Your problem is you're torn between wanting to be defined BY a Him, and wanting to be defined FOR a Him. What you hope for is to find the one who can both define you and define you just for Him. You seek to be unique, to be entirely his creation and property and to live accordingly. Make sense?

The problem is you don't really know who you are for YOU. You carry the baggage and scars of past experiences where you gave too much to someone who wasn't worth it and that's made you afraid of giving yourself over again. You feel depleted, jaded... worn down even.

What you don't understand is that until you know yourself, you're not qualified to judge what you need, only what you want... and they're two VERY different states of mind. Only exploring yourself deeply, on your terms and with your purpose in mind, will you understand who's actually inside you trying to get out. All you know now is who you DON'T want to be, which is essentially who you are. You don't know what you DO want to be, only that you want to be... something... for Him.

There's a disconnect there. What you actually need is the safety and security to just... explore yourself and learn what's underneath all the scar tissue and fear and insecurity.

Slaves absolutely have choice, and every time they kneel and serve, obey and accept their Master's will, they reaffirm that they have chosen him.
There is no greater honor for either.

I think mostly submissives and even slaves come here hoping to meet their true selves because the reality is submissives often barely know who they are, or want to be or could become. Submission is a very outward looking mindset; it doesn't really exist for the benefit of the submissive, but instead seeks to be validated by how it can be of benefit to another.

As a result, when the submissive looks inwards it's common for her to only see shifting shadows, fog and the occasional illuminating flash of lightning. But even that clarity can often shows her things she doesn't recognise or understand or is actually comfortable knowing might be within her. True darkness is, after all, just that; dark, unknown and forbidding. Without another to shine a light, to put it all in context, what's left is a palpable fear of the unknown... and that unknown resides inside her, is part of her and yet can feel utterly alien nonetheless.

So when submissives and slaves look for a connection, what they really seek is someone to make sense of them, someone who can see them as they are and see what they may become and then help them make the journey.

The trouble is that the submissive needs and wants to invest so deeply into that someone that it can end up simply expecting to become all things to them, regardless of if they are actually able to. Submission itself can become so intoxicated at the thought of who they serve, it overlooks or ignores or simply doesn't see the price such service comes with.

When you mix that in with a relentless outwards focused desire like pure submission, the result is a lot of baggage, like low self-esteem, lack of self-worth, inadequacy, fear of failure, fear of feeling or appearing stupid, to name just a few. Then the submissive can end up almost desperately willing to take what that special someone says as gospel, especially if it ties in with that baggage.

If you believe you're worthless anyway, someone who matters to you telling you they think the same thing can both crush any sense of self-determination in a girl, while also pushing her to believe that, without him, she might never have anyone ever again and so she'd better do better, try harder, give more, offer more. And so the collar that should signify trust and growth and learning and service and sacrifice and growth and all of those glorious things, sudden gets tighter... and tighter... and tighter still. And in time the submissive can barely breathe enough to stay alive.

And so her service comes from fear, not love and from a place of desperate futility and not one of passionate hope.

The submissive chooses who and how she serves.

To the submissive, how she serves is based at least partly and often predominantly on her own tastes. 
A slave doesn't think that way. She is focused on his responses to her service, not her own. 
Thus, her pleasure and fulfillment comes as a direct consequence of his.

A slave does not exist without a master nor a master without a slave. Each is created by the other.

The slave goes into her service thinking about what he might ask of her and if she can provide it. She enters eyes wide open to the likelihood that she will be pushed and challenged, that she will have to learn and adapt and that she will have to confront and get past her own perceptions of her capabilities. 
A submissive would just shrug, say 'not for me' and walk off.

And if that's true, then both slave and master seek his pleasure and fulfillment first. Hers, as I said, comes from providing it. That's all.

I think submission pushes the submissive to want to know the other. All the better to serve them, kind of thing. But I've always felt that she should first know herself, and that in doing so she can then begin to serve herself before she tries to serve anyone else.
And the more she knows herself, the more she looks inwards and understands and, more importantly, accepts the nature and truth of her submission, the more she can understand and, more importantly, accept the nature and truth of the dominance she seeks.
It's just, there are so many layers here, so many levels of intensity. From occasional kink to an absolutely all devouring way of life, what's needed and wanted can always be found. But if you don't know WHAT you need and want, then more it's more likely you'll end up where you don't belong, and so that overwhelming hunger for place and purpose won't be fed, let alone sated.
And down that road, misery awaits.
Nosce te ipsum, and all that.

