Broken.

"Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul, if either your sails or your rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas. For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction."~Kahlil Gibran~

I had a person ask me today if I thought I was "broken" due to the way I choose to live my life. I had to think about that one for a moment, really think and a quote came to mind. And with that quote I had to think more, for how can you have reason and passion together working as one, but then through that quote, I realized you have to have both to work, one without the other will not work. So yes, I am broken, I have been tossing about for some time now. Not at a standstill, but tossing about, like broken glass, all over the place.

But, before I go any further, I think I have been broken in a different way for many years. I am not of the norm, do I choose to live my life as the "norm". I figured that it must be something in my make-up, deep inside of myself that makes me crave the dynamics of Master/slave. I have tried, "nilla", I have many times in the past, and found that it lacks what I "need". Not what I want, or desire, but what I need. It lacks passion, it lacks the reason I need to keep the passion from burning to destruction. I need a man, I need a Master, I need the dynamics that make me thrive and feel less broken. I have read many posts over the years about how submissives/slaves must be broken due to the nature of who they are, what they need, and how desperate they are.

I can relate, I am that person, I am that slave. I need that direction, I need that dominance, I need that structure, I need those rules and rituals, and that absolute power exchange. I would rather hear, "Good girl." than "Nice job." I read things on blogs, on posts, on Fetlife that talk about, physical aspects" of the lifestyle and how they make or break a slave. I disagree. Physical is a mere piece of the pie so to speak, at least for me. The mind, and the soul is what makes it work, what makes me tick. The mental is what makes me thrive and not flounder out there, or floating about with no direction.

I suffer PTSD, (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) from a previous abusive relationship, vanilla. It had nothing to do with M/s. Another broken crack in my make-up. Many would say that I was not broken beforehand, I would disagree again. Why? Because I was looking for an intense Master/slave relationship, and often that line is indiscernible. The line between abuse and mastery. I don't need someone to "fix" me, not in that way. I don't need someone to try to "heal" me, not in that way. What I need is someone to embrace my nature and nurture it in the ways it needs to be.

I can remember when I was a little girl thinking that I needed to be "married" to be whole. That is what I was groomed for, but even in that, my first marriage happened when I was 18 and it was nothing what I expected it to be. He was not the leader of the house, I wasn't the leader of the house, just two kids playing house. I kept searching for that "relationship" I had imagined in my mind, even though I had no idea what that type of relationship was. I did not come from an abusive home, I came from an average middle-class home. I kept wondering how in the world did I come up with a list of needs that were not "average". I kept searching and searching and having people telling me that there must be something wrong with me.

And now at the age of 53, I know from years of experience, I am broken in so many ways. Without that reason and that passion blended together in harmony, I will become more broken and then I will be floating around out there aimlessly. No direction, no sense of "me" left. And I just got out of that, not too long ago. I am still fighting getting "right" within myself. I suffered in a past relationship, and am trying my damnest not to bring it into the previous one. It has not been easy.

How do I determine which type of "broken" is healthy and which type is not? The type that is healthy for me is the type that gives me direction and makes me thrive. The type that is unhealthy is the type that leaves me out there drifting and tossing about.

So in answer to the question, yes I am broken, both the good and the bad. I need to learn to heal, I need to learn to embrace. I need to learn to trust that I am on the right path at times, and not resist. I need to shake free of those shackles that society has placed on me, and put "HIS" on instead. I have no misguided sense that he can heal me of the bad broken, but I do have expectations that he too will embrace the good broken.

Life goes on......