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Over thinking - 7/31/2011 5:42:34 AM   
Aileen1968


Posts: 6062
Joined: 12/12/2007
From: I miss Shore, New Jersey
Status: offline 		Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?

There are people who have contracts and fill out forms of what they like and don't.
They set up written rules of how their relationship is going to work and run.
I could come up with twenty more examples...

I just have never been able to understand that aspect of all of this.
I'm generally very open minded in terms of whatever floats your boat, but this I just don't get.

Do you have a contract with your mother? Your best friend?

Some relationships do require it...boss/employee, etc.
But a personal relationship???
You can have a million rules set up for a relationship, but it never takes into account that you're dealing with the real life emotions of another person.
It's like trying to control Mother Nature to me. That's something that is impossible.

If your relationship is like this, please explain to me how it works and why it works because I haven't ever been able to wrap my brain around it.



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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 6:03:31 AM   
gungadin09


Posts: 3232
Joined: 3/19/2010
Status: offline 		i have a fetish for over-thinking things in general, not just BDSM relationships.

pam

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 6:13:38 AM   
xssve


Posts: 3589
Joined: 10/10/2009
Status: offline 		People are raised with certain romantic notions, and it not just sexuality, but "lifestyle"etc., an abstract ideal of how thing ought to be, which doesn't often mesh with the reality of trying to stretch a paycheck, keep the bills paid, keep the house from falling apart, the laundry done, the kids fed, etc., etc., all of which is basically a lot of work and hair pulling, not very romantic at all.

To top it all off, gender roles are in flux: is the woman makes more money than you do, is she the boss? Traditional roles are under assault from every direction, but mainly economic - thing is, people tend to attribute those things to cultural movements - the "culture wars" etc., it's the downside of conspiracy theory: it really isn't a female conspiracy, or a gay conspiracy, etc., I'm sure they're there, but they really don't have the clout to alter things to this extent  - it's a stock market conspiracy, it just about cheap labor and making more profit.

Anyway, despite the facts, it tends to get attributed to some shadowy social conspiracy, so social solutions tend to get proposed - a "slave contract" is not substantially different than the "contract marriage" of the religious conservatives, it's a band-aid solution but it makes the participants feel better, i.e., their roles are defined, it offers a promise of social stability, although it doesn't really change anything.

Point is, for the most part, people crave stability, predictability - it's hard to develop expectations when things are constant flux, the best you can do is find a small group of people and decide that this is how it's going to be, regardless of what the rest of the world is doing - and taken from that standpoint, it's understandable.

It's basically what we all do, we just don't all need to formalize it with an (unenforceable) contract.

At worst, these people are fooling themselves if they think it has any future as an institution - a contract gives it that institutional cachet, and some sheen of institutional authority, and I suspect it appeals more to the authoritarian crowd - and it's fine, I'd rather they worked their kinks out that way, it's probably much healthier than the alternative, more right wingers should be doing it, IMO.

In short, it's another form of role play - to some extent, it theoretically protects the Dom, because he/she at least has some proof that the relationship is consensual, but otherwise it basically satisfies the need to make it "official", the stamp of authority, kind of a bureaucratic fetish.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 6:24:36 AM   
risktaker9


Posts: 197
Joined: 3/10/2010
Status: offline 		I can understand it as it applies to a more casual type of thing. It takes time and effort to build a relationship, even if it's a NSA one. It's kind of like using Cliff's Notes. These people lay out like/dislikes and expectations on both sides so both can proceed to the fun stuff and have a good chance of it working out within a range of what is acceptable to each person, without having to do the dirty work of getting in there and really knowing someone. General ballpark type nstant gratification.

For anyone with a long standing relationship I guess I don't quite get it either. Unless it's a reminder. People do forget and they do take things for granted. If you had rules/regulations/contracts you would be more compelled to do the those things rather than have them go by the wayside and then think back on it fondly and wonder where those days went to...

