What makes you submissive?

[deigja]

;-) I´m with Tom too, there are many factors playing together to form our personality. Some are set, some develop depending on the surroundings. We learn how to cope with the things we experience.

I have not made any experience with rape, no experience with sexual assaults. Still i had what i can tell from lookig back now, submissive fantasies.
at the age of 17 perhaps i was pretty insecure but gathered all my courage to tell a boy in my class that i was interested in him. this resulted in me beeing bullied by almost the whole class, all the boys and at least some girls as well. This taught me to hold back a lot, not to open up to any one easily and not to make the first step in a relationship... still it did not influence my beeing submissive. it neither made me less submisse nor reinforced my submissiveness. What i perhaps need more in a relationship than others now is security. I want to feel wanted even more than before and it costs me a lot to open up as I´m pretty much afraid of getting hurt. Also in that time I had some problems with my submissiveness. Because of what had happened to me I was struggeling with myself, with my feelings. I was not in peace with myself and with my desires.
There was a time I actually felt that I was abnormal. Fotunately I have overcome that by now
This is no setting. it is something I aquired over the years. And it has become a habbit hard to break.
What a good D/s relationship has to offer in this respect is the trust that has to build between the lovers, the closeness, the communication that should be there in any relationship but is inevitable in a good D/s relationship. Still my aquired way to cope with feelings makes it harder to reach this point.

Ultimately I can only say one thing: The setting within me was there early but there were a lot of factors that influenced my beeing able to handle it, to reach a point where I was finally selfsecure enough to live what was programmed early on.
And I could even Imagine people beeing turned around in a way. Depending on outer factors I could imagine one, especially someone with a hard life, never to find to him or herself.
As some of you already mentioned there are those people who have been abused and end in a circle of abusive relationships... Some, like you Gem, have broken out, but some perhaps never will. Due to outer circumstances they will perhaps never find to their submissive, dominant or vanilla setting and live it in a way that makes them happy.


Sorry for taking so long.
Greetings, Liz

[gemmy]

lol Isabella - great stories and i know there is a serious undertone to this thread but that was the point - i didn't bare a very intimate part of myself to make people laugh :P

it gets people talking and exchanging experiences and ideas about why they think they might be submissive

quite obviously yours was innate from the start

[DowntownAmber]

As usual, mastersgem, I am following your post with considerable intersest (you always seem to cast us into controversy!).

Obviously cases are being made for both the "nature" and "nurture" side of this argument. This leads me to think that it's likely a healthy dose of BOTH. I am firmly convinced that our experiences do not define the whole of who we are, and certainly can NOT make us into people we are never inclined to be in the first place. However, the incidents that occur (especially the traumatic ones) as we live our lives are most certainly deciding factors in how our raw materials come together to form a person.

If I were to head to my kitchen right now, I could mix up two bowls of cake batter from identical ingredients. I could do EVERYTHING just the same, but then put one cake in the oven for 45 minutes and the other in the microwave. For those of you that don't bake, let me clear this up by saying I ain't gonna' get the same end result. The point? No matter what you start with, different preparation gives different results.

If I felt like prolonging the metaphor here, I could approach it from this angle as well: while the cakes are baking let's head out to the grill -- one grill, one temperature, no variables. Everything I put over the flame will be subjected to the very same set of conditions. So, I set a stone on one side of the grill and a block of wood on the other side. After a little while, the stone is still there. It's a little hot, mind you, but I can grab it off the grill and set it aside and when it cools down it's still going to be the very same stone. The wood? Most of it has burned away. I can scoop as many ashes up as I want, but I'll never be able to make a block of wood out of them again. The same experience that left one type of material unscathed, wrecked another.

We need, as people, to undertand both things: what we are, and the effect our lives have on those innate tendancies.

[gemmy]

As usual, mastersgem, I am following your post with considerable interest (you always seem to cast us into controversy!).

thank you, i think? lol *winks*

Obviously cases are being made for both the "nature" and "nurture" side of this argument. This leads me to think that it's likely a healthy dose of BOTH. I am firmly convinced that our experiences do not define the whole of who we are, and certainly can NOT make us into people we are never inclined to be in the first place. However, the incidents that occur (especially the traumatic ones) as we live our lives are most certainly deciding factors in how our raw materials come together to form a person.

