I never regretted giving in to my married lover Mister Big. Here’s why.

On our last date, Mister Big casually mentioned something about “chasing” me, before I finally gave in. And although he was obviously saying it as a joke, that I was so difficult to convince to have sex with him that he had to give it his all, I was triggered by that one word.
Chasing.
“No,” I said, slow but certain.  “You didn’t chase me. You behaved in a way that got you the girl but you didn’t move. That’s what made it so smart. You didn’t move at all.”
A friend later said all predators have different hunting tactics, for different prey. And she asked me; “Do you think he knows what he’s doing?”
But I shook my head.
No, he doesn’t.
It’s instinct.
He is just as incapable of explaining how he got the girl, as the lion explaining how he got the buffalo. I mean on a basic level he knows. Because he thinks what he does it really simple and easy. But he doesn’t understand that he’s actually constantly adjusting his technique based on signals he knows how to read. And that it goes even deeper. That it’s not his modifications, his being agile and capable of shifting gears, techniques, ways to approach her, that’s getting him the girl.
It’s the connection itself.
He flirts with a woman giving her his full attention.
In that sense he is right, in not being able to explain it. Because his hunting skills, much like the lion’s, are only the result of being tuned in to the woman.
They’re not a success formula in itself.
But either way the word “chasing” implied to me, a forward moving action. To which I would have responded a hundred percent negative. As a lot of women would. Because all prey, animals and women alike, are wired to detect motion. And I do understand the hunting/flirting comparison has tremendous pitfalls and downsides but I m just going to use the parts that overlap. We (prey) have radars that scan for danger. But our radars can only detect movement.
We can also visually identify a potential predator- but if he holds still and doesn’t move, a “false alarm” signal will soon follow. Because the conclusion (that it’s a threat) is not backed up by our motion detector, by our radar.
I assume female radars are all set at different levels, but mine really closes the gates, pulls up the bridge, and aims the canons just in case, as soon as a man makes a move that I interpret as chasing or hunting.
If a man makes a move, for example getting me a drink, we engage in conversation, he asks me over to his house, even while having sex, he must at ALL TIMES express superior confidence, and self-control. Even the word “express” suggests too much movement to my taste.
He simply is calm and confident.
REGARDLESS OF WHAT I THROW AT HIM.
He must never, ever, chase anything, or we’re back to square one with me throwing him out of the castle and pulling up the bridge.
I told a friend that even though I myself was totally unaware of my own feelings for Mister Big – a married business man who had nothing to offer except his company at times when he chose to make himself available to me – there were signs that I liked him and signs that me rejecting him would not go down the way it had with other men.
The most important sign I liked him was that I talked about sex with him. I talked about it in detail, detail I had not told anyone, about what my deepest desires were.
He.
Did.
Not.
Even.
Blink.
He didn’t hold completely still either, in the sense that he was speechless or impressed or something. He smiled, implying he liked what I was thinking. He made a joke. But nothing in his response implied that he was particularly experienced, skilled, or knowledgeable on the subject of sex.
And he certainly did not suggest, that he was going to do those things to me. Nor did he lean over and confide in me that if I was so interested in sex, he could teach me a thing or two. That he had some tricks up his sleeve, that he would show me, if I would choose him.
Wink wink.
Good God!
Unfortunately that example was not even fictional. That was something that happened on a date with a man trying to impress me by moving forward, leaning in, seducing me with his sexuality. All things I do not respond well to.
Anyway.
I was taken aback myself about all the things I had told him. At this point I had no idea I was attracted to him. In my mind I had just spilled my darkest side, all the things I was probably going to hell for just for thinking about them and I was never going to get my fantasies fulfilled because they were despicable AND because I didn’t like the men who offered to initiate me in an almost teacher-apprentice kind of way – spilled all those things, to a stranger. A married stranger, who I did not want sex with because I did not feel attracted to him. By telling him all these things, I had crossed the lines of common courtesy and human decency.
I didn’t even want to think about how badly this would end.
I had gone through so many male friends who I had turned down, because they just didn’t get the message I had told them beforehand;
That I wasn’t interested.
That it was just a friendship thing.
That I wasn’t looking for sex.
That I did not feel attracted to them.
I told my friend yesterday;
“Somehow, men think that because they have feelings for you, you must have feelings for them. And I m all irritated like: TRUST ME! You would know if I did!”
She shrugged and answered;
“Exactly. You wouldn’t even be talking if you felt the same way. You’d be having sex.”
My friendships with men always included having rejection talks, and usually the guy did not take it well and would remind me time and time again, I had rejected him. Work that into our conversation over and over. Until I was tired of it, and told him our friendship was not going anywhere if he couldn’t get over his rejected lover status.
And here I was.
Deeply involved in sexual conversation with a man I did not want to have sex with. I was prepared for the absolute worst. This would not go down well. Not if there had been other men,  who had made such a huge drama of being rejected when I had not been sexually explicit at all. When my mixed signals had been nothing more than a smile or kindness.
Mister Big made a joke.
He smiled.
I can’t even remember exactly what he did but it was sweet and easy going.
And when I told him I was a bit ashamed of being so, dark, he kept responding in that unremarkable yet comforting manner. Like I said; I can’t remember exactly what, that’s how totally low-key it was. I just remember how it made me feel.
That he was okay with me being dark, or whatever I thought I was.
That he was not shocked, just amused and that he was enjoying the conversation.
At the end of the night, I just wanted to get this whole thing over with. Me having given off not even mixed signals, but HELL YES! signals…. I felt terrible, but it had to be done.
I couldn’t leave him hanging there.
We were saying our goodbyes, and I took a deep breath and said; “Listen. I told you this at the beginning of our date. I m not into you. Do I need to repeat that?”
He cut me off.
You could even say that he did so in a violent manner.
It was certainly determined.
“Did you enjoy yourself?” he asked.
I did.
“So did I. Then there’s nothing to talk about.”
Yesterday, when I told this story, my friend was speechless.
“Wow. He refused to be rejected by you.”
He did.
And shortly after we had our first kiss, which by the way he started. Something I can’t get over gushing about. For almost a decade I had been the one who made the first move. Guys were just so slow. And I  couldn’t blame them, since I responded so violently to them making a move. That mister Big managed to be slow, easy going, and quiet, yet knew exactly when the moment, SECOND, had come when I wanted to be kissed (and no, it wasn’t at one of those cheesy saying goodbye moments either); that took my breath away.
This man had the masculine stillness I had longed for, for years. Yet when he moved, he did so in tune with the desires that were hidden in the deepest layers of my brain. Not the outer surface where I was still over-analyzing it.
He knows me better than I know myself. Right from that first rejection talk, to the first kiss, to doing with me the dark things that I listed out for him on our first date. Always the same recipe, of being calm, understanding, and funny. Yet knowing exactly when to leap.
Maybe Mister Big was right.
Maybe he did chase me.
Because he sure as hell caught his prey.

