#you know how longterm shared goals are important part of a relationship? remember that?

[lavenderfeminist]

When you say you don’t want to be someone’s “experiment” what do you mean? Even if you dated a woman who came to the conclusion that dating women wasn’t for her how would that make you an experiment? That women would be bisexual still. Bi women who don’t want to date women are still bisexual and so are bi women who are more romantically and sexually attracted to men. Do you think straight women “experiment” with dating lesbians? I thought someone like you would disagree with that. Bi women like this aren’t less bi than your bi gf who has only dated women. Neither of you are holier than thou.

Nobody’s calling into question anybody’s bisexuality, you fool. I simply don’t feel like being the way someone finds out they don’t want to date women. Because ‘experimenting’ very much includes being bi, dating the same sex, and deciding you’re not into it? And not wanting to experience that kind of rejection is a perfectly valid and human desire? What a genuinely insane thing to say to me. The fact that you took that as me calling into question someone’s sexuality and not expressing that I’m literally just not interested in wasting emotional and physical energy on somebody who’s not serious about me is fucking INSANE, by the way.

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

Cult Conversion, Deprogramming, and the Triune Brain

Geri-Ann Galanti, Ph.D. California State University, Los Angeles, California

https://www.icsahome.com/articles/cult-conversion-deprogram-galanti

Abstract

This article presents a theoretical analysis of cult conversion and deprogramming based on the model of the triune brain. During participant observation at a Unification Church training camp, the author found, to her surprise, that her intellect was unaffected; the “brainwashing” affected her emotionally (limbic system). Cult life involves much ritual behavior (Rcomplex) but de-emphasizes intellectual processes (neocortex). Interviews with deprogrammers indicated that their goal is to get the cultist to see contradictions between cult doctrine and practice —in essence, stimulating the neocortex. Thus, cult conversion and deconversion emphasize different parts of the brain.

Several years ago I worked on a project on cult conversion and deprogramming. I spent time talking to deprogrammers and former cult members, and briefly stayed at a Unification Church training camp. Recently, in the process of preparing for a class I teach on the evolution of emotions, I read Carl Sagan’s The Dragons of Eden (1977), which is based upon Paul MacLean’s (1973) model of the triune brain. It gave me a new way of understanding what goes on during cult conversion and deprogramming. I would like to share my thoughts on that subject.

Before I begin, one caveat: Much of what I write is speculative and an oversimplification. Certainly, all parts of the brain are involved in most behavior. What I am suggesting is an emphasis on certain portions of the brain during certain types of activities. I do not intend this paper to be a neurological analysis of what occurs during cult conversion and deprogramming, but rather another perspective we can use in examining the phenomena.

The neurological approach may be useful in understanding those aspects of cult conversion and deconversion that do not readily submit to psychological analyses, for example, chanting’s sometimes puzzling effects, the development of phobias, and “triggers.” The neurological approach may also help account for the compelling quality of certain intense cult conversion experiences, such as those commonly associated with the Unification Church.

The Triune Brain

For those who are unfamiliar with the triune model, it simply suggests that the brain has three basic components, which evolved phylogenetically. In other words, as new classes and orders of animals evolved, natural selection worked to elaborate upon the form of the existing brain, adding to it, rather than creating a completely new version.

The oldest and most primitive is the Rcomplex, or reptilian brain. The four basic drives “feeding, fleeing, fighting, and sex” are based in the reptilian brain. It is the site of instinctive as opposed to learned behavior. Sagan suggests that ritualized behavior has its basis in the Rcomplex. Although in animals, much ritualized behavior is instinctive, learned rituals may also be located in the Rcomplex. They may be created in the neocortex, but once behaviors become ritualized, conscious thought is suspended. Chanting, for example, shuts off the conscious mind. Perhaps the reptilian brain takes over.

The second component of the triune brain is the limbic system, or mammalian brain. It is the primary site of the emotions. It contains the thalamus (the relay station for all information passed to the cerebral hemispheres), the hypothalamus (which regulates many functions, including hunger, thirst, sleep, heart rate, hormones, and the autonomic nervous system), the amygdala (associated with emotional memories), the pituitary (the master gland), and the hippocampus (which stores spatial memories).

The third component of the triune brain is the neocortex, generally thought of as the “thinking brain,” or the intellect. It contains the frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal lobes. The frontal lobe is involved in decision making and anticipation of the future. The temporal lobes are associated with language, perceptual tasks, hearing, and memory store. The parietal lobes are related to spatial perception. The occipital lobe houses the visual sense.

Sagan (1977) summarizes the relationship between the triune brain and human nature as follows: the ritualistic and hierarchical aspects of our lives are influenced by the reptilian brain; the emotional, religious, and altruistic parts are largely localized in the limbic system; and the intellectual parts of our lives, those concerned with reason, are a function of the neocortex.

