A Weekend of Dominance and Submission

I haven't talked about the bdsm aspects of my journey an awful lot on this blog. Probably because the connection between submission, tantra and spirituality was still kind of blurry for me.

Anyway, last weekend, my wonderful wife and I engaged in one of our D/s weekends.

As always, I served her every need. I did the groceries and prepared the meals, I gave her footbaths and foot massages, I pampered her in any way possible. Adored her, cherished her, whispered all possible sweet nothings I could fathom.

Come sexy time, there was a lot of kneeling in the nude, there was biting and scratching, ballbusting and other fun stuff I won't mention to protect the guilty.

I got to experience what bdsm folks call "flying". It's an incredible feeling, and I highly recommend it - only, you have to be a masochist to enjoy it, terribly sorry for the rest of you poor souls out there!

I ate her out whenever she wanted (which can never be often enough for my delicate taste!).

When I was allowed inside her, I absolutely refrained from cumming.

In many ways, this is the best part. The karezza folks really seem to be right about that - for whatever hormonal reason, it creates an incredible sense of intimacy and connection. It feels like falling in love again for the first time, only about a hundred times more intense and rewarding, more conscious, more "I hand myself over" than the "knock-on-the-head inevitable" style you see in the movies.

Am I weird in thinking about 1 Co 11 in that context? ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ᾗ παρεδίδετο... Yes, definitely weird! The good kind thereof.

I'm still on a high. Every breath fills me with insane bliss, coupled with the best form of horniness you can find. It's truly amazing.

Of course, all of this is only possible because we build on the trust and connection forged in almost 8 years of relationship - all the troubles, ups and downs, tragedies and accidents small and large. You can't build this overnight. You can't have it with a total stranger. Not to knock one-night stands, everything has it's own advantages - that's just not one of them.

I love the idea that my kinks, my interest in chastity and nofap, can be part of building up this larger thing, this together-thing, this beautiful manifestation of love. I always somehow wanted that. I always thought that it was inside this whole kink thing, somehow, somewhere... and now I know.

You don't have to be a label

Okay, I admit that this fundamental wisdom is quite the deepity - but it hit me like a sledgehammer earlier today, so I'd like to share it:

You don't have to be a bdsmer just to do some bdsm stuff.

I self-identified as a sub for the better part of my adult life. First you struggle, then you get used to it, and at some point you take it for granted.

However, the more I actually practice some bdsm rituals with my wonderful lady, the more they  become just another expression of our love. This makes me question why I should self-identify with the label at all.

bdsm is just a set of activities. If you like to create an identity around those, fine, go ahead, it's not a bad thing per se, and it will bring you in community with a lot of interesting folks - but it's really not needed if you just want to tie your partner to the bed.

No need to be a tantrik either, just to breathe and masturbate. And indeed, do you have to "be a christian" just to believe something, or to attend some church?

Of course, arguably, if you believe that Jesus rose from the dead and saved us all, then you're a christian by definition.

But there is a difference between accepting a label just because the definition fits, and self-identifying with that label.

My hunch is that this latter way of dealing with labels is where all the trouble lies. It is fairly obvious that - while your beliefs sure inform your actions and form your character - you are not simply defined by your beliefs.  You are not a christian, and nothing but a christian - you're a christian and a father/mother, son/daughter, student, hacker, etc.

It is also obvious that such identification can lead to ugly stuff like suicide bombings or flying planes into buildings - or, a bit less dramatically, to vote for a party that does not actually support you or your causes.

Another obvious deepity is that identification with a label does not necessarily make you a suicide bomber. In fact, it might inspire you to do a world of good.

So where does that leave us? Personally, I get ever more wary of labels, the older I get. I find that in many cases, they are - not so much evil, but - unneeded, unhelpful. I don't think we can ever get rid of them, but I think that it makes sense to not identify with any one label too much.

Enhanced Sensuality through Abstinence

Last week, I engaged on a higly reduced diet, led by my partner.

On top of no orgasms and enthusiastic obedience to all my Lady's whims, I was not allowed any porn, and I had to ask permission to use any kind of erotic media. To facilitate this, I blocked all reddit images, and I set my search preferences to "moderate safe-search". Despite my long-running habit of neotantric ejaculation-free self love, I abstained from even that, just to be on the safe side.

By the end of the week, I felt exhilarated, liberated and excited. Women on the street appeared more sexy. Beauty appeared more intense. My Lady was an adorable, unfathomably and dangerously beautiful goddess, even moreso than she always is. The need for bare breasts evaporated and made way for an appreciation of faces and gestures and movements and forms.

