Hello everyone! I remain new here, and am more of a reader than a poster. I love the site so far, and I am amazed at both the openness of the members here and the intelligence of the discourse. This is no ordinary forum.

Anyway, I've been exploring my relationship to bdsm quite a bit lately, and I wrote something the other night that I wanted to share with someone, and who better than this audience here? Here goes...

"I feel I am finally starting to understand that a D/s relationship is a complete embodiment of love and respect. A true submissive must not be an empty shell, but rather a self-created work of art. A submissive is both painter and painting, or, perhaps more appropriately, composer and composition. The dominant then becomes the musician, giving life and reality to the inherent beauty of the notes on the page of the submissive's heart. It takes tremendous skill, extensive practice, and unwavering focus to execute such art correctly, but when done successfully, one sees the essence of human love.

Indeed, this is the story of Tristan and Isolde (sorry to those who don't know the opera): the submission - the perfect, musical submission - of a man to his mistress. Wagner, for all his manliness, comes off as the ideal submissive, the composer of himself, waiting to be played by a virtuouso.

There can be no soulless, mindless obedience here. The piece of music, the sub, must be bent to the dominant's will, but she cannot be broken. The notes are of her choosing, only the tempo and cadence is His. To break from the metaphor: it is her desires, her need for pain, punishment, loss of control, her need to please, that takes precedence. The resoluteness and uncompromising temprament necessary to the dominant cannot compare, ultimately, with the spirit of the submissive. Her's is the spiritual role, the essence, his merely the manifestation.

I could continue to wax poetic here, but I think my point is clear. This is the place that I occupy; my path is not that of the spirit. Rather, I am the conductor, turning the sheet-music of my submissive into true sound. All my dreams, my thoughts, and my gut tell me that this is part of what I am meant to be."

Thanks for reading!