RE: The Impossible Task

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Focus50 -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 5:30:01 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: kalikshama quote: If I think she is hung up on not failing me, my preferred "task" is to fit her out with a hogtie and have her release herself. For those who don't know me, I tie my girl up like I mean it. There is no wishy washy "you're not sposta undo the ropes" kinda nonsensical rules in my D/s - she absolutely can, IF she's able to.... If you'll pardon the brief hijack, someone on another thread mentioned hogtying for an amount of time that did not seem reasonable to me. I know everyone is different, but how long do you usually leave your girls in a hogtie? Or, in this scenario, after how long would you release her? No set time, it isn't about the clock. As long as she's relaxed and comfortable and no issues from the bonds etc - and there aren't other matters needing attention. I like "bondage only" scenes anyway but this type (preceded by strenuous attempts to get free) are shorter than the usual. So yeah, I erred in saying it poorly. A "bondage only" scene is usually around 2-3 hours; this, while not putting a clock on it, probably around an hour or so. Again, depends where she is with comfort and sub-space etc. Here, I'm more making a point about who makes choices and decisions as well as what constitutes failing. And as the one in charge, I'm only relaxed for as long as she is. This is a learning thing for me, too. A fear of failure (and remedial "task") is something I address early in the relationship and a one-time thing. Focus.

NuevaVida -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 5:37:47 PM)
I have a lot of thoughts on this so I'll try to write them up cohesively since they're kinda spinning around in my head at the moment. First, I've had enough failures in my lifetime - and learned from them - to know and understand I'm not always going to win/succeed/accomplish/etc. If he were to set me up to teach me that lesson, I would find it quite irritating. I'm 47 years old - if I don't know by now that I'm not always going to succeed, then I haven't been paying attention. If he were to set me up to see how I'd do, he'd be disappointed in my response. More often than not I'm aware of what my capabilities are, and how far I can stretch them. If he were to push me to do something I was 100% certain I could not do, and pushed me regardless of me telling him I was 100% certain I could not do it, I think I'd become pretty angry about that. Would I try anyway? It depends on the task, I think. A little more than a year ago we went through this - he thought I could do it and I knew I couldn't. But I tried anyway. And guess what? I couldn't. It was more of an emotional thing than physical (although physical was involved). The result almost killed our relationship. However, it ended up being an awesome turning point for us, in more ways than I can write about here. I don't really see failure as "failure" - He helped teach me this. We all have limitations - physical and/or emotional. And circumstances (either by life or by our own making) occasionally bring us to meet those limitations. Sometimes that's simply knowing where the starting point is, to work from, to reach beyond it. Sometimes it's simply knowing that's as far as you can go. Any "failure" is an opportunity to springboard from, and learn some very valuable things about yourself (you/yourself is a generality here). But - - Being intentionally set up? KNOWING for certain I would fail? Intentionally setting me up (in a non playful way)? I would be angry. And if it happened a lot I would lose trust in him, and probably not like him very much. I went through many, many years feeling like a failure and beating myself up over it. It took a LOT of work to know and understand that I am not a failure. I won't go back there again, and if his intention was to put me back there, I'd see him as harmful to me. He encourages me to feel good about myself, and to succeed, not fail. So I can't imagine a time he'd do this. And if he did, and we both knew I couldn't, I'd probably say no. GASP! "Slaves don't say no!" But I probably would. It's a consequence of his choices and he'd have to deal with that. Then again if I wasn't certain of my inability, I'd try. My last owner once decided I could only pee every six hours. I thought that was ridiculous. But I tried to comply. The result was an inability to hold my bladder any longer, and feeling like my bladder combusted and emptied itself anyway. That happened three times - once in my kitchen, once at a Peet's Coffee, and once in my car. This was followed by a pretty painful UTI. Hey, he ordered it, denied my protest, and so I did it, because I didn't believe I could say no. He withdrew the order after my doctor had me on a 10 day antibiotic treatment. I did not feel like a failure - I felt like HE failed ME. As for "giving them something to work on," as mentioned in the OP - Life gives us enough to work on. He doesn't pile on more stuff for the sake of it. If he wants to see me work at something, he has many opportunities already. Now, if this was just a lighthearted request or nothing actually serious, we could totally have fun with it. [;)] ETA: Damn that got long!

