12.    Finally - Internal reinforcement and correctors

Unfortunately a trainer cannot influence all reinforcement and correctors. There are a number of internal factors that will influence a sub’s behaviour over which the trainer has no control; in spite of the fact that these can have an enormous influence on a sub’s behaviour.

Some of those are related to the internal general feeling of a sub and are often the consequences of moods and can vary on any given day. Others are our internal values and norms; those are very deeply buried within a human being and are therefore hardly changeable

In the first group we see aspects as: relaxing after a day of hard labour; pain; boredom and things like that. After a full day of hard labour and stress Ella is lying on the couch in front of the telly; it will be hard for John to motivate her for training.
In the second group we might see: guilt; moral responsibility; doing the right thing; cheating; all things that have come up as a result of our upbringing or important events. They form the centre of our character. Always bear in mind that it is the purpose of training to learn a sub wanted behaviour and to unlearn unwanted behaviour.

Never will it be the purpose of training to change or alter her personality. Altering somebody’s personality means that you will bring permanent damage to her psyche. This will bring you outside of my vision on and definition of BDSM.

Epilogue

And that completes my vision ob BDSM. Playing a game that will bring pleasure to both parties - within the triangle: safe, sane and consensual; regardless whether this is an individual play or within a TPE relationship.
Influencing behaviour is not always an easy task. It can be a time consuming and slowly evolving process. A process that needs continues directing and that is in need of knowing where it will lead you. At the end however there will be an enormous reward as well as the satisfaction of achieving the goal. And therefore there is a lot of pleasure to be obtained from training. I hope that this article has contributed to that.

Take care and Have fun. 

Starmaster – november 2008