House Tearmainn

So I talked some about insecurities a couple of days back, and that went over well. I suppose I should cover the rest of the story while I’ve still got it in brain… what to do about insecurities once you’ve found them. This is, obviously, one of those things you spend a lifetime working on, and not the sort of thing that has a “one size fits all” answer, but here are a few hard lessons I’ve learned up along the way.

• Listen. If you are lucky enough to have a sub, listen to what they tell you about your behavior. Sure, it’s easy to blow off their opinions as “topping from the bottom” or “unslavelike”, but they (hopefully) focus a tremendous amount of attention on you, and are therefore the best barometer you’ve got. Watch out for phrases like “that felt weird”, “that wasn’t like you”, “you’re acting differently”, etc. For me those have all been clues that my insecurities were driving my actions.
• Ask yourself the hard questions. Why did I want that? Why do I need this? Is this activity going to have negative long term effects that I am unwilling to deal with (sawing off a limb, for example)? Is the way that I’m acting consistent with what I’ve told my slave? That last one is important. Most slaves seem to thrive on consistency, and if you are telling them one thing and doing another it will eventually lead to a lot of hurt and confusion. Whether the words or the actions are the more honest part, insecurity could be the cause.
• Talk. You are the rock, the unyielding solid object around which someone else can build their world. That doesn’t leave a lot of room to be a human being sometimes, and it certainly doesn’t leave you with any less baggage to deal with. If you don’t feel comfortable disgorging your insecurities to your sub, perhaps it’s time to find a local M/s or BDSM group. It’s amazing how truly good it can feel to realize you’re not the only one with these feelings, and especially to find people that you can respect who feel the same way. You don’t have to be perfect, and you don’t have to go it alone.
• Let your ego get stroked, but stay humble. In a likelihood your submissive wants you to feel good and be happy. They’ll want to tell you that you are the most awesomest awesome that ever summed an awe. It may even be true that you are the very best master for that slave, and good on ya! Sometimes a bit of confidence is all it takes to beat those insecurities down. Sometimes you might just need to hear the same thing over and over again, ad nauseum, forever. The problem lies in allowing yourself to believe that you really are the best, the brightest, and the only at everything all of the time. Try to remember that you, your sub, and the relationship are all a work in progress, with the only finished product being death. When you can admit your mistakes you are in control of them. When you can’t they control you.

This all comes across a bit wishy-washy, but if you feel a need to be “hardcore”, emotionally distant from your slave, or acknowledged as perfect (even though you know you’re not, right?) perhaps you should take a look at why. If not, don’t worry. There’s a pretty good chance you’ll have plenty of time to ponder it when your sub leaves. Ok, that was low… but not entirely untrue.

I’m not saying you should allow your slave to tell you who you are, or should be. I’m saying that you should decide that, and if you behave that way consistently they will know when you are acting out of character. I’m not saying that you should second guess yourself all of the time. I’m saying that you should never allow yourself to indulge the fantasy that everything you want and do is right, simply because it’s what you want, or do. I’m not saying that you should use your slave as a therapist. I’m saying that you can be ok with who you are, and that it’s good to hear that other people are ok with it too. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t bask in the worship that you undoubtedly deserve. I’m saying that you should be vigilant in your efforts to continue to deserve it.

Whooee. I am probably dead wrong on at least one thing, but that’s where I stand now. I hope I’m still writing this a year from now and I can categorize this “Embarrassing Old Posts” and replace it with something better. I do realize this comes off as soapbox-ish, but hope that my other posts make the case that I’m not judgmental and only speaking from my own limited experiences.

Insecurity. It destroys relationships and lives faster than you can say “abusive asshole”. It is what drives some of people to become dominant in the first place, and what drives some people away from it once there. I find it pretty ill-defined, though, making it hard to pinpoint what it is, and easy to deny it when it pops up. So let’s start with a definition*:

–adjective

1.	subject to fears, doubts, etc.; not self-confident or assured: an insecure person.

