Thursday, January 25, 2007

Thankful for the Welcomes

My decision to go independent was a sudden one. I did not have a chance to inform most of my submissives. If you have not recently emailed me, I may have no way of reaching you. But please know I value your servitude and that this isn't a case of me attempting to shun anyone.

I am having a blast with my independence. Honestly, I didn't think it would make that much difference. But I am having so much fun now. It was just time for me to make a change. What I love is a greater sense of control -- over who serves me, over all aspects of the D/s experience. Of course, control is really what it's all about for me! It feels more authentic to be a Mistress this way.

I have been deeply touched by how other pro dommes in the independent community have reached out to me and welcomed me in their playspaces. What a difference to go from that peripheral awareness of each other's presence to actually being invited to play in the most well-equipped and elegant dungeons in the city. It's a wonderful feeling to know that my sisters are watching out for me and supporting me in this move.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Healing through Hurting

I was in my bodywork class, hovering over a classmate as I applied the healing knowledge we had just been taught. As I worked on him, I realized that I had never partnered up with a man before. Actually, that's not true. I had teamed up with a very nice gay Asian man during another class. But this was the first white man I'd worked on -- the typical demographic for my submissives -- and it triggered something in me. As I located the different muscle groups on his neck, I suddenly felt this overwhelming urge to beat him.

"What am I doing here?" I thought for a second. "No, it's all right," I told myself. "I'm expanding my horizons and that's a good thing." I took a few deep breaths and continued focusing my energy gently.

I decided to take this course in the healing arts for my personal growth, to push beyond my comfort zone. Rather than stay safely within my areas of expertise, I wanted to get in touch with my more nurturing side. Believe me, it has been a challenge!

For one, in my everyday existence I am not the most somatically inclined. I'm someone who lives inside my head -- thinking, imagining, planning, analyzing. Yet it has become more and more apparent to me that being centered in one's body is vital to mental clarity.

I feel that I'm already there during my D/s scenes. The play is intuitive to me and I naturally move with the flow. And so I 've wanted to grow that awareness beyond the extraordinary rush of a power exchange to everyday life. Strengthen that mind-body connection. It has been a new journey for me. And up until now I wasn't sure where this path was taking me, and whether my being Mistress would continue to fit in.

It's really two sides of the same coin. Firmness with gentleness = SM domination. Gentleness with firmness = somatic healing. The thing is my personality is so obviously biased towards the former. And today in class I realized that was OK, that I wasn't there to change or undo all that has made me who I am, that I was simply acquainting myself with a new language for relating to others.

I've wanted to be more balanced, so that I'm not "monolingual" in the sense that asserting myself as an alpha female is all that I know. [Interestingly, my major injuries have all been on my left side -- which coincides with "yin," the one half of yin-yang associated with emotions, receptivity and the feminine. It's been suggested to me that getting more in touch with my yin energy would be beneficial.] But that doesn't have to mean the demise of Mistress Xia. Long live Mistress Xia!

Wrestling with this endeavor, as someone who's so used to being teacher's pet and top of the class but now finding myself struggling to take it all in, I have gained an even greater appreciation for how much fun I have as a dominatrix. It's an unexpected side effect -- helping me realize how good I have it. After all, I can get spoiled without any perspective and forget how blessed I am.

I shared my thoughts on all this with a good friend. She laughed and said "Your healing is hurting. And you are so cute. You are the cutest bitch!" That made me smile. I used to think you couldn't be thought of as "cute" and be taken seriously as a domme. Breaking the mould. . .

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Impressions from "Sin City"

Impressions from "Sin City" aka closest place to hell on earth, which manages to be pretty damn fun when chock full of porn stars!

As the madness wound down and the convention floor emptied, I ran into a fellow pro domme walking out of the small GayVN section tucked away in the corner of the expo. This stunning Los Angeles deviatrix, her look a cross between classic Betty Page and Morticia Addams, devastated in her thigh high boots and strappy leather corset. What, pray tell, was she doing here?

