Thanks for the First Full-Day Workshop

The first thing I want to say is "thanks" to everyone who came out to the full weekend workshop.  I was just awed by the response to this.  I'd felt for a while that basic Psychological issues were under-presented in the Community. 

I just cannot thank the attendees enough.  Some of you were people I knew, and some people I'd never had the honor to meet. I think the thing that says the most about the caliber of people who came is that every single person/couple who I did not know has commented to me on how friendly the group was and how welcome they felt.  I think that just says a lot about everyone.  Thank you all so much for being the first audience for the full run of this material.  

I also want to profoundly thank the rest of the household.  Stephanie, JayLynn, and Miranda did a huge amount of work to get the house ready and prepare yummy food.  Thanks also to Gregg and Alba for Apertifs.

Conception

When I conceived the Course back in November last year, it was just a standalone module linking the things I had learned together.  By mid-spring I'd realized that in doing this I was forming the whole of an underlying practice of consensual power-exchange.  I never changed the course title, because I think the original description was apt.  But I'd promised tying things together, and that became the first presentation of the "Comprehensive Mastery" concept.

I defined "Comprehensive Mastery" as "A results-oriented system of skills and learning which is designed to be applied to the self and partners to form the core of a rounded and pragmatic practice of consensual power exchange."  I then proceeded to put forward a lot of "it isn'ts" the most important of which included "a cult of personality" and "a replacement for any traditions you have."  I knew I had a toolset, but I realized I also have a toolbox, and that to present the toolbox coherently I should give it a name.

The concept differs a little from a lot of traditional Power Exchange when we come tot he world "results-oriented."  I see so many Power Exchange relationships where the practice of this or that tradition is getting only so-so results, or where it's clear that the results are coming from the New Relationship Energy, not the actual Dynamics, and neither partner understands when things fall apart.   The focus for Comprehensive Mastery is on a good long term outcome.

I think several things are clear coming out of the workshop. I think it was a huge success and I've received some very warming praise.  But...enough patting on the back, my personality type doesn't run to that. 

Changes

First, we have more than one day of material.  I'd considered that, but I wanted to give "everything I have."  The result is that I'm splitting the Workshop into two days.  There's enough demand that we'll re-run it in January. 

In terms of interaction, the first two thirds were great.  We have some writing exercises, and some fun games and roleplay to get people up and moving.  I heard a lot of laughter and that's good.  But we need more of that in what will be the second day, and fortunately it lends itself to that very well...creating that will be fun, and I look forward to it.

The manse needs better theatre style seating.  The Manse can hold eighty people comfortably for a party, but that's with both floors open, and people circulating. A presentation means everyone has to have comfortable space to sit in one room.

Sixteen participants and eighteen people was a lot.  We'd officially planned to top things off at fourteen.  Despite being a "big house" we often don't get to make the best use of the Manse because the "big room" is also the dining room, and the Foyer and Parlour are split, which is pretty but not space efficient.  We figured out how to reverse engineer everything so that the Dining Room can be the major seating which should take us up to about 25.  I'd say 'we won't get 25 people for a two day workshop' but I also thought we wouldn't get 16 for a single day workshop. 

The Materials

Right now I'm not going to post the booklet online.  I will make it available individually to all the people who attended, and if someone has great need of it, I'm willing to send it to them, but the current plan is to expand it with the material for January and publish it.  There will be an e-book format, priced for accessibility, not profit, but I think we want to get the material out formally.  I promise it will be out *soon.*

The Expansion

Most of the expansion will be fleshing out more details about the various submissive skills and techniques, and drawing clear parallels to the Mastery skills, making it clear that both partners need some measure of both skillsets.  I also want to at least begin to give examples of exercises or play to teach each of the skills, and I want to expand the Mind Control/Behavior Modification segment with examples both of what to do and what not to do. 

Again...thanks to everyone.  And for the people who couldn't make the workshop, it will be offered bigger and better several times next year...and of course as I mentioned with special provisions for folks who were at the first workshop and are primarily interested in the Second-day materials. 

Myths and Facts about Hypnotism? - basic hypnosis - Part II

Myths and the archetype of "Svengali"

Through the earlier half of the 20th century, an oft-quoted statistic suggested that only about fifty percent of the population could be hypnotized. There are other myths about hypnosis, the most common being that intelligent people cannot be hypnotized because they are "too smart to fall for it," or that only weak-willed people can be hypnotized.

