From Pain is Growth...

I have heard it said "If you're not having any fun, you must be doing it wrong." 


I wonder if the same could be applied to growth? "If growth doesn't hurt you're doing it wrong." Even better we could apply it to love? "If loving isn't painful you're doing it wrong."


I am dealing with loss. It is my loss, my choices and I readily admit I am here in this place because of them. Ultimately no matter how conflicted I feel, I know I made the right decision. I might not have did it in the most elegant manner, but this experience has made me realize quite a few things about myself had it not happened at all.


My Daddy passed away June of 2001. He died of a massive stroke 6 months after his visit to my home here in Utah. His first ever visit and conversation after 10 years of silence. It was as if the universe had rewarded me for my "good behavior" on one hand, and then saw fit to take him away. It left a huge hole in my heart. He was my daddy and after all that time, I was once again Daddy's girl.


I fell in love with a man who filled that massive hole in my heart. He soothed that ache that I didn't realize that was there.


This person did what others couldn't do. He stripped me bare, made me feel vulnerable, but most of all made me feel **safe enough** to be vulnerable. This has been a double edged sword for me. On one hand I thank him for this, on the other hand I curse him for this. Now I am vulnerable, but far from feeling safe and secure in my new found vulnerability.


I thought I wanted to be owned, be "slave". Thought it would be a type of freedom that I had searched for. Security & safety that I never had within my marriage.


I quickly found with each step through this looking glass I would have had to compromise my views, my needs, my definitions, my authenticity to make this dream come true. I fought tooth and nail. Spitting venom, both literally and figuratively kicking and screaming. I hurt people and have apologized. I deeply regret it and wish I could press rewind so I could have said "No thank you" from the start. I don't, however, regret loving, trusting or being striped of my emotional armor.


Out of this, has come both positive and negative for me. I have more clarity. Property, for me, is an unattainable fantasy. Slave is not in my genetic make-up. Neither are any of the other "labels" this site likes to banter about. I'm okay with this. I'm okay with being a woman. 


I am not okay with being the vulnerable little girl but it is a part of me that I cannot deny. Because I choose to be this way, I lay alone at night, sometimes crying, sometimes just being okay with feelings and emotions. I have always learned lessons the "hard way" this lesson could not have been learned any differently. 


I may not be a financial wizard, I may not be a perfect parent, I may not be the perfect sub/slave/property. I never will be, it isn't who I am. 


I can say I am a loving, caring, passionate, and honest woman. It is okay to not compromise my wants, needs and desires. It's okay to be my vulnerable self.

Moving Boxes...

I have been opening, unpacking and moving boxes for the last 12 months or so. Some of these boxes are inside of my mind, some of the boxes are physical belongings from my move from place to place.

I get really tired of doing this over and over, but it seems I will more than likely spend the rest of my life in motion. 

Is that such a bad thing?

I have unpacked a few things only to realize I have no place for them, so I pack it all back into the box, shove it in a corner to be unpacked another day. 

Procrastination?

Other boxes I have taken "this or that" out of necessity and closed the box only to return it to the shelf. After all I got what I needed out of it, and someday perhaps I will need the rest of what's in the box. 

Does this make me a pack rat?

I have days where I just want to empty the contents of the boxes and toss the boxes away. 


I have days where I want to just throw out the boxes full of stuff from my past. 

Could it be genuine fear that keeps me from doing either of these things?

Perhaps.

I have finally found a voice in one of the boxes. It was covered in dust, from 3 decades of abuse and neglect. One of the boxes I unpacked recently was full of courage. Put those two together and I have found I can do just about anything I set my mind to. 

Can you imagine me being able to say No? 

I can tell you I have had to learn how & when to say "No".

One box that I had been eyeing for some time was owned by someone else... I was looking to put myself in that very box as property. That box got too small too fast. I've found that while my life may be full of boxes, I am not meant to be in one. 

Is this a bad thing? 

It could have been, but now I have chosen not to find out.

I wonder around here from this forum to that forum reading & observing, pondering the mistakes I've made, the losses I've had, and the great gains I've earned. I have been able to conclude that I am not fit for "slavery" anymore than I can fit in a small box. While it works for many of you out there, I've found it personally will not work for me. 

I will eventually tear out the seams or fall through the bottom of that box.

I have learned that I can only give service when I personally "have" something to give emotionally/physically. 