If I were to head to my kitchen right now, I could mix up two bowls of cake batter from identical ingredients. I could do EVERYTHING just the same, but then put one cake in the oven for 45 minutes and the other in the microwave. For those of you that don't bake, let me clear this up by saying I ain't gonna' get the same end result. The point? No matter what you start with, different preparation gives different results.

If I felt like prolonging the metaphor here, I could approach it from this angle as well: while the cakes are baking let's head out to the grill -- one grill, one temperature, no variables. Everything I put over the flame will be subjected to the very same set of conditions. So, I set a stone on one side of the grill and a block of wood on the other side. After a little while, the stone is still there. It's a little hot, mind you, but I can grab it off the grill and set it aside and when it cools down it's still going to be the very same stone. The wood? Most of it has burned away. I can scoop as many ashes up as I want, but I'll never be able to make a block of wood out of them again. The same experience that left one type of material unscathed, wrecked another.

We need, as people, to understand both things: what we are, and the effect our lives have on those innate tendancies.

i truly enjoyed this Amber, well done hun

[Cool Luke's Hand]

I also realize that it would be idiotic to assume that something like a rubber fetish or love of high heels could be genetic.

How so? When broken down to the most basic level, homosexuality is nothing more than a fetish for having sex with members of the same sex (just as heterosexuality is the opposite and asexuality seems to be the lack of either), and since there's now a growing view that homosexuality is the result of genetics, what's stopping one person's desire to be spanked from from being the same?

[Isabella King]

I pinched this from one of the links that Icy put on another thread. It made me laugh.


"If there’s an illness, there’s a website where the mentally ill try desperately to justify their unhealthy fixations and actively recruit others into their sick club. Denial abounds in these people. Rather than seeking help, they, safely huddled together with their own kind, celebrate their own depravity and try to build a “lifestyle” out of disorder."

This seemed as good a place as any to drop it

[Cool Luke's Hand]

"If there’s an illness, there’s a website where the mentally ill try desperately to justify their unhealthy fixations and actively recruit others into their sick club. Denial abounds in these people. Rather than seeking help, they, safely huddled together with their own kind, celebrate their own depravity and try to build a “lifestyle” out of disorder."

That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

[slave eswn]

That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

yes it is pretty dumb, and since i don't play well with ignorance, let's just not got there...

[casie1124]

Ah the nature or nurture question....

For me I can remember being quite young and playing with the kids in my neighborhood with the other kids. When playing, the other little girls would fight over who would be the princess that day, I on the other hand always wanted to be the prince's servant .
I fantasied about being controlled and other various things at a very young age, before they were sexually arousing.
Though through life I found my self in some pretty nasty situations. Some I must admit I put myself in because I didn't realize there was a healthy way to act out my feelings, others by peer dumb luck. Though I believe some of those situations furthered my desire for submission

I do believe that it solely depends on the submissive in question. In my experiences many submissive people I have had contact with have been in abusive situations. I throughly believe a lot of those situations were brought about by not realizing their true nature and seeking out people to fulfill their needs in unhealthy ways. Then there are some that simply became so use to being submissive in situations completely out of their control that they truly need some form of submission to feel whole and complete they don't know how to function otherwise, stumbled on this wonderful world of bdsm and found a healthy way their needs could be met and hopefully have found or will find someone to help them work through their issues. I've also met submissive people who have never experienced anything other than consensual abuse. It's truly an individual situation, not one size fits all.

Casie

[TomOfSweden]

I pinched this from one of the links that Icy put on another thread. It made me laugh.


"If there’s an illness, there’s a website where the mentally ill try desperately to justify their unhealthy fixations and actively recruit others into their sick club. Denial abounds in these people. Rather than seeking help, they, safely huddled together with their own kind, celebrate their own depravity and try to build a “lifestyle” out of disorder."

This seemed as good a place as any to drop it

he he funny. The funniest thing is that it's so revealing about the person writing it. Fetish for hate?

[icey]

he he funny. The funniest thing is that it's so revealing about the person writing it. Fetish for hate?

except he's not supposed to hate he's a preacher lol i found it funny but also a bit frightening too.

like anyone else i wouldnt want to be called broken or 'made' by anyone either but i still believe that our experiences as well as genetics , social environments etc all play a part in what forms and shapes us. how can it not?

