I am preparing for a presentation my submissive and I are giving at a conference this weekend on best practices for integrating kink and vanilla life. Although we’ve done a version of this presentation before, I’m finding myself contemplative as I revise my notes and re-think some of the ongoing lessons I’m learning.
There’s always little bit of imposter syndrome in play for aspects of kink, especially when one is oriented more toward the Left of the slash (The “D” or “Dominant” in D/s). As a Dominant, I’ve had to do a lot of inner work to really understand, appreciate, and most effectively manifest my Dominance. Just because something feels natural (as my Dominance always has), that doesn’t mean that we’re necessarily adept at fully embodying and living out what we are. Just because you know where you are on the gay/straight spectrum, it doesn’t automatically mean that you know how to be good at relationships oriented that way.
We can be confident in our identities, but it takes self-awareness and practice to be able to express ourselves authentically, particularly when we’re trying to have meaningful relationships with others.
I remember in a therapy session a few years ago, I was struggling with feeling torn between my kink and professional lives. When I was a professor, there were real reasons why I could not be “out” as kinky or polyamorous, and it caused me a great deal of stress. I remember going into therapy because I thought that my problem was that I wasn’t keeping strong enough boundaries between the two. And even though my therapist at the time was barely kink-aware, she helped me see that the harder I tried to enforce what I perceived as a very strict boundary, the more stress, depression, and anxiety I was feeling.
The breakthrough came when we were talking about the different “personas” that I perceived when I was in the classroom and when I was in a kinky space. She asked me about the times when I felt that the boundary was the “thinnest” between my Dominant side and my professional side — which was a sensitive area for me, professionally. I had always prided myself on maintaining professionalism and healthy boundaries in the classroom.
But I was able to admit to a certain rush I got as a professor giving exams to my students. There was something about the contextual tension in the air specific to the classroom, their looks of anticipation and stress, how some of them looked cocky because they thought they’d ace it; how others looked completely terrified. I told her how much I enjoyed joking with them through the process: “Please remember, if you fuck this up, I am TOTALLY going to judge you in every way.” Or “This test is really, REALLY easy. I took it myself just before class and finished it in 5 minutes and got 100%.”
“Didn’t you write it?” someone would ask.
“Yes I did. But actually I lied about getting 100%. I got a couple of answers wrong. That’s how hard it is,” I’d respond.
And then when they’d mumble, laugh, and/or shake their heads, I’d shoot back with sharp “SHHHHHH!! The exam has started!” slapping the podium to make them jump.
As I was relating this story, I remembered something, and it rocked my world.
After all of the ribbing, I’d shift my tone and reassure them by saying. “Okay. Breathe. You’re ready for this. You’re going to do fine.”
And then, somewhat embarrassed, I realized that was something I also said to partners before scenes; although in that context, it had a very different tone, and a very different feel to it.
I remember sitting my my therapist’s office, gobsmacked by the fact that I never noticed before that I started scenes with the same exact words as I did when I gave exams. And, in all honesty, I cannot remember which came first … whether or not I adopted that phrase first in a kink space, or first in an academic space.
My therapist pointed out that, despite the fact that I said the same thing in both circumstances, I was naturally able to maintain a healthy boundary nonetheless. That higher ground, that ethos, that capacity to hold space for both aspects of my life: it was always there.
Thus began the ongoing journey for me of examining all the ways in which aspects of my Dominance wove their way through my life, along with all the other aspects of my calling as an educator, mentor, and guide. Indeed, when I stepped away from my university career, it took … no, that’s wrong … it’s taking (present tense) a village of people to help me figure out my shit, because I had mistaken my professional life as my core, rather than the higher values that informed that professional life.
I’m fortunate enough to have a partner/submissive who’s an expert in emotional intelligence and leadership. I’m also fortunate enough to currently have a therapist who is actively kinky and living in an authority-based relationships themself. What I have learned from their collective wisdom, as well as the wisdom of friends in and out of the scene, a career counselor, and so many of my fellow kink educators, is that the issue I was having wasn’t necessarily one of boundaries per se, but that I wasn’t necessarily seeing the higher purpose, the higher ethics, the core values that guide my life holistically, and that transcend the different roles in my life.
