Why relinquish power when I’ve spent years fighting to have it

September 8

Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about surrender.

Not the way it looks from the outside - kneeling, serving, obeying - but the way it feels on the inside. The messy, contradictory psychology of it all.

Why is power exchange my kink? On the surface, it doesn’t make sense.

In the world, I often feel disempowered. And so I understand the currency of power when you can wield it. When you’ve had to lead, defend others, and protect yourself in order to survive, power becomes something you grip tightly, something you fight to retain even as people try to strip it from you.

At work, in relationships, in society, I’ve known what it feels like to be diminished, dismissed, or used. That’s one kind of loss of power: the unchosen kind.

So why then, with all that history, would I willingly surrender power in a relationship? Why would I consent to being contained, directed, even controlled?
What does it say about me that I’d even consider it? That I’m not worthy of having power? That I’ve been play acting this whole time?

But here’s something I’ve recently discovered: disempowerment is theft. Surrender is offering.

When I hand power over to my Dominant, it isn’t because I’m weak, incapable, insecure, or uncertain of myself. It’s because I’ve made a choice in response to what I have received from him - his presence, his steadiness, his containment, his pacing, his experience , his care - that allows for a shift within me. Surrendering power, then, becomes a deliberate act. A gift if you like. And that transforms not only the experience, but the entire relationship.

Yes, surrender provokes ***. It stirs the part of me that has always had to stay on guard. To watch. To assess. To analyse. To pre-empt.

But when the container is right, when I trust the one holding me, surrender brings freedom.

Freedom from having to decide everything.
Freedom from scanning for danger every second.
Freedom from performing strength when I’m tired.
Freedom from presenting an image that hides the softer parts of me.

In those moments of surrender, I feel more powerful, not less. Because my submission is not collapse. It’s precision: where I place my devotion, how I allow myself to be shaped, and who I decide is worthy of holding me.

The paradox is this: inside a Dominant’s containment, I often feel more at rest than I do in the so-called freedom of the outside world, the freedom I’m supposed to have by virtue of choice, but which so often feels like exhaustion in disguise.

And yes, I use that word: rest.

For individuals like me, who have been discarded, used, or toyed with by those who liked the idea of taming us more than they liked the idea of knowing and protecting us, rest is radical. Rest is sexy. Rest is the condition under which curiosity, vulnerability, and intimacy can flourish.

That’s the thing I wish my closest friends understood about power exchange. It isn’t simply about what he does to me, or what rules I follow. It’s about what happens inside me when I surrender: the internal tango between *** and freedom, between exposure and safety. Between wanting to show all the intimate parts of who l am, but also need to hide lest l am see as too much…or conversely not enough.

Sigh.

I’m laughing at myself now because after years of fighting to hold on to power here I am begging to let it go.

Edited September 8 by dartford848358
Random asterisk in text

September 8

The brain really does work in some weird ass ways 😂

I’ve gotten to the point I just kinda.. do 🤷‍♂️

September 9

The interiors/exteriors thing is interesting.

I feel the same but inverted as a Dom. In polite society, I feel like I’m fighting for control over myself. To be liked and accepted and seen as a safe, friendly, and valid person. For the record I think I am all those things, and this is not to say that I spend all day actively having to resist hurting people or anything.

But to get Freudian we all suppress our ids, right? We’re careful not to make the tasteless joke, or lash out at the asshole customer, or to look the wrong way at the pretty girl, or to give our hearts away on first dates. We’re careful not to be unlikable. We’re careful not to be ourselves.

So in accepting that gift (and responsibility) of power we can transfer all that fretting and focus onto another person. And it feels like reassurance that even if we behave exactly like the fucked up person we’re afraid of being perceived as, that doesn’t negate that we are accepted, trusted, and even loved. I heard someone recently say “it’s like, ‘what if I am a monster? And what if that’s okay?’”

I think power exchange is beautiful, and that we’re lucky to live in a world we people with diametrically opposed desires can find each other and explore those interiors. It’s like magic, borderline spiritual, that two people who crave the opposite inward experience can be bonded and see each other so deeply.

September 9

It's only natural to want to feel heard, be loved for who you are, respected and appreciated. Not what you can do for someone else. Everything is out of balance when selfishness, greed and lust are the only goals and selflessly giving, loving and forgiveness is ignored.

September 9

This is beautiful.

September 9

On the rare occasion in life I've found someone who I do consider to be dominant .capable as in they don't have to tell me they're dominant. I simply know what their presence, their actions and their thoughtfulness and what they attend to and what they do not pay attention to. alot of people don't understand that certain aspects of bdam are the most intimate form of trust you can have with someone, truly