<3LSH
An Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living

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Het verzameld werk is inclusief Big- het Engelstalige dagboek over mijn affaire met Mr.Big

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Als je yogales bij me volgt in Nijmegen kan ik het ook voor je meenemen naar de les.

The only thing that’s ever sustained me,
that’s ever made up for the degree to which everything otherwise seems pointless and mean and wrong,
are intense and mysterious emotional experiences that stick in my soul until I can work them into something beautiful.
 Charlotte Shane – Prostitute Laundry

—–
Diary entry with erotic story ending. Lauren is on her first real date with Big in months, and she’s reminded of her early beginnings as a mistress. She has rocked being the third woman since high school. 

Saturday December 23, 2017

Big asked me what I had looked like, at seventeen.
The age where I had my first affair with someone who was already involved with someone else. It had lasted for over six months and I had ended it because we were only making out, and rubbed a bit. Usually fully clothed.
Never mind the relationship not going anywhere; I had a sexual agenda.
I had been ready for real sex before my former boyfriend had dumped me right before my (our!) 17th birthday. And before we could share that first time together.
The ex did have his first time sex before his (and mine!) 17th birthday. With someone else.
Leaving me not just heartbroken, but a virgin as well. Which I probably found even more unforgivable. So the clock was ticking as to exactly HOW MUCH he had beaten me to the punch. Of exactly HOW MUCH he had hurt me. And although I was absolutely devastated, like any teen receiving a blow like that, I was also drawing a line at turning eighteen a virgin.
My virginity was the painful evidence that I had been dumped.
I needed it gone.
So although I adored my secret make-out buddy (secret meaning our entire school knew but not his girlfriend), I took matters into my own hand. I said yes to a guy who was four years older than me.
He wasn’t a player.
He had lived together with his previous girlfriend and now owned his own apartment. He could cook, possessed the basic skills of keeping his house clean and he had two cats. He was exactly the drama-free boyfriend I was looking for.
And he stayed a great boyfriend. I left him three years later, but only because I wanted more excitement. Not because he had let me down in any other way than the one I could have predicted from the start.
It wasn’t until recently that I remembered that there had been someone before this three year long carefree relationship.
Someone important I mean.
Because I had kissing sessions with a variety of men. Two of them were gay. They were my favorite, and the only ones I would do reruns with, aside from the cheating guy. Big asked me that as well; how many men I had kissed.
This was after we had a conversation about how many women he had slept with, a topic I had never thought I would be able to handle.
But that had been years ago.
Now it aroused me.
Anyway, he asked me how many men I had kissed and I laughed. And then he asked me if I still knew all their names. And I laughed again.
There were so many.
I never felt kissing counted for anything.
I mean other than a test if you wanted to go further. I also told Big I had some really strange experiences too; That sometimes the kissing had been amazing, and yet I had felt no desire to go further. What I didn’t tell was that sometimes the kissing had been terrible and yet I had pursued. And not without getting satisfying results in all other areas.
I ve never had bad sex in my life. I ve never misjudged sexual chemistry. But in retrospect I can say that my “kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince” logic was not a hundred percent accurate. Someone could be a prince in bed, when kissing like a frog. And someone could kiss like a bonafide prince, and I would still not take it further.
It was all very weird.
But I do like kissing, and maybe it did give me the right information since I never ended up with someone between the sheets that didn’t work out.
Anyway I was telling you about the cheating guy/mistress situation that I had apparently already worked myself into, age seventeen. This was such an eye opener to me! I knew that I was good at this whole being a mistress thing.
It suits my sexual preferences of wanting to be monogamous myself, but needing a guy I can admire and who I feel is sexually active with other women.
For starters with his wife.
Honestly, I feel that this aspect of sexual orientation – which basically comes down to preying on second hand sexual energy but being unable to digest it in its raw form (hence the monogamy on my own part) – is highly interesting! It has been the biggest takeaway from being a mistress.