[TomOfSweden]

except he's not supposed to hate he's a preacher lol i found it funny but also a bit frightening too.

Reading a book doesn't mean you automatically understand what the author was trying to say.

[moet369]

I am submissive because that is me. I have read the posts on the thread and find them quite intersting as to how people end up being submissive. I on the other hand have not had any abouse in my life and grew up with a pretty "normal" childhood. I grew up the way I am now, which is naturally, and happily submissive. I never talked much in school and shied away from people that were aggressive not because of any other reason except that, that was me. I used to find myself apologizing for everything I would do, Including my presence in rooms, which I did belong but found myself not to "fit". Submission for me is a way of life that I have grown to appreciate. It has drawn me to other lengths in my life that I find quite interesting. For instance, I joined the Army. I find being here that I take orders much easier than my counterparts. Sorry for writing so long.

[rooshoe]

Submission for me is a way of life that I have grown to appreciate. It has drawn me to other lengths in my life that I find quite interesting. For instance, I joined the Army. I find being here that I take orders much easier than my counterparts. Sorry for writing so long.

Wow, you too? Lol i thought i was the only one who did/noticed that. Also, i always wondered, when i looked around, how many people standing in formation next to me had closeted kinks..

[Always_Rockin]

I have known that I was submissive since I was 15 when I started having sex. I always wanted it harder, rougher, kinkier. I wanted to be tied up and called names; along with all of my countless other fantasies. I had a completely normal childhood, no abuse of any kind, but I have always needed to be Dominated and controlled.

[RedHotKinky]

"If there’s an illness, there’s a website where the mentally ill try desperately to justify their unhealthy fixations and actively recruit others into their sick club. Denial abounds in these people. Rather than seeking help, they, safely huddled together with their own kind, celebrate their own depravity and try to build a “lifestyle” out of disorder."

Ha ha, what a fantastic quote... especially the bit about celebrating depravity!!!

Personally I am convinced that people can be born submissive/Dominant, just as people are born gay/straight/bi etc.

I have had bondage and submissive fantasies for as long as I can remember, and often practised self-bondage as a child. I have never been abused, mentally or physically, and had a very happy childhood. I have always been submissive, I have always known I have been submissive (even though I didn't fully understand as a child), and I am proud of what I am.

[mastersbirdie]

well I am definatly a submissive I suffered severe abuse that has left me with ptsd but I am working through it. I was molested from age2 until age 17 when I got married I was also sodomized by my grandfather at 14. my marriage was very abusive but is over now. I hated the abuse but I had fantasies about forced sex and having some in control of me. Since I have met my new master he is wonderful there is a lot of bondage and sex. I am his collered slave but there is no abuse I consent to everything. Having the right to consent matters to me. my abuse did not make me a submissive my free choice did. Its what I am.

[TomOfSweden]

How so? When broken down to the most basic level, homosexuality is nothing more than a fetish for having sex with members of the same sex (just as heterosexuality is the opposite and asexuality seems to be the lack of either), and since there's now a growing view that homosexuality is the result of genetics, what's stopping one person's desire to be spanked from from being the same?

I was being specific about just those things. Rubber and high heels. I'm not going to rule out the possibility that there are qualities in rubber that speak to some base animal desire. I can come up with a long list of qualities in both rubber and high heels that could be candidates to set off genetic triggers. But we quickly run into very dodgy territory. So I didn't mean there aren't any. It would just be wrong to make assumptions.

Most of these genetic triggers aren't even logical. Red lips is a great example. And one which there's actually been research on. Young people have darker colours of red and more full lips. So if everything else is the same, who ever has the fullest and darkest red lips we're going to assume is the youngest no matter how bizarre the lips have been painted and how much the lip-stick is painted outside the lips. It seems like no matter how much we know it's just fake, we cannot see past this. Our instincts make us helpless in avoiding this judgemental error.

Being sexually attracted to youth seems to be some kind of base make-up of all humans. So we're more likely to be turned on by people sporting "whore-make-up" no matter how much we know it's just fake, and no matter how much it offends cultural conditioning, as might be the case with transvestites.

ok, long legs.... I guess.... high heels isn't so strange.

