IridiumGarden

Punishment is based on creating a fear response of some kind. Fear erodes trust and connection. Trust and connection are essential for the surrender of a submissive. Therefore, punishment erodes what is essential to a healthy, successful Ds dynamic. This makes punishment of any sort incompatible with my relationships. 

I am a leader and a carer in my career and daily life.  I do not punish any of my charges, and it insults the dignity of another creature to punish them.

I make mistakes, but never intentionally. I have no motivation to brat or test the boundaries a partner may set for me. I hate failure, and I hate displeasing. My motivation is to make a partner proud. That is incentive enough to avoid mistakes. That is, provided I have a partner capable of feeling and expressing pleasure, and who wants to have pride in who serves him. A constructed, unnecessary punishment added on top of knowing I have failed or displeased just creates more pain for everyone, and even has more subtle, insidious impact, such as contributing to feelings of inadequacy.

The best way to avoid making a mistake is communication, flowing clearly and in quantity in both directions. The best response to a mistake or misunderstanding is to try to get clarity, then discuss it, find common ground, and discuss how to avoid what went wrong. I believe in accountability and responsibility, and also in practicality.

I acknowledge that my position on punishment is perhaps unusual or unexpected. I consider myself well healed from my traumas, none of which I would consider terribly serious to start with. I know myself, and I know my needs. I have no hope of serving anyone if I cannot serve with an open, vulnerable heart.

Some submissives apparently require a punishment mechanism, either to set aside their mistakes with a physical reminder or something else to even the scales, or to have some sort of other constructed reminder of which way the power exchange flows. I am not so unfortunate. I can understand these concepts perfectly well through verbal reassurance.

"Sex Without Love" by Sharon Olds

How do they do it, the ones who make love
without love? Beautiful as dancers,
gliding over each other like ice-skaters
over the ice, fingers hooked
inside each other's bodies, faces
red as steak, wine, wet as the
children at birth whose mothers are going to
give them away. How do they come to the
come to the come to the God come to the
still waters, and not love
the one who came there with them, light
rising slowly as steam off their joined
skin? These are the true religious,
the purists, the pros, the ones who will not
accept a false Messiah, love the
priest instead of the God. They do not
mistake the lover for their own pleasure,
they are like great runners: they know they are alone
with the road surface, the cold, the wind,
the fit of their shoes, their over-all cardio-
vascular health--just factors, like the partner
in the bed, and not the truth, which is the
single body alone in the universe
against its own best time.