Because that’s the third question Big asked me;
“What have you learned, these three years?”
I answered;
“That I am monogamous. That I like being committed to you.
But that I also need you to have other women. I need you to bring in that energy.”
I told Big the story of the cheating guy when I was seventeen. And that the most remarkable aspect of our liaison, was the group of friends in which it was embedded. Five guys and two girls, one of them was me. We went to each others birthday parties, we hang out on Fridays after school. We kept each other’s secrets.
When it was his birthday, he asked us over, and we all went.
His girlfriend was there.
I didn’t rat him out, nor did his friends. None of us did. We had a watertight pact of friendship and camaraderie. Our make-out sessions had not just created a bond between him and me. It closed the deal for our entire group.
Mister Big was cooking us dinner. Maybe that’s why we did so much talking. It was nice way to bond because it had been so long since we’d been together properly. With plenty of time, privacy and me not being in my period. With the prospect of having real all the way sex. Not just all the stuff I could do keeping my panties on.
The talking about sex and our relationship was foreplay.
We were taking accountability for our sins.
Just like the steak he made us; an animal had been killed to feed us. It was a mortal sin. One that bonded us.
Yesterday I saw the Last Jedi, the latest Star Wars movie. And it wasn’t until I was there, watching the high voltage sexual tension between bad guy Kylo Ren and good girl Rey, that I understood the full power of secrets, and dark stuff.
Understood why that group of friends formed a tight bond around the cheating of one of its members.
Why the affair between Big and me feels so sturdy, and forever growing stronger. Every rendez vous adding another layer to it.
First I thought it was the secretiveness of it. That shame, danger and fear are simply better building materials than love and transparency.
But the movie made me realize it was something else. And that it had been something else for three years. That it had been something else way back in the days when I was just seventeen.
And that this insight, this knowledge, was the reason that any affair born in the darkness has a lot higher chance of surviving than the one created in the light.
Like I said; it’s not that secrets and sins perse create a better bond. It’s because in relationships born from darkness, secretiveness and mortal sins, everything is included.
Everything is loved.
Someone’s light and someone’s darkness.
We love, accept, embrace, sit through it if we must – twice as much from each other. That’s why we, the sinners, create such strong ties.
We bond on what makes us good, and we bond over what makes us evil.
It’s the same reason in Star Wars the good guys have a lot worse time than the bad guys.
The good guys only accept their good deeds, and are ashamed if they fuck up, or have fucked up. Whereas if a bad guy fucks it up, he’s just sorry the job didn’t get done. He accepts everything from himself. The good and the bad.
Accepting all sides of yourself is the path to ultimate power.
Accepting all sides of the other is the path to ultimate love.
It’s not that within our relationship, or within ourselves, Big and me are all evil. We don’t like hurting others. But if that’s the way it has to happen in order to get something we want, we’ll do it.
It’s collateral damage.
Like the animal that had to be killed for our steak.
 An extra marital affair (and being good at it) means that we accept each other’s dark side. I fully accept him cheating and lying. And he accepts me needing other women, to be around somewhere. In order to stay fulfilled.
Me needing that second hand sexual energy.
Him needing that first hand sexual experience of having multiple partners.
And on top of this, we bond the same way other couples do. In the same magnetic, emotional, breath-takingly beautiful way we all do.
Or at least I do, ever since I got myself a proper boyfriend age seventeen.
I was sitting on top of Big, my feet next to his hips, sinking into the black leather of the couch. He was sitting up straight, embracing me as I lowered and he entered. Shallow fucking. I buried my face in his neck and sobbed. I said it was like I couldn’t feel how much I loved him until he was inside of me. He comforted me and kept fucking me in that same, light way that seemed to draw out every emotion that had been bottling up, all the months I had missed this.
It all came out.
I don’t think I ever cried so much especially not during sex so gentle and loving. After he came we lied together, in silence. I had my eyes closed to absorb every moment. In my imagination so did he.
His body felt warm and heavy.
“I had red hair,” I said. “Wavy. Down to my shoulders. I wore black clothes. Always. And I had porcelain skin and wore red lipstick.”