Because hypnotism is a natural extension of how we learn and process information, it is immediately obvious that bright people can be hypnotized. In fact, they probably get more out of it than most others, just like they may get more out of reading or listening. I've found that the more intelligent a subject is, the better they tend to respond to hypnosis. I tend to believe this is because a person who is more intelligent is more likely to have pre-existing levers to help get beneficial concepts through the critical are of mind. Even someone very self-destructive, who is also intelligent, may have a lot of channels "around" their self-destruction carved by intellect.

And of course, being hypnotized has nothing to do with being weak-willed. The concept goes back to the image of George du Maurier's Svengali, who wields an unhealthy power over the innocent young (and eponymous) heroine Trilby. If you're not familiar with the stereotype of Svengali, Phantom of the Opera is essentially the same story with the antagonist presented in a rightly more sympathetic light.

I won't go into a lengthy revisionist interpretation of Trilby (Svengali does better by her than might generally be assumed) but merely say that the fact that a strong-willed older man can dominate a younger girl does not establish a model for hypnotism, but for a power exchange relationship.

Most subjects of hypnosis are not Trilby. They are as likely to be Svengali. The cultural tar-brush of being associated with a weak-willed and originally talentless young girl has kept many away from the hypnotists' chair out of fear of comparison. In fact the strong willed likely make better subjects having more ability to assist in pushing mutually agreed upon information through the critical area of the mind, and greater ability to master the "willing suspension of disbelief."

But the myth remains that only half the population can be hypnotized. In the early 1960s, Dr. John Kappas came to believe that he had the key to a major element of suggestibility when he identified what he called "Emotional" and "Physical" personality types. In practice, his distinctions, while not perhaps as unique as he would like them to be, seem to bear out empirically and a large school of hypnotism which gets good results have been founded on his behavioral model.

We now know that most people can be hypnotized, but that about half the population has a different suggestibility that does not look like the classic “stage hypnosis”

Everyone can be hypnotized. The overload of message units that bypasses critical area of mind takes place:

• Driving a car, when our conscious mind disengages and we are not aware that we are driving

• Watching a movie when we jump in our seat or cry because we have lost the line that tells us that the movie is “not real.”

In fact the “willing suspension of disbelief” is synonymous with “helping to bypass the critical mind.”

E & P Personality Types

The first thing to understand about "Emotional" versus "Physical" sexual-personality types is that the terms were first used in a clinical setting, talking to Hypnotherapists. They don't refer to the actual traits but to the defense mechanisms.

Now Dr. Kappas was a smart guy but not apparently an advertiser or communications specialist. Rather than come up with more descriptive names, he shortened them to "E" and "P" since that would be easier for a layman to understand....err...hmmm....helpful like cats John...

The full exploration of "Emotional" and "Physical" Suggestibility and Sexuality is beyond the scope of this writeup. We will focus on the Empiric characteristics that allow you to recognize and hypnotize Emotional and Physical Suggestibles.

The E&P Suggestibility and Sexuality model presents a valuable method for analyzing relationship dynamics, and we'll revisit the model in that capacity, but for now we are going to focus on what it means for human suggestibility.

"Emotionals" (people who are emotionally defensive)

"Emotional" means "uses emotional defense mechanisms to safeguard the physical body and the ego" not "is gothic" or "projects wild emotions..." Emotionals respond to attempts to touch their physical body or induce physical intimacy by putting up ego defenses of fear

The suggestibility of the Emotional is based on a defense to protect his or her physical body. They will lead with their emotions before they will accept physical touch. This doesn’t mean being “overtly emotional” rather that they will experience embarrassment, fear, anger, anxiety, irritation, or frustration as a line of defense to protect their physical body from “invasion” (unwelcome touch, physical intimacy, etc.).

The Emotional suggestible may be overly concerned with what others think of them, and easily embarrassed by their physical body.

The Emotional ends up repressing feelings in the physical body, and becomes “more remote.”

Being an Emotional Suggestible is often a response to the behavior of the primary caregiver. In the first five years, if Mommy said “I love you” but appeared detached and distant, the Emotional learned not to trust the direct language, but to look for the meaning “behind words.”

The Emotional tends to speak very literally but takes information in inferentially

Well adjusted emotional - the sober businessman who seems unemotional, but is solid and reliable. He comes out around his family and close friends and can be warm at times.

Poorly adjusted emotional - the workaholic who has gone through two divorces, and never has time for his family, who seems to enjoy putting rules and money ahead of any human considerations in the name of a "logic" so cold it is scarcely logical at all. The "human factor" infuriates him.


Physicals (people who are physically defensive)

The Physical uses their physical body as a defense to protect their emotions. They respond to physical touch positively and seem to need a lot of it, as it represents acceptance. They fear being emotionally "crushed" more than they fear touch or harm.

Talking Physicals tend to be very animated and use a lot of gestures, and want to get close to the person they are talking to.

