To My Future Mommy/Dominant

[Cranius]

I promise to love myself and give to myself, so that I can give myself to you.

TL;DR - This morning, I confronted a hard truth: physically, I am so much weaker than I thought. Although painful, that truth has helped me re-think what it means to give.
Reflecting on that hard truth, Kink/BSDM is becoming a spiritual journey for me. I thought it was about self-exploration, and it is, but that label is reductive: for me, this is increasingly about how to be, and how to live. How to be my best so that I can serve my best.

Hallo Meine Fruende,

Let's get down to brass tacks. I've abused my body my whole life.

I've taken it for granted. Not in the traditional or stereotypical way you see in the movies, with drugs or overindulging, but in the opposite extreme: disuse, inaction, stagnation. Not eating, not exercising. Eating poorly. In Tao terms, I am too passive, too much yin.

I'll give you some numbers. Numbers don't lie. I'm 5'11 and 148 pounds. I have a BMI of about 20.5, and barely scrapes by the "underweight" threshold of 18.5, and I've been underweight most of my life. My entire upper body is shaking as I type this, and all it took was five sets of eight knee pushups, and three sets of continuous one minute planks.

My first thought? I want to backspace that so badly. That's embarrassing.

But, let's be real: I made choices that led me here.

Just as I made choices that led me to this wonderfully community, my local kink groups, I've made choices my whole life, especially the last 14 months, to neglect my body. There are a variety of reasons for this, but they are all interconnected, and they all trace back to my concept of my own identity. 5 months ago, I developed a stress-induced tremor and chest tightness. My whole life was obsession with my work. Too much yang in my pursuit of one thing led to neglect of others. It's yin and yang in Tao-- too much yang in one area leads back around to yin, and contains yin. It is why there is a dot of yin in the yang, and a dot of yang in the yin, and why they encircle each other.

So, what does this have to do with D/s or being a little? Where the hell am I going with this?
Well...lots, maybe too much to consciously articulate. This writing is a deluge of new connections to things, reframing existing connections, and attempts to see things in a new light.

The thought I keep coming back to, though, is that the best way I can serve a future mommy/dominant is to serve myself-- know myself, love myself, care for myself.
I need to show up as my best self, if not for myself, then for them. Whoever I enter into a dynamic with deserves all of me. Although that means accepting my faults with my strengths, that also means that I give all of myself to them. And how can I say I am giving to them if I am not giving to myself?

A future dominant can guide me, shape me, work within the structure we agree to. But, I owe it to them to be the best clay I can be.
Master sculptors can't work with clay that falls apart, is unbearably hard, and aged.

On the DDLG forums, I have written about more sensitive topics to me, and have an accountability tracker there. What keeps me going isn't myself-- it's this community. Seeing its excitement, its encouragement, its gift to me as I continue to give to myself. I'm learning to think of D/s in the same terms.

I've spoken at length in my other writings about how I came here. This piece, the physical piece, feels like the biggest domino, probably responsible for so much more in my life than I realize or am conscious of.

Thank you ALL for helping me along the way. Strangers, friends, people I've met. EDIT: I'm on the verge of sobbing in happiness. I felt the paradigm shift, the reason to change.

Mit Liebe und Umarmungen,

Joey