<3LSH
An Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living
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You can find my 10 books in my shop.
standard 25% off!! (my gift to you)

recommended for UK and US readers, the book about the first two years of my affair with Mr.Big; Big, erotica and diaries (2017)

aanbevolen boek NL:
Het boek Benjamin, verzameld werk Engels en Nederlands
Het verzameld werk is inclusief Big- het Engelstalige dagboek over mijn affaire met Mr.Big

Witte Tijgerin (€5) en Het Boek Benjamin (€45) zijn ook te koop bij de Feeks 
Zij regelen ook de online bestellingen.

Als je yogales bij me volgt in Nijmegen kan ik het ook voor je meenemen naar de les.

I found thinking about him comforting.
 Charlotte Shane – Prostitute Laundry

—–
Lauren finds her true calling and treats herself to a night out;
the five year anniversary with celebrity and muse Rafael.

Saturday December 9, 2017 

I feel like this is the last thing I ll write this year.
Which is bullshit because even if nothing exciting will happen, and 2017 just finishes without anything noteworthy – I can and most likely will, write for my Dutch book Maitresse and my yoga and lifestyle book, or books, White Tigress.
But I mean the diary. That I won’t have anything to write in here. That you won’t see me, until the next emotional high or low. And it has to be so impressive that I will sacrifice writing on those other books, or my yoga work, in order to get the story out.
I don’t see that happening. My life is exceptionally quiet. And exceptionally wonderful. Because I really did find my calling, in the troublesome week between my book reading and Rafael’s show. By the time he came to see me, after his show, my life had already fallen into place. There was nothing more I needed. Not from him. Not from Mr.Big.
I was free.
These were the events that lead to this Zen state of mind, starting with the book reading. Which went perfectly well. It was something I had wanted to experience. Was I any good at giving them? Did I enjoy it? Did I lack any skills or would anything unforeseen pop up? At first it seemed like it wouldn’t.
In fact I loved the reading so much, that I was convinced I would go professional, and get myself gigs for this. Until I collapsed, into what someone once described as “A dark night of the soul” Mine was not that dark, but I did get sick, followed by five days in which I felt unstable, ashamed and desperately tried to figure things out.
I deciphered the problem to its core, threw away all the elements I didn’t like, and then I clicked the remaining pieces together.
Which, unexpectedly, made the perfect fit.
By the time I met Rafael I had full clarity on The Big Picture. I knew how I was going to thrive at being a writer, and a yoga teacher, without collapsing in the middle of my work week. It basically came down to a clean cut; Yoga on weekdays, LS Harteveld on weekends. But with a massive tweak. Which was that I was going to stop pretending I was a normal yoga teacher and I was going to write from the heart for the studio.
I cancelled my entire existing media program which had been way too plain and generic. And in the ten hours that were freed up by that, I started writing real stuff.
From the heart.
I completely stripped away any feeling of “this is how a normal column promoting a yoga studio should look like” and just went for it. I wrote. Daily. I hustled, promoted my yoga. And it worked. Even though I wasn’t really counting on it to take immediate effect, because these things take time.
People may not immediately recognize you as the most fun, unorthodox yoga studio from the city. And even if they do, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s their preferred flavor.
They may turn away and prefer generic yoga instead.
Which is totally cool.
So when I already had actual results within days, it was more than I had counted on. I would have been satisfied with merely my newly found joy in writing for the studio.
I had stopped pretending to be a normal yoga teacher who only blogs or does social media because that’s required this day and age. I showed I loved doing it. That I was writing because it lit me up from the inside.
And no longer stuff that any copy writer or any other yoga teacher could have written. Not anymore. The writing for the studio – just like teaching itself – had become purpose work, soul work. I basically chose to see myself as a badass, writing yoga teacher first. LS Harteveld hobby writer second.
LS Harteveld was marginalized – giving her only the weekends which often didn’t start before Friday 8 pm. That may sound like a cruel thing to do, but in reality, once I started speaking my truth for the yoga studio, the urge to speak What I Really Think here- as Miss Harteveld – was eliminated.
And the remaining writing for LS Harteveld went really well.
I would easily churn out ten thousand words in diary entries, private mailings, blog posts. And still see friends and family.
Many people will find my new week/weekend structure too compartmentalized, but for me it is wonderful. It takes all the pressure off LS Harteveld. On the weekends I will sleep in and only write if I feel called to do so. Which apparently I do.
But I am free as a bird to spend my weekends the way I want to.
And it was with this new found freedom that I saw Rafael’s new show. Rafael has been my muse since 2012, so it was our five year anniversary.
I now see this long period of being his fan, as entirely logic. It fits with my sexual preference, which is that I m a mistress;