Often Physicals are social and outgoing, tend to dominate conversations, and have difficulty understanding the emotions of others because they cannot relate to what other people say and feel, only to what they say and feel.

The Physical tends to speak inferentially but take in information very literally

Well adjusted physical - the sexually active woman athlete. She likes volleyball, and tends to hang around with "the guys" a lot, is social and outgoing. She may have a few partners, and she is conscioius of setting boundaries to keep from getting too deeply hurt by them, while remaining intimate.

Poorly adjusted physical - the sexually active girl who has to climb on everyone's lap. Barely aware of the other women around, she throws herself bodily at anyone who might give her touch and attention, often drinking or getting high without really understanding why it helps her to act out. Driven by emotion she has trouble maintaining a steady relationship, but is devestated when they fair.

Confusion

Do not confuse how someone wants to respond with how they do respond. Use inferences to communicate with Emotionals and direct literal suggestions to communicate with Physicals.

Making Suggestions

Our business with these types is knowing how to make suggestions to them. Use Literal suggestions with Physicals, Inferential suggestions with Emotionals.

With Emotionals, you have to get “behind” the issue. For example, in conventional hypnosis, if client lacked confidence speaking in public, with the physical you might suggest that “You will be more confident talking to a group of people because it allows you to be more successful.”

With the Emotional you might need to find out how they feel about the situation (embarrassed, not up to it, etc.) and then have them imagine feeling comfortable in a group situation and that they are an adequate person, and that now that they are comfortable their anxiety will dissipate. This creates a comfortable “known.”

Emotionals often experience delayed reaction , whereas Physicals often notice a result right away.

Special Cases

Equally suggestible. Some people fall near the 50-50% mark, and are about as suggestible in both directions.

Intellectual Suggestibles. Some very high Emotional suggestible need a “reason” for everything. They want a “why.” You must not only use inferred suggestions, but give a reason why they will work.

The best way to handle this sort of person, rather than rationalizing each statement, is to use a method known as “auto dual” where you have them repeat everything after you and explain that they will hypnotize themselves.

Now that we've explained this very important area of suggestibility...(we'll revisit it later as a theory of human sexuality) we're ready to discuss the Laws of Hypnosis, and also the....ethical concerns and considerations...the juicy breast meat I know you've all be waiting for.

Introduction to Erotic Hypnosis - basic hypnosis - Part I

An Empircal Model of the Mind

In the next few posts, I am going to go over the basic material from my Erotic Hypnosis Class, breaking it into segments for easy digestion. We'll start with the empirical model of the mind (1) that we use for modeling reactions and personality.

Introduction

The Theory of Mind is an empirical model for explaining how human beings behave and respond to hypnosis. It may differ or conflict with other scientific models. Psychology is a Science. Hypnosis is Engineering. Scientists can ask difficult questions about the weak force of gravitation. Engineers need hard numbers to build bridges. If you understand this model, it will give you a framework to constructively explain and understand behavior. You may want to combine it with other models and theories – for example I combine it with Eric Berne’s theory of Transactional Analysis. The point is to present a framework for understanding behavior.

Basic structure of the mind

Conscious Mind – everything you are thinking right now and remember from about the past hour and a half

Critical Area of Mind – part conscious and part subconscious. This area contains your memories of the last 24 hours. It is the filter between the Conscious mind and the Subconscious mind. The object of Hypnosis is to bypass the Critical Area of Mind and speak directly to the Subconscious mind. The Critical Area of mind cannot be completely bypassed. If a hypnotic suggestion is given to a subject which is either detrimental to their health and safety or goes in total opposition to their way of thinking, they will reject it. Critical Area of Mind forms from about age 7-14

Modern Memory Area – everything you remember from conception to the present life. “Nurture” Good or bad: Wear a raincoat, good girls don’t. Religion, Parental Edicts, Friends Beliefs, Television…

Roughly, Life Scripts and Parental knowledge according to Berne's Transactional Analysis Model. This is the area we most strongly address in Hypnosis.

Note that the Modern Memory Area has no ability to recognize conflicts. Thus if information was put into it by two different sources, and they were able to bypass critical area of mind, either because we were too young, or because we were in a suggestible state, the conflict exists. This is particularly true of sexual behaviors.

Primitive Area of Mind – genetic and evolved learning. “Nature” Running away, impulse to kill, wanting to eat. Roughly, Child according to a T/A Model.

What is Fight and Flight?