But rubber!!! It's the most fake and unnatural thing I can imagine. That's a large part of why I like it. It offends everything natural. Drives me insane with lust. ....it's getting hot in here.... but ... I cannot see how that can be anything but learned behaviour. But again, I'm no expert. I doubt anybody in the whole world is!!! This isn't exactly a big field of study today

[sub-timmi]

How so? When broken down to the most basic level, homosexuality is nothing more than a fetish for having sex with members of the same sex (just as heterosexuality is the opposite and asexuality seems to be the lack of either), and since there's now a growing view that homosexuality is the result of genetics, what's stopping one person's desire to be spanked from from being the same?

I have to agree with Luke here - I a Bi male and a sub. what I need is the total hand-over of control to a Dom/me. anything like punshment etc. is only a phisical demonstration of this.
I also agree with "Mastersgem" regarding postion of authority held during 'Vanilla' Times - I have held very senior postions in some global companies. It is the power thing that does it for me not an abusive background etc. though without any research to back up my thought that this may be the case for most male subs.
Hope not to upset to many but thats my penny worth on this

[slave eswn]

de'javu-it's like a paragraph (similar) from a book i've written in my head. are we from the same sick family?

[bondsman]

I can't pinpoint a reason for my submissiveness (seems like no one else can either), as I've never been abused as other people have. But I am a believer in personality developing as a result of environment. I've had relationships that were very one sided, including non-sexual, and I'm not sure if this is the cause or result of my need to be controlled. Even my best friend when I was young was a "bully," and that was one of the most open friendships I've ever had. If I associate closeness or intimacy with submission, then my relationships with friends or girlfriends have defined me; if not, then my submissiveness has made me a target for those kinds of people.

I agree with tydnchaynz. It doesn't matter in the end.

[gemmy]

I can't pinpoint a reason for my submissiveness (seems like no one else can either), as I've never been abused as other people have. But I am a believer in personality developing as a result of environment. I've had relationships that were very one sided, including non-sexual, and I'm not sure if this is the cause or result of my need to be controlled. Even my best friend when I was young was a "bully," and that was one of the most open friendships I've ever had. If I associate closeness or intimacy with submission, then my relationships with friends or girlfriends have defined me; if not, then my submissiveness has made me a target for those kinds of people.

I agree with tydnchaynz. It doesn't matter in the end.

No it really matters not, I agree, but it is interesting peeking into the psyche of others and see if we have things that relate or not.

I do like this statement you make bondsman..."But I am a believer in personality developing as a result of environment." - I think it must play bearing on some of who we are as well

[Ownedfyre (mm1)]

I have always been a person that likes to make others happy. Whether it is cooking for them, laundry, helping them out in some way.....I have always liked to please other people. I also can remember that at any given time in my life, where men are concerned, I have always wanted to please them. Strong, arrogant and controlling men have always attracted me. Not always for the best, mind you, but I have always been drawn to them. A man who can handle himself well, take care of things and make me feel like I belong on my knees! That is the man I want. I guess it took me a long time to realize it. I never knew about D/s until recently. It was like finding that 'thing' that made me whole inside. I always felt incomplete and now I know what it is I need. It has been a wonderful discovery for me, and I know it is truly my calling.

[bellelapine]

