Submissive Training: Cognitive Behavioral Theories
A lot of kink is rich with psychology. In order to train someone to be exactly as you desire them to be, you first have to know how to make legitimate behavior change. One methodology for this is utilizing cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT).
CBT is a form of psychological treatment that is very common these days and can be a lot of fun to carefully experiment with within the context of a BDSM relationship. You will hear seasoned BDSM practitioners caution you against using BDSM as therapy with your submissive. Hands down they are right, it is not a replacement for therapy, but what they sometimes fail to recognize is how it is a fantastic adjunct to it. In the most ideal scenario you are piggybacking off the issues that your sub is working on in therapy and helping to generate more creative and lifestyle specific alterations of the exercises. Depending on your dynamic you may also be helping your submissive to be accountable and to participate in the exercises. I discuss how your submissive might feel about accountability compared to their vanilla counterparts in this post. First, let’s talk about what CBT is.
The focus of CBT is to identify the way the submissive is currently thinking and provides exercises to move toward changing some of that thinking from negative to positive.
Core Beliefs: CBT is based on several core beliefs, including:
faulty or unhelpful ways of thinking breed psychological distress.
learned patterns of unhelpful behavior perpetuate psychological issues.
"People suffering from psychological problems can learn better ways of coping with them, thereby relieving their symptoms and becoming more effective in their lives" *
The benefits : including but are not limited to:
improved confidence
improved gratitude
improved insight and self awareness
improved problem solving skills
improvement in emotional regulation
improved ability to recognize and manage thought distortions
Although having submissive self improvement be a goal in a BDSM relationship is common it is not a small undertaking and a good dominant will know if this is within the limits that they can manage. The Dominant needs to acknowledge if this type of play excites them - they have to be invested in watching their submissive grow emotionally.
There is nothing worse, or more irresponsible, than taking on some components of your submissive's therapy and then abandoning them. This is cruel and can be significantly damaging. Realizing mid way that your submissives' issues are too much for you or that you are bored with the concepts of participating in therapeutic play could be incredibly detrimental to your submissive's life progress. This is why so many practitioners will say not to do it, because they don't trust the Dominant to know their own capabilities. This is pretty smart given that a lot of people lack self awareness. Do no try to help someone else, if you are incapable of managing yourself (to a degree, no one is perfect). Ultimately, you are manipulating the mind of the submissive in a real way with good intentions; do not adopt a puppy if you do not intend to take care of it.
Having your submissive serve you with pleasure and a sound mind will make everyone's lives more fulfilling. The Dom who is most excited about these concepts will be looking for a relationship with nurturing aspects and will want to cultivate these improvements so as to reap the benefits of a happier more stable submissive. The Dominant ideally takes great pride in their submissive's progress, thus finding their own reward for their efforts.
The focus of the CBT exercises might be on helping your submissive soothe themselves or specifically challenging them to conquer one of their fears. The Dominant might encourage your submissive to use mantras and to build positive habits. You may want to correct your submissive's negative thinking by replacing it entirely with line writing or other behavior modifications. The crux of any change or new habit is always consistency.
Matthew Lacorro writes some helpful pages with examples of CBT exercises in his book "Mastering the Art of Dominance" (LINK TO BOOK REVIEW). This is part of his sections on curriculum building for your submissive. He touches on a different exercises that include elements of art therapy as well. One of the recommendations that stood out to me were having your submissive write affirmations. I would have loved more in this section of the book, but appreciated that the author got specific and provided real examples. He also smartly cautions the reader not to take on more than they can handle in this arena.
CBT is just another tool that you can sharpen and place neatly into your tool box to pull out for later. As newer players in BDSM we sometimes get blinded by the elegance of a wooden paddle or the crisp sound of a whip and forget to look for these more impactful abstract tools that control the mind. File this one under emotional management, nurturing, and growth.
* https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/cognitive-behavioral