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 6:50:37 AM   
RaspberryLemon


Posts: 422
Joined: 7/18/2011
Status: offline 		We do have a contract. It's not notarized or anything like that--we don't need that kinda crap. It's just something the two of us wrote up and looked over and agreed to and signed. It's not meant to be legally binding in any way--it's meant to be bound by our morality and our intent to perpetuate and sustain the relationship.

It doesn't contain frivolous things like likes or dislikes, or anything money-related. It's a general list of rules and expectations of both of us, and the general confines of the relationship itself. It's meant to be all-inclusive, thus the generalization in most of it (the only "specifics" in there are rules that I am to uphold myself to.)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aileen1968
You can have a million rules set up for a relationship, but it never takes into account that you're dealing with the real life emotions of another person.

Except that that is precisely what our contract is about. It's not because we need it to conduct our relationship properly, and it's not role play either. It's just two functional, capable human beings writing something down for the sake of clarity. We're not over-thinking, we are just stating something clearly in writing. It can be re-written, revised, and amended as needed. It's just something that helps us maintain a clear picture of what is expected of both of us. It's not something everyone chooses to include as part of their relationship, and it's not something that absolutely HAS to be done, but it's something that exists in our relationship, and it works for us.

We didn't start out with this contract in place--it was quite awhile into our relationship before we wrote everything down, agreed upon the wording, and signed. Nothing is really different as far as how it's affected our relationship, but it does serve as a reminder and affirmer to the rules and expectations that are in play--essentially, to us, it is the written form of a collar.

EDIT: I would also like to include that my Master is a rather forgetful person (head/brain trauma, so I don't mean just your normal "forgetfulness",) so often times if he agrees to something or I agree to something, even something huge, it is commonplace for him to forget about it. So for him, having everything in writing is a good thing; this way, he can go back to it and affirm and reaffirm if necessary. This is a big part of why this contract is useful to us.


< Message edited by RaspberryLemon -- 7/31/2011 6:56:48 AM >

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 7:27:31 AM   
JanahX


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Status: offline 		They do it because they're fucking stupid.

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 7:31:33 AM   
JstAnotherSub


Posts: 6174
Status: offline 		When I first found out about this thing we do, I thought all that stuff would be necessary. It seemed like too much damn work, I have to admit.

When I met the domly dude, everything just flowed naturally though. It really is easy and a no-brainer, when it works. Or at least it was to me.

I fully expect it to be that natural and easy again, if it ever happens.

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 7:38:36 AM   
Kaliko


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Status: offline 		The need for a contract has flown out the window for us quite some time ago. But in the beginning we did have one, for two reasons. 1. Honestly? It was kind of fun...to spell it all out and have those first few bits of what I thought at the time as real expectations. And 2. Because of the kind of people we are. We analyze everything to death, both of us. We can spend hours arguing about whether a word was used properly in a sentence. Nothing ever comes simply for us from the get-go - we have to look at all options, explore all options, know what we like and what we don't, and then talk about it for a zillion hours. We tried the contract thing because it was an option we learned about. Turns out, we don't need or want one.

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 7:59:25 AM   
littlewonder


Posts: 15659
Status: offline 		It's just another form of control for whoever is doing it and most likely a fetish or kink.

It's really not my thing either. I don't need to think about those types of things. I just let my relationships flow naturally. They're either going to last or they won't. We either drift apart or we stay together be it my relationship with my dom, family or friends.




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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 8:20:01 AM   
HannahLynHeather


Posts: 2950
Joined: 4/4/2011
From: where it's at
Status: offline 		well, this is a topic about thinking, so i had better let heather deal with it. 
i think some people just crave structure, that's just the way the are fucking wired. some people are afraid of possibilities, of what ifs, so they like to have it all figured out in advance. so to those sorts, a contract makes sense.

the big problem i see with a contract in the context of an interpersonal relationship is that it can't cover everything without being so broadly worded as to defeat the whole purpose of having a contract. something that is not covered will come up, of that there's no fucking doubt, just ask anybody who has been in a relationship for a few years.

they are unenforceable and they are bound to fall short at some point. so they pretty much have to be a kink, and a passing one at that. almost everybody i know who has a contract ends up just sort of tucking it away and quietly forgetting about it.

don't get me fucking wrong, you need some sort of agreement in place, but the simpler and more broadly framed it is the better. that way its adjustable, and its more generally applicable. once you have that, you have the real basis for the relationship, then you can make all the detailed contracts and suchlike you fucking want, because when they fall short, and they will, you can refer back, so to speak, to the basic agreement for guidance.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 8:58:21 AM   
Epytropos


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Joined: 7/23/2011
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Aileen1968

Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?

