You Can Be Wrong

A Dom/me is supposed to be this wonderful, infallible creature, in complete control, never letting anything bad happen, nor making mistakes.

OK, enough of the unrealistic fantasy. No matter how much of a Dom/me we are, we are humans first, Dom/mes second. The unfortunate reality is that humans do make mistakes. So, how should we deal with them?

Denial

Denial works wonderfully for Cleopatra (Queen of Denial... De Nile... Oh, forget about it). It also seems to be the first place many of us Dom/mes retreat to. After all, we are supposed to be infalable, admitting to a mistake might lower us in the eyes of our subs and the rest of the community, right?

The problem is, when you do screw up, deny it all you like and people will still notice. All you really achieve is showing people that you are too proud to accept your own shortcomings. Worse, this side of you will probably get talked about because it pisses people off and so your denial will actually do more harm than good to your reputation.

If you deny your failings to yourself as well, you cannot learn from them. After all, we learn from our mistakes, right? When denial reaches this point, as you are no longer learning from your mistakes, you are destined to repeat them which means you are never going to grow in to the Dom/me you are capable of being.

Finally, and most damaging, when the Dom/me denies it, the subs tend to take on a lot of the blame for themselves. This leads in to them trying to fix a part of themselves that is not broken, upsets them and can ultimately do a lot of harm.

Self Honesty

The first step to dealing with a mistake properly is self-honesty. Accept that you can make mistakes, look out for them and, when you make them, figure out how to avoid making them again.

Even if you are determined not to admit your mistakes to others, at least self-honesty will allow you to learn from them, avoid making them again and become a better Dom/me for it.

Another part of being honest with yourself is accepting that we do not all start off as the World's Greatest Master. Once you make the mental shift to accepting that you do not know it all, and that no one can reasonably expect you to, accepting that you can make mistakes becomes easier and less of an all threatening concept.

Admit To Your Mistakes

Admitting to mistakes actually brings with it a lot of easy advantages.

First, once you have admitted to a mistake, it is virtually impossible for anyone else to continue to criticize you for it without looking incredibly rude. Take the following apology for example:

"I am sorry, I missed the signal. Now I know what to look for, I'll watch more closely in future. It won't happen again. I feel terrible that it should have happened at all though."

There is almost nothing anyone can say to continue to criticize. Continuing to point out that they were wrong is pointless - they have already admitted that. Pointing out how they could do better is equally pointless. Continuing to berate someone who is feeling terrible is incredibly rude and will lose you far more credibility than they do. All in all, the moment you apologize, politely and with dignity, there is nothing anyone can do to make a further issue of it.

The second advantage of apologizing is, do it even occasionally and you dispel any illusions that you are incapable of accepting you are wrong. You do not have to apologize for every last mistake - just doing so occasionally will let people know you have the maturity to recognize them in general.

Show That You Have Thought About It

Once you have admitted to a mistake, consider talking about the concepts involved. You do not have to apologize any further - that has already been covered. Now you can talk about the concepts involved, in general.

Talking about the concepts allows you to demonstrate you have thought the issue through and now understand it better than before. Not only is this reassuring to others that you will not repeat the mistake; it allows you to show off your deep, Domly understanding of the subject and appear an even wiser Dom/me for it.

Accept Criticism

If you follow the steps already talked about, most people will not feel any need to criticize any further. Still, sometimes they will want to feel like their concerns are recognised and that you are not a risk to all of the kinky things they hold dear.

When someone does want to critique, let them. It is generally a lot easier to let them get it out of their system now, rather than have them dwell on it and build it in to something bigger.

The trick to letting someone criticize you is not to turn it in to an argument. Listen to what they are saying - they may well have good points. Also, if you are obviously listening, they will feel their opinions have been considered and therefore are more likely to shut up sooner. Finally, keep your answers brief - while you may be tempted to explain yourself, that gives them something to argue with. Brief yes or no type answers show you are paying attention but give them nothing to continue arguing with.

When it comes to your submissive who is the one who appears to be criticizing, consider whether or not that is really their intention. In most cases, you have done something that has hurt them and they want reassuring that they are safe. Explain to them how they can ask questions politely, rather than as criticism and make sure your answers are reassuring. Most submissives do not intend to criticize when they ask questions but all too often Dom/mes misread the searching for information as criticism and deal with it badly.

You Do Not Have To Do It All Of The Time

The main problem with recognizing your mistakes is that you do not want to come across as someone who is either incompetent or unsure of themselves. Apologizing too frequently can create that image.

Fortunately, so long as you recognize the main mistakes and do so occasionally, people will accept that you have done so, only personally, with all of them. The end result is, overall, less criticism, of fewer mistakes, from others as they assume you have already dealt with it.

Conclusion

We can all make mistakes. Dealing with them and their consequences well, as opposed to denying them, is one of the many things that differentiate a good Dom/me from a bad one. While it may seem like a weak thing to do at first, being able to recognize your mistakes and learn from them is something that others do pick up on and will result in their having a far higher opinion of you.

SoulThief