Thank you for sharing everyone. It has been interesting to find out that a few others have shared similiar experiences on the road that I have, as well as enlightening to find out that we may just be "wired" that way.
I actually beleive that my parents helped to make me submissive. My Sir and I laugh about that sometimes, because there are little things that strike me as similiar between my parents relationship, their relationship with me, my relationship with my siblings and my own D/s relationship with my Sir. Allow me to elaborate, I'll try not to ramble too much .
When I was younger, unfortunately, one of my siblings was sexually abusive. This went on for sometime particularly during times in which my mother was hospitalized (either with the new baby or her heart surgery). My father was working and trying to take care of us, and threats of violence were generally made to ensure my silence. It started when I was four and continued off and on until I was fourteen, so I was molested off and on for ten years.
While this was going on in secret, I watched my mom. She cooked, cleaned, ate last, didn't sit down until everything was done, and worked at her studies. She was in my eyes a sub, and to be honest I spent a long time both envying her and resenting her for not being stronger (I think however if she had been we would not have the amazing mother/daughter relationship we have now). Because she was ill, I was afraid to tell her anything that went on, and I felt the need to protect.
Soon after the abuse stopped, I began looking for a relationship. Something anything to fill the void I felt. I knew there was something wrong, but it's dreadfully difficult to pinpoint anything when you feel ashamed of your own sexuality. I got into several abusive relationships...actually standing up for myself, fighting back against the jerks I was dating and going out of my way to sort out why this was going on.
Throughout the iffy relationships I had, one thing kept standing out...the fact nothing was doing it for me. I felt alone in my relationships (which were not D/s), I felt something was not right or missing always. I met Sir online and when I spoke to him the first time it was as if a little light turned on in my head.
We spoke about collars and what they meant...and I realized very dejectedly that I would probably never get a collar because I didn't know anyone I could trust to give me one.
Because I had essentially been "broken" through my abuse both in childhood and as an adult, I was sure that nothing would ever be able to get through those walls I'd erected and no one would be just right. (Okay so after that phone call I knew my Sir was it) But up until that point, I'd just been looking in the wrong places at the wrong people and didn't know it.

....kind of makes me feel like singing "A Whole New World" from Aladdin sometimes (teehee)

[Daes]

Last time I checked, masochism and sadism were labeled as "mental disorders" so looking up research may prove to be less than useful.

I don't have an abusive history, though I do wonder if my japanese background has any significant impact on my submissive nature. In the households I gew up in, both in my parents, grandparents, and otherwise - you were respectful, you offered to help, and I did what I could to keep others happy. My mother was a dominant figure (shes hispanic), and my dad (he's japanese) seems attracted to dominant women. When I look at it from all aspects of his personality I am very much my father's daughter.

I've always found great happiness in giving to others - friends, family, or otherwise - I give because it brings me fullfillment and I have always had that trait. I've always enjoyed servitude. Now when it comes to masochism it is not so much the pain that gives me pleasure so much as everything else. It is my way of pleasing Him to make Him happy because his pride in me brings me joy. When I say "Give" I don't mean in gifts, but in the very utter sense of the word, to give Yourself, to give of yourself.

When I do something that makes Him happy, makes him smile, makes him proud of me, it inspires within me the most wonderful feeling. I can't Be any other way. I want to give all of me. Finding someone that can handle that is another issue entirely.

[babygirl1204]

I think I was born submissive, I was sexually abused as a child at a very early age but didn't remember it until I started having sex. In my teen years I always seem to be attracted to controlling boys but never allowed them to have any control it was always a problem.

After I started having sex I never enjoyed it, I had great partners but somehting was missing. This was my opinion of sex.... key word "was"

It is like a good hot bath, when you first put your foot in its really really hot, then your slowly put the other foot in and lower your body getting deeper into the water until you are all the way in and well once you were all the way in it wasn't so hot after all.

It wasn't until I figured out I was submissive that I realized you can alway turn the heat back up to keep it hot.

babygirl

One other note as a child I was never spanked or beat for any reason I was always protected by my sisters if I were due a spanking they too the blame for what ever I did.

[Lady Hecate]

I'm not sure what makes me submissive.
I think i might be different in my background from other subs too, based on some of what I'm reading here.
I was spanked as a child, but I've never been horribly beaten really. Although I guess what one considers to be
"abuse" might vary from person to person...

I'm pretty sure I'm a sub though..I just left a man who was pretty submissive because I wasn't satisfied by him at all and he frustrated me. I couldn't bearthe thought of always having to tell him what to do..just awful..ugh..

[gemmy]

I'm not sure what makes me submissive.
I think i might be different in my background from other subs too, based on some of what I'm reading here.
I was spanked as a child, but I've never been horribly beaten really. Although I guess what one considers to be
"abuse" might vary from person to person...

I'm pretty sure I'm a sub though..I just left a man who was pretty submissive because I wasn't satisfied by him at all and he frustrated me. I couldn't bearthe thought of always having to tell him what to do..just awful..ugh..

We're all different

and uniquely, we're all the same..

xo

[Lady Hecate]

interesting observation..

nice to meet you BTW, Mastersgem, I'm brand new here.

[gemmy]

Nice to meet you as well Lady Hecate - welcome to the Library