Brainwashing/Cult Conversion

Several years ago I wrote a paper on brainwashing based on my experiences at a Unification Church (“Moonie”) training camp (Galanti, 1984). I noted that to my surprise, the “brainwashing” that took place did not affect my intellect. I sat through a total of nine hours of lecture on Unification Church doctrine. As I sat there listening, I naïvely kept monitoring my brain for signs of brainwashing. There were none. With the zeal of a professional graduate student, I was able to silently critique both the content of the lectures and the methods of presentation.

I observed that the leaders began and ended each lecture by having the group sing a moving song. That felt good. It surrounded the whole lecture with an upbeat, positive feeling. (Thus, they began and ended the lectures by stimulating the limbic system.)

I noted that they allowed no questions. We were to “learn” the material, not question it. The lecturers spoke very quickly and wrote a lot on the board. There was no time to think. Everyone was too busy copying down the material. I asked one of the longterm members if she got bored listening to the same lectures over and over. She said no, that she heard something new each time. No wonder. We were given so much information that there was no time to really hear or process anything. Thus, even the part of the training that is ostensibly devoted to neocortical type learning actually involves very little thought.

So, I wasn’t brainwashed “if the term refers to our intellectual processes. But the Moonies did get to me. I had arranged to have a friend and former member pick me up from the camp. I remember saying to him afterwards, “I had a great time. Remind me again what’s so bad about the Moonies.”

The next day I was interviewing a former member of the Unification Church who had become a deprogrammer. I spent an hour or so asking her about her experiences as a cult member. Then I switched to the topic of deprogramming. I asked how she went about deprogramming someone. She looked me straight in the eye and said, “Exactly the way I’m doing with you right now.” I was stunned. I didn’t need deprogramming. I didn’t believe their doctrine. Yet, I, who had read many accounts of the abuses of the Unification Church, who had heard tales of horror from the mouths of several ex-members, yes, I had to be reminded “what was so bad about the Moonies.”

They had gotten to me, all right. But it wasn’t through my intellect. They got to me emotionally. (In other words, through the limbic system, not the neocortex.) And the emotional truth was far stronger than the intellectual one. I liked the people there. I had fun. We sang songs and played games and acted like children. I didn’t have to think about anything. They made all the decisions for me. My neocortex got a vacation.

Cults often emphasize ritual chanting, meditation, or prayer. It is well known that repetition induces trancelike altered states of consciousness. It is not clear how such altered states fit into the model of the triune brain, but since they are produced through the use of patterned, ritualized behavior, they appear to involve the reptilian brain more than the neocortex. Many scholars who have studied the process of cult conversion (e.g., Appel 1983; Clark, Langone, Schecter, & Daly, 1981; Conway & Siegelman, 1978) note that the self-induced trances impair neocortical functioning. In other words, trance states stop you from thinking.

The Moonies use a technique called “love bombing,” which certainly affected me on an emotional level. Love bombing basically consists of telling people how wonderful they are. For example, one morning “Jane” said to me, “You know, Geri, you’re really one of the most open people I’ve ever met. You don’t put up any defenses. You’re really open. I think that’s so great.” When she said this, part of my mind went on alert: love bombing, love bombing. But the other part thought, “Well, yes, but it really is true. She probably really means it.” In any case, it made me feel good. Intellectually, I realized what she was doing; emotionally, I bought it.

Jane showed me a letter written to her by one of her church “sisters.” It was very emotional. She told me that the letters that Unification Church members write to each other were much more meaningful than the shallow ones her birth sister writes. Those, she said, tend to be about daily events. Her church sisters write about their feelings. It was clear that in the Unification Church, feelings are more important than anything else. Members are encouraged to feel, not to think.

Margaret Singer (1979) writes about the problems faced by people coming out of cults. Among them is a severe inability to make decisions. This is not surprising. Cult members are not in the habit of making their own decisions: what to eat, when to eat, where to go, what to do, what to believe. All these and other decisions are made for them. Decision making involves the neocortex. Perhaps it is like a muscle that is weakened after disuse and needs exercise to get back into shape.

Many former members commented that they stayed in the cult out of fear. Cult doctrine teaches that the only path to salvation is through the cult. To leave is to risk eternal damnation. They were afraid of what would happen to them if they left. They were afraid of what would happen to their soul. Fear is a powerful emotion based in the Rcomplex. So, cults hook you and hold you by using the lower brain centers.