"I'm looking for boys to work for me," she said cooly. With a glint in her eye, she revealed her fetish for depraving men with forced bi scenes. Her eyebrows raised in excitement as she described hard-bodied boys flirting with each other all around her, pulling out her camera to show off a few prize pics she snapped.

In the photos she was a Queen surrounded by a bevy of toned and tanned twinks. Yeah, I love it when I meet fellow true believers. She was the real deal. She didn't just act the part of deviator. She lived it.

I was in sexy butch blend-in mode in my camouflage pants, platform boots and a CBGB t-shirt. My cohort, on the other hand, kept attracting the attention of the last lingering fans, who would periodically interrupt us with requests to take her picture. She flat out refused with some and gamely agreed to with others. One guy futilely asked her to show her "boobies" -- he actually used that word -- to which she sneered and slyly gave him the finger as she posed. I don't even think he noticed. I guess he wasn't looking at her fingers!

The place was practically empty when a woman from Playboy Radio came up and asked my friend if she represented the booth we happened to be standing in front of. After she said no, the woman asked if she would be willing to go on the radio to talk about whoever she represented. She thought for a second, then said "No thank you."

After the woman had left, I told my friend that we had missed an opportunity to present ourselves as a Dominatrix Dynamic Duo, ta- dah! Anyways, the only likely result of that would have been a marked increase in the number of wanker emails we receive. When it comes to my personal presentation, I come from the school of less is more. Better to maintain some mystery and distance, so that I know that those who serve me have put in some effort to find me.

We decided to continue our conversation over dinner. The closest restaurant in the Venetian was crowded with industry people and the wait was at least half an hour, so we high-tailed it to the food court. It looked like any other food court in a shopping mall, but with a few surreal touchs. As we sat there for hours trading "war stories" and sharing how we got to be the kinky bitches we are, controversial porn pioneer/scumball Max Hardcore hovered at the periphery in his trademark cowboy hat, smoozing with other insiders.

I excused myself to the bathroom. In line in front of me was an old lady talking to a very pretty blond who I recognized as Digital Playground star Jesse Jane. Despite her super-bumped up chest, she had a girl-next-door look about her, looking stylish yet not overtly sexy in jeans and a cream jacket.

The older woman, the kind of lady you can see going to church regularly in her nice little community, was asking her if she'd seen the Blue Man show playing at the Venetian. Jesse said no, that they had just come back here for ice cream. "What a nice young lady," I could just imagine the old lady thinking, "I wish my grandson were here to met her."

I marvelled at how she fit in like that. It probably made her happy to just be a sweet All American girl for a moment. When it was her turn to go, she was in and out of the stall in less than 30 seconds. "My! That was fast," said the old lady, innocently.

With my exotic kohl-lined eyes, bra-less in my red punk shirt and shit-kicking boots, I knew it was unlikely that this lady would strike up a conversation with me! Such is life. . .

Good girls. Bad girls. The games we play.

Friday, January 19, 2007

What's with Vox?

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Wednesday, January 17, 2007

ATTN:if your email address is "Xia's slave"

OK this has happened a couple of times so I want to address it. In the past as well as more recently, a few of you have sent me messages from email addresses that included an apostrophe i.e. "Xia's slave." Somehow you are able to send out messages from this address, but whenever I try to reply it just bounces back. I think apostrophes are not really valid in an email address. So if you have not received a reply, it is not because I am ignoring you!

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

To each Her own

I confess to being in Vegas this past weekend for the AVN awards. I've always been fascinated with the porn industry and I hadn't hung out with anyone in this biz in years. I figured now or never, and I'm glad I did. It was a blast catching up with folks I'd met in the past, getting acquainted with new faces, and just playing the fan to some of the bigger-name talent.

Several years ago, before I embarked on my pro domme career, I had gone on an all-inclusive vacation in the Tropics that featured porn stars shooting scenes morning, noon and night all over the resort. It was wild to watch and fun to party with these sexual athletes. I gained new respect for the men and women in this profession. They had to have the stamina to go for literally hours, the strength to stay in positions that surely burned their muscles, and the savviness to look carefree and hot while doing it.