The world of nofap

As a person involved in western neotantra, bdsm chastity games, and some other stuff, I lurk on some subreddits such as /r/nofap, /r/pornfree, and  /r/semenretention.

I have struggled for quite some time to get clear on the differences between the apparent majority opinion on those subs, and my own way of thinking.

There is the nagging suspicion of a covert religious agenda. There is a slew of irrational pseudoscience, of course. There is an odd kind of team-spirit. There is a focus on long-running streaks, the longer the better. There is a promise of superpowers that I don't believe in.

All of that is not the core issue.

The core difference

People on /r/nofap try to achieve freedom through abstinence from sensuality.

I try to find enhanced sensuality through abstinence.

If both of those sound strange to you, I absolutely understand. If you buy into the western narrative of ongoing "sexual revolution" and indiviudalism expressed via sexuality, then all of this sounds strange, by necessity.

The western idea of individualistic sensuality

I'm building on those western values as a foundation. In fact, I am, as a person, infused with them, built on top of them. They are built into my being. I grew up in the 1970s and 80s, after all. I was formed by a deeply indivudalist, (post-)sexual-revolution society.

There is, obviously, a deep-running neurotic relation to sexuality in western culture. For a long time, the idea was to catch and conquer the beast, to see sexuality as something basal and primitive one had to overcome, or else...

With the sexual revolution of the late 20th century, this idea shifted: Now, sexuality was something to appreciate and to indulge in. Everybody was free to do what they wanted in their bedrooms (except if they did not want to do anything, which made them seem odd and suspicious). Consent required, of course.

Freedom, hence, was to be expressed in the chorus of "You don't get to tell me anything, and I'mma prove it to you by watching the filthiest porn I can find, and wanking to it until my balls fall off."

There is something fundamentally wrong in both approaches.

Don't get me wrong. I do not oppose sensuality, or sexuality. They are not evil, not sinful, not addictive or bad. Wanking can make you feel good. There is no harm in it.

I do oppose, however, mindless, overindulgent "sensuality". I oppose the idea that "more equals better". I resent the perverted, twisted kind of "sensuality" that comes in the form of glossy magazine covers. I think that women twisted into yoga-esque stretches just to show off their genitals are the opposite of sensual. I think that exploitation is unsexy and sad.

In fact, I like to put this kind of "sensuality" in scare quotes, because I think it is not sensual at all. There is only a superficial similarity.

Some personal history

I got into all this, long long ago, via bdsm chastity games.

My initial motivation was not to overcome my sensuality or my sexual desire. It was the opposite: I wanted to amp it up, in order to experience the masochistic pleasure of denial. I wanted to "spice up" my sex life, and for whatever reason, chastity and "denial" was what kicked my kink.

Over the years, my goals changed, as I changed through age and experience. Instead of suffering, I found joy. Instead of "enforced" abstinence, I found moderated sensuality. In sex, I found spirituality. Underneath the kink games, I found a layer of truth.

I found deep potential in deliberate self-constraint.

We should not let this potential be monopolized my morality and religion. We should liberate it from those shackles. We should cherish our sensuality by shaping it, arranging it, enjoying it slowly, in small pieces, rather than swallowing whatever we can find, whenever we can find it. We should see moderation as a joy, not a chore.

A little tidbit from my neotantric experience

You go slow, and you achieve unfathomable bliss. You don't "overheat", and you experience endless orgasmic feelings. You stay at a low level of arousal, and it keeps you from exhausting your resources.

By not overindulging, you become more sensitive, and hence you achieve greater pleasure.

A flaccid penis is more sensitive to touch than an erect one. I don't have to tell you how to fact-check that claim.

This works on the physical level, but it works on any other level, too.

Layers of deepness

Obedience to my Lady is a form of chivalry and pure love. It is very kinky, and it is more than that. It runs deeper. There are layers to it.

This is not to say that the kink is "wrong".  The deeper layer is just another part of a greater thing, which encompasses all those layers.

There is a general principle at work here; just a bit of common sense, really, which has been known for a few thousand years: You reduce quantity to achieve quality.

You practice moderation so your excesses get even better.

You stop wanking twice a day, so whatever kind of sex you choose to have, is even more sexy.

By reducing your exposure to pornography, you become more sensitive to beauty. You may experience more sensual joy. The one partner you have in your life, may well become... not only "enough", but an unexhaustable well of wonderful experiences. By not trying to escape the bonds of monogamy through porn, you find renewed sensuality inside your relationship.