Deprogramming / Exit Counseling

I interviewed numerous deprogrammers about the process of deprogramming. The key factor they all mentioned was getting the cultist to see the contradictions in the cult doctrine and cult practices. In other words, deprogramming is largely an intellectual process. Today, exit counseling is distinguished from deprogramming by the lack of coercion. However, originally the term deprogramming referred to the process of countering the cults’ “programming,” and did not imply the use of coercion. In exit counseling, which has largely supplanted deprogramming, the emphasis is on information, again in an effort to reactivate the cult member’s critical thinking abilities. “Exit counseling is a voluntary, intensive, time-limited, contractual educational process that emphasizes the respectful sharing of information ...” (Clark, Giambalvo, Giambalvo, Garvey, & Langone, 1993, p. 155).

Steve DubrowEichel (1989) presents a near-transcript of a 5-day deprogramming. The turning point for “Ken,” the Hare Krishna who was being deprogrammed, occurred on the second day. It came when Curt, the deprogrammer, read from the official ISKCON version of the Gita. It stated that the true master’s home “is not illuminated by the sun or moon, nor by electricity.” Curt pointed out that electricity did not exist when the Gita was written. This triggered a long-repressed doubt in Ken, who said he had wondered how the saints could have written about electricity centuries before it was discovered. Prabhupada was supposed to be perfect, and here he had made an error. This discovery led Ken to find other inconsistencies in the doctrine. Curt complimented him by saying, “Hey, there you go! You’re thinking now, Jackson!” [emphasis mine] (p. 71). Ken replied, “It’s something, a thought that I never actually, I never confronted the questions in my mind because that would appear as a blasphemy” (p. 71).

In order to deprogram cultists, the deprogrammers have to get them to think again. Not feel, not react, but think. Using the triune model, the cult conversion process involves deemphasizing the neocortex in favor of the Rcomplex and limbic system, while the deconversion process emphasizes the neocortex.

Discussion

Many scholars have suggested various models of cult conversion, ranging from those that emphasize social-psychological processes (e.g., Cialdini, 1984; Galanti, 1984; Zimbardo, Ebbesen, & Maslach, 1977) to those that focus on information processing (e.g., Edwards 1979; Conway & Siegelman 1978) to those that stress the role of altered states of consciousness (e.g., Clark et al., 1981; Goldberg & Goldberg, 1982). What I am suggesting in this brief article is another way of thinking about both the process of conversion and deconversion.

I think much of the power of cult conversion comes from its use of the lower brain centers. Both Rcomplex learning and emotional learning are closely associated with survival and thus much more powerful than intellectual learning. If I am betrayed by my lover, I may never trust him “or any man” again. However, it may take me several lessons to learn to use a computer. Emotional lessons are learned far more quickly than intellectual ones. I need be bit only once by a dog to be afraid of dogs ever after. Limbic and Rcomplex learning obviously aren’t impossible to unlearn; if they were, psychotherapists would be out of business. Generally, however, it takes longer to unlearn such lessons than it does those of Anthropology 100 or Math 250.

My model focuses on MacLean’s concept of the triune brain. Both cult conversion and cult participation emphasize the use of the lower brain centers; in MacLean’s terms, the Rcomplex and the limbic system. Deprogramming, on the other hand, is designed to stimulate the neocortex. However, since the effects of Rcomplex and limbic system learning are so powerful, longer term therapy is often needed to undo the emotional damage done during the process of cult conversion. Ideally, the result of deprogramming and counseling is a reintegration of all parts of the brain.

References

Appel, W. (1983). Cults in America: Programmed for paradise. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.

Cialdini, R. (1984). Influence: How and why people agree to things. New York: William Morrow.

Clark, D., Giambalvo, C., Giambalvo, N., Garvey, K., Langone, M. (1993). Exit counseling: A practical overview. In M. D. Langone (Ed.), Recovery from cults: Help for victims of spiritual and psychological abuse (pp. 155-180). New York: W. W. Norton.

Clark, J., Langone, M., Schecter, R., & Daly, R. (1981). Destructive cult conversion: Theory, research, and treatment. Weston, MA: American Family Foundation.

Conway, F., & Siegelman, J. (1978). Snapping: America’s epidemic of sudden personality change. New York: Dell.

DubrowEichel, S. (1989). Deprogramming: A case study. Cultic Studies Journal 6(2), 1-117.

Edwards, C. (1979). Crazy for God: The nightmare of cult life. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall.

Galanti, G. (1984). Brainwashing and the Moonies. Cultic Studies Journal 1(1), 27-36.

Goldberg, L., & Goldberg, W. (1982). Group work with former cultists. Social Work 27, 165-170.

MacLean, P. (1973). A triune concept of the brain and behaviour. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Sagan, C. (1977). The Dragons of Eden. New York: Ballantine.

Singer, M. (1979, January). Coming out of the cults. Psychology Today, pp. 72 -82.

Zimbardo, P., Ebbesen, E., & Maslach, C. (1977). Influencing attitudes and changing behavior (2nd ed.). Reading, MA: AddisonWesley.