At the convention festivities in Vegas, I was surprised to discover that many of the women in porn I talked to had tried their hand at professional domination. One beautiful blonde told me she had worked at The Chateau in LA for years. Another cinnamon vixen spoke enthusiastically of a scene she had done for a local SM website. Yet almost every woman I spoke to felt that BDSM was too emotionally draining for them. That was my second surprise. BDSM emotionally draining? For me, it is re-energizing. It's a vital outlet for my darker tendencies -- turning pain into beauty and feeling alive because of it. I have those heavy forces within me and they have to go somewhere. Better put towards creative, fruitful and exhilarating exchanges than anywhere else! Well, I suppose that's why they're porn stars and I'm the dominatrix. To each Her own. And I do own it :-}

Monday, January 15, 2007

Taking Sessions at the Inner Sanctum

I am back in town and available starting this week. I am taking sessions at the Inner Sanctum dungeon in the Mission district of San Francisco. Feel free to email me with inquiries: xia.bdsm@gmail.com

Yes, I am still keeping up this blog. If you have found it, consider yourself fortunate! I will not have a link to it on my new site, but may still post more personal musings here just for the hell of it. I think this will be a good place to start up random riffs -- publishing bits and pieces here helps inspire me as I work on longer-term projects. There is definitely something motivating about knowing I am reaching an audience immediately with my writing. Ah, instant gratification.

Monday, January 8, 2007

Independence

As promised, more changes. After four and a half great years at The Gates, I will be taking my final sessions there tomorrow. But wait! There is hope :-) I will be continuing to practice my craft out of a privately-run dungeon in San Francisco.

Though my website is still in the works, I will have a new Eros ad up on the 16th. I will be continuing to utilize email as my primary mode of communication. Feel free to reach me this way with inquiries. Note that my personal schedule affords me limited hours of availability for sessions, which I will conduct during weekdays only. Priority may be given to those currently serving me.

I will be out of town and unavailable this Thursday the 11th until Monday the 15th.

Friday, January 5, 2007

Transitions

Climbing up on Solsbury Hill
I could see the city light
Wind was blowing, time stood still
Eagle flew out of the night
He was something to observe
Came in close, I heard a voice
Standing stretching every nerve
Had to listen had no choice
I did not believe the information
Just had to trust imagination
My heart going boom boom boom
"Son," he said "Grab your things,
I've come to take you home."

-Peter Gabriel, "Solsbury Hill"



Change and growth were the hallmarks of 2006 for me. The new year looks like it will also be a time of transition, transformation and new beginnings.

I feel that I have come so far as a domina. I am now at a turning point. My new website is in the works. And there are more changes in the air.

In re-building my site, I am starting from the ground up to reflect all that I have become. In its previous incarnation, it had grown into a labyrinthian creature -- almost 20 pages in total, with many hidden pages tucked in here and there. In its new form it will be honed down to a few simple, elegant pages. You will see. . .

As I contemplate my future as a domina, I have pondered the place of this blog. I must admit it isn't clear to me if there is one moving forward. I started this blog in 2003 and it has been a joy to write and get such wonderfully positive feedback.

Blogging has reinvigorated my interest in writing about the world in general, not simply femme domination (which you may have noticed from my recent off-topic posts!). I am grateful for the encouragement and compliments I have received, which has helped motivate me to commit to longer-term writing projects.

Yet lately I have realized that I no longer feel it is appropriate to share in this way with new submissives - that is, people who have not yet met and served me. Not that it was wrong before. I am simply in a new state of mind about my role as a Mistress. A new stage in my evolution.

And so I will leave this blog online to be perused by those who encounter it. I will start up a new one to go along with my new site, though it will likely take on an entirely different tone. I am envisioning posting mainly on topics such as proper etiquette towards the Mistress.

Happy New Year Everyone! Live, Love, Laugh. Here's to a great '007.