When a Woman Says She's "Submissive in Bed," She Usually Means Something Else

Here is a warning for the men. When a woman tells you she is submissive, your brain may go straight to jackpot. But submissive is an enormous word, and a lot of the time it does not mean what you are hoping it means. Often, it means she just does not know what she is doing.

Submissive is not passive

This is the whole confusion, and Master says it bluntly.

"She's not submissive. She's just passive." — Master

When many women say I'm submissive in bed, what they are really saying is, I don't know what I like, I don't know what I want, so I'll just let you do whatever and not have to think about it. That is not surrender. That is avoidance. She is not handing you control, she is opting out of the whole thing.

The starfish problem

I call it the starfish. She lies there, arms and legs out, makes a little bit of noise, maybe fakes the noise, and waits for it to be over so she can be free again.

"She just exists. She's passive. She's waiting for you to be done." — Marian

There is no interaction, no presence, nothing being given. It is the stereotype people pin on certain countries and certain transactions, the woman who is simply there, naked on the bed, while a man does his thing and leaves. And it is not sexy, because nothing is actually being exchanged. It is two people in a room, one of whom checked out.

Real submission is the opposite of checked out

Here is the thing that took me years and a whole book to understand. Real submission requires you to know yourself first. You cannot consciously hand someone control of something you have never even explored. The starfish is not too submissive, she is not submissive at all, because submission is an active, chosen, engaged thing.

When I submit to Master, I am completely present. I know what I like. I know what I want. And precisely because I know, I can choose to give him the lead, which is a gift, not a vacancy. A truly submissive woman is the most engaged person in the room, not the least. She is paying attention, responding, trusting on purpose. The passive woman is just absent and calling it a personality.

Why this matters outside the bedroom

And this is the part that goes way past sex, because it is the same mistake people make about submission everywhere. They think a submissive woman is one with no opinions, no preferences, no spine, who just says yes to whatever. That woman is not a happy submissive. She is lost, and lost is not the same as devoted.

The submissive I write about, the one who is actually happier, is a woman who found herself, who knows exactly what she wants out of her life, and who then consciously chooses a man to follow toward it. The knowing comes first. So if a woman tells you she is submissive because it saves her the trouble of having a self, that is not the jackpot. The jackpot is the woman who knows precisely who she is and chooses you anyway.

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