******************************

GeriAnn Galanti, Ph.D., is on the faculty at the Department of Anthropology at California State University, Los Angeles, and at the Statewide Nursing Program at California State University, Dominguez Hills. She is the author of Caring for Patients from Different Cultures (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991).

“Socialization techniques through which the UC members were able to influence” – Geri-Ann Galanti, Ph.D.

Take Back Your Life: Recovering From Cults & Abusive Relationships

Re-forming the Self: The Impact and Consequences of Institutional Abuse

Cult Indoctrination – and the Road to Recovery

Writings of former members Many recount their experiences in the organization or their journeys out of it

Scared of Leaving?

Moonwebs by Josh Freed

My Time with the Oakland Family – the Moonies

The Guru Papers: Masks of Authoritarian Power

conformity

Contract for Membership in a Cultic Group or Relationship

[amysubmits]

Hi :) I am going to tell my guy that I want more spanking, we have it a little bit, sometimes. But I want to ask if we can incorporate it more into our sex life as well as possibly as DD. I’m having trouble with the wording though.. How did you approach the subject with CD? Do you have any tips on how to say something like that without feeling like an idiot? 🙈

Hi!

AAAAAAAAAAH just reading this took me back to all those feelings I had when trying to tell CD. My belly feels funny. 

With you already doing some fun spanking, asking for it more often is rather likely to be a yes I would guess. If you decide to ask for this but not to ask for domestic discipline yet, then maybe consider that instead of just asking for ‘more’ maybe consider admitting how big of an element it is in your sexuality. I think if I would have been able to tell CD that spanking was my primary fetish, or that I liked spanking because I liked feeling like he was in control, he would have started to understand so much more about me than he did based on me simply asking for spanking. 

Like you’ve done, I started out by telling CD that I liked spanking. His reaction to that was mostly excitement. If I’m being really honest, I think it was his first clue that perhaps I wasn’t 100% vanilla sexually and that was what excited him more so than the spanking itself. But, all I said was I liked spanking, so he assumed I wanted him to smack my ass during sex which is not my jam. When I realized that just a few slaps on the ass during sex didn’t excite me - that I didn’t “really”  like spanking. That I just liked the idea or fantasy of it. Which in the end, did not end up being true - but I believed that for a long time. So, that kept me from bringing up spanking again for a long time. At some point, I recognized that when fantasizing about spanking it was never about being spanked during sex. In my head, the fantasies were always being spanked ‘for real’. I still didn’t know what domestic discipline was, so I think at some point I tried explaining to CD that the reason the ‘during sex’ swats weren’t working for me was how they didn’t feel ‘real’. He suggested role play to make it seem ‘real’ and we tried it once but I was way too shy and awkward and..yeah. No. Not for me. So then we were both thinking that I just liked the idea of spanking and not the reality of it. So we were just stuck for a long time. As in, literally a few years of 0 progress. 😂 In the end, what I learned was that if he just playfully swats my ass during sex, I don’t feel particularly dominated. Of course, this is not true for everyone, it’s just me. For me, if he is just swatting my ass during sex to turn me on, well it just doesn’t feel like he is ‘in charge’ really and I need it to feel like he’s got consensual, but serious, not playful, control over me for it to make me feel submissive. 

Unfortunately, I don’t remember any real specifics on that first DD conversation, but I can share the gist of it. We wound up having a few talks about DD within a few months span so I may be confusing what we talked about, when. So if this slightly contradicts old blog posts I promise I’m not trying to lie in either post I just am too old to remember all the details perfectly. 😂

It was about 4 years ago. I know that I admitted to him that I had found forums for domestic discipline and that it felt ‘right’ to me. I may have tried to explain how I thought it may be the answer to getting spanking to be real and therefore work for me instead of feeling fake. Understandably, he was really confused. He thought that on one hand, I was asking him to be my disciplinarian “for real” (I was!). Yet because I had brought it up in connection to how our past erotic spanking and attempts at role-play had failed - he thought this was just a really complicated way to roleplay without it feeling like role play. He is really not into the idea of bratting, in the sense of breaking rules on purpose to get punished. To the point where even from this very first conversation he explained that he had zero interest in creating rules that would be set up just for me to break. He explained that he wasn’t opposed to the idea of truly disciplining me, but that it was going to be taken seriously if we did this. I tried explaining to him that I thought that was my goal, too. I didn’t want to create rules just to break them, either. I wanted to please him. He explained how he worried that it just wouldn’t work out that way - he thought knowing I could get spanked for breaking the rules would encourage me to break the rules because I like the idea of spanking. He asked me what types of rules I thought might work. I threw out two that I had seen over and over on DD forums - a spending limit/budget, and a rule about not lying to him. This was my biggest mistake in the whole conversation, I think. The reason being that I’ve never had a problem with overspending or lying. So in his mind, me suggesting this rules made him think that I really was just looking for rules to break, and he already had that suspicion, so it just confirmed it in his mind. He had NO interest in me lying to him or wasting money (of course!) so he refused those rules and asked for others. I wasn’t able to think of any and neither was he so we just left the conversation there. I kind of felt like the conversation was both a win and a loss. My biggest fear going into the conversation was that he would be judgemental and feel like I was a freak for wanting rules and punishments. He seemed generally open to it, which was a big relief and felt like a win. On the other hand, I felt like he was almost open to DD in general, but not really with me, because of my spanking fetish. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to convince him that I would take DD seriously, but I strongly believed I would. Seems how he did not reject the idea, we would talk about it here and there from then on. Maybe 3 other conversations in 6 months following that first one? 