The survival instinct is based around a choice between Fight and Flight

When we are threatened we are triggered to run away, or fight (Sympathetic Nervous System)

When we cannot run away, (because we are trapped, or because we are out of energy or have run away from the immediate danger but still feel threatened) we “play dead” – retreat into a passive apathetic state where we don’t call any attention to ourselves. We retreat into the Primitive (Subconscious) mind.

Fight and Flight lead to nervous anxiety and tension. If the attempt at flight is frustrated it leads to repression (taking things inside, constructing defense mechanisms, illusion of control) or depression (escape into fantasy, sleep, etc.)

Sensory Input (Message Units)

Humans receive sensory input (message units) into the brain from 4 Sources:

The External Environment – weather, television, jobs, partners, traffic - example "It's windy and dark"

Our Body – digestion, aches, pains etc.- example "I am thirsty"

Conscious Mind – logic, reason, objective decision making (Adult in T/A) - example "after this class I want to go find that hot girl/guy"

Subconscious Mind – everything we have ever learned from religion, parents, peers, etc., whether it conflicts or not.- example "that girl/guy is 'hot'"...."oh why?"...."uh...I dunno...I like his/her ass"..."really why?...."I dunno it just...makes me hard/wet" (responding to subconscious stimuli you don't fully understand...

Critical area of mind forms between 8-14 years of age. During this time we stop accepting all suggestions and ideas implicitly and begin to question them, as we are increasingly faced with contradictions and issues. We form Critical Area of the Mind to protect the Subconscious, filtering what goes into it.

After we are about 8-14 years old we reject most new ideas that are offered to our modern memory area by filtering, either immediately through logical thought...or after sleep. That's why we tend to reject an idea after we've "slept on it." We tend to accept ideas if they get past our critical area of mind. This happens with strong emotion (being in love) with drug use (I was drunk) and with any hypnotic modality that tends to increase suggestibility. Our school teacher, Radio ads, magazine ads, and church are all hypnotic modalities. Suggestibility is how we learn as humans and we cannot do without it.

Through Hypnosis we seek to bypass the Critical Area of mind and put ideas directly into the Modern Memory Area.

Pain Pleasure Syndrome

This is a short, but useful, digression on the concept of "knowns" and "unknowns"

“What you don’t know can kill you.” That’s an evolutionary mechanism. It makes us have anxiety about unknowns, and feel comfortable with knowns.

Some theorists go so far as to say we feel knowns as pleasure and unknowns as pain.

This is generally a good adaptation. But it can end up meaning that someone likes abuse or pain, because it is a “known.”

Most of us have some qualities like this, BDSM offers a constructive way to channel those qualities without actual abuse detrimental to our lives. Outside BDSM, many people end up in abusive relationships because past abuse makes them desire a "known" that is not healthy. If they have strong emotional attachments to that "known"...it means love, sexual arousal, acceptance, etc., then they will tend to follow it even at the cost of their self-respect or mental well being.

What is Hypnosis?

Hypnosis occurs when an overload of message units causes the conscious mind to shut down and induces a retreat into the primitive mind. This creates a hypersuggestible state, allowing us direct access to the subconscious mind.

If this happens in an uncontrolled situation it can create futility, melancholy, and being over-receptive to negative input. We lose our defenses.

Hypnosis is in many ways the mental equivalent of BDSM. We create a positive situation in which to experience this state, making it pleasant and relaxing instead of depressive. Therefore we achieve a positive rather than negative outcome.

1. The core concept of suggestibility as presented here was originally described by Dr. John G. Kappas, Ph.D.

Panic, the Eroticization of Anxiety and Resentment

Panic and Anxiety

If you know me, you know that I've been very interested for a while in Panic, Anxiety, and certain aspects of humiliation play. In a lot of ways, I feel that what passes for "humiliation" or "ego reduction" ends up being a shorthand for "all the hitherto poorly explored and understood psychological aspects of WIITWD." But let's not get too high minded here. I also like a cheek under my boot. That said...

The Eroticization of Anxiety

I am very familiar with panic from shame. Some of the most poignant memories of my life are the red tide of shame rising, burning my face and ears, making my throat constricted, and making my pulse pound. But they aren't erotic for me.

However, we know from real science that they *can* be erotic. We know that people in a mildly dangerous situation will believe they had an erotic response to a member of the opposite sex, and will respond with more interest later than if they met her in a situation that wasn't mildly dangerous.

Most of us know what both "burning" anxiety and "low level anxiety" feels like. Low level anxiety feels suspiciously similar in some cases to being in love. The feelings Romeo describes in regards to Rosalind might as well be a clinic description of anxiety issues. Scientists are now telling us that in fact, in the brain, love looks a lot like OCD.

In any case, if all your initial erotic experience was in a state of heightened anxiety, you are going to respond sexually to anxiety. Fetishize it. That's how fetishes seem to work.

