb it a little ;) ).

But my point being, that even if they want to change certain things about you it doesn't have to erase you or your personality. Yes, they will most likely show you what is within their acceptable limits and what they like and don't like, but it doesn't have to change you -just your way of expressing it!

She continues the newsletter with describing how she has often "struggle[d] to the point of frustration at being ‘better’ in various ways."  And haven't we all? What I really liked though was how her Master often responded to this by leaving her a note reiterating His philosophy; “All you have to do is be willing to submit. It doesn’t matter if you fail or succeed. What I do with it after is up to Me.”

I really liked that philosophy! Being willing and trying is the most important thing -of course one should strive for success, but in the end it is the effort that counts.

So my conclusion on this is that changing how a person is presenting themselves is completely different to changing who a person is.

Why would one change the very thing that attracted you to the person in the first place?

How does you as a submissive feel you have changed for your Dom? Have you changed something you feel you rather hadn't changed? 

In what way do you as a Dom want to change your submissive? 

After thought:
Isn't there a difference between 'change' and 'shape / mould'? 

Maybe that's where you find the right balance?

To change the submissive's 'bad traits'; the weaknesses and shortcomings but not the person, and to shape the way they service so that it fits into just that Dom's ways?

(But maybe that was a given?)

I don't know, just a thought -I would love to hear your views on this!

With love,