There are people who have contracts and fill out forms of what they like and don't.
They set up written rules of how their relationship is going to work and run.
I could come up with twenty more examples...



I know you're being semi-sarcastic with this, but in all seriousness I'm pretty sure people do get off on the paperwork. It creates in them a sense that they are bound by law and gives them the (false) notion that they cannot simply walk out if they so choose. It's not unlike marriage - the idea of a written commitment is comforting because it gives your life stability. Those of us who are more cynical will think to ourselves that the whole thing is shit since, unlike marriage, it is in no way enforceable by law, but the more idealistic among us might take pleasure in it, enviably.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 9:03:44 AM   
DomImus


Posts: 2004
Joined: 3/17/2009
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Aileen1968
Do you have a contract with your mother? Your best friend?


Comparing either of those relationships with a bdsm relationship is just as hard for me to wrap my head around as the premise at hand is for you.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 11:17:12 AM   
Iamsemisweet


Posts: 3651
Joined: 4/9/2011
From: The Great Northwest, USA
Status: offline 		If you acquire property together, a contract dealing with that makes sense. If I owned property with my mother or best friend, I would also have a contract.

< Message edited by Iamsemisweet -- 7/31/2011 11:19:46 AM >

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 11:27:22 AM   
NuevaVida


Posts: 6707
Joined: 8/5/2008
Status: offline 		Hey relationship contracts aren't my thing at all, but wow at some of the degrading comments in this thread already about those who have them.

I've talked to friends who have contracts, because I didn't understand the need or desire.  In one case, it was a dominant man who liked the mindset it created in his slave when she had to sign it and acknowledge all the things she had just agreed to.  He said sometimes seeing it on paper and actually signing your life away drives a point home much more clearly than someone nodding in agreement to something she might not fully understand the big picture of.

In another case, both the dominant and submissive had had some very rocky relationships in their history, and they wanted to sit down together early on, and decide how they wanted to build their relationship to be the healthiest it could be.  In doing so, they began writing things down (together) that were important to them in a relationship.  They wrote down where they believed past mistakes came from, and they wrote down newer methodologies which they thought gave them the best path going forward.

From those writings came a more simplified "contract", which was more of a written agreement/promise to each other that they could refer to and come back to, if they ran into trouble or forgot "Oh yeah, this is how we were going to conduct ourselves in this particular type of situation."

I guess I think of it this way - people all over the world read and refer to self-help relationship books.  A relationship "contract" is simply a personal, thought out "self-help" guide, specific to their relationship.  I don't knock it.  I just don't do it myself, personally.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 11:39:01 AM   
LadyAngelika


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Joined: 7/4/2004
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quote:

Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?


I think it's a combination of things. Some people are more analytic than others. Some people have a longer path of self-discovery. As always, YMMV.

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 11:59:14 AM   
NuevaVida


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quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyAngelika

quote:

Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?


I think it's a combination of things. Some people are more analytic than others. Some people have a longer path of self-discovery. As always, YMMV.


I agree but would also add, some people just like talking about subjects of interest - even though they're really not spending a lot of brain energy analyzing bdsm, they just like talking about it and sharing ideas. This can come across as over-analyzing, though.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 12:04:29 PM   
UniqueRaven


Posts: 1237
Joined: 9/30/2009
From: Austin, TX
Status: offline 		Is thinking a form of kink? Sure it can be.

For me it is a big part of my kink, actually - I enjoy considering M/s dynamics, and O/p dynamics, and everything in between. I am a visual thinker, and the exercise of converting my vision into words is a huge one for me, and it's one that I enjoy - it's also why I write.

