What is a Slave

This is purely my opinion and my feelings on what it takes to be a slave, much of it applies in either a purely online environment, the LDR or in a 24/7 live-in arrangement. I write this as much to clarify things in my mind as to inform others of what, in my mind, a slave is and how a slave functions. I am a female slave who is owned and collared by my Mistress. Most of the information on the internet seems to be of a heterosexual nature; however I don't see any differences in how a slave approaches her day to day activities.

What is a slave?

A slave is one who is owned, how many times has that been tossed out by those in the BDSM and Gorean lifestyles? In my mind there is much more to it than that; the slave brings much to the table, the heart and need to serve, to please their owner and to be found pleasing by their owner. Those are drives that must come from inside the person.

I maintain that anyone can be taught what a slave does, but nobody can be taught to be a slave. What does this mean, you can teach someone to be attentive to others, to have a pleasant demeanour, to see to someone else’s needs ahead of their own, and the thousand and one other things that a slave does in the course of her day serving and being in service to her owner. None of those make a person a slave much less a good one, what you have done is made a servant. If that is what you want then fine you have what you need.

To be a slave is all that and more, much more. It is the need to serve something you don't feel complete if you are not doing. The drive that keeps you serving when you really wish your owner would just let you roll up in your spot and rest. The intense inner need to please your owner, this is not just sexually, not just when she declares it play time but please her by having her tea ready when she comes in from work, anticipating refills, anticipating other needs of hers. Is her laundry done, ironed, folded and hung the way she likes. Do you keep her house the way she expects (or better go that extra mile and exceed expectations); is her dinner ready when she wishes it to be? When dinner is served do you automatically sit and eat with her, or do you have rules that state that she will eat first and you will eat only after she has started or with her permission?

Do you talk out of turn; seek to control the conversation because it is the only thing you think you can control? I used to do that and believe me it got me into all kinds of hot water. Learning to let go, to be transparent with your feelings, to allow your owner to make you into what she needs you to be is one of the hardest things that a slave has to learn. Many of us were, and may be are, intensely private people and we do not give up that control easily. It is something I struggle with daily, keeping my responses to a minimum, asking for permission before going into detail on a point, asking myself if what I am going to say is simply noise or if it actually adds something to the conversation. If it is simply noise, an attempt to control the conversation, or worse a form of topping from the bottom, I am learning to resist just blurting it out and to think about what it is I am truly desiring to say and then respectfully asking if I may speak. I can, and have, been told that my comment is not welcome at that time, to which I simply reply “yes Mistress” then sit quietly. This is something that has taken me months to learn and to get this far, I will freely admit that I have much further to go in learning to be open, and be the book that she needs me to be when it comes to emotions but over time I am learning that as well.

We all speak of limits, both hard and soft, hard limits are those which are inviolate and the soft limits are ones your Dom can push. My limits, all about seven of them, are all the hard limits (cross these and I walk) type. My owner’s and thus my limits as well are:

· No kids in scenes,
· No animals,
· No scat,
· No vomit,
· No blood sports (this one is a double danger because I’m on thinners),
· Nothing that will put me or my partner in either jail or hospital.

As I have said to others all else is negotiable. Early on Mistress told me what my limits had to become; I have worked hard to get comfortable with the same ones she has. I used to have a laundry list of what I would not do, or might do but to really give up the control I had to back away from the control of the relationship that limits give.

In many ways it is the same with safe words between us. Right now we are in a long distance relationship with a definite eye to moving to real time sometime in the future. I currently have safe words but they are so I can stop a session if I am creeping too close to subspace. While there is nothing at all wrong with subspace, if your owner is not there to bring you back safely it can be dangerous. Once together where she will be there to help me back safely I know I will lose them but that is ok since, after 5 months with her, I trust her implicitly.

Somewhere in my reading I came across something that read (paraphrased), a submissive chooses service, but a slave chooses obedience. How does this make sense when there is service and obedience on both sides of the coin? To me it speaks to the level of commitment and the depth of the obedience. A sub may well seek some level of control over the way the relationship works using things like limits, safe words and other ways to maintain some form of freedom.

Often it has been said that the last voluntary thing a slave does is beg the collar from her owner and to a point that is true but since consensual slavery is not legal and binding there is an out even in that. A slave totally wraps her world around that of her owner, placing her owner first in all things. Can you do that, set your owner first in all things, and allow her to control all things? I’m not talking about becoming a mindless doormat to her, since that is the last thing that a Mistress wishes. There are going to be a million decisions that will need to be made, ones that you cannot ask how to do them. The trick becomes to know what your owner expects and how she expects things and make the decisions based on what you know she expects. When you set out to do a task, do you do it because you will get some satisfaction and pleasure from it or do you do it because you know your owner expects it to be done and in pleasing your owner you find your own pleasure? Is your first thought, this looks fun, I’m going to enjoy this or do you give your owner control and say do I do this because it will please my owner that I do it.

A slave is one who is owned; to that extent the common terminology is correct. We slaves thing of ourselves that way and learn that we come second behind our owner’s wants, needs, and desires. Yes, being owned, we are property and can be treated that way; however for the most part we are extremely valuable property. Our value is not measured in dollars and cents but in our service and the pleasure we bring. As a slave my pleasure is to know that what I do for my Mistress, on some level, brings her pleasure. In the LDR phase that we are in right now there is a limit to how I can be of assistance to her. Most of my service is simply being with her, hearing her out on issues, offering advice where I can and I am allowed to do so for now my service is primarily in the emotional support category. When the day comes that Mistress decides it is time to take the relationship to the next level there will be much more that I can and will do for her.