What good is giving away an empty box?

I have learned that my sexuality is fluid. I don't just fuck/lick/suck anything or anyone, I can be quite picky and intimacy is a HUGE turn on for me. 

It's not about the size or shape of the box for me. 

I have also pondered my masochistic tendancies and found I tend "use" physical pain. I use it as a form of catharsis. I don't enjoy pain one bit, it doesn't "get me off" in that manner. For me receiving pain has to be on my terms and no one else's for it to be useful and effective. 

Masochism = My Cold Box

My sex and my pain are two separate experiences for me, and I enjoy my sex way too much to really mix the two. 

Sex = My Hot Box

I do have many sadistic thoughts, I have been able to experiment with those. They are a very dark part of myself that I still try to keep in a box, and can only let it out to play when so inclined and the energy is right.

Sadism = My Pandora's Box

I have learned more about polyamory, and have found that for me, being single & poly, my "primary" relationship is with myself. I am not "wired" for patriarchal type relationships. I have learned that I can have that love and intimacy I need with many others on so many different levels. It's natural for me to love more, to embrace more and "be" more. In order to not compromise my personal authenticity I have found I must stick to egalitarian-type relationships.

I have had to "move into" being this confident and comfortable with who I am. 

I still have many boxes to unpack, and slowly but surely someday I shall be home. 

^..^ 

Want in one hand... Shit in the other... is it scat play?

My mother used to have two different sayings that she loved to remind me of on almost a daily basis:

"You've got 'want' in one hand and 'shit' in the other. See which one fills up first."

"What you 'want' and what you 'get' are two different things."

I have only been actively exploring the world of BDSM & Kink for a little over a year and a half. It has introduced me to many things. Shown me so many different aspects to living and loving. For the experience and the people I have met I am grateful.

It also opened up a door to a path called "Polyamory". Seeing the different type of loving and open dynamics around me, until January of 2010 I had never thought I would have the capacity to love more than one. Turns out I am full of this thing called Love and I can be honest and open about it.


So I had continued down this little tangent path called Open Relationships or Polyamory. In my "want" I pictured finding a primary eventually, and going forward and exploring many more relationships, living laughing and loving. Again, this is in my want category.


Just recently, I have been presented with an opportunity with a couple who I can fall in love with so deeply, however, what they want is a Poly "closed". I spent a weekend with them. I loved it, I felt warm and fuzzy, I found new fetishes and explored a few feelings that I thought weren't there. I felt love, I felt belonging, I felt synergy.


While I have experienced this with them in a weekend, and they wish to make it a lifetime, I cannot help but wonder, why settle? That's what I would be doing, wouldn't it?
Settling and not knowing what I might have missed out on? I am much like a child that way... since I left my bad marriage, I have always promised myself that I will never again do two things with the rest of my life: 
#1 being  Marriage - this will never happen again for me.
#2 being Settling - settling for what I have vs. trying to better myself and continuing evolving and growing. 


I have taken a lot of time working on me, trying to live my life authentically, being disillusioned. My biggest fear is that I will never have what I want, and I will give in and settle for something I really don't want to be.


It is tough to love openly, honestly with most of the men around me being taught that societal patriarch is the "norm" and I am just a slut not seemingly worthy of true love. Most men don't really get it. So few understand that while yeah a fuck and suck would be nice... but I need the intimacy to go with it. I need the true and honest friendship, not just a "booty call".

I am conflicted, fore I do honestly and openly love this couple, but fear that commitment will take me back to an old illusion archetype that I have worked so hard to free myself from. This commitment would also require me to pull up what little roots I have and move even further away from any semblance of friends & family that I do have. I would have to quit a job that I love very much. 


Is love really worth that much? This is the question I have to find an answer to. Is happiness really worth giving up all that you know? "Yes!" you may cry... but lets get real folks... would you really??? Color me a skeptic, but I highly doubt that most of you would.


I don't yet know the answers... I am not sure if I will ever know. How do I tell them that? And more importantly will they wait for me to find the answers?

A Few Things I learned this weekend... ^..^

1. One should never yank on a chain when there is a big hairy man on the other end.

2. I really like yanking chains (they jingle & they are shiny)

3. When said chain is yanked get ready to wrestle... well more like be tackled than wrestle. He is much bigger than I.

4. Happiness is being bound and chained.

5. Love is waking up and realizing you are bound in more ways than one.