I am monogamous, and I like distance. It’s space for me to admire and literally muse over a man. For me a man has way more value as an unattainable muse, than as a reliable partner. And being a monogamist, one man has more value than a series of men. Which I find confusing and tiresome.
That’s the reason I m still with my lover Big, with whom I ve been with for three years. And it’s the reason I’m happy being a fan of Rafael.
I feel emotionally moved by them, and they make great muses.
So I went to see Rafael’s show and I m afraid I sucked up every word, every gesture, every second of his stage time. I forgot when the last show was before this but I m guessing 2015. But it was too long… And it had the same effect as not seeing Mr.Big for a long time. I was thrown between an accusatory;
“How could you do this to me!”
And the bittersweet knowledge that all the waiting had eventually only fueled the pleasure. Made the moment more memorable.
Rafael and I sat opposite to each other.
We talked about his show and his upcoming book, and just general stuff on the professional side of things. But there was also something else. Something that I will not reveal here, because it was private. But it bore a remarkable resemblance to me having hid my real personality as a yoga teacher. So that no one would get mad. Me before coming to terms with, and ultimately fully owning the fact that I m a mistress, even though practically every woman I speak to responds with either;
“How can you do this to his wife?”
or
“I can’t understand you do this to yourself.”
I m not doing anything to myself. This is who I am. And if things end with Mr.Big I ll either look for another married man, or if he’s available, I ll make sure that he understands that keeping me interested will include spending quality time with me, just as much as spending time away from me. In which I want him to appear busy with his own life, to not bother me, and to be absolutely fucking thrilled if we meet again. I want him to only share things about his other women for the single purpose of turning me on. Not because we’re going to have an honest and open conversation about it, or because he’s oversharing. That’s cruel. I want him to be totally devoted to exactly what it is I want, to what arouses me, to what I want to hear. And at the same time I want him to regularly create vast distances between us, which I can fill with writing; With dreaming; With creating, and recreating, the image of him I hold in my head.
That’s what’s it gonna take.
In a similar fashion, Rafael was doing a great job as my muse. But he was holding out. I could feel it. In the same way I had been afraid, and was still afraid at times, that being a mistress would get me killed. That someone would put a knife between my ribs because I had sex with a married man. Until ultimately I had decided that stepping into my true power, was more important than being scared. That I couldn’t keep hiding forever. That I had to accept that this was who I was. That yes, there was a betrayed wife in the equation, and that I was probably a monster for needing other women somewhere, around a potential partner, in order to give him the light of day.
But it was simply who I was.
I knew there was power into totally stepping into that role. And well… Rafael had something like that going on. And I pointed that out, that maybe, he was meant for greater things. That maybe, the time to play safe was over.
That maybe, it was time to step into his power, and face whatever the consequences might be because in reality, keeping all that stuff within will do you even more damage.
It’s a life not lived.
It’s a calling not heard.
Five years ago, I read Rafael’s book. It was a mixture between fiction and facts, where he becomes the prime minister of the Netherlands. In years that followed he withdrew from the idea that this was a real goal, or calling.
But writing this post now, a week after having this conversation with Rafael, I realize that even our undocumented conversation really comes down to me believing that he was meant for great things.
My belief that the fictional novel associating him with politics, was actually his true calling. That me pushing him to step into his power now – about the topic I won’t share – is related to me insisting he was writing his own future with that novel.
His own heart’s calling.
That he wasn’t just meant for greater things, he might have been meant to become the greatest thing.
That in reality, self-deprecating Rafael, bore all the markings of a great leader.

<3LSH
An Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living
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Rafael is in the English books;
LS Diary (€10)
Bedtime Stories (€ 15)
Mirage (€ 5)

aanbevolen boek NL:
Het boek Benjamin, verzameld werk Engels en Nederlands
Dit Boek Benjamin (€45),
mijn verzameld werk inclusief de boeken over Rafael, die in het echt Johan Fretz heet.
is ook te koop bij de Feeks 
Zij regelen ook de online bestellingen.

Als je yogales bij me volgt in Nijmegen kan ik het ook voor je meenemen naar de les.

It wasn’t really about sex as a genital experience. It was about sex as revelation, illumination of connection amid chaos.
Charlotte Shane – Prostitute Laundry

—-
Lauren is still involved with Mr.Big, a married man. And in the lee of her planned out workweek, she starts to understand the underlying dynamics of their affair. And all the forces that seem to be working in her favor.