I know we talked at some point about how we both recognized that I was always eager to please him. I explained how women in the domestic discipline forums explained that being taken in hand for punishment felt bad because it displeased their HoH (aka Dom) and how I thought displeasing him would make me feel guilty enough to ‘ruin’ the excitement of spanking for me. We also talked about how my pain tolerance was low, so I thought he could pretty easily spank me too hard for it to be enjoyable. We continued to circle around the “problem” of not knowing what rules would work for me because all the ones I saw on DD forums were for things i did not do - lying, wasting money, speeding, getting poor grades, being late to work, and so on. Just for the record, during this time, he seriously, I swear, said “You are too good already. You don’t need any rules.” I like to remind him of that now.  😇

But seriously, what he meant was - I wasn’t doing anything that was obviously damaging to myself or our relationship. He did not think I was ‘bad’. So about six months passed, and then we started DD, suddenly - at his request, because he realized I could have a rule to improve myself, even if wasn’t exactly ‘bad’.  I lost my debit card one day, which was something I did often. We found the card in one of my pants pockets in the hamper. Again, a common experience because I forget that I left a card in my pants and just take them off. So he just came to me and said that was going to be a rule - that I had to return my debit card and ID to my wallet as soon as I was done using them. If I lost my cards or if I left them in a coat or jeans pocket I would be punished. 

Honestly, some part of my brain kind of yelled ‘That’s so weird! That isn’t a DD rule..’ but I was so excited that he was on board with starting DD that I couldn’t care too much. In hindsight, I’m so glad I just went with it. I feel like it’s important to let him lead in the ways that he feels called to, not just to push him to lead in the way that I envision. 

After giving me that new rule, he made it clear that we were trying DD. He was not saying we were definitely going to do this longterm. He was still worried that I would break the rules on purpose to get spanked, and I knew that he would call it quits if he felt like it was just a game. I remember being in the store together, and him watching me carefully put my cards back into my wallet as soon as the cashier gave them to me and him having this satisfied expression on his face. I could tell he really enjoyed seeing me work on correcting a bad habit, to be good, to please him. Of course, eventually I forgot and was punished for that rule but it took long enough that he had already seen that I was clearing putting effort into correcting the bad habit so that largely helped erase the fears of DD being a game. 

Whew. So I guess, my advice is to try to explain your motives as clearly as you can. If you want DD to be a way to truly correct your behavior and not something you do for kinky fun, make sure he understands that. Perhaps have some blog posts printed or send him links so he can read some examples of how it works for other couples. But, keep in mind that he is his own person and you want him to be his own type of Dominant so while it’s okay (and good!) to let him know what you like, make sure you aren’t expecting him to be some character you’ve read in a book or some other Dominant you’ve read about online. In my opinion, it’s actually a good thing if he refuses to do some of the things you like because it means he’s standing up for being himself and not letting himself be pushed into your exact idea of a Dominant. You don’t really want him to turn into someone else, you want to find a way to blend DD into the relationship you already have, so that you maintain your personalities and the connection you’ve already had, and just blend DD into that. I know sometimes that’s a problem early on in D/s or DD, is the person who did not bring up the idea feels like they are being pushed to be something they aren’t. So try to make it clear to him that you feel like he is dominant already (give examples of how you see natural dominance/leadership in him or in your relationship already if possible), and that you just want to help that blossom, but that you like who is already is and you aren’t trying to really change him. 

Also, try not to sweat over getting a specific ‘yes’ or ‘no’ in a single conversation, necessarily. It’s okay if he has questions and concerns and needs time to process and read and learn. It took CD about six months to come around on it, which I thought was a bad sign during that six months, but of course, I don’t feel that way now. You’ve read about DD so it doesn’t seem like a brand-new concept to you, but it will to him - so if he needs time to read and process and understand, that isn’t necessarily a sign that it’s not for him. It’s also not necessarily a bad sign if he says yes to some of your ideas and no to others, as long as the ‘no’s are to things that you dont’ find truly essential to your idea of DD. It’s a very good thing to negotiate and find a style that is meaningful to both of you. 