A tiny bit of buddhism

Buddhism teaches that opposition is just as binding as desire. You fight your urge -- it only becomes stronger. If you want to be free, you have to let your urges pass through. You have to somehow learn to live with them. You have to find a way to integrate them, while not being their slave. Total rejection might be one necessary step on that path, but it cannot be the ultimate goal. As long as you fight it, you are not at peace.

So again, those weird places on the net...

It seems to me that people on /r/nofap and companion subreddits come from a place of desperation. Their unability to shake their habit turns into self-loathing, and a wish to be able to eliminate it completely. Understandable, since they identify an addictive habit as the root of their issue, and they can't seem to get rid of it.

They claim supposed superpowers of irresistable attraction, so they can boost their morale and stay on track.

I'm not here to tell them otherwise.

I am here to propose an alternative view on sensuality in general.

I propose that less might actually be more. I propose that, instead of "getting rid of a nasty habit", you might be able to learn to enjoy heightened sensitivity through moderation, and the habit becomes a non-issue.

Are you a (no)fapper?

As mentioned above, I trained and practiced for many years, and I don't expect anyone to instantly "get" what I'm talking about if they're at the point where they hate themselves for their wanking; in spite of wanking off twice a day, like every other normal guy in my society, I never self-identified as a masturbation addict, and I was never into a lot of porn anyway, so I never saw an issue.

I do appreciate the difference.  I really do. The problems that those subreddits try to address, were never exactly my problems to boot.









For example, due to my training, I do not have sexual fantasies, as long as I don't want them. That's one huge advantage!

I have the subjective impression (without any hard evidence of course), that the way nofappers go about it, is only effective for a tiny minority. They don't see any other way, so the only way that presents itself, seems to be the only way forward.

It might absolutely be necessary, if you really feel you are hooked, to completely eliminate any form of porn, and any wanking, for a good while. After all, whatever works for you, works for you. I won't debate that.

If you are a nofapper,  I don't suggest that you should just believe me.

I suggest that you should remain open to both ideas, that you explore gently, slowly and with caution, and that you learn from your own experiences.



It might be a good idea to have a plan for the time after your "streak". That plan should involve a positive attitude towards your sensuality.

I suggest that you keep the ideas I present in the back of your head, that you research them when you feel sure that you can do so without danger.

So you want to be a "slave", huh?

You want to be begging for mercy, down on your knees. You want a latex-clad strict Belle Dame Sans Merci to tell you how small and useless your penis is, while she wields a whip the length of Roissy and fucks your ass with a 15 inch dildo made of steel, covered in ginger essence.

You have a perfect bullet list in your head, and there are 42 items on it. You know the weapons she is to use, the clothes she should wear, the exact amount of Icy Hot to put under your foreskin.

If that's what you want, and if that's what you get, by all means, go for it. You have my blessing. More (or less) power to you!

Seeing all the complaints of (mostly male) subs about how they can't find what they crave, some skepticism might be in order.

My Lovely Lady and I recently decided that our sex had become a bit... habitual. Not bad. Far from it, we both felt it was great, but we also thought that a wee bit of spicing up might be the way to go.

Of course I dragged my old bdsm and chastity fantasies out of the closet. We had ventured into that county several years before, it was quite fun, and then we just kind of forgot about it, never mentioned it again. She's very inexperienced in that regard, She's basically compassion incarnate, and She is just... soo.. not sadistic at all.

I decided to make it as easy as possible for her. To frame it more like a bit of chivalry on my part, as our mutual, combined learning experience - everything but the cliché. She's an extremely sweet girl, so I asked her to be precisely as sweet as she wanted to. The sessions would last for as long as we decided, and instead of trying to "punish" me for inexistent and made-up "crimes", we would try and find the limits of my pain-tolerance, together. It's our journey together, as a couple, as people.

Lo and behold.

Next thing I know, I'm fetching Her drinks and serving them in style. I'm in for a week of teasing and denial. I'm kneeling by the side of the bed. I'm getting pegged.

She made me write her a text every day at noon, in which I was to ask her, kindly, to tell me what she wanted me to do for Her that day.

It's brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. That one instruction was so "mild" that She didn't have to feel like She was overstepping some boundary. She doesn't have to think of it, I have a task to perform for Her every day by default, and She can always decide to just give no order at all if She likes.

There is a level of D/s that is overtly sexual. Kneeling naked by the bed is very, very sexy.

There is another level. It's where you take out the trash, and serve Her meals, and try to think of things to make Her life easier. It's where you let Her choose the video to watch, but you also prepare a few choices because you know She has a hard time making decisions like that. It is this level that goes truly deep. It is where bdsm and spirituality meet. It is where you're about to go "naaaah... not AGAIN, I wanna do sumthin ELSE...", and then you think of your place in this, and you shut the fuck up and do it, and it is transformed into pure sweetness as if by magic.