But in the terms of a D/s relationship, I have learned that I much more agree with Aileen. It is possible to over-thing things to death. It is possible to build in failure points into a relationship, because sometimes contracts and expectations create the scenario of...what happens when one of the two has a bad day, or simply decides that they don't want to do xyz anymore?

I experienced this with my ex - we had a contract which we loved. We spent a great deal of time writing it, it was meaningful to us, and we allowed for it to change over time.

But, when one of us didn't act in accordance with the contract - because we were human, and we're not perfect - the other began to question why. And by having our "code of conduct" in writing, it created all these expectations of each other...expectations that didn't work over time.

This is again why I am such an advocate of being authentic in a D/s relationship - simply being yourselves. And sure, a contract or other "thinking" can be part of that but...I just say, everything in balance.

And so for me, while I know I enjoy my thinking and it is great fun for me, I have no specific expectations of it being part of my relationship. I'm happy being "his" however he wants to me to be, and in whatever way makes us happy...and doing my "thinking" as my own thing, which hopefully he will support and encourage as well.

Just my thoughts, etc., as always. :)

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 12:10:35 PM   
IrishMist


Posts: 7480
Joined: 11/17/2005
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Aileen1968

Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?

There are people who have contracts and fill out forms of what they like and don't.
They set up written rules of how their relationship is going to work and run.
I could come up with twenty more examples...

I just have never been able to understand that aspect of all of this.
I'm generally very open minded in terms of whatever floats your boat, but this I just don't get.

Do you have a contract with your mother? Your best friend?

Some relationships do require it...boss/employee, etc.
But a personal relationship???
You can have a million rules set up for a relationship, but it never takes into account that you're dealing with the real life emotions of another person.
It's like trying to control Mother Nature to me. That's something that is impossible.

If your relationship is like this, please explain to me how it works and why it works because I haven't ever been able to wrap my brain around it.



Contracts. I have never used one myself, not in the sense of actually sitting down and writing out everything, and then being 'expected' to follow the written word. I do, however, understand the need that some have for them.

Not everyone goes into a relationship of this kind for the emotional reasons that most seem to focus on. For some, it really is nothing more than a 'personal relationship based on a professional relationship'. Meaning...their emotions do NOT enter into it. They are in the relationship solely for reasons other than 'I like him, I love him, I want to be with him'. In addition to that, not everyone has a sexual relationship with their partner.

Then, take into account also those who are only tops or bottoms and have every meet with another written out and agreed to. These people ALSO make it a point to only play with each other, and to not top or bottom for others. They have a strong relationship, yet, it's not sexual ( or it could be, but it's still regulated to top/bottom only ), they don't live together, they are not married, they may or may not have partners outside the top/bottom role, etc etc.

Written contracts can come in handy for a great many reasons. We may not always understand them; but that does not mean that they are not needed and wanted by some.


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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 12:17:37 PM   
LadyAngelika


Posts: 8070
Joined: 7/4/2004
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quote:

ORIGINAL: NuevaVida

quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyAngelika

quote:

Is over thinking a bdsm relationship a kink?


I think it's a combination of things. Some people are more analytic than others. Some people have a longer path of self-discovery. As always, YMMV.


I agree but would also add, some people just like talking about subjects of interest - even though they're really not spending a lot of brain energy analyzing bdsm, they just like talking about it and sharing ideas. This can come across as over-analyzing, though.



So here's the thing: I wrote that some people are analytic, not overly analytic. There was no judgement in my statement. You are right, some people just like analyzing.

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RE: Over thinking - 7/31/2011 12:21:21 PM   
OwnedFemaleFlesh


Posts: 182
Joined: 4/9/2011
Status: offline 		fast reply - Because it turns me on. It seems so final, so inescapable. It's like my slavery is set in stone. Just reading it is a huge erotic rush for me. I don't see it as over-thinking, I just see it as a really hot, exciting, submissive thing to discuss and decide on xxx

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