And if that was drawn out, for weeks, months, years, it gets stronger. You reach a point of wanting to live in a state of constant low level anxiety, or even high level anxiety. Or craving a situation where you feel the waves of shame wash over you...because that plays into erotic excitement.

The No Win Option

One thing that always confused me was logic traps. Why would anyone want to be put in a "no win" situation where there was no good option. But there are a host of other situations, revolving around coercion, discovery, etc. that combine with those.

As I've gained a dawning understanding of the mechanics of panic attacks, panic disorder, and the eroticization of anxiety, I've begun to have an increasing understanding of these things. I can't say I have "a full explanation" but I do have a lot of observations.

The Warring Components of the Personality

Fetish revolves more than most people realize around the ongoing disharmonies between the components of the personality. In the classical model everyone accepts these are the "Id" or the instinctual part of the mind, the "Ego"...the self...and the Super-Ego, which is the critical and moralizing part. The Id tells us we want to the gratification of getting fucked, the Super-Ego tells us nice people don't fuck strangers and there the fight usually begins.

The problem gets worse if what the Id is craving is a little more extreme than just feeling loved by being touched. If the issue is "I can only cum when I'm being physically threatened or forced shamefully down on my hands and knees in a parking lot with risk of exposure and gagged on cock," then the Super-Ego may say "You are by the standards of society some sort of fucking monster and you ought not to be allowed any pleasure...your actions are endangering *ME*"

So...it's not just a fight, it's the Rumble in the Jungle....the Superfight...the Mother of all Battles...

So...the ego, which has to play broker in this mess tries to do some things to give the Id what it wants, while keeping the Ego from hanging a scarlet letter around it's neck and branding it an outcast from civilized people.

• Creating "known safe" situations that appear not to be. The Id isn't very smart and it can be fooled. If our trusted Dom wears a hood and acts fierce, the Id may respond to him with anxiety, but the Superego may not set off the alarm bells that say "you are endangering us all."

• Creating "known loss" situations. It's one thing to want to be assfucked in the mud. It's another thing to endure it. If the situation that creates shame is one where there is not a "win" option at the same time the Id is struggling with delicious fear and confusion, the Superego is saying "well I suppose you couldn't help this one." The Superego isn't actually very smart either.

So..."no win" situations provide a certain "out" for the psyche. By being "no win" you aren't bad...

THE LARGER ISSUE OF PANIC AND ANXIETY

So...low lying anxiety and panic attacks may be an element of our erotic makeup. But they can also poison relationships and day to day life.

It is tempting to assume that sexual trauma creates a fetish for anxiety. But real life suggests that while that's not uncommon, there is not a one to one correlation. I know girls who experienced severe trauma, but don't seem to have panic/anxiety attacks. I know girls who experience panic attacks but have no apparent triggering trauma or cause.

Eroticization is a tool to make anxiety bearable and focus panic and anxiety into something constructive. To provide an outlet and a focus for the needs of the id.

But if in the end, you spend most of your day with "your heart in your mouth," it's going to be hard to be an effective person and make effective adult decisions. Hard to let the adult element of the mind have the driver's seat.

CONTROLLING PANIC AND ANXIETY ISSUES

I tend to feel that panic/anxiety should be treated. There are treatments out there which don't kill the sex drive, and can make the beast manageable.

When it is in control it is often debilitating, and sometimes the first thing it erases in its stomping is the will to do anything to stop it. Almost the definition of "panic" as opposed to "anxiety" is that the panicked person lacks the ability to do anything constructive to alleviate their panic.

I think it's also possible to approach panic/anxiety through discipline in combination with eroticization. But I think discipline should be a measure that comes after a valid medical treatment as part of an attempt to create a healthy normal lifestyle.

I've been surprised at the number of girls I've run into who were very attached to their anxiety and didn't want to get rid of it. I've been able to define two rough tendencies:

a) They don't recognize that they have an anxiety disorder and so don't see anything wrong with it. They were taught by their family or friends that being "high strung" (crying jags, hysterical panic) was *normal* for girls, and while weak, it is perfectly fine. Often this plays into submission. Often the girl is scared of appearing weak and has worked to learn to live with low-level anxiety constantly so it only bursts out at certain times.

b) It is addictive and they are afraid to get rid of it. It represents enough of their sexuality that they honestly fear losing it will mean having no emotions. It's like trying to convince Romeo to WANT to stop being in love with Rosalind. As miserable as it makes him he doesn't want to stop. Nor does he believe that he could probably be happier loving somebody else (yes in his case it didn't work out so well, but all analogies have their limitations).

