Meta-Talks: What’s the Point?
So tonight I was wandering around Tumblr and I came across a question and an answer.
The question was, and I’m paraphrasing here: “what’s the point of meta talks? Shouldn’t people just talk about things?”
The response was what gave me pause. The answerer basically was summed up like this: “meta talks are actually super bad and give the submissive the idea that they can’t express themselves whenever they need to. There’s no point in talking about the relationship as though it’s seperate.”
Basically, meta-talk = bad.
I cannot tell you how wholeheartedly I disagree.
What’s the point of having a meta-talk? What’s the point of taking a scheduled time to discuss the dynamic when you should just be talking about the dynamic all the time?
Yes, it would be amazing if @herdramaticsir and I could just sit down and talk about our dynamic all the time. But sometimes there comes a time when we need to actively plan our talks. It’s the same concept as scheduling sex, putting date night on the calender, or making sure you call your mom once a week.
There are three kinds of meta-talks, as far as I can see.
An example occured in a post I did called “Measured Dominance” when I shared a moment about T requiring me to start wearing make-up. The short version is that He gave me a rule during a moment of intentional D/s that set me into a place that I wasn’t sure I could handle. I responded appropriately, then asked for a meta talk right there. It was a sort of “pause, can we discuss this” type moment where we could regroup and figure things out.
This is another thing that T and I have encorporated into our dynamic. Every Sunday night, we sit down together and we have an in-depth meta talk check in. How did the week go? How did we feel about things we did or did not do, things we introduced such as new rules or guidelines? Was there enough tangible D/s for our comfort, or do we need to be more intentional about things?
If there is something going on in the dynamic specifically that isn’t working right in that moment, or if you’ve noticed a problem that needs to be intentionally discussed, this is when you call for a meta-talk. “Hey, so, I’m really been struggling with the fact that I’ve been asking for a maintenance beating for almost two weeks now. This is something I really need and something that is very important to me. Could we please sit down and talk about this, as well as maybe set a timeframe in which this will occur?” This is a beautiful method of communicating issues, problems, or time-bound needs without slipping into the issue that comes from “topping from the bottom.”
My parents had this thing they did called “marriage time.” They did it every other day. They would sit down on the couch and say to my sister and I, “girls, we are going to spend some time talking about our marriage and our relationship. It’s important for us to do this. Go play in your room; we will call you when we are done.” It would be anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour, depending on how much time they had set aside in their day, but it always happened. They made it a priority.
This has stuck with me my entire life. Check-ins are healthy and normal. With the chaos of life, planning them and making them an intentional rhythm in a dynamic is extremely healthy.
I have never once felt like the practice of meta talks silences my voice or instills a “speak when spoken to” mentality.
If anything, it makes me feel more confident and secure in my ability to talk to T as not only my SIr but also my boyfriend and life partner.
(@instructor144 has an incredible piece on meta-talks that can be found here. It’s one of my favorites, and is absolutely worth the read)
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