The Triangle
Monday November 27, 2017

t’s Monday morning, and in the wake of my epiphany to focus on my White Tigress and The Mistress work, I already feel accomplished. 
I still suffer from insecurity though.
For days on end, many socially awkward things happened. Which I did not share because it had made me insecure and I didn’t want to give them more power than they already had.
Or maybe I didn’t want to verbalize them until I knew what their common demeanor was.
What lesson could be learned.
In retrospect I think it was just a sign I did not have clarity yet, that I should speak ONLY about those two topics.
White Tigress and Mistress.
That’s it.
And the rest of my writing will just have to sell itself. Or not. It’s completely irrelevant if it does or doesn’t.
I’m on my self-imposed weekday fasting from writing, but obviously that’s only working marginally. I’ve closed down my Twitter and I ll limit myself to diary entries like this one.
But nevertheless ideas keep flowing.
Yesterday I wrote the first chapter to my Dutch Mistress work,but this morning ideas for the upcoming chapters just fell into my lap.
I immediately scribbled them down in my notebook.
One of the key insights is how the love triangle, formed by the mistress, the man, and his spouse, may be the most important reason these types of affairs can last that long. I ve heard of liaisons lasting for decades.
They ve definitely seemed harder to break.
It’s like this triangular formation has its own will to live. Just like groups do.
That’s why group dynamics are so strong because the group uses any means nessecary to survive. It doesn’t accommodate the needs of the individual members; its primal concern is the survival of the group.
This could be the case in our love triangle.
It’s a separate entity, and one we all feed with our energy, both positive and negative. A fight between my lover and his wife will be absorbed by the triangle, just as swiftly as our last full-on session making love.
Which was months ago, unfortunately.
But it was never something I interpreted as a sign to doubt the strength of what we were having.
Seems now, I was right.

Powerplay
Thursday December 7

This is probably the messiest diary in the history of memoirs.
I have a notebook filled with breakthrough thoughts that changed my life for the better over the past ten days. Five pages of scribbling on my night with muse Rafael. And two on what the upcoming chapter of my Dutch book Maitresse (Mistress) should be about.
Oh, and I have a personal rule in place which makes diary writing on weekdays a mortal sin against being a fulltime yoga teacher. It’s simply not allowed.
And then what do I do?
I come to you with a new insight, on a moment I should be writing for my yogabiz. And I m forsaking all my other self-imposed rules such as keeping this diary organized and to log events in the correct chronological order.
So let this be messy.
And let it be quick.
But yesterday I got such a profound extra insight in the mental makeup of a Good Mistress – and key to why I thrive at this relationship form when it would simply destroy most women.
The key is; powerplay.
It started when I was explaining to a friend how I had chosen the Dutch title Maitresse, over the word Minnares (both translate to Mistress in English).
I said I thought they meant the same, although technically Maitresse may be exclusive to mistresses who are kept/ financially supported. He said that I should look that up, because the remarkable thing about my life’s choice was that there was no financial gain of any kind.
I was totally independent.
So I did. I Googled the two Dutch words Maitresse and Minnares, to see if there was a difference. There wasn’t. But I did read one of the articles describing the relationship between a mistress and her lover, and the title just clicked;
“Being a mistress; He dominates.”
I ll be damned!
Now, I ve never made a secret about my preference to be dominated in bed. In fact, being spoiled rotten the last three years with Mr.Big, I m pretty sure I ve reached the stage where I m no longer able to have sex if it doesn’t include me getting play raped, and getting my boundaries pushed or even violated in the most delicious, intrusive way imaginable.
It reminds me of a game I used to play within my long-term relationship. God that seems like a lifetime ago.. But he realized I would do anything, any assignment, if he said it was (roughly translated) a “horny assignment”.
From taking out the trash to buying a porno dvd for him; it truly didn’t matter. As long as he said I had to do it, and that it was a horny assignment.