Lucifyre -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 7:33:51 PM)
The simple answer is, Mr would never intentionally set me up to do somethiing He knew I wasn't able to do. If He gives me a task, He has full faith in my ability to complete it. Howeveer if I am unable t complete whatever it is He has directed me to do, it is my responsibility to let Him know what I am having trouble with and why, and depending on the circumstances He will either let it go, or assist me. Our relationship is based on a HUGE amount of trust, if He were to direct me to do something He knew I wasn't able to do, it would undermine that trust we have. Aside from that fact that He and I are no bullshit kind of people. Lucifyre

JeffBC -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 8:25:04 PM)
Never considered it and I haven't run into a situation... any leadership situation actually... where that sort of strategy seemed wise. I'm just don't tend to play games like that. At least to me that seems like a wonderful way to undermine my own authority.

TemptingNviceSub -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 8:46:08 PM)
I am not a big proponent of tasks unless they make sense, are usable to making life easier in the long run or are part of a scenario. At my age,success or failure is to much a natural part of life, to add even more stress to deal with is often times incomprehensible. I can appreciate the mindset behind tasks but they have to have purpose in order for me to take them seriously. Tempting

DesFIP -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 9:02:42 PM)
Theoretically it could teach that it's okay to fail. However, the risk is that it teaches something unintended - that you're untrustworthy.

SacredDepravity -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 9:26:22 PM)
~FR~ I am hard wired to want to please and succeed for my dominant. Sadly, I don't actually care what he thinks success or pleasing is. I know that task completion equals obvious success. If you are wanting something deeper, then you are going to have to set the ball on the tee for me first. Otherwise, you get a crying mess that feels like I don't measure up and am not an asset to the dominant. That's just facts. If I am constantly put in a position of failure by my dominant either by means of impossible commands or literally putting up blocks to my success, then we are not a match and I would even consider it abusive. Additionally, such a dominant had best not even ATTEMPT to punish such a failure. That will end badly...verrrrrry badly. SD

RaspberryLemon -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 11:16:35 PM)
In my opinion (and I can say my Master shares this opinion with me,) intentionally setting your subordinate up to fail is just plain bad leadership. It's dishonest at best, and at worst kind of mean-spirited and potentially damaging to the relationship and/or the self-esteem/confidence of the individual receiving the order. As far as I can recall, my Master has never given an intentionally impossible order or task to me. If he did, I would not react well and it would certainly do harm to our relationship. It would make me angry that he would intentionally set me up to fail. He and I both know how hard I try for him, and how much it pains me to disappoint or fail him. It would hurt to know that he was intentionally setting me up to feel awful. And I'd feel awful upon failing to accomplish what I'd been ordered to do, even if I knew it was impossible from the start. It would destroy my confidence in my proficiency to serve him, and it would wreck my self-esteem. On top of that, it would erode my trust and respect in him as my leader. Receiving intentionally impossible orders would cause the bonds of trust that we share to break down into confusion, doubt, feelings of failure, and even resentment. At least in my relationship, I don't think there could ever be a circumstance in which him intentionally setting me up to fail could be useful or have any positive outcome. ETA: Great topic, Athena. Very interesting to see everyone's opinions on this.

AthenaSurrenders -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/4/2013 11:20:50 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: NuevaVida As for "giving them something to work on," as mentioned in the OP - Life gives us enough to work on. He doesn't pile on more stuff for the sake of it. If he wants to see me work at something, he has many opportunities already. ETA: Damn that got long! I'm about to go to work so don't have time to respond at length yet, though I am enjoying the responses so far. I just thought I would clarify this: by 'something to work on' I was imagining along the lines of 'my sub appears to struggle with time managements/organisation, I will set this mammoth task so that I can watch how she approaches it and then help her learn new techniques'. As opposed to just projects for the sake of projects.

mnottertail -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 6:37:07 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: myotherself quote: ORIGINAL: mnottertail Was the guy at the bar any good? You were amazing, honey. The best. Now, about that $50 you owe me....[:D] Yeah, about the $50....you will probably want to downgrade me to 'adequate'.

graceadieu -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 7:14:05 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: AthenaSurrenders I can see it being used for 'funishment' scenarios. Can anyone offer any other reasons why they might assign an impossible or at least unrealistic task? Have you done this, or been on the receiving end? Did it turn out positively? Can it ever be a good thing? I've had this done - once and only once - as a surprise lead-in to a funishment scene. It fucked with my head pretty badly, and damaged my trust.