I cannot express too strongly how someone who is in a perpetual state of eroticized anxiety flashing to panic disorders may be both horribly miserable with it (the panic often involves self-loathing and self-torture) and utterly addicted and unable and unwilling to do anything to get out of it.

Anxiety can become the object of love. Whether we imagine that Romeo got off at night to Rosalind's image, or internalize his erotic response by denying himself as long as she denied him, either way that was his sex-life. Taking her away was no more welcome than the removal of any other lover.

In a larger sense, if someone experiences most of their sexual reward through anxiety, there is a fear that its removal will mean they cannot experience sexual emotion.

c) It may be the only alternative they have experienced to Depression. If their Anxiety disorder causes them to cycle between exhausted depression and new bouts of Anxiety they may consider Anxiety desirable, and seek it out.

THE POWERFUL FORCE OF RESENTMENT

A final and overarcing concern is entitlement and resentment. Anxiety often feeds self-loathing and self-hurt. Why do people hurt themselves? Well typically it's because they've been hurt.

The Id says "hurt something."

The Super-Ego says "You can't go around hurting things, that's bad."

So they hurt themselves. It's not a good compromise, but its the only one that both parties will allow. The problem is that in doing so there is a huge amount of anger and resentment built up. Because every self-hurt becomes an additional harm that makes the Id want to lash out. Remember the Id isn't very smart.

It has been my empiric observation that most of the women I've known who invited humiliation...or any of the sorts of sadistic play where the thing that was hurt was their emotions, not mostly their body...have had a tendency to spike back with very strong resentments. Sometimes at the Dominant, other times at other things around them.

Often they self-describe as "extremely submissive" and are very passive and easily manipulated in scene. In some cases they tend to be very resentful and subversive out of scene. In other cases they talk about having massive anger/hatred/violence build up which they want to lash out with, but are otherwise pretty decent people. Sometimes they act out powerfully.

Often there is resentment of a family situation. Neglect, physical abuse, rape by a trusted intimate of the family, or rape by an outsider which was trivialized, ignored, or not believed, or abandonment or desertion by a parent or guardian.

Often there is a strong subtext of wanting to "act out" in a way that is almost saying "look what you made me do/made me into."

I've begun to think that a lot of time the core of emotionally masochistic behavior was a sort of "I'm going to go eat worms" behavior. I've seen it especially with women (possibly men too, but that's outside my experience) who were neglected...who weren't paid attention to, or who were abused and never got the emotional care they needed for it. I think they asked for attention, and couldn't get it, or didn't feel they had permission to ask, so they did "I'll sit in the dark" behaviors.

As they grew to be adults, and their literal parents grew into the part of their persona that Freud calls the "Superego" - the part that makes rules, sets standards, and tells us if we are good enough...that need becomes unfillable. The adult that won't acknowledge them becomes...their own mind. And so they engage in hurting themselves, or asking to be abused and hurt with an expectation that being hurt will bring them some sort of eventual sympathy, but the person who could sympathize is long gone.

Of course they don't objectively believe anyone will sympathize, or even want them to. But it seems plausible and even likely that the lack of sympathy feeds into anger which feeds into anxiety, which is then eroticized.

HOW THESE THINGS FIT TOGETHER

In a perfect world, we could just find erotic outlets for anxiety and that would be fine. But there is a subtext that when we do, if we aren't very careful, we are feeding the loop of Resentment, and may in the long run be making more trouble.

How do we break out of that? Isn't that in the end what leads vanillas to say "stop this is dangerous...just bury the fucking Id and it's desires."

I don't think there's an easy answer other than to point out that the results when the Id doesn't get any release seem to be...well...bad. Bitterness and an unfulfilled life at best, periodic spectacular acting out to the point of self-destruction at worst.

So...we need to try something. But what we do better come with a decent dose of compassion and whatever aftercare the person is able to accept. Often that's not very much.

Beyond that I think we need to remember that the Ego is not a helpless partner in all this. If we're growing and strengthening the Ego, it becomes more able to set terms, make plans and vent resentments on its own. So at the risk of oversimplification, the key to a positive outcome is probably to put the Ego...the Person's adult self...in the driver's seat and help them get firmly in control of the whole three ring circus.

Stumbling on Happiness - Part the First

For the past year or so I’ve been making occasional allusions to a great book with a really stupid title. Daniel Gilbert’s book Stumbling on Happiness sounds like it should be what the late Douglas Adams called a “Liff” – a book that claimed “this book will change your life!”

Gilbert makes no such claim. In fact, being a dry, acerbic wit that I can relate to, he actually tells you that you won’t accept his advice on how to become happy. He's probably right when it comes to stubborn asses like me, but it's useful advice nonetheless.