No choice comes without consequence. Stay as you are and you remain unfulfilled and, in many ways, irrelevant when compared to the other choice, to embrace change and evolution.
Of course, change and evolution might cost you everything you have, and more besides, but it might also lead to somewhere truly worth going to.
Both have downsides.
Both have upsides.
Sitting there pondering that is effectively stopping yourself making a choice because while you're doing all that pondering, you're staying as you are. All the 'but I'm trying to learn so I can make an informed decision' is just so much self-serving bullshit. You're treading water, soaking up information that, even if it was relevant, you're not going to allow to truly affect you.
Make the choice.
Stand by it.
Prepare to regret it, hope you don't.
That's all there is.
If you choose to stay as you are, leave places like this well alone. If you choose to evolve, be prepared for your current world to begin to fall apart, one way or another.
Change is a hard and remorseless path to take and, by definition, it leads to places unknown that, unless you commit to the journey fully and without hesitation, will at best freeze you in place or at worse make you run back the way you came, determined to try and salvage something from the life you never wanted in the first place.

I don't care how many people demand that someone prove themselves worthy of trust, it cannot be done. Trust is not quantifiable. There's no point where someone untrustworthy tips the scales and suddenly ticks a box to become trustworthy.
Either you trust them or you don't and arguably that decision has less do with how they behave towards you than it does with how you perceive them. When it comes to trust, perception is really everything.
Trust is a choice and that choice is constantly being validated, over and over again right up until the point where the trust is betrayed. That can happen so quickly it takes your breath away, or it can take time, blindsiding you on some quiet Tuesday afternoon when all seems right in your world and in reality you're seconds away from someone you loved and believed in tearing your playhouse down with what seems like sadistic glee.
And of course, that betrayal of trust may never happen. We've all got friends we've known for a lifetime that we wouldn't share certain truths of ourselves with. Conversely, we've all met someone soon felt instinctively we can simply open up to. I daresay that over time we've been proven both right and wrong in each of those cases.
But regardless, they don't prove themselves worthy of trust. We choose to trust them, or choose not to, and we do so on a gut level, instinctive and often irrational. I'd argue that actually the more a person tries to convince us of their trustworthiness, the least trustworthy they seem.
To paraphrase Shakey, sometimes the lady doth protest too much, you know?

But to me, vulnerability is the point of all this; creating it, knowing how to use it, putting it to work, building something with it, even if it's simply the momentum of my girl feeling safe and secure in exploring it with me. In my experience there's too much emphasis on the physical and way, way too little on the mental.

I honestly believe that D/s is, for some people at least, less a fetish and more an incredibly powerful therapy. It's a way inside them that is able to shine a light on the deepest needs and most conflicting desires, the parts of us we most want to show to those who matter, but fear being rejected if we do.

Rope, crops, canes, wax, needles, wimples or onesies, whatever your 'thing' may be, that's all it is; a thing, and things have never much interested me. Our heads are often like one of those huge, rambling mansions that started off with actual plans and intentions but soon started to be changed and revised. Eventually we just started making it up as we went, putting extra rooms here and there, closing off this part of the building and opening up a brand new, shiny part to replace it. And then, at some point, we stopped, looked around and realised how far we'd strayed from the original plans, and their attendant hopes and expectations. 

Now, looking around, we only have the sketchiest memories of what might be locked up in the deepest parts of the house, hidden away even from us. What's in there is far more 'us' than what we ever easily show and, when we internalise that vulnerability, what we actually do is fill our head with all the things we *wish* we could let out, and *wish* we could talk about and *wish* we could trust someone enough to share.

Truth be told though, often we just don't like or trust ourselves that much and so we struggle to believe anyone else could either.

I'm old, so I'm prone alternately to bouts of wistfulness and bouts of being distinctly irritated. With regard to the first, while it's something of a cliche to look back at the past and see it through soft-focus, rose-tinted glasses as some kind of nirvana, the old adage feels more and more relevant as time goes by...

Things were different in my day.

And that ties into being irritated, often almost irrationally so.

