This particular post is the first in a series which touches on the subject of guilt and how to manage it.
This post's topic is specifically about cheating and whether feeling guilty about the possibility of cheating on your partner, is in fact relevant.
Guilt- the all consuming emotion, a feeling that you can’t seem to shake and the thoughts you can’t get out of your head. But, does it really have its place here in your life? In this and the subsequent posts, I am going to discuss with you why guilt doesn’t have a place in BDSM and tools you can use to shake free of it.
Firstly, you must ask yourself the question, ‘why do I feel guilty?’
Most people who enter into the world of BDSM feel guilty for one or more of the following reasons. It may not list everything, but it will help you understand that you and many others feel the same way when it comes to guilt.
1. You are married or have a partner and feel as though it is cheating.
2. You fear that your fetish or kink is weird/abnormal.
3. You feel as though the money you spend on BDSM could be going to other things such as wife/family/bills etc.
4. Worry and guilt surrounding what others may think about you if they knew.
These are all normal and common responses when first entering this world or even after decades have gone by. The first thing is to break it down and try to look at it from a bird’s eye perspective. When looking at oneself, people are often guilty of looking at their life through a microscope, so if you allow yourself to view things from another point of view, more objective and logical, it may help you to put things into perspective.
In this post, I am going to cover the first topic in two sections, I will cover the other topics and areas relating to this subject in the future. If there are any points you would like me to discuss in future blogs, send me an email and I may well write about your topic/question.
The first point- ‘I am married/have a partner and I feel as though this is cheating’. This is a tough obstacle, for the most part, it is all about how you personally compartmentalise things. Some find it very easy to put things into boxes in their mind and have no qualms about separating the two. Others, struggle to the point that they feel as though they must choose between their partner and their kink. Most people choose their partner, understandably. However, is it so understandable?
Firstly, what is cheating exactly, what does it mean to you? Is cheating solely a sexual thing or does it mean emotionally being unfaithful as well? These are questions that you must ask yourself, however I will pick it apart so that if this applies to you, you may use this to guide your thoughts.
Being unfaithful means different things to different people, for some, it means having sex with another. For others it is placing oneself into a position where eroticism is involved with another. The first point if very easy to tackle, by far, most Mistress’ do not have sex with their clients. Simple, no sex = not cheating. What about the other part however? What if you feel as though engaging in anything erotic with anyone else is cheating? Well, I’m not going to say this will be easy, the brain is a complex machine and we have to find ways to quell its many thoughts. The question itself however goes far deeper than just ‘engaging in anything sexual with anyone other than my partner is cheating’. If you look at it so black and white, then yes, it is cheating, however the question you really need to ask yourself is ‘why is it that I have to ‘cheat’ in order to get my sexual needs met?’
Take a moment to ask yourself this question. More on this subject is covered in Guilt 1.2.
~ Empress Akari
Foot note: Though I have been using 'her' in this post, this can also mean 'him', or 'them'.