When somebody talks about “how to be happy” I’m immediately skeptical. My guess is that they are going to sell me a choice lot of horseshit that is little more than common sense, and call it profound. Fortunately Gilbert does not want to give us advice on how to do things to be happier….”eat better, get more rest.” He wants to tell us how the human brain works and how it processes information and how that affects one of three states we lump together as “happiness.”

Gilbert puts forward that most of what affects our “happiness” is our perceptions and handling of the future. He goes on to explain how, and why, we think about the future, and why we make mistakes that lead us to be unhappy. He then goes on to propose a remedy we probably won’t accept.

You can argue about emotions and theory all day long, but Gilbert is talking about firm, provable, mechanical facts about how the brain works. He’s simply not wrong. When he talks about our perceptions he’s defining things as provable as this famous illusion:

It’s a little scary to have the future so reduced, but he does it brilliantly, with tongue in cheek. If you can follow him, you understand a lot more about why we do the things we do, and along the way learn several tricks that are very useful to the M/s and BDSM lifestyles.

In the next several essays I am going to break down his basic principles as they apply to M/s and D/s.

For starters Gilbert explains

Why we think about the future.

On one hand, thinking about the future is pleasurable. Studies confirm that when people daydream about the future “they tend to imagine themselves achieving and succeeding rather than fumbling or failing.”

The bad news? “Researchers have discovered that when people find it easy to imagine an event, they overestimate the likelihood that it will actually occur.” Statistically that biases us towards un unreasonable optimism.

Right now you’re probably thinking “that doesn’t sound like my sub.” The converse is true. We think about the future in order to avoid bad things. “People who seek treatment for their inability to stop thinking about the future are usually worrying about it rather than reveling in it.”

Does that sound familiar? In a community where trauma is not an unknown, how many times have we held the hand of a partner who is cursed with anxiety, and not the good kind.

Gilbert explains why we think negatively about the future:

The Paralysis of Negative Anticipation

“First, anticipating unpleasant events can minimize their impact.” If you want to read about the studies that support this buy the book…the short version is that it’s true.

This is fertile ground. We’ve all dealt with girls (or boys) who simply would not look on the bright side or embrace opportunity because it hurt too much. Better not to hope or dream and not be disappointed. It affects Masters too, and can cause a paralysis of anxiety that is one of the most common reasons a submissive seeks a Dominant partner. The need to have a controlling influence to break that paralysis.

It’s easy to tell someone “well just jump into deep water.” And so terribly easy to become frustrated when they seem to be unable to. Our own experience teaches us that there is no joy and happiness without risk. Why do our submissive partners not see this.

Let’s define the qualities of a Dominant – someone who tends to bend things with their will. Now we all know that “Submissive” doesn’t mean “beta.” The world is full of strong willed girls who aren’t submissive to anyone else. Many submissive are strong, brave, and make good leaders. But on some level the characteristic of Submission is a to be conservative in regards to certain types of personal choice. To seek protection and shelter not to risk it all.

We can’t, as much as we’d like to, simply pitch them into deep water and teach them to swim. Sometimes we can and must do that, but if we do it without any base-work we are courting disastrous failure. The basis for any D/s Relationship is to build a solid foundation of trust and care that makes the submissive partner feel safe jumping into deep water. That is critical to offsetting their tendency to think of the future negatively or pass up opportunity in order to minimize the chance of hurt.

The Benefits of Negative Anticipation

Whether one is a proponent of Capital Punishment or not, I am willing to hazard that fear of the noose or being put in the hot seat has kept more than one of our fellow men alive who otherwise would now be pushing up whatever it is that cemeteries allow you to grow on graves in these diminished days.

In short, the other reason we think negatively about the future is that it actually allows us to avoid consequences. Humans don’t have to have their left hind foot snapped off in a trap to learn to avoid things that are made of steel and smell of oil.

Gilbert says “in short we sometimes imagine dark futures just to scare our own pants off.”

With this benefit comes a danger. Humans have a frighteningly long childhood. One theory of evolution suggests that a slow maturation rate is a random mutation that is responsible for much of human intelligence. Whether that’s true or not, we do a lot of thinking and learning before our adult personalities are fully formed.

Not surprisingly this means we learn some important lessons while our personalities are still that of a child. The things we learn are the root of most of our paraphilias. They are deep and complicated and often seem simpler than they are.

One thing we often see is aversion…the personality that avoids a specific common thing because it learned differently. If it was Daddy’s habit to beat you with a stick every time he did gardening, Roses may strike one much as a steel trap strikes the three-legged fox.