I don’t remember a whole lot of the specifics of what I said, unfortunately. But I do know that my communication was imperfect in multiple ways, which is part of why we had to have a few conversations to work out details (like the rule problem). So I think that goes to show that even if your wording is imperfect, or there is some miscommunication, you can have additional conversations in the future to help clarify and find solutions to problems or concerns together. I don’t think the perfecting wording could make someone who isn’t cut out for DD like it, and bad wording won’t prevent it from happening if it’s right for you both. I know it’s easier said than done, but try not to sweat every word. :) 

Another common thing I hear in general is discomfort and/or worry on the D side that they are being asked to be ‘mean’ or aggressive. If you use words like Dominance when talking to him, I would recommend explaining that you aren’t looking for a sadist from a porno - especially if you are talking about this as a full-time “lifestyle”. Many will worry that they are expected to be an asshole all the time if you want a full-time Dom. Assuming that he doesn’t enjoy being an asshole, that may concern him so try to explain what kind of dominance you like and how he fits into that vision of dominance already, as he naturally is. 

Some blog posts of mine that you may find helpful:

Leading His Way

Not A Game

Beyond Punishment

Hearing Her Cry (This is Cd’s)

Night And Day

Erotica & Consent (or my vision of DD before I lived it)

Also our first podcast episode covers the beginning of us dating through when we started these blogs so about a year or two into DD. So it covers how we started DD. 

https://soundcloud.com/overtheknee/how-we-got-here.

Also this tag on my blog is for blog posts from anyone I’ve reblogged that I think may interest people who are working to transition from “vanilla” to D/s (at least in the sense of not intentionally/purposefully having D/s) to intentional D/s . 

http://amysubmits.tumblr.com/tagged/vanilla-to-d%2Fs

Good luck! I’d love it if you’d update me on how it goes.  😊

[faiteach]

A Reflection on Romance

I want to preface my musings by saying that, since my divorce I have sworn off romantic relationships. The immediate response from most people in regards to that statement is “Oh no! You can’t give up on love because of one bad experience!” 

Well, I’m not. I’m conceding defeat after 7 failed relationships, 1 failed marriage and more than 30 damaging romantic & sexual encounters with more than 30 individual men overall. I’m admitting that the problem, generally speaking, came from within myself as much as it came from the influencing social constructs outside my control. I’m taking an indefinite leave of absence from the battlefield of love in order to work on myself and to prioritize building up my own life before I have to worry about building a relationship with anyone else. To keep that commitment, I had to close the door on romance completely. I allowed the bitterness and rage to salt the earth of my love and swore I would never again seek out the waters of affection. 

With that being said, lately I’ve felt a warm breeze in the spaces of my heart where I had thought nothing would ever be permitted to grow again. 

I'm learning to live I'm trying to be better I'm learning to give But I don't know if I'm a giver

Certainly, I’m still in no position to be dating, but my perspective on love and relationships has finally grown enough---I have finally grown enough---that I feel if given another chance, maybe there are a few things I would do right this time around. In the past, I was simply so desperate to find someone who would fill the void inside me that anyone who spent a little time and attention on me became an Object of Affection. I would get caught up in Fantasy and Expectation, imaging how our True Love would progress. I would distort, discolor and break myself just to re-make myself into the image of the kind of woman they desired. I knew nothing of who I was. I knew everything about who I wasn’t. 

After being rejected, neglected, used, and never fully understanding how my own behavior played into their hands, I spent some time thinking that Men were the Enemy. Then I spent some time realizing that I was the Enemy. Forgiving myself was harder than forgiving them. 

I’ve dedicated the last few years to getting to know myself. Learning my limits, my expectations, my wants & needs, my likes & dislikes, my morals & principles. My goals & dreams. I’ve learned how to take care of myself, and how to manage my life so that I feel more in control. I’ve reduced my stress levels to a minimum and managed to claw my way out of debt. My mood is incredibly stable, in comparison with the past, and although self-harm is a still a flickering threat that appears in my darkest hours, the frequency is drastically reduced. 

As a part of that process, I’ve begun to examine my expectations for the future. Do I really want to live the life of a hermit, completely alone somewhere in the woods? The important thing to remember I think, is that I could still be happy there. But maybe it’s not the sum and total of what I want. Maybe I do want a family of my own, even if its just me and a partner (esp. if its just that). Maybe I do want to dedicate the time and effort to building a relationship with someone besides myself. 