It's where you stand behind her and gently pet her shoulders while she's brushing her teeth, just because it feels good for her. Where you feel the urge to fetch Her a fresh towel after Her shower, not because it's kinky, but because that's the way it's supposed to be.

It's sexual too, but it's also just basic good old-fashioned chivalry. It's a form of medieval, romantic self-conquest and discipline that often seems to get overlooked in the modern world, where we're all on a quest to become more, not better. It's oh so sexy and satisfying, and what's more, it just feels very, very natural.

And if you struggle to get your Lady on board, let me humbly suggest that you drop all bdsm dressup, forget whips and chains and nipple clamps, and frame it as just you being nice. It might get you further than you think!

BDSM: So you REALLY want to make your sub suffer, huh? (NSFW, very very VERY NSFW!!!!)

Danger danger danger. NSFW, very very VERY NSFW sadomasostuff ahead!!!! Danger danger danger.

You have been warned.

Here's your sub's new diet, for one week:

SUNDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: Roasted, unsalted nuts and seeds. Sugar free, low-fat yoghurt
• Dinner: Steamed potatoes. Add assorted body liquids to taste. No salt or spices or anything else.

MONDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: Steamed brokkoli and brussels sprouts. No salt or spices or anything else of the kind.
• Dinner: Mixed salads, with lemon juice for a dressing. No salt or spices or vinegar or oil or anything else of the kind.

TUESDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: Steamed mixed vegetables. No salt or spices or anything else of the kind.
• Dinner: Steamed potatoes. Add assorted body liquids to taste. No salt or spices or anything else.

WEDNESDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: Sugar free, low-fat yoghurt, one apple, one grapefruit.
• Dinner: Steamed lean beef. Add assorted body liquids to taste. No salt or spices or anything else.

THURSDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: Raw vegetable sticks (from cucumbers and carrots). No salt or spices or anything else of the kind.
• Dinner: A bowl of rice. No salt or spices or anything else.

FRIDAY

• Breakfast: Porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature. 
• Lunch: Steamed chicken breast.
• Dinner: Steamed lean fish. Add assorted body liquids to taste. No salt or spices or anything else of the kind.

SATURDAY

• Breakfast: porridge, made of water and oats and nothing else, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Lunch: A bowl of steamed peas, carrots, and potatoes, prepared the night before and served at room temperature.
• Dinner: If they made it, a full-blown steak dinner at a fancy restaurant of the sub's choosing, top's treat. (Otherwise, you're single again, so don't bother.)

For drinks, we offer a rich assortment of tap water, stale weak instant coffee (without milk or sugar), various sorts of stale herbal tea, or pomegranate juice, mixed 1:5 with - you guessed it! - tap water.

After that week, I'm sure they'll beg for your mercy, they'll swear to do everything right, and they'll never again forget the groceries, ever. They'll also have lost about 5 pounds.

Or else, they might go on a 4 week water fast, gain enlightenment, and leave you.

Just in case it's not obvious enough, this is a joke. Do not radically change people's diets willy-nilly, especially not if they are diabetics such as myself, or otherwise deal with chronic illness. A person's diet is nothing to meddle with. I just enjoyed making it up, that's all.

With that disclaimer out of the way, frankly this sounds like a pretty healthy, though not exactly tasty diet for one week. I might give it a try at some point, with a few adjustments for my diabetes, and sans the body liquids.

Tantra, nofap, and chastity

I have not ejaculated outside my spouse's vagina in about two months now.

I guess that makes me somewhat special, and a bit of a specialist, hehe.

Recently, I've become very interested in the differences and similarities between tantra, the "nofap movement" (if you can call it that), and the bdsm chastity kink.

One surprising aspect of my current practice is that there is no "unbearable horniness". I don't experience my arousal as uncomfortable, nor am I in need of "release". I feel the "energies" flowing more or less all day, sometimes it makes me incredibly happy and sometimes it just is whatever it is... and sometimes I forget all about it and just go about my business.

In a way, this makes me an impossible candidate for my former chastity kink. I don't know how I would react if a woman does the whole tease-and-deny program on me, and I do get regular sex, so in a way it doesn't even count as chastity... but if we put that aside, I guess I can happily live this way for a very, very long time. Probably forever, though I guess there will be "relapses".

I am fairly certain that this incredible ability is tied to the lack of compulsive sexual fantasies. All the mindfulness meditation has taken care of that, I guess. When I engage in a tantric self-love session, there is practically no sexual fantasy accompanying it, as long as I don't deliberately conjure one up. It's pretty liberating.