All this is obvious and if it was all that this book had to say we’d consider ourselves out a few bucks, but this is just laying the groundwork.

The Allure of Control

In investigating the “why” of “why we think about the future” Gilbert suggests and obvious truth. We don’t think about the future to have a pleasant entertainment. We think about the future in order to do something about it. Start a fire before it gets cold, take an umbrella if it will rain or shift money out of bonds before interest rates skyrocket.

He asks the apparently obvious question of “why should we want to have control over our future.” He then posits two answers one right and on “surprisingly wrong.”

“The surprisingly right answer is that people find it gratifying to exercise control – not just for the futures it buys them, but for the exercise itself. Being effective – changing things, influencing things, making things happen – is one of the fundamental needs with which human brains seem to be naturally endowed, and much of our behavior from infancy onward is simply an expression of this penchant for control.”

Hear that Doms and Dommes? It’s natural.

Now, here is the interesting thing. Gilbert goes on to talk about the risks involved in loss of control. “Human beings come into the world with a passion for control, they go out of the world the same way, and research suggests that if they lose their ability to control things at any point between their entrance and their exit they become unhappy, helpless, hopeless, and depressed.”

So, let’s remember for a moment that this is not a statement about Doms. It’s a statement about humans. Stupid word games aside, last time I checked that includes your submissive or slave.

Gilbert cites some rather scary research. Patients at a nursing home who were given a plant statistically lived longer if they had the responsibility of caring for it – 30% to 15%. If those odds hold true as a Master I should never die.

But…that’s not the chilling part…they did another experiment where students visited a nursing home. Some patients got to tell the students when they could come and visit others just got visited on the students’ schedule. Those in the high control group reported being “healthier, happier, more active and taking fewer medications” than those with little control. Remember these are abstracted studies so this isn’t random hearsay…there are careful inventory and analyses for these things.

So…same result. Only in a followup after they discontinued the experiment, they found a disproportionately high number of the patients in the high control group died in the ensuing six months. A significant enough number to convince the researchers something they hadn’t thought to test…that losing control has a more negative impact than never having had it at all.

‘These and other findings,” says Gilbert “have led some researchers to conclude that the feeling of control – whether real or illusory – is one of the wellsprings of mental health.”

Gilbert spends a bit of time exploring how we often behave towards random events as if our control matters. People will bet more on a game of chance if they pick the number or roll the dice, even if there is no statistical ability to influence the outcome.

What does this mean for BDSM? I see a couple of immediate fallout observations.

1) Having a dominant to exercise control may in many cases fulfill a need to limit the impact of the unpleasantness of losing control by refusing to take any.

The downside to this is something we experience all the time. A submissive or slave who is willing to “give up control,” but bridles at “taking orders” when those orders involve doing something that is challenging. If we understand that this is a motivation to experience control we can understand that limitation better

2) A D/s Relationship that is going to be non-egalitarian should start that way. We’ve all heard of couples where they “slowly came round to an M/s dynamic. “ In practical terms taking away a partner’s control is likely to provoke resentment and upset. State the terms of a relationship clearly.

3) We may exert control over a Submissive, but we know that their mental health is dependent on their feelings of control. Very few people really want to lose all control. What they actually want is to exchange some control for a feeling of safety and security. Often what we are really doing is creating a solid basis from which those who have had control ripped away, or have never had much and are scared to experiment with it, or fear a loss of control can feel “safe” while going experimenting with using control. We create an environment where someone who has had problems with control can experiment “a little at a time.” But contrary to all M/s literature, it’s unlikely that in most cases completely depriving our partners of all control is really what is desired, except inasmuch as that may be an act of taking control.

The Surprisingly Wrong Answer

The next thing which Gilbert investigates is the surprisingly Wrong answer to why we try control the future. “We insist on steering our boats because we think we have a pretty good idea of where we should go, but the truth is that much of our steering is in vain – not because the boat won’t respond and not because we can’t find our destination, but because the future is fundamentally different than it appears through the projectiscope. “

Gilbert likens this to other illusions – those of eyesight and memory, and puts forward an explanation based on how the human brain actually works.

Gilbert’s Central Thesis

In the book, Gilbert holds his central thesis till the end. He projects, correctly, that it is an answer that most readers probably won’t and can’t accept. In the remainder of the book he details painstakingly why we aren’t actually all the good at projecting how our future will be, and then proposes a better method for making decisions about what will bring us happiness…alas, his answer is one that, however practical, most of us will have a hard time digesting.

As time permits, I’ll build on this essay, and detail the remainder of the interesting and creative points that this fascinating look at how our minds actually work

.....More to come