As these thoughts grew, I began to think about who I would want to share that life with. I never used to waste time speculating on that before. I watched too many girls and women craft ephemeral Prince Charmings in their minds, leaving them forever disappointed by a reality full of flawed human beings. But I thought, there is some sense in putting together a blueprint of what you want in a partner. Chemistry is all well and good but a real, longterm relationship takes commitment, shared goals, shared morals, shared principles & values. These things are more important than whether or not he has green eyes and dark hair. So, in some small back corner of my brain, I put together an idea of who my partner would be. 

Kind, Generous, Empathetic & Thoughtful - no more machismo. No more manly men. Give me a Phil Dunphy, give me a Marco Diaz, give me a Steven Universe. I want a man who isn’t ashamed to have a soul.

Physically active/loves nature - particularly for outdoor type things like hiking with me and Jamie. I intend to be an Amazonian Warrior and I want someone who will motivate me to do it by keeping healthy activity a regular part of our lives.

Outgoing - I can be very introverted, so someone who could balance that trait in me would be great

Close to their family but not obsessed - I’m not close to my family, it’s an experience I’ve completely missed and frankly, tight knit clans make me uncomfortable. But I’d like to be with someone who does know how a close family feels, and will bring that to the relationship. 

Humble - Any man who can’t admit his own faults will never survive an encounter with me, let alone a relationship. I am unforgiving in the face of unyielding arrogance & pride because I recognize these as negative traits of my own and if I have to swallow my pride sometimes then by the fucking stars so do you. 

Now, I’m not about to go sign up on tinder or any other dating service and start interviewing, ahem I mean dating random strangers to find a suitable life mate. Dating is exhausting, I have no stomach for it. Getting to know new people is exhausting, especially under the pretext of “I’m getting to know you to see if I want to bone you regularly someday”. Not to mention the fact that I have zero interest in casual sex and most people these days go about dating with the expectation that sex is one of the first items you check off the menu. 

I used to do casual sex. I used to have one night stands. In all those years of sexual activity, I have never orgasmed with someone. It’s not because I’m a closeted lesbian, I can assure you. It is very definitely because, in all those years of shallow beds, I never searched my soul deep enough to realize how highly I value intimacy. It is sacrosanct in my soul. I prefer to reserve it for someone who has truly earned the honor. Every single sexual partner I’ve ever had, every single time I’ve had sex, even in my short lived marriage, I dissociated during the act. I tuned out. I put on some basic Sex Noises and checked out the back door. Because I wasn’t ready to do it at all, I just thought I had to. 

Things are different now. I understand my own boundaries, I’ve learned to listen to the voice in my head when it says “No.” I know what I want from a partner in a relationship and I’m prepared to police behavior that I find unacceptable. I’m not so afraid of being alone that I would be unwilling to leave someone who seemed unsuitable nor am I going to change who I am just to attract someone I think I want. 

I believe that if you pursue the things you are passionate about, if you build the life you want to live, the right person will be found within it. They’ll come to you. Not by magic, or by divine intervention, but by the intent with which you choose to live. So I’m remaining dedicated to improving myself and my life and building a future I will be content to live in, regardless of the company I keep, but I am now leaving the door open should someone enter my life who would be willing to make it even greater by my side. 