And my current lover Mr.Big and me, have always been very aware that me wanting to be ordered around, and him wanting to be dominant, was a golden match in the bedroom. Probably the reason why we don’t get enough of each other. We could become one of those mistress/ lover couples that last a lifetime, simply because we’ve both been so hungry for this. Now I shouldn’t speak for him of course. And I do give him credit for being a talented adjuster to whatever is required. His sexuality, what he will do with you, is a mirror image of what the woman desires. But having said that, I do have strong indicators that being dominant is at the core of who he is.
And I simply know that being submissive -in a non-leathery BDSM kind of way-is who I am. Sure, I can do versatile, I can do dominant. But it’s merely killing time until something or someone better comes along.
It’s a favor. Not true love.
Mr.Big and me have always been aware of this powerplay in the bedroom, but I had never realized the extra marital relationship itself had this pull on me, for exactly the same reason.
That being his secret lover was working the same submissive kink.
Over the years I ve been able to identify many strong and unusual preferences in myself, either sexually or relationship wise. But I had managed to miss this one.
In the late nineties, I was fan of Eric Roberts. He’s almost like the wicked (and definitely more interesting) twin to Julia Roberts. Except that they re not twins. He’s her estranged brother. But wicked he is.
In an interview he talked about his marriage, and he said that the key to a good marriage was that he was dominant in the bedroom.
Everything else his wife could have.
But in the bedroom the roles were traditionally divided.
I read this, and although I liked the idea of giving myself totally to Eric Roberts, there was something unsettling about it. Maybe it’s even the reason that after two decades I still remember him having said that in the first place. Something, in this recipi for a good marriage, turned me off… But what was it?
Now I know what it was; that a real sub needs a partner to be dominant all of the time. I don’t want anything to say, period.
And there is a reason for that!
Because pain, in the broadest sense of the word, arouses me.
For example; I like that Mr.Big has sex with other women. It turns me on. But the real reason it turns me on, is because it hurts.
I do feel the pain of being apart, or of having to spend important days without him. It does hurt me less than it would to other people, because I do have a giant inner-hermit. She’s the one who writes, and cares little for company.
But sure, she’d love to put down her pen to play sex slave to Mr.Big, far more often than she does now. But all in all, being alone from New Years day, and all other holidays from there on forth? It’s not affecting me the way it could be expected.
There this masochistic sweetness in the pain of not being his first.
Of not being his priority.
But even when that pain can no longer be tied to pleasure, and the uncomfortable starts to feel like the unbearable, and a wounded ego roars its ugly head, demanding to be looked after. Demanding a man of her own.
Even then!
Something else comes into play. And it’s exactly the mechanism that makes a real BDSM slave take more pain, and endure more humiliation.
Power.
Like a fucking God.
The knowledge that you, a consenting submissive, cannot be harmed. That physical or mental pain makes you stronger. Both types of pain do the same thing; They make you turn inside. They’re like mental silent seclusion. You have nowhere to solve this, but inside.
Either you find a way to neutralize this pain, and refind your calm, or you bail out and the game is over.
Sure I can go find a man for myself, who will stop hurting me and will attend to all my needs. To all my superficial needs anyway. But come on! In the end, my need to be challenged, and the euphoria of being able to go so far beyond what used to be my limits – is much bigger than my desire to have someone with me on Christmas eve.
They say it is never the dominant who is in charge. It is the submissive. The dominant is the one working his or her ass off in order to please the submissive.
Sometimes it’s a paid relationship; the dominant mistress gets paid to hurt and abuse the paying client.
But even when it’s a coincidental pairing, where like I said no one gets paid and we have no financial ties, I feel like I m the one getting so much out of this.
Every minute he’s not with me, is either a chance to feel intrigued, and be turned on or it is an opportunity to grow. To learn to act confidently, face whatever dark thought or self-doubt is triggered this time.
And give it a fucking wink.