MariaB -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 8:01:09 AM)
What immediately came to mind for me is rock climbing. Steve can do the much more technical routes than I can and you would often hear me saying, 'I'm not leading that, its impossible'. As far as I'm concerned its an overhanging nightmare that I just can't work out and if it wasn't for Steve absolutely insisting that I try, I would walk away thinking there is no way I could do that. Its not about him demanding that of me though, its about getting me to understand that if I only used my intuition I can conquer most of my fears. If you look at something as impossible then you will fail but if you emotionally commit to it with absolute determination you will more likely carry it through. Focus made a good point about 'the fear of failure'. Fear of failure is a huge hurdle to overcome, especially when you think your good at something [:)] What I now have to do when that little shadow of doubt creeps over me is ask myself the question, 'how I am going to overcome this problem/puzzle?'. By doing that I send a demand to my subconscious to supply an answer. The answer was there all the time, I just needed to open up to my intuition. Now I don't see this as very different from things I have done with my submissive in the past. I wouldn't want to ever venture into anything that terrified a person and if I was setting them up for complete failure, (an example of that may be me giving them a demand in French when they cant speak French and insisting they do that demand before getting to Google Translate) then I would be doing it for fun and games. Its purely funishment with a capital 'F'. If however, I feel they can do something successfully if only they try and they feel that they can't, I will simply work on ways to make them believe in themselves and have confidence in themselves. As far as I'm concerned there is no failure in such situations if only they try.

MariaB -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 8:13:16 AM)
I also hear too many submissives saying, my ex mistress/master was always setting me up to fail. To a degree that may be true but a lot of that is about shirking their own responsibility. All too often if we transfer the blame of our own poor performance to something or someone else it comforts our ego.

AthenaSurrenders -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 9:04:03 AM)
Maria, your rock-climbing example comes closest to what I have experienced personally. I've never been given an order than he didn't think I could complete, but there have been orders that I didn't think I could do. He's generally been right. I think this sort of encouragement can be a wonderful thing, so long as the dominant has a decent grasp of the submissive's actual capabilities so that he or she can find that balance between pushing them to achieve and demanding more than they can give. I can imagine that no matter how well-intentioned, frequently being asked to do things you can't manage would not put someone in a good headspace. This thread has been a bit of a thought exercise for me. I've never been set an impossible task but I can see some situations in which it might work out for us. I have a habit of overthinking tasks and panicking that I might fail before I've even begun. So if handled sensitively, I could see him doing this as a way of emphasising that obedience, rather than success, is the most important thing. Perhaps it would work better if I knew in advance that the task he was setting would be impossible - as in, there's no point worrying about failing, you WILL fail, but by giving it your best shot you'll be serving me. I know that I would not respond well to the situation Grace described where it was linked to a funishment scene without her knowledge. If he wants to play that game, I'll play along or he could give me an obviously jokey task (like 'go buy me the winning lottery ticket or you'll be in big trouble'). But I would definitely feel hurt if he set me up to feel awful in order to get off. So although I'm only guessing how I would react, I don't think I would feel this would damage our trust, as long as I knew what he was doing up front. If he was tricking me, or if he was just such an idiot that he was asking things that would be harmful to even attempt like myotherself mentioned, I'd be seriously pissed. Then again, I know I didn't pick a moron or a dick to submit to, so it'd be easier for me to interpret something like this as done with the right motivations - I might feel differently if this were a new relationship. My husband has spent years proving that he does care about me and our dynamic, so I doubt an incident like this would make me stop trusting him, even if it didn't get the desired result.

JeffBC -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 9:10:06 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: AthenaSurrenders Maria, your rock-climbing example comes closest to what I have experienced personally. I've never been given an order than he didn't think I could complete, but there have been orders that I didn't think I could do. Well sure but those are two very, very different circumstances. Pretty much all of the major changes I've made in our relationship Carol "didn't think she could do". Setting someone up for success then having it turn into failure isn't even remotely the same thing as setting someone up for failure.

mnottertail -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 9:26:35 AM)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGzqbEeVWhs

littlewonder -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/5/2013 11:05:16 AM)
Those were the points I made in my response. Master does that all the time. I never think I can do something. I constantly doubt my ability to do stuff because others have tried to teach me in the past and gave up or I could not do it. But with Master's encouragement and tasks he has given me and my love for him thus wanting me to try hard to accomplish for him plus I admit, his consequences are usually worse than the "impossible" task lol. I always thought I could never finish college but here I am with one more course and I will be going on to my bachelors degree. We were actually joking about it last night about how my brother was always disappointed in me for not going to college and one of the reasons why I think I always feared going back. Master has never met my brother yet and I told him I think my brother would love him for this alone lol. Sometimes you just have to have the right person who can encourage you to do something so don't let your experience with your ex dom/me make you say you won't ever do this or that. With the right encouragement anything is possible.

ForeverGaia -> RE: The Impossible Task (1/9/2013 12:57:29 AM)
FR I don't like being set up to fail; I'm oriented to want to please my Owner all the time. I know realistically I won't always reach that goal, but I think it hampers progress to actively be set up to fail. Gaia.

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