Another effect is that I'm way more creative, and I feel most energetic and alive. I get more reading done, I write more, I'm just way more present.

I am doing those sessions daily now, by the way. I set my alarm to go off half an hour earlier to have time for that. I love it!

Of course, it's hard to pin it all down to that one specific activity. Correlation is not necessarily causation. But the correlation is definitely there. Definitely.

As for a bit of theorizing, I admit to some feelings of pity, probably even some fatherly condescension, towards the nofap crowd. They appear to come from a place of scarcity, neediness, and addiction, and they lack the tools that I have built up over many years now. It's all willpower and  If I were to try and preach to them (which I won't), even if they were receptive (which most won't be), I would not be able to pass on any knowledge. This journey can easily take years, it's next to impossible to believe it until you see it for yourself, and if you are steeped in helplessness and self-loathing, that's not a good starting place at all.

I have the impression that there is a deeply post-christian mindset going on there, in which the goal is to fix your own broken self by renunciation and asceticism -- through suffering. As hard as it is for me to say that -- they might have it easier if they did it for religious reasons and imitatio Christi, rather than just to escape their plight.

It is sad to see that porn has such a negative effect on many people. I grew up before the omnipresent, immediate availability of porn, and while I won't go on a moralistic loathing trip, (we didn't have access to a lot of useful information -- our early sexual encounters were not quite shiny examples either!) I see that this brings enormous issues. Of course, porn is not the root of the problem -- we have our neurotic view of sexuality to thank.

I was never one to watch porn, really. I enjoy beautiful non-porn-y pictures of naked women much more. Interestingly, I don't even do that so much these days, without any conscious effort on my part (I don't see anything bad with that, so why would I...)

Something weird and interesting is definitely going on here! Stay tuned!

The Narrative Appeals of BDSM

It has long been my view that one of the appeals of BDSM is its inherent narrative structure -- its dramatic capacity.

Take, for instance, the classic "9 1/2 weeks". Both the novel and the movie were bestsellers back in the day (I think); even if bdsm practitioners will tell you (and they are right) that they're lousy examples of actual BDSM, because everything in them is based on non-consensual acts, or abuse for short. What titillates the most is not Kim Basinger's body, or Mickey Rourke's smile, but the drama of a woman who falls for an abuser, enjoys it for a while because it is so erotic, and then tries to escape his iron clutch. We may protest the inherent sexism, and rightly ask why anyone would like to make out in the cold rain (without catching the common, absolutely unerotic cold!), but few of us can help feeling slightly aroused by the hot action in there.

Never-ending happiness is endlessly boring, just like mindless fucking.

Even in the simplest bondage scenario, there is a sub struggling against the ropes, crying in "pain", sighing pleasure. There is a dynamic, there is dramatic structure, there is tension and climax and payoff. Of course, simple phantasies will never fully exploit the potential therein -- but it is there, nonetheless.

This is why 90% of BDSM porn is about non-consensual violence, rather than politically correct, SSC-conforming scenes. Knowing you can safe-word out of your predicament is great in real life, but in our imagination, we want the racy stuff. Those cries better be for real. Those sighs better be just as real, too.

Of course, the narrative thrill is there in real life, too, because of our tendency to get lost in the game and ignore its game-like characteristics. It's what can make long-term games and mind-games so appealing. Many a sub completely forgot that there even was a safe-word agreed upon. So lost were they in the crazy world of commands, humiliation, and ropes.

Will the chaste sub make it to the end of the set period of no-action? Will he come out at the other side, a changed person? Will he be able to fulfill all the tasks he was given? Will the domme finally grant him his well-deserved release, or will she find some excuse to prolong his suffering?

These are the sort of questions that drive a well-written story. Character arc, challenges, pro- and antagonists... it's all right there.


The appeal of BDSM is not necessarily "just" pain and cruelty, even when simulated. Our inborn craving for well-told stories is just as good an explanation as any.

Do monks and nuns feel this way, too?

Don't even try to argue that you don't know what I'm talking about.

So... do they, or don't they?

Due for release

Tomorrow I'm due for "release", as they say in kinkalese professional terminology. Seeing as my beloved is void of any sadistic urge, I'm sure I'll get it, too.

I am looking forward to it, sure. But not at all in the way I used to, or in the way I expected.

I feel like I am now a bit more calm about this whole chastity thing. I also feel like I got over the initial craving. Yes, it feels like cold turkey. (At least as far as I know it from going off cigarettes 15 yaars ago.)

I am looking forward to the intimacy, being with her and inside her. It's not so much a race for a goal as it used to be. I wonder what my feelings will be after the "finish".