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I've been in early-stage startup marketing/growth roles for over 12 years (with 3 exits as HoM) and I can tell you without a doubt that if you’re an early stage startup you need to learn how to hack PR yourself because Agencies can charge about $5000-$10,000 a month. Timing is important here, but what I'm about to teach you is a longterm process, that you only unleash once you have data proving that your product/market is ready.Hacking PR is all about building relationships with the media related to your industry and getting them to tell your story. Over the past 12 years, I’ve worked with startups all over the world and at all different budgetary constraints and you’ll hear me say this over and over again, I believe that early-stage stage startups should NEVER hire a PR agency, if they’re cash-strapped.PR agencies are simply too expensive for an early stage startup so you need to know how to generate your own buzz so that once you have the funds to hire a professional PR agency, they can expedite your growth, and build on the PR program you already put in place yourself. Here are the 6 steps to hack PR for your startup that I have used time and time again for companies all around the world:Step 1. Figure out your keywords/topics: What is your business relevant to? What keywords and topics are people writing about that your business’ news can apply to. For most projects I’ve been fortunate enough to be working with I’ve aimed to find 3 categories/topics/key phrases for relevancy. For example, a travel app that uses AI to help with travel booking will be interesting to reporters who write about Tech, Travel, and Business, not just travel. Think about these keywords and terms and run over to alerts.google.com to set up alerts for them (don’t worry I’ll explain why in a second). So again, going back to the travel app I’m going to set up alerts for “ AI startup” “Artificial Intelligence Apps” “travel startup” “travel industry news” “ digital nomad trend” and so on….Why do this? Simple, because I want to see which writers are writing stories that I can be a part of. Every day I check these alerts and also visit Google News to see if I missed any terms (customizing your google news saves hours here monthly).​Step 2: Create relationships with Reporters: So now I’m seeing everyone whois writing relevant stories about my industries. The beauty of PR Hacking is that 90% of these articles have the writers’ contact information on the article.If they don’t have their direct email, they’ll usually have their twitter. So everyday, I will grab the relevant email addresses and names and go on over to my excel sheet or Google doc and drop them in…building this list during product development, or in expectation of a launch. If it’s a large enough contact I will email them immediately saying that I loved the article and I’d love to offer them an exclusive to be featured in the next piece. The focus here should be about creating value for the writer. Not just asking for free promotion. My favorite personal quote of mine I’ve ever said is “Spam isn’t spammy if there’s enough value for the recipient”. If there’s no email, I’ll go add that person on twitter and tweet to them immediately to follow-back and then I’ll DM. I will continue doing this until my PR Hacking List has reached 300–500 entries. Now you’ve got a solid list for Press Release Distribution!Most reporters put their email address on their publications directly, to entice people like me to send them stories! Utilize this to start building a relationship with them. Don’t be spammy, but create value for them.​Step 3- Make Your Own Milestones! This is another one of my favorite quotes. Often times when I work with early-stage startup founders on PR Marketing they tell me they don’t have anything newsworthy. To that, I immediately call BULLSHIT! Just because you don’t have a $1,000,000 revenue stream yet or 500k monthly uniques doesn’t mean you don’t have something newsworthy. Think about your mission that you initially set out to complete, are you further along than when you started? Think about your data, is your product solving the problem it set out to? Have you mapped your millionth datapoint? At another travel startup I headed PR for, the founder told me he had nothing I could use for PR, so I sat for an afternoon with the engineering team to see what they were working on. Turns out they had created the world’s largest database of categorized hotel review sentiments. That might sound boring to you, but to a writer who writes about hotels, travel or big data that’s sexy as hell. I spun it up into a PR Marketing campaign and we got 4 nationwide articles with no spend. This company got acquired 4 months later. Find some sexy, relevant news story based on what you ARE doing, even if you haven’t fully done it yet. Try to push out at least 1 story per quarter even if you’re heads down into product development, just to maintain thought leadership and industry awareness. NOTE: If your startup is going for fundraising try to do 1 per month!Step 4- Create your own Press Release! This doesn’t have to be a scary mountain to climb. Writing a press release is all about making it very easy for reporters to do their job. They are usually quite LAZY. They want relevant, copy-pasteable chunks of writing that they can simply regurgitate onto their article to look like they’re amazing at their job. If you can help them be lazier, you’ll win more. Just remember three main rules: Focus on the value for the reader, keep it simple, and include a lot of numbers, quotes, and facts. Also include a sexy title, a subtitle that goes further in depth and make sure your date is the day you email the release out. Reporters will insta-delete your email if the PR is outdated. The need . fresh news.Step 5- Distribute your Press Release. This is the fun part. Start blasting that baby out. There are two main tasks here: 1 send your PR with a short and succinct paragraph in an email to your press list you’ve been cultivating ( I use a free Mailchimp Account with every company email address). Be sure to personalize the email subject with first name and organization so the open rates are higher. The second task is to send direct emails to the biggest press contacts a few days prior. I like to title said direct emails with the word EXCLUSIVE, and yes, in all caps. Always offering the big dogs the exclusive will no doubt create more value for them, and therefore make it more likely you’ll get that big nationwide press release marketing push your company needs. Work with them, see what they need to be better at their job and then provide it. We’re all just people trying to work. Remember that. They need you too, so help them out.Step 6- Stay on top of reporters. I recommend using a free ESP like MailChimp (free under 2k email list) to send out your press emails so you can easily track opens. You do this so you can see which reporters opened the email more than once and follow up with them directly. A lot of times they will open it, start working on your content and forget and move on…so if you stay on top of them you 10x your chances of getting featured. I also recommend copying the email campaign in your ESP, and resending to the segment that didn’t open the previous email every 3 days. Just keep hammering them until they either say “Please remove me from your list, unsub or respond to set up a time to chat. More often than not, the response will be just a Thanks. Will be in touch one-liner but even that is good enough. The goal is to start building a foundation with the people who tell the story in your industry. Get noticed, become a go-to source and eventually a thought leader in your industry.Pro Tip: Also spend some time distributing your press release on free sites like PRlog.org, Reddit (The Startup Subreddit for instance), Flipboard, StumbleUpon etc. You can even repurpose your press release into a blog post and post it on your blog, which can then be shared on social media etc. Just be sure to wait a few days after sending to the PR contacts, before you post publicly.​There you have it. That's all you need to do to get press traction for your project. And then once you raise a round, you can hire an agency to expand on what you've done.​If you're interested in proof of who I am, google my username. I look forward to answering more questions!​-AndrewStartups