:: Edgeliving: Master Jim and slave marsha ::

:: Sunday, September 21, 2003 ::

Tell Me the Best Way to Get to Mastery and slavery

Isn’t the Internet a wonderful thing? With a few clicks of your mouse, you can go to a site such as MapQuest, enter your beginning location and your destination, and get, in excruciating detail, turn-by-turn, tenth-of-a-mile by tenth-of-a-mile directions in seconds. Your only task if driving alone is to avoid an accident while attempting to follow those detailed directions.

So, where is the leather MapQuest? The MapQuest that will allow me to enter “inexperienced dominant” as my beginning point and “all knowing Master” as my destination, and which, with a mouse click, will give me the step-by-step map for my Master/slave journey?

If you have been reading this webpage, you already know that I do not believe such a resource exists. There are no resources, either on the Internet or in a dust-covered box in the dark recesses of a leather store, that will give me or anyone else, a detailed map of the Master/slave journey.

The journey of a Master and slave is a very personal experience. While those sharing the experience can gain insights from written resources, attending leather events featuring M/s seminars, and developing a circle of acquaintances and friends who also practice M/s, the only way a Master and a slave can find their way is to chart their own course. As a Master with some experience, if asked, I can talk to you about developing a philosophy, the elements of a contract, how to begin to establish protocols, and the ethics of ownership -- but only you can translate this information and incorporate what is useful to you into the fabric of your own Master and slave relationship.

One way to describe Masters and slaves, then, is as artists. Give six pairs of Masters and slaves six palettes with the same colors and you will end up with six entirely different paintings in terms of color, form, and substance. Give the same six pairs some of the building blocks of an M/s relationship -- control, philosophy, direction, discipline, protocol, ethics and service -- and you will end up with six totally different Master/slave relationships.

The way we walk the path of Mastery and slavery, the way we travel on our M/s journey, will be unique to each pairing. There is no one way to walk this path successfully, and there is no one accepted road map for the M/s journey. Perhaps the only certainty is that if someone tells you his is hers is the only way, then that person can be rejected as a false prophet. As painful, time consuming and error-filled as it may be, each Master and slave pair must find their own way. Some will fail, some will succeed: all will struggle. For those who are able to stay the course and fight through the problems they will face, the end product will be a Master/slave relationship that has a better chance of surviving because it was built through the blood, sweat, and tears of a Master and a slave.

In leather,
Master Jim

:: 11:35 PM [+] ::
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