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ORIGINAL: domiguy

I hope to see you on the news... I would tell my friends...."You know that crazy bitch that ate those puppies and then gutted her boss?...I saw her tits."

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ORIGINAL: kiwisub12

Have you (group you) ever seen a tree, say, an oak , and thought how beautiful and perfect it was?

and got closer and realised that there were stumps from broken branches, and holes in the trunk from woodpeckers, and holes in the leaves from insects

and the thing is, those things don't make it any the less awesome. If anything, they make it even more incredible that it had those things happen to it ,and it continued to grow and reproduce and be even more beautiful.

If it was perfect, it wouldn't have been tested in real life , against all types of weathers and pests - and would collapse the first time a strong wind came along - because it wouldn't have been tempered.

quote:

ORIGINAL: gungadin09
Does anyone else feel that being somehow "damaged" is an asset in BDSM? Like, maybe, we're a big club of freaks who have just learned to embrace it? i feel like if i was a normal, well adjusted person i wouldn't be here. As much as my weirdness embarasses me, i'm still kind of proud of it. i don't think i would want to exchange my fucked up life for a normal one.

quote:

i can do better than that. When they catch me eating those puppies, i will dedicate it to all of you. i will say, "This one is for all of my friends on collarme. i LOVE you, man!"

pam

quote:

ORIGINAL: gungadin09

i do. i've always seen myself as kind of a freak. When i was little, it used to really bug me, how different i was from everyone else. My interests, aptitudes, thoughts, feelings, whatever-- always seemed at sixes and sevens with other people's. i used to watch others, copying them, trying to figure out what i was doing wrong. i even kept a notebook. i wrote down what people were wearing, how they acted, what they said. i was trying to understand what "normal" was, so i could learn to be that.

Needless to say, it didn't work. i could never learn to be different than i was. Eventually, i just gave up on it. For years i resigned myself to being depressed and isolated. i thought that's just what life had in store for me, and i should just accept it. It was years before i learned to see any value in being different; to view it as an asset instead of a liability.

i would like to say that as an adult i've learned to embrace my "freakdom", but i'm afraid it's not that simple. i'm much more content now than i was as a youth, but i still struggle fitting in in groups; still get thrown off balance walking the line between what's conventional and what's really me. i find myself frequently misunderstood or misjudged, and i still have problems with insecurity and low self esteem. At least it's not as bad as it used to be.

Does anyone else feel that being somehow "damaged" is an asset in BDSM? Like, maybe, we're a big club of freaks who have just learned to embrace it? i feel like if i was a normal, well adjusted person i wouldn't be here. As much as my weirdness embarasses me, i'm still kind of proud of it. i don't think i would want to exchange my fucked up life for a normal one.

Any thoughts? All you freaks out there, sound off!

pam

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ORIGINAL: gungadin09

Any Dominants out there think they're damaged? Or, any men? Guess we've mostly heard from female subs, so far.

pam

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ORIGINAL: sexyred1

I also think it is important how you define the word damage.

To me, damaged is not getting over things in your life, letting them defeat you. Damaged is when you are depressed, isolated, suicidal, hurt, distrustful, in pain all the time. Damaged is when you cannot let things so, you don't move on, you blame your victimhood.

Being into BDSM or being eccentric or anything else, is self expression, not damage. Yes, someone could come to BDSM from a place of real damage, but I venture that for most of us into it, are into it for how it makes us feel and who we are inside, not as an antidote to whatever perceived damage we have.

quote:

i've always seen myself as kind of a freak. When i was little, it used to really bug me, how different i was from everyone else. My interests, aptitudes, thoughts, feelings, whatever-- always seemed at sixes and sevens with other people's. i used to watch others, copying them, trying to figure out what i was doing wrong. i even kept a notebook. i wrote down what people were wearing, how they acted, what they said. i was trying to understand what "normal" was, so i could learn to be that.

i would like to say that as an adult i've learned to embrace my "freakdom", but i'm afraid it's not that simple. i'm much more content now than i was as a youth, but i still struggle fitting in in groups; still get thrown off balance walking the line between what's conventional and what's really me. i find myself frequently misunderstood or misjudged, and i still have problems with insecurity and low self esteem. At least it's not as bad as it used to be.

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ORIGINAL: laurell3

But that's true of EVERYONE in the world in varying degrees...There is NO normal. There is no necessity to be like everyone else.

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ORIGINAL: gungadin09

quote:

ORIGINAL: laurell3

But that's true of EVERYONE in the world in varying degrees...There is NO normal. There is no necessity to be like everyone else.

i think our lives are acted upon by two opposing pressures- the pressure to conform, and the pressure to be ourselves. i think it's naive to say, just ignore the pressure to conform. It IS necessary to be like everyone else, to SOME degree. People who stray too far from the norm are locked up. And even for those who are not, being TOO different can be stressful. But, like you said, everyone experiences these feelings, not just me.

Having said that, if there is no "normal", then there is no "normal" degree of self confidence, no "normal" degree of insecurity, no "normal" degree of introspection, and no "normal" amount to want to talk about these problems. i think i do accept myself. Just not in the "normal" way.

pam