You see, once upon a time submissives knew what the word meant, knew the responsibilities that went with it, knew what it demanded and what might be the consequences of embracing that place and purpose.

Back then, nobody with an IQ above their own shoe size thought submissives could ever be weak or trivial or could be taken for granted. The idea of a submissive as a doormat or an automaton or as having no choice... honestly, I have no idea what anyone would have thought of that idea back in the day. As far as my peers were concerned, submission was rare and to be cherished.

It was also meant to be put to use.

That is and always was the whole bloody point of it. Submission didn't exist on it's own terms for it's own reasons. It's to be created from, shaped and refined, custom fitted for the needs and benefit of the one lucky enough to call it theirs.

Submission belonged to her but it wasn't for her. It was for him. She choose who she gave it to but not what he did with it. That was collaborative. That was, well, the dynamic. Change. Evolution. And it was a journey taken together.

Because without him, submission has no place or purpose, and without her, neither does dominance. That was how it worked, you know? Parasite/parasite, feeding and sustaining each other, fulfilling each other, needing each other, reduced and diminished apart, consumed and intoxicated together, free to explore and share and confide and love and revel in the pure fucking joy and release of each other.

Able to just.. be.

But now? Now submission comes with clauses and caveats. It expects to be pandered to, for it to be the master of it's destiny, both leader and follower with the dominant reduced to little more than an enabler and life coach. Nowadays, submission seems focused on the experience of... whatever, but only on it's own terms, up to it's own boundaries and no further. What's presented as someone seeking what lies beyond the life they know quickly gets reduced to a fucking Meatloaf song; I'd do anything for love... but I won't do that.

And I'm tired of it. I'm tired of seeing the dance, the endless games of charades. So few commit, so few push themselves or allow themselves to be pushed and fewer still seek to find what lies on the other side of that horizon they keep staring at.
It's depressing as hell and they know it and they wish, fervently, they could reach out and grasp the nettle but they won't. Can't.

And the things is, they'll still be doing this in a year or two or three or ten, wasting the only thing of value any of us really has; time. Everything else is an irrelevance by comparison.

Because, and make no mistake here, submission has the power. Submission is the most desirable of commodities because submission is freedom and submission, to both sides, is breathtaking.

But too many wear 'submissive' as a way of identifying what is and not as a statement of intent. I think of how so many submissives express themselves and I'm reminded of those lottery winners who overnight add half a dozen zeroes to their bank account and insist it won't change them.

But then maybe things have changed and I'm just getting all Canute-y because I don't like it or recognise it. Maybe I'm a relic or, God forbid, a snob or elitist, but I've just always believed service is sacrifice. In it's simplest form, that's all it is but 'that' can be so much in the right hands.

Everything.
Anything.
But... something.

That's all I'm saying.

Nothing's set in stone. This - D/s, M/s, BDSM (sooo many acronyms ffs lol etc), the lifestyle if you must call it that (though please, don't) - is all fluid. As people we're not set in stone. In the most basic aspects of our lives we're reactive and rarely pro-active. We're variable. Fickle. This isn't any different at the start. The point is to move past that point.

The thing is, we're not encouraged by the world to do so, so we're kind of out of practice.

We're given a set menu of life and experiences and there's an implicit understanding we're not going to order off the list. So when we do, when we feel something calling us, we don't really know what to do with it. When that is primarily an emotional and sensual response to something almost intangible, it's even more dislocating. If you want to travel, you can. If you want to get a car, have a family, re-train for a career, take up a hobby, blah, blah, blah then that's all fine. There's ways to do it, guides to follow and advice readily available.

But if you want to explore you... that's so much harder to do. And so much less encouraged in anything but the most stereotypical ways. So believe me when I say, the most important thing to do is start. Somewhere, anywhere will do. But start. Open your mind, your legs if you want, but start. Planning for an unknown is like herding cats. Angry cats. Angry rabid cats. On an electrified floor. On Mars! No, that's silly. Took it too far there.

If it feels right, continue. If it doesn't then stop, re-orientate yourself, start again. Until you find someone who matters more than you because you say so, you are and should be the most important person in your world. Act accordingly.

Freshly towelled dry from her shower, wearing only a bathrobe and with her heart beating a little faster in anticipation, Alison unlocked the door to what had once been the spare room, and went inside. As always she secured the door behind her, leaving the key in the lock, and then stood and surveyed her space for a few seconds.