I felt I was being torn by conflicting identities, when in reality, and when viewed from that higher perspective, none of those identities were in conflict at all. It’s ironic that I wear a BDSM triskelion ring on my finger, yet could not apply the same sense of unity into my entire life. The BDSM triskelion stands for the tripartite interrelationships of BDSM: Bondage and Discipline, Dominance and Submission, and Sadomasochism. While it’s just fine to lean more heavily into any of those specific distinctions, they are all interrelated. And here I was, actually educating my then-therapist on all of this, and not seeing the unity that already existed in my own life.
So, while I did not have the privilege of being “out” in terms of my kink or polyamory, that was not the root cause of the stress I was feeling. I had lost sight of – and sometimes was fighting against – an integration that already existed. I had to shift my perspective from the point of view of seeking out integration to a point of view that these aspects were already integrated and that I needed to figure out how to work with that integration. I had to untangle the best way to be who I … already was?
In examining this, I also see the privileged space from which I’m working. The fact that these struggles are internal, and that regardless of what’s going on in my head, I still have cis/het/white privilege. These internal struggles do not hinder the fact that I can walk in most spaces without ever drawing the attention of anyone or having to justify myself for just being. Having a BIPOC spouse and a queer submissive remind me on a daily basis about my own privilege.
Yes, there have been times when these internal struggles have become deep and intense enough to trigger deeper anxiety and depression, causing me to engage in self-destructive behaviors and ideations. But thankfully I moved past all that.
But getting back to my original point, in trying to understand that integration, I had to move my perspective above singular identities or labels by which I sometimes identified myself. It is not possible for “Sir Quill” to hold all of the same spaces and kinds of things that “Dr. [professor]” does. I am more than the sum of my parts; and it’s that “more,” that comprises a higher self that encompasses all the different spaces that I can and do occupy.
Even if we can’t name what those higher values are right away, we can feel them and can see evidence of how we live by them. I knew early on in this process about what kinds of things I needed and aspired to in my D/s relationships; I also knew what I needed and aspired to in my professional and personal life. And, in all honesty, they weren’t that different from each other. Even as an educator, I always viewed my role as more of a guide. I moved people forward. I helped people see their own inner talents and value, and how to bring them out. I elicited the strengths that students may not have known that they already had.
It was my own stubbornness that stopped me from seeing that I endeavored to do the same thing with my submissive partners, and my romantic partners, and with my students. I just wanted to help people see their best selves, and express themselves that way, and that gives me deep satisfaction: whether it’s from seeing my spouse overcome a self-imposed limitation or fear; or helping my submissive access her power via her subspace or through accomplishing goals; or relating something in a class that helps an attendee overcome something that was holding them back.
This is what “I” do, not just Sir Quill; not just Dr. [professor]; not just [my legal name]. I am all of those things, as well as more. And I have learned that acting from that highest space is the way to remain the most true to myself.
I do want to be clear on something, however, especially to those who may be reading this and feeling their own pull to live more “authentically” in their kink or polyamorous lives: I know that there are some in the kink and leather communities who eschew “scene names” altogether, and are vocal and out activists for kink- and polyamory-related awareness and causes. I am grateful to them for that and the incredible work they do. But as is the case with so many of us, it’s not just about my safety and privacy, it’s about the safety and privacy of my partners and metamours. It’s tricky. Even LGBTQ+ folx who are proudly out may not have the privilege to be “out” in regard to other aspects of their lives. These things intersect in complicated ways.
But, despite the complexities and complications, being more than the sum of our parts allows us to live authentically in those higher values, or that higher self, which unifies all the diverse and varied parts of who we are.
Go mindfully, my friends. And be.
NOTE TO SUBSCRIBERS: Since I’ll be presenting this weekend, I won’t have enough time to write up a post for the 17th. The next post will drop on the 24th. Thanks for understanding!
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