I told her that we can and should freely express our wishes and desires, the both of us -- only, mine are optional while hers are always binding. It seems to me she is good with that. She did, for what it's worth, send me to go pick something from the store across the street a few days ago. That's a good start!

I have to admit I just love "serving" her, pulling her a bath and giving her feet a rub and stuff like that. Not even nessecarily the sexual things. And she seems to feel in a similar way, so we might be up to a "race of kindness" in the future.

ETA: In an online forum on FLRs I read this:

There is a part of us submissive males that realizes we want to let go of our ego, that it is actually better for us if we do. 

This feels very true. The question is whether this is simply due to hormone fluctuations. After that, this probably being the case, the next question is: Does it matter? After all, our emotions ARE our hormones, to the highest degree. We cannot distinguish the physical from the psychological in this case. So, if I hack myself via orgasm control to become a better person, then I do have changed myself. It's actually a rather huge thing, once you start thinking about it.

Surprise!

As it turns out, she has been planning to ask me about some more serious chastity play for about a year now. Just as I did... We both hesitated. She is really into this stuff now, while still retaining her enormously charming, enormously empathic, friendly personality. I love her to pieces for it.

And all that, while I am pretty certain that we're one couple that has a lot of high-quality communication, compared to several other couples I've known. It's a bit scary, when you think of it.

She put a ring on me. Okay, it was my idea, but who cares -- it's such a strong symbol, reminder, and so inconspicuous. I was tempted to go on my knees for the occasion -- it would have been such a lovely reversal of gender roles. But then again, who cares. We had lots of fun, I'm horny as heck, it's all good.

I sent her a list of possible punishments today. I tried to make it so they're not all really just fun for me... :-) I'm curious whether she will finally let out her cruel side. As things are right now, I cannot imagine breaking the chastity of my own accord, anyway. There might of course still be the uncontrollable nightly occasion, which I have not experienced in like half a decade or so.

I'm on some FLR forum these days, but I hesitate to post a lot. This is not an FLR, nor does it feel like it. On the other hand, it is not purely a bdsm/chastity type thing, either. It is something deeper, something very personal and romantic, not at all a "Strict and Cruel Dominatrix/worthless slave" arrangement. More like very-good-relationship version 2.0.

On the other hand, I love that I can now visit my old fellas at the local bdsm café and brag to them because, technically, I now have a 24/7 D/s relationship going! It's like the holy grail of bdsm, innit?

Another thought is that this makes me try to be a better person, in all respects -- such as trying to tidy up more, hanging up the laundered clothes (which she hates and always forgets), cooking for her, and sticking to my exercise and diet regime. Oxytocin is my new best friend!

I am happy. I am in love. She is happy. She is in love.

This is good.

Male chastity is stress relief.

Forgegone conclusions are a great way to gain freedom.

This August, I received a diagnosis for type 2 diabetes. I was admitted to the hospital, received infusions, rumbazumba the whole messy shenanigan. So I decided to treat elevators and escalators as demonic entities, refrain from eating any sweets and stick to a low-carb diet, and do my frackin' exercises every day.

With the motivation of maybe, one day, being able to eat a good piece of mousse au chocolat (I do make a mean one!) without regrets, and maybe never having to inject myself with insulin, there was no question whether I'd stick to the regime or not. I just went for it.

Needless to say, losing about 6 kgs in a month, and receiving all the health benefits from that, is a motivation booster in itself. During our vacation, I was able to walk 7 to 8 kms per day with my girlfriend, which would never have happened a year before. I don't sit in and watch stupid youtube videos at night, but read books... real books, doorstoppers like Ulysses! The last time I had enough energy to do that was like 10 years ago.

Apart from that, this one decision, once taken, freed me from a lot of stress. It is actually really nice to not even think about a Mars bar. And I really don't. If I forget and accidentally do use an escalator, I walk back the stairs, and back again, just to reinforce the habit. It feels a bit like I'm my own dominatrix, sometimes.

Now I have given up the decision about having an orgasm and laid it into my girlfriend's loving hands. I do not have to spend a minute thinking about whether I want to wank tonight. Instead, I can focus my mental energies on more productive stuff, such as the aforementioned reading of books, or, even more importantly, finding ways to please her.

Somehow, now I feel a bit guilty about forcing her make do my decisions for me...

Just a bit.

A little follow-up to my last posting

Amending my last posting on the current state of my chastity affairs, I would like to add the following:

I do experience a hugely increased urge to "serve", i.e., plain old do a lot for, my girlfriend. I feel deeply in love, very romantic, I want to take her out to dinner and do a lot of little stuff, like vacuuming the bedroom, without mentioning it. I always loved her a lot, it just went from intense to hyperrealistic, from comfortably warm to hellishly hot.