2.	not confident or certain; uneasy; anxious: He was insecure about the examination.

3.	not secure; exposed or liable to risk, loss, or danger: an insecure stock portfolio.

4.	not firmly or reliably placed or fastened: an insecure ladder.

Hmmm. That’s a good start, but still kind of fluffy. How about self-confident?

–noun

1.	realistic confidence in one’s own judgment, ability, power, etc.

2.	excessive or inflated confidence in one’s own judgment, ability, etc.

Ok, so I can triangulate myself at least into the gray area here, but it’s really not concrete enough to be of use in examining my own behavior. In the context of dominance, my feeling is that insecurity is what causes me to act in a more or less dominant way than my nature would dictate. That brings us a bit closer to the ugly truth of things, which is that when I am controlled by my insecurities I am not being honest.

I am tempted to say that my insecurities are based on a lack of information… that if I knew exactly what was going on all the time, I would never be insecure. In truth, that’s crap. Lack of information feeds my insecurities, but I’m sure I could that I could navel gaze reasons for them that extend to past relationships, and even childhood. Where they come from is important, of course, to tearing them down, but that’s not what tonight’s post is about. What I’m talking about tonight is how I identify that feeling that makes a liar out of me, and how I deal with it.

This post isn’t about making things better… it’s about not making them worse. If you want to see how to make things better, time travel a bit into the future I’m sure there will be a post about how to tear down those insecurities and how living honestly as yourself is the best way to build up that self-confidence. I suspect already that I’ve bitten off more than I can chew on this topic tonight.

Insecurity, for me at least, is a reaction. Without spending endless hours detailing the things that make me feel insecure, here is a concrete example. For a while, a fair while, pais and I had trouble with S/m. Truth be told, it extended back at least a decade and through other relationships as well. My problem- a lot of years desperately wanting S/m activities and no opportunity to do so. Leaving me quite experienced with much of relationships, dominance, and love, but not at all with responsibly inflicting pain.

So, the time comes, I have a willing subject. What to do? Up come those insecure feelings… I don’t know what to do. It’s mighty uncool to ask, and I’m not sure who I’d ask anyway. My usual guidepost in these situations is to look to what I want, and see if the desire is feasible. However, when faced with trembling girlflesh and no great experience with what pleases me, the “what I want” query tends to come up with stupid things. (Cue porn music) I know what the right thing is, on some level, I just can’t make myself believe it. Instead I fall back on what I think a sadist (or dominant or master or whatever role is on my mind) should do. Foolishness of the highest order!

Knowing this, I second guess. Then I know I’m second guessing, so I third guess. Finally I decide to just “act like a sadist”, which takes the form of either beating the everloving crap out of her (to my short term satisfaction and long term dismay) or doing less than I would have liked (to my short and long term dismay). In the end I’m not entirely satisfied because I was really trying to satisfy some fictional cardboard cutout of a dominant in my head, and pais is a wreck because she knows when I’m not being myself… and at those times she has no idea what I want.

So how can I tell it’s insecurity about being a sadist that’s the problem? I think it’s when I start fishing around in my head for roles to play. When I feel like what I want isn’t really {whatever} enough. If I feel that twinge of guilt that what I want is wrong, even though I know for a fact that it’s completely acceptable in the current circumstances.

These days I can catch on to that feeling pretty quickly, but I’m not always great at stopping the reaction. What works best is just being honest. Of course that only comes with knowing what I want, which only comes with experience, but at least it’s something. In the meantime the best I can do if I find myself clueless and seeking inspiration is to act like the ideal me, and not like an ideal role.

I think that insecurities are a hugely destructive force in the M/s community. It’s really a pity that acknowledging them makes people feel like they’re fakes. I don’t believe that to be true, I just think it makes them human. If you can’t accept your human frailties and need to play the role of super-dom I suspect that your insecurities are running the show and not you… which actually kind of makes you submissive, doesn’t it?

* Definitions are from my old friend dictionary.com. Perhaps not the best, but serviceable.