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Noah -> RE: Does Masochism Interfere with Submissiveness? (1/22/2007 2:16:13 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: juliaoceania
There was a question asked a while back that never got a proper answer from my perspective, and that is this:
For those of us "s" types, do you think that your masochism interferes your submissiveness? Do you worry that getting a masochistic fix will become your primary motivation for your submission?
For dominant types, have you noticed a difference between masochist submissives and non masochistic submissives when it comes to the motivations for their submissiveness, just in your experience of course.
I consider myself masochistic, I enjoy pain sometimes just for the sake of it. I used to worry that this would become my motivation for my submissiveness when I first began exploring this part of myself. I no longer worry about that for me personally, it is not my primary motivation, it does not interefere with my submissiveness whatsoever. I can see where it might begin to, if getting that "fix" became more important than doing what I was told, etc. I was wondering what other people's experiences in this regard are.
I don't invest much time in analyzing motivations. As a matter of fact I think that most of what people offer as accounts of their motivations can be dispensed with in the sense that I don't believe we know why we do things, quite generally.
You went to the store. Why? To get milk? But why that store? Closest? Cheapest? Why do you prefer closest or cheapest? Or indeed why did you choose closest and/or cheapest despite "preferring" friendliest or trendiest, or greenest? And why milk? For pancakes. Why pancakes? Did your grandma make you pancakes the morning of the day she died, and in your trauma had you displaced that memory from your conscious mind but does it still impinge somehow?
NOW do we know why you went to the store? Frankly, I doubt it. The thing is that I told you last week to tend to the grocery shopping and you're doing it. We're cool. Why should I sit up nights ruminating over your motivations?
Our actions are conditioned by lots of things, some of which we have some kind of half-assed acccess to, many of which are opaque to us and presumably many more of which are unkown to us and unsuspected by us.
If I should ask you why you did something, it is actually another question in disguise. "What account do you offer as to why you did this?" This in a sense which is very, very different from a request for a report of what actually motivated you, because I don't believe that you know why, in the first place.
If things are going along wonderfully but motivations are suspect, well you can focus on events or focus on largely inaccessible psychological states--or whatever motivations are. I don't even know what they are.
But in a relationship, a close relationship, I have already ruled out concerns about ulterior motives. If those concerns arise then, well I am immediately not concerned about them, interestingly enough. Whatever particular situation happens to be giving rise to my doubts and suspicions about a person is very unimportant in comparison with the greater situation which finds me failing to trust.
I have enough on my plate managing the goings on in my own head. I think it is presumptuous, maybe rude, very toppy (as opposed to dominant) in any case, and mostly pointless to try to occupy someone else's. I'll bracket enough room to go in there for elective forays of psychological or enmotional sadism. That's just entertainment for me, though. I'll be fucked if I'll be chained to your motivations as an ongoing relationship maintenance function.
If the behaviors and the vibe are right, who gives a shit? Direct your energy to something beautiful or something productive, or both, or just relax and go with it.
If either the behaviors or the vibe aren't where I want them, I get to work on the behaviors and the vibe.
If you're wondering about my motivations, or I'm wondering about yours--in any more than a trivial, passing way, then you and I don't belong so close together. That is to say that if I am with someone it is because I believe in that person in a deep way. Whatever her motivations may be, if they motivate behaviors I approve of then they are of no concern to me; I am content with them without knowing them, just as I am content with her blood chemistry without having hourly printout, presuming she's navigating the world and our relationship in a way that pleases me.
I demand a lot. For me to demand all that, and then besides go spelunking in her head and try to micromanage motivations, well in the first place that is way the fuck more maintenance than I want to do. I guess one of the things I expect of a partner is for her to manage her own motivations. If she isn't capable of doing that (with occasional help upon request, even) then she is way too much of a pain in the ass for me.
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