She did this for two reason, both of which had come from him. The first was to remember how far she'd come, how changed she was already, how different and evolved were her thoughts and desires already, and how much joy there was to experience, even in this limited environment.

The second was simply to make sure all was as all should be. The double bed with its simple but useful, black wrought iron headboard was central against the same wall as the door, a sheeted mattress over a mattress protector and several very firm pillows on top. At the foot of the bed, patiently waiting, was the high definition webcam fixed atop the old adjustable tripod Alison had got cheap at a yard sale. To the side of that was an adjustable wheeled hospital table that held her laptop, currently showing a procession of her favourite pictures as a screensaver. Extra long cables trailed away to wherever they needed to go, their length ensuring the table could be moved as needed.

On the far side of the bed was the wardrobe that had been in this room when Alison had moved in. Made of cheap veneer, it was decades old but it was solid and, once put to use, had served its purpose well. Alison oddly empathised with that wardrobe. Two single wardrobes flanked a small dressing table area with a plain wooden chair in front of it, another yard sale find.

She opened the wardrobes in turn. One held the tools, the other the clothes. Inside the tool side door hung the belts and collars Alison had bought but mostly made, a variety of thicknesses and widths and materials, but mostly leather. From hooks on the inside of the door hung the thin chains and cords for the clamps, again some bought but most repurposed things like bulldog clamps and even some heavy duty tradesman clamps. Alison didn't like those, though she did enjoy using those crudely brutal items despite not liking them. Service was sacrifice, after all.

There was also two drawers in the bottom of the tools side and this was where Alison kept the plugs and dildos and vibrators she'd accumulated over the years, almost all before meeting Him. A few other random items like lengths of rope and rolls of tape, a blindfold, a couple of gags... that sort of thing. There was even a pair of handcuffs, but they weren't to be used except for one specific situation. Next to them, like a partner in crime, was the pack of large freezer bags. She felt a little burst of liquid heat between her thighs as she thought, in fear and in desire both, of needing to use the handcuffs and the other items.

The clothes side was just that, the place Alison stored the things she only wore for him and only wore in this room. There wasn't a huge variety, but she could achieve most looks she wanted, from lingerie to full outfits to achieve certain looks. She liked dressing for Him very much and she carefully selected what she would wear that night.

Before she dressed, Alison set the messenger program on her laptop to auto-connect and pointed it where she would dress and get ready for Him. As she did so, she also looked around the room at the pictures, most post card sized and framed but some A4 size and Blue Takked in place, but all printed by her. They were, He had said, an important part of her training, that she should always be able to see representations of what they desired and aspired to, as well as a few images, stills captured by Him, of Alison serving. There was beauty there, but also depravity and the forbidden, things she would be dismissed for and others she would be condemned for. Displaying them so openly was still deliciously arousing.

Alison smiled to herself. Before Him, this had been a spare room for people who never came to see her. Now it was Their Place, a shrine almost, the room where They met, where they joined and shared something more intense than anything Alison had ever known. She hoped, desperately, that she gave him the service he deserved, that he was worthy of, for opening her eyes and helping her see the place and purpose she'd long yearned for and been terrified of.

They'd come so far but the journey was barely started.

The laptop chimed as He came online. Her heart skipped a little as she slid onto the bed, kneeling, head bowed, palms upturned on her thighs. She heard his breathing and closed her eyes in pure blissful anticipation of serving Him. Softly, she spoke.

'Allow this girl the strength to answer questions she cannot fathom...

Allow this girl the spirit to know his needs...'

As she spoke the prayer, love and need and devotion and willingness bloomed inside her and she felt, as she always did with Him, that she was Home.

I look forward to seeing her.
Presentation matters to me. Nudity, as I've said before, rarely appeals; I prefer my gifts wrapped. To my mind, there are few things finer than simply appreciating how a girl looks, from the overall effect of the outfit she has chosen for my eyes, right down to the details of how well, or otherwise, each item is worn. From lightly running fingertips over the swell of a breast, seeing and feeling the nipple stiffen through the fabric through to pressing the heel of my palm against her underwear, feeling the first bloom of arousal and anticipation, are singular delights I doubt I will ever tire of.