This is so entirely clichéd as to border on embarrassing!

Now, I'm fairly certain that this has to do with the hormonal changes involved in our roleplay, and it coincides with what every other practitioner of bdsm-type chastity will profess, but I would not like to neglect the possibility that this is simply thankfulness -- after years and years of not being able to live one's fantasies, finally having a partner who is as appreciative, cooperative and adventurous as that is simply fantastic, and I am indeed deeply thankful to her.

Natural Courtship, Mating and Bonding

One of the major surprises of my new condition is how it feels 100% just right - like it had been the natural state of affairs all along, and I had just failed to see it. Like coming home. "There and back again", indeed.

(For those who haven't read the other posting and won't, the short of it is that I started into a very loving, very gentle, device-less version of bdsm-style male chastity, and it is precious.)

As the title written on the beautiful belly of the young lady on top of this blog suggests, I will not move to generalize, out of a few moments of private enjoyment, that all guys in relationships should always be in a state of courtship, encouraged by "enforced" bdsm-type chastity. Duh.

I will, however, allow myself to indulge in those ideas for a while, just because they are so sexy. I believe that your own beliefs can very much be a part of your joyful kinky adventures, as long as you are prepared to admit that this is what you are doing. It is a kind of extended (or in-tended?) roleplay.

I will also allow myself to deliver a few hypotheses, in the firm knowledge that they are not at all conclusive or scientifically sound, but just my own private adhoc speculations.

The question is, of course, why the heck does it feel so good? And moreover, why does it feel so natural?

I'm guessing that modern neurobiology might have something to say about that -- Marnia Robinson seems to cover that in "Cupid's Poisoned Arrow", but I have not read the book yet. From what I have heard, it is probably something to do with the brain's reward circuits.

It is at least a curious occurrence how basically all of the romantic media industry revolves around this one very subject: Pair bonding, and male persons' apparent inability to accept it, live it, enjoy it, submit to it and become monogamous in the process, mostly because of their need for "indepencence", i.e., freedom to mate with everyone else.

I don't believe for a second that monogamy is the natural order of human affairs, period. There is far too much evidence to the contrary (see "Sex At Dawn", by Christopher Ryan).

In the light of what I have experienced in my life, and specifically what I am experiencing right now, I should say that there are two distinct modes of pleasure with regard to sex and relationship: Marnia Robinson would call them "mating" and "bonding" modes. Both are probably related to one or the other of two different hormones *), and you can get a high from either, as well as get hooked on them.

This might imply that, contrary to what we are generally taught, there is really not only one source of happiness with regard to sex, but there are two: orgasm is one, and deliberate delay of orgasm is the other. One triggers the satisfaction of mating, the other brings in the rewards for bonding. **)

If so, that would mean that we humans are probably only half-monogamous, the other half being polyamorous: driven by a sex impulse to procreate no matter what, but at the same time, longing for life-long bonding. Would that not explain an awful lot in terms of our pervasive issues with relationships? Like, why we have seen a need for using religions (the other strongest force on the planet) for millennia now to regulate them, why we tend towards serial monogamy rather than straight-up polyamory in the face of failing societal rules for relationships, and why so many very happy, very committed monogamous relationships tend to fall apart after quite a huge amount of time.

It would also mean that we get to... well, not precisely choose between those two modes, but probably rather... surf them. Go more for one at a time, rather than assuming that real happiness is only real once you have both. Realize that it's not your partner who is to blame when things start to go a bit boring, nor yourself, but your biology -- but also that, rather than being a slave to your body, you now have a choice to do something about it.

That would be awesome indeed.

Of course, all of this does not explain at all why there seems to be such a massive difference between men and women -- how much of it is related to nurture rather than nature.

Since these are just ad-hoc thoughts from a few days of experience, it may very well be that this is all really just a reflection of my personality and upbringing. Yay for catholic education! Hooray for christianity!

But wouldn't it just be way more interesting the other way?








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*) or, more probably, complex circuits involving one or the other of those, among other substances

**) Marnia Robinson, as far as I see, advocates for a kind of sexual restraint, otherwise known as "karezza", for both sexes. As this opposes my kinky malesub view, I choose to ignore the female side of the equation for now...

There and, hopefully, never back again: Re-starting a journey of male chastity.

Warning: This is a looong posting. Be prepared!


