Slave or submisive

As I wrote in a previous post, I was feeling lost. I knew my purpose was to serve and please him, but I didn't know how to fulfill that purpose. I needed to know how to serve him better, how to be what he wanted me to be... heck, I needed to know what he wanted me to be. I needed guidance and direction, and most of all control.

So, Griz and I sat down and talked about things… where we wanted to go with our D/s and what each of us wanted out of it. And here's where we ended up: the goal is for me to completely surrender my will to him, to put myself under his control 24/7. Ultimately, our goal is to have a total power exchange relationship. This won't happen for us overnight. I need to learn to trust him more and obey him even when it doesn't suite me. I don't want to be his sometime submissive, I want to be his submissive all the time... which brings me to a topic I've been struggling with recently...

Submissive or slave?

When Griz and I first talked about moving toward a TPE relationship, he phrased it as a "Master/slave" dynamic. And I hesitated, because I've never seen myself as a slave, and I like identifying myself as a submissive. I had thought of a slave is more of an object and while I love the idea of Griz treating me like an object some of the time, I honestly don't see how we could keep up that dynamic all the time and still have a loving marriage. Slave also has sexual connotations to me, like sex slave, whereas submission is about all of it - the sex and the service. I feel like his slave during heavy play, but not when I'm fixing him dinner. I realize this is a highly charged subject about which many knowledgeable slaves and submissives and masters have written about, so I'll just preface this by saying these are only my opinions.

To get to the bottom of my feelings about being his slave, he gave me assignment to learn more about M/s by reading online and talking with a couple of other slaves or submissives. My good friend, padme, and my new friend martha were kind enough to listen to me and answer my questions. They were both so patient with me and thoughtful in their responses- thank you so much! My basic question was, what is the difference between a slave and a submissive? Both padme and martha said they started out as submissives, and eventually became slaves, and they both characterized being a slave as a more intense form of their submission... which is what I read on some of the websites I visited. Some people view being a slave as an extreme form of submission, others view slavery as something completely different from submission. There seem to be a lot of different opinions and definitions out there. One of the main differences between a slave and a submissive seems to be limits. Many of the websites I read said that submissives work within a framework of limitations, whereas slaves have no limits. But padme brought up a good point in that most (if not all) people have some limits, even if it's only one, even slaves. Are there slaves out there who would kill themselves or someone else if their Master commanded it? Maybe, but I think there are very few of them. So, I don't think a slave can be defined by limits, what someone will or won't do. After talking with padme and martha, I think being a slave is more of a state of mind than a set of actions. I think being a slave is an extreme, much more intense form of submission, but still fundamentally submission.

So with all that being said, does it matter what words Griz and I choose to define our relationship? I don't think it does. I am HIS, His good girl, His submissive, His slave, His lover, His friend, His (almost) wife. That's all that matters.