I look forward to holding her.
Standing behind her, an arm around her waist, holding her to me as my other hand wanders appreciatively. Tilting her head to the side, putting my mouth to the soft, warm flesh of her pale neck, reveling in the feel of her skin to my lips, feeling her breathing quicken and deepen as she pushes back against me in response, breathing in the scent of her, need growing.

I look forward to kissing her.
To laying down alongside her or even kneeling as she stands, hands running with increasing hunger, savouring the textures of her skin and the fabrics adorning her. Her hands on me now, her own passion responding with increasing confidence to my own. Her fingers in my hair, mine in hers, mouths meeting, greedy now, demanding and urgent. I feel her arc against me as her arousal seems to grow exponentially and press a hand between thighs that part at the first touch to find the thin material of her underwear saturated with the wet heat of her.

I look forward to wanting her.
As she begins to saturate my senses, something starts to waken in me. My fingers tighten in her hair, my other hand moving with more intent, hunger growing with desire. I can feel the pressure start to grow inside my head as I feel the shift, the warmth of desire beginning to turn into a red-eyed want. I look at her and see that she knows, that she feels this as well as I do. I see a flicker of uncertainty, perhaps even fear, flicker across her face but that just makes it worse. Need comes off her in waves and my fingers push past the fabric and sink into her, liquid heat enveloping them even as she arcs her back. My thumb presses home, eliciting a sharp intake of breath, and I know she's already hovering on the edge of the first fall.

I look forward to craving her.
Inside me, something dark and malevolent takes an unknown shape. It's not anger and it's not rage and yet, at the same time, it's very much both of those things. It's hard to describe, harder still to define but it's there and it's growing. She has to suffer for me, but I don't want her endurance or her tolerance. I don't want her to grit her teeth and get through all that's coming for her, like she's paying a penance. Acceptance isn't enough, either. What I want is to feel her embrace her place and purpose with me, see her sacrifice herself for me.

I look forward to tormenting her.
Seeing her face contort with pain as I simply twist and grip her flesh. Seeing dark tears run from the corners of her eyes as my cunt-soaked fingers push deep down her throat. Seeing the conflict of desire and trepidation as she rolls onto her front or rises to a desired position. Seeing the way she shudders with pain as she is struck, by hand or cane or strap, wherever I see fit to strike her.

I look forward to tormenting her, too.
Seeing her face contort in pleasure as my mouth closes greedily over her nipple, sucking and feeding. Seeing her eyes widen as I shove spit-slick fingers deep into her cunt, over and over and over. Seeing the intense need growing in her every movement and sound. Seeing the way she shudders with pleasure as she is given permission to step off the edge and fall, over and over, deeper and deeper.

I look forward to hurting her.
To once more laying with her, formerly urgent and harsh touches becoming slow and controlled. She's open now, vulnerable, all raw nerves and endorphins, and such opportunities are not to be wasted. So as my fingers and hands do their good work, so I whisper to her, of secrets and shames and of fear and doubts. I hold her accountable to what she perceives as her shortcomings and feel her resulting, almost physical, need to atone, to be punished and to pay a price, any price, for being the sinner that she is. Her punishment is slow, relentless stimulation, using her vulnerability to set the inadequacy she feels in her head against the undeniable arousal of her flesh. There can be no pain here, no cruel touch, because that's what she wants and feels she deserves. At this point, what she wants is of little more than passing interest to me. With slow, gentle kindness I will drag her to the edge and set her to fall, over and over. And on the way down, her guilt and shame at being unable to hold back and deny herself that release will send her racking with sobs.

I look forward to pleasuring her.
At some point I will sit her up or bring her to her feet, the movement less about position and more about creating a fire-break, drawing a line between two states of mind. Fingers will slide back into her hair and the grip will be savage, perhaps eye-wateringly so, as my stimulation of her becomes similarly harsh and seemingly uncaring. I will move her as I want, dragging her if need be, shoving and pulling her into whatever form pleases me. My hand will land across her face, sometimes a single heavy blow, sometimes a quick flurry of lighter impacts. Ass and breasts and thighs will mix and match with crop and cane and strap. But the language will be soft and adoring, whispering of her beauty in my eyes, of my trust and faith in her, of how intoxicates and seduces my senses, one by one, over and over. And she will fall with my encouragement as I lead her back to that edge, and let her fall, over and over until she is, finally, spent.