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There is a highly specialized genre of blog posts on the internet. It concerns itself with the writers' numerous experiences with "male chastity" -- that is to say, "enforced" abstinence of men regarding sex or, more specifically, ejaculation. There are fora for it, there is, as usual, according to rule 34, a plethora of porn about it, and -- equally as usual -- fantasy and reality often dance a very intimate danse macabre in those writings.

One basic narrative goes like this: Guy (heterosexual, white, 25-35 years) cheats on spouse. Spouse catches guy. Spouse purchases a chastity device which the guy is forced to wear. Henceforth, the guy is completely helpless, and the woman gets ever more dominant. Girl gets all the joy, guy does all the chores. BDSM tropes of all (im)possible kinds ensue.

Alternatively, the guy talks his woman into keeping him chaste; she complies more or less out of pity or curiosity, but without any real interest. After a while, she realizes the benefits to the situation (guy's horniness makes him do everything he can for her), and he is now a veritable sorcerer's apprentice who cannot undo what he has done. Again, BDSM tropes ensue. Happiness in slavery.

I will try and do my best to avoid all those cliché-ridden trappings of the aforementioned genre. I want to be as honest as possible.

I was interested in male chastity even before I started out with tantra. Problem was -- as with practically every aspiring male chastity apprentice -- that there was no fitting female partner to be found. Several kinds of experiments with self-locking, online and short-term keyholding *) arrangements, and 8-9 years later, I had given up on the whole thing, had begun exploring tantra and was moving on. The interest spiked a few times over the years, but all in all, it was a closed book.

Now, after 3 years with my current girlfriend, I somehow talked her into giving male chastity a try for a few days. Without going into the boring technical details too much, let me just say that there is no device (aka chastity belt) involved and very little bdsm stuff. She's soo not into being sadistic, it's actually kind of amazing!

It's an arrangement for mutual pleasure where she gets all the orgasms and gets to say when or if I am allowed to come, and I get... well, what I gain from it is to be the topic of the rest of this blog posting.

The most obvious, of course, is permanent, unrelenting horniness. While for many of you, it might not at all be obvious how this can possibly be a boon, for those who already took a peak into western tantra and taoist sex, the advantage of "semen retention" should be obvious (although, as I have expressed early, I do not believe for a second that the tantric explanations of it bear any connection with reality).

As for all the clichés mentioned above, it is definitely true that there is more energy, that I can focus on my partner more clearly and with more mindfulness, and that I now have more of a certain kind of tender feeling towards her. It used to be there before, half-buried below heaps of everyday busy-ness, but now it is way stronger. I guess it is called courtship.

Do you remember the first time you ever fell deeply in love? Did you feel completely and utterly helpless, and strong at the same time?

If you're a guy, you will know what I mean when I say that you would have done everything in your power for the girl of your dreams -- if not just to do her. I don't know how it feels for girls; I guess it's somewhat different, since our biological roles in sex are quite different, regardless of what modern narratives try to promote. **)

It's one of those feelings we all crave basically all our lives, and many of us try and regain that feeling, as soon as we feel its end with our current partner, by moving on to the next.

In many modern relationships, that initial phase of traditional courtship has vanished altogether. So was the case with us. I guess, deep inside, I was missing that phase. There were reasons, of course, and I won't bore you to death with them, but somehow it didn't seem quite right to me -- only, at the time I didn't realize that something was missing.

There is, on top of that, the tantric/taoist thing about having no goal to achieve for myself. Being able to focus on her like that feels nothing short of amazing. In a way, this is, to me, a key to actual real-life tantra.

Where we stand now is that I have this insane desire to please her -- not only under the sheets, but in general -- that I want to do good things for her every day, all day long (and I'm not quite sure how this will play out once I'm back to the office.... sheeeesh!!). It just feels so damn RIGHT. It feels like how this relationship should be. It feels like how I should feel toward her.

I have the feeling that this is a journey of shared self-exploration, of growing as persons and as a couple. For me, anyway, it feels like a huge step of personal development.

I don't entertain for a moment the idea that this will be our future state forevermore. It shall be a game we play for a little while, then another little while, then maybe another, not so little one...

Let me also say that there is not a moment of "force" there. All these theatrics about the guy being forced into submission seem exceedingly tedious and quite useless to me. Should I ever feel that this gets too much for me, I will simply tell her, and we will decide, as a couple, what to do about it.

And that's it for now. No clever punchline here. Just insane amounts of desire, a lot of joy and great curiosity.

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*) "Keyholding", where one person keeps the key to another's chastity device.

**) Hooray for gender diversity! I have no clue how these things feel for trans*persons. In this posting I'm talking about the majority 90% heterosexual cispersons, which happen to be, as it were, my natural area of expertise.