Re-mystifying Submission

I experienced something today that drove the point home entirely:  submission is in the mind.  It sounds phoney and insubstantial: but submission is in the mind.  I met a man and we traded a brief private conversation in the middle of a public gathering, and it was enlightening in ways I don't get to feel every day.  He wasn't trying to teach me anything either.  All he did was present me with a conundrum upon which to meditate.   I didn't even particularly understand the conundrum, to be honest.  I felt slightly foolish.  (Hooray for the hanged fool of the tarot!  Once again, I honour thee!)  I understood the picture that came with the conundrum... a bound woman, blindfolded, readied.  I understood the words of the conundrum: imagine a man who knows what to do with such a woman, and who will be unpredictable, and who will be in control, and who (being her dominant) has already established her safety and his sanity.  He's got into my mind and he's making me do things!  The fun isn't lost on me.

"To steepen the learning curve," he said to me, I would have to consider these things.  To consider theoretically, to imagine the conditions, to picture in my mind.  I'm sure all he wanted was for me to acclimatize myself to the possibility of "him", as it were.  It's a nice line.  It's a fun and romantic twist on the meeting of someone new.  "How about it, baby, you and me on a beach far away... picture the possibilities!"  A man could do worse for an opening gambit, especially if he's willing and able to deliver on the temptation.  But nevermind all that:  I have learned something extraordinary.  All of my imagining, all of my steepening, all of my considering, and all of my picturing have fulfilled in one afternoon what legions of men have been unable to accomplish in months of knowing me.  I have chastely, intelligently, experimentally experienced a perfect idea of submission -- a Platonically perfect idea of submission -- in my own mind.  The conundrum:  "How do I make this real?"  And the simple solution:  "It already is."

The Fool, Part 2

You can give away only what you own.  It's a principle at play in "The Story of O" and it is a principle I was reminded of by my mentor this weekend.  You can give away only what you own:  and if you don't own yourself (and know yourself, and understand yourself, and take stock of yourself, and regularly prepare yourself) then you can't submit your true self to a powerful and creative dominating force.

Reading "Fifty Shades of Grey" drives home, really, what it means for a woman to submit to a man: the man (Mr. Grey) wishes to provide for Ana, in every sense of the word.  Provide shelter; provide attention; provide food; provide physical fitness; provide physical maintenance; provide intellectual stimulation; provide for all the basic needs for survival, in short, as well as the luxuries that will maintain and increase her beauty.  (The tension in the novel arises from her need for, rather, love.)  The novel drives home, however, what dangers lurk for a young submissive, inexperienced and unsure.  The greatest danger is in how (and whether) the submissive thinks.
Does the submissive have the nerve to negotiate her own terms?  Does the submissive intend to have all her thinking done for her by the Dominant, or will she continue to formulate her own opinions, ask questions, and explore her world with her own eyes as well as with those of her Dominant?  How she thinks is pretty important: her self-esteem is on the line.  To surrender yourself is to expose your ego to shaping, refinement, an external force molding (and sometimes re-creating) parts of you.  If you have surrendered yourself to someone who does not know how to articulate honesty, complex issues, or even simple issues so that you can understand what is at stake, beware.

A woman sometimes wants to be re-shaped: maybe something was molded badly, before, and maybe there is someone in the world who knows how to fix that.  Over time; with careful mastery.  Over lots of time, after much trust, and with delicate skill.  Maybe there is someone in the world who knows how to remove that jarring shard without leaving nerve-damage in the wake.  That someone is, truly, a Master who can turn something beautiful into something even more beautiful.

When the Fool's card appears in the tarot spread, the seeker must ask oneself if the path has been obscured.  The seeker must understand whether significant change is on the horizon or whether it is simply time to strip down to the heart's core and, now, examine.  The seeker mimics the fool's journey as the spread reveals trial and test; and only at the end of the journey does the fool finally know, reunited with that almighty string-Master who has controlled fortune from the very beginning.  Oh to You, in the future, You who makes me breathe, Oh!  I learn for You, and I strive for You, and my aim is where You look.

May your April Fools be gentle in their mischief!

The Fool

I do love the tarot deck and all its artistic manifestations.  Tarot appears in poetry, in drama, in real life; it also appears behind the scenes in ways we never really connected before (or at least that is my experience as I continue my learning).  April Fool's Day is near upon us, and to celebrate there are many Foolish things happening this weekend in Second Life.  I am looking forward to a costume dance, personally... I love playing the fool.  And I'm just naturally such a good little fool.

I might "masquerade it up" a bit, though.  Because there is one thing I love as much as playing the fool and that is the license afforded me by playing the masked fool.  And the license afforded others, masked, and the liberties they take when they realize their newfound freedom to do with the bodies of others what they have only, previously, imagined doing.

The Fool, in Tarot, is a character to embrace.  How could one not?  The fool is the character seeking experience.  Naive, new, fresh, he carries everything he needs (and it isn't much) in his pack.  There is a dog who guides (or who teases; or who distracts; or who represents the driving animal desires that propel the young mind towards permanent experience); there is a flower in his hand; and there is the whole world ahead of him.  The major and minor arcana wait patiently in the deck, shuffled newly for each seeker, in the order determined by the fates and guiding forces.  Experience is about to come.  Experience will permanently mark the fresh journeyer.  Knowledge transforms; knowledge burdens; and knowledge destroys the innocence of the new mind.

On the edge of the precipice, the fool is about to step off into the realm of knowledge and experience.  No longer on dry land, "not in Kansas anymore," experience soaks the seeker and cultivates the tastes of the future.  Appetites are formed.  Cravings develop.  One begins to shape one's own mind and habits, determined to experience more and more.  April Fool's day is so very, very, very loosely based upon this principle that the history is nearly gone.  But it was once, a long time ago, the beginning of a fresh new year.  New starts; new acquaintances; new experiences; new living.  This time of year, the beginning of spring in the West, this is the time of the new and the innocent.  I have my own rituals for this time of year (and we all do, to varying degrees) and this year my ritual includes the daily meditations upon my needs, my shadows, my limited (but growing) experience, and my unfaltering path along this voyage into real, good fantasy.  I give myself license to feel what I want to feel, beginning now.