I look forward to loving her.
And then I will just wrap her in my arms and hold her while she sobs with the emotion and the trauma and the joy and the confusion and the intensity of it all. We will talk about whatever needs to be talked about and at some point the exhausted tension in her will begin to evaporate, the tears will dry up and she will smile and laugh.

And after all that, I simply look forward to being with her.

She lay on her back as the man she called daddy lifted and spread her legs, resting himself against stocking clad thighs, the weight of him holding her back and open. He took himself in hand and she felt the tip of him nudge with blunt intent at her sex. He felt huge.

She turned her head to look at the woman laying alongside her, the one she now called mommy. This was the first night of their new family, of her new place and purpose in a world she'd felt increasingly alone in and alienated from. This house, and the life she would live in it, had felt like the answer to a question she'd never really understood, let alone asked.

It had been her new mommy who had shown the girl the bedroom that would be hers. Shown her the double bed with the O rings screwed into the posts and above the bed where there was also a mirror. It was, they had both said, very important for the girl to see herself serving as she was meant to. She saw the wardrobe, the drawers and the 'toy chest' as they'd described it and she had begun to feel the elevator in her stomach drop. It had felt almost perfection that she had found this, but now, seeing the physical proof of the life she would live and the world she would live it in, reality was taking the shine off her rose-tinted expectations.

A little later, after they had eaten their first family meal, the woman had told her it was time to get ready for bed and the girl had followed where she'd been led. In truth, she hadn't even thought about not following; the idea never occurred to her. Perhaps, she had thought, this was truly who and what she was meant for.

The woman had cleaned her, inside and out, an intensely invasive and personal experience that had left her feeling ashamed, faintly violated and intensely, almost absurdly aroused. It wasn't really what was done to her, so much as how it had been done, with precious little thought of how she might feel and a lack of intimacy that bordered on indifference. But that had changed when, once dried, the woman had helped her dress for her first night in the new house.

They had gotten ready side by side, the woman keeping a critical but not unkind eye on the girl's progress, correcting this, adjusting that, stressing the importance of detail and that there was a right way and a wrong way to prepare for her daddy but that she would learn. One way or another, the woman had assured her with a knowing smile, she would learn.

When, finally, both were presentable to the woman's standards, the girl had been led to the bedroom where the man waited. He had praised them, inspected them, tasted them and the girl had thanked her daddy, feeling a kind of hot, liquid clench as she heard words she'd said many times suddenly take on more weight than she had ever known words could have.

And now here she was... her first night. Her new mommy, her new daddy. Her new life. Her new place. Her new purpose. Her new world.

And he felt huge and fear prickled against the balloon of her delicious, almost reluctant arousal. So she had looked to her mommy and the woman saw the fear, saw the doubt and uncertainty and, in response, gripped the girl's hand in hers and kissed her forehead.
'He's too big, mommy,' the girl said and the woman smiled.

'Sshhh, angel. It'll be okay, I promise. You'll see. What kind of little girl would you be if it didn't hurt the first time your daddy fucked you?'

And at that the woman had smiled, turned to look at the man and nodded. The girl felt a brief second or two of intense pressure and then he was in. The agonised wail that rippled up from inside her was choked off as the woman's mouth pressed onto her own, nimble and greedy tongue between parted lips.

Later, when the man and the woman were lying in their own bed, they slept the sleep of the well fed and sated. The girl, restrained and lying in the dark, feeling whatever she was feeling, cried a little before sleep took her. But, when she awoke, she found herself wet, aroused and feeling strangely at home for the first time in her life.

And all was at it should be.

None so deaf as those that will not hear. None so blind as those that will not see.
Matthew Henry

You can't educate pork.
Anon.

The idea of the slave as having no choice is as inaccurate as it is pervasive. To be slave is to absolutely retain choice, to absolutely have an opinion and a voice. It's just that your primary concern is his well-being and satisfaction. I would argue that the choice of a slave is more important and passionate than that of a submissive for that very reason.
I have always found that a submissive chooses how and who she serves; a slave simply chooses who.
The love and service of the slave is pure and true. Nothing and no-one gets in the way of it and it is not there by default. To be slave she needs her master. The reverse is that to be master, he needs his slave. They are different sides of the same coin and what they share is uniquely and exquisitely theirs, and theirs alone.
That's all. I just cannot abide the common belief of the slave as some kind of unthinking robot without choice or voice when in truth she is the polar opposite of such a creature.

If she wants me to hurt until she can take no more and then to give her more anyway, that's ok. That's an act. If she wants to say or hear things she's afraid of, that make her curl up and almost visibly shrink into herself with shame and inadequacy, that's ok. That's an act.

But if she wants them because she believes that's all she's fit for, that she deserves them through her own sense of inadequacy, because she feels shit and wants to feel shittier, if that's her why, then that's not ok. Those things in isolation, as the whole point of the thing, I'm not interested in. They diminish us both.

Don't get me wrong, I've no issue with taking her to those dark places and for all those dark reasons because in the end we need and want what we need and want, but there are two conditions; the first is we get there my way and the second is she can't stay.

These are not the kind of places you should spend time in, but I understand all too well the desire and undeniable ache to visit, but you should always have a return ticket and never, ever go alone.

Getting stranded or abandoned there isn't good for mind or body in my experience.

Suffering isn't about what I do to her, it's about what she wants to say or do or feel as a result, and there is nothing (literally) that's on the no-fly list. What I want, as simplistic and vaguely cliche as it sounds, is her freedom. I don't want her to need all those defense mechanisms and security measures. I don't want her to feel the need to censor herself or hide something away from me through insecurity or fear. Pleasure or pain, dream or nightmare, I want it.

So many times I've seen so much going on in the eyes, that internal dialogue of thoughts and images that are often little more than abstract little fragments, and I want them. The things that flow through our heads in the deepest, darkest throes of pleasure can be anything from terrifyingly intimate to utter gibberish, like a livestream of a hallucination. Don't care... I want it.

And why do I want this? Because I want *all of her*. I want her to know, not just to see and believe but to absolutely fucking *know*, that she is welcomed and wanted here, with me, entirely and with all her strengths and weaknesses, her virtues and vulnerabilities known and embraced. I've never found much joy being inside someone's body; it's being in their mind that intoxicates me.

BDSM, D/s, SM, M/s, M&S, NQR and any other acronyms I've missed has been part of my life, one way or another, for as long as I can remember. But saying that, most of what I see these days seems to lack joy, let alone purpose. I mean everyone to their own, but there seems to me far too much emphasis on spectacle and not enough on intimacy. If you want to understand rope or using a cane or making pretty patterns with needles, the resources are there, from beginner to expert. But if you want to understand the person, then as far as I can see that's not covered in the How-To sections.

The common reply here is to say that rope, canes or needles are the tools that you use to understand the person, but I've never been convinced by that argument. It's seems to me like saying you use a mallet and chisel to understand wood, but in both cases all you're doing is using the tools to force something to exist, not understand it.

And the answer to *that* is that it's a flawed comparison because wood doesn't answer back, to which I can only shrug and say that, as far as I've seen, quite often nor does the person those tools are being used on.

You don't serve by learning acts or things. You serve by learning about you, your strengths and weaknesses, how to present yourself, how to dress and talk and behave in a variety of ways and how to recognise when to use each one. You learn how to crave his pleasure more than your own, how to feed off of his desires and needs and gain your sustenance and validation from providing for him.
You learn how to step outside of your own sense of self, your own comfort zones, how to see where your gifts lie, yes, but also how to see that often you limit yourself based on morality or ethics and not knowledge and truth. You cannot truly embrace and serve another until you can embrace and serve yourself. You do that by increasing your knowledge about and confidence in yourself.
The desire to serve is one thing, but being ready and able to serve is entirely another.

Dominance is not altruism. You need to remember that, and to also understand that service is sacrifice. It's not uncommon for subs and slaves alike to find their submission is a genuine burden and often emotionally acidic because they can't make use of it. That's because, by definition, their submission doesn't exist for their benefit; it exists for the benefit of the one they offer and devote it to.
Seeing the one they serve take pleasure and find reward in their submission is where the pleasure and validation is found for the girl. She is raised up to be something and someone for him that she could never be for herself.
In that way, they free each other. There's nothing altruistic about it; both are primarily in it for their own reward, it just so happens that they cannot find it without each other. A dichotomy to be sure, but also a truth.