<3LSH
An Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living
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You can find my 10 books in my shop.
standard 25% off!! (my gift to you)

recommended for UK and US readers, the book about my affair with Mr.Big;
Big, erotica and diaries (2017)

aanbevolen boek NL:
Witte Tijgerin +
Het boek Benjamin, verzameld werk Engels en Nederlands
Het verzameld werk is inclusief Big- het Engelstalige dagboek over mijn affaire met Mr.Big

Witte Tijgerin (€5) en Het Boek Benjamin (€45) zijn ook te koop bij de Feeks 
Zij regelen ook de online bestellingen.

Als je yogales bij me volgt in Nijmegen kan ik het ook voor je meenemen naar de les.

I realized I’m most effective and focused
when I give myself a project.
Charlotte Shane – Prostitute Laundry

—–

Lauren gives book readings, sees friends, and just generally goes around like any normal aspiring writer.
Which is of course a recipe for disaster.

Clarity
Saturday November 25, 2017

I have many beliefs and one of them is that if doesn’t feel good, it’s not good. It’s not your path, not your match, not the thing you came here for on this earth.
Yet at the first sign resistance I find myself rationalizing why I should – and do – continue anyway. I don’t even seriously look for alternatives, as if there is some kind of medal for pushing things uphill.
But this time I received clarity before I got a chance to get lost.
It all started with my first book reading.
On my only available weeknight – the only one off from teaching – I read at a local bookstore. I had made a selection of stories, and tied them together to a theme that suited the occasion. Afterwards I went out with friends who had come to see me; and by Thursday I was convinced giving public presentations was my new mission in life. And I had the whole thing on video! I would win people’s hearts putting this recording on my deserted YouTube channel, and it would help me to get booked.
Everything was absolutely great.
Until it all came crashing down.
Before the sun set I was so sick I had to cancel all my classes. I was terribly angry with myself for having done this public reading experiment on a weeknight. Any backlash would immediately impact my real work.
These were not the kind of risks I was willing to take in order to get my books read. There was no weekly energy budget that said; “For public readings”, or even for any PR for my books.
My LS Harteveld writing had already been colonizing on my workweek, and if I would expand to readings it would get even more out of hand for something I called a hobby.
Because I liked being a yoga teacher.
I had no intention of switching careers. Until summer the two occupations had been able to peacefully coexist, but now I was up till my ears designing my new studio program.
It was running its first edition and everything still had to be created. It was costing me ten to fifteen hours of extra desk work, every week. July 2018 I would be able to publish two studio manuals. I assumed the Harteveld writing and the work for the studio would settle back into place after that.
But I was currently I working crazy hour workweeks for the studio alone, and I didn’t have a minute to spare.
And on the weekends?!
Did I honestly believe that after a forty hour workweek for the studio, diligently refraining from LS Harteveld work, I would want to spend the weekend giving public readings?
No.
I would want to throw myself head first into my writing Friday night, thirsty, needy, growling at anything that got in my way. And I would ignore all options presented to me, of cultural agendas and fun stuff planned. I did make an effort not to be a total hermit and went on dates with friends. But I would always work up until the last second at my beloved desk, rush, run and hurry and still be late for our date. I would enjoy it but not without secretly longing for the moment I could get back to my desk again.
I could see where I had make a mistake in my reasoning.
Because the night of the reading I had literally said;
“It’s been so much fun! It really feels as good as free time.”
I had completely overlooked that I don’t have a need for free time. I engage on it on a therapeutic basis.
And I had a quick nightmarish thought of going back to making videos, in order to get in front of people without having to leave the house, until I realized I didn’t want to do that either.
All I want to do is write.
Write.
WRITE.
August 2018 my new yoga program is all laid out and from then on I ll have ten to fifteen hours a week available to promote my LS Harteveld work. And I know exactly what I ll focus on. I know my true mission, and what every reading I ll ever give for the rest of my life will be about.
And it’s going to be awesome.
I ll tell you tomorrow.

To work
Sunday November 26

 Fifteen hours and counting.
I think I broke my productivity record this weekend. I wrote a Dutch blogpost about the upcoming show of my muse Rafael;
mailed my private list;
wrote the diary entry as featured above;
and I just completed the first chapter of my upcoming book about my mistresshood; Maîtresse
Which is one of the two Dutch words for mistress. It’s funny; usually Dutch needs more words, where English is more specific. But with mistress it’s the other way around. In English mistress can mean both a dominatrix or a lover. In Dutch we have two words- maîtresse, straight from French, and minnares – and they both mean lover. I chose the French one.
I actually saw daylight too! And got exercise. I had a long bike ride because I had a lunch date with my mother, an uncle and two aunts. They were by foot, and I would meet them halfway in their walk, at a fairy-tale like restaurant. It’s hidden deep into the woods, and there is only an unpaved road.
I arrived there half an hour late, but they were even longer delayed. Our mobiles didn’t work, making it even more nostalgic. I chose a pancake with more topping than a Domino’s pizza. It was really good, but I couldn’t help but think;
“This counts as dinner! This saves me time in the kitchen, so I can work more!”
A work addiction is such thing of beauty!
Anyway, so I actually saw daylight, exercised and also did something social. Which is an exceptional score for me. Otherwise the whole weekend was just write, write, write. The way I like it. And I even skipped my a.m. journaling and mindset practice, which includes writing down a Charlotte Shane quote in my diary. My real diary! Not some notebook reserved for mindset work, that I ll toss when I m done with it. I m actually giving her a spot in the most precious diary of all, that will be filed when it’s full. Which is not for a long time, I don’t write much there lately. Everything either goes straight in here, or it stays undocumented.
But I was going to tell you my purpose work!
What it was that the book reading, the rebound, fallout, whatever you want to call it, made me realize. That I m NOT a normal author who wants to promote her work. My books, like this diary Reboot that you re reading right now, have served their purpose once written. I ll make an effort to make it nice, do some editing, and publish it.
 I m extremely proud of all my books. 
But I don’t need more work, promoting them. But I did realize that I do have a message. That my vision on solitary women with multiple sex partners (White Tigress) as well as my vision on being a mistress (solitary women with only one partner) is unique and dearly missing from the options we give ourselves as women.
And I do want to write, and message, and perform or talk about that.
I don’t know how many speaking gigs I ll be able to squeeze in with my regular work – but we ll see when the time comes. For now I ll just focus on creating my core work, my message.
I already have the Dutch White Tigress/ Witte Tijgerin guide, and I m currently translating it to English. And as I said, I started my Dutch Mistress guide today. Once I finish it I ll translate that to English as well.
I m going to give the White Tigress/ Mistress project my full attention and launch January 19.
Oh to hell with it… I ll do another book reading!
After all, it’s a Friday.
If I crash and burn the next day, no one will notice.

<3LSH
An Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living

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nieuw Nederlands blog Zeg maar Lauren

You can find my 10 books in my shop.
standard 25% off!! (my gift to you)

recommended for UK and US readers;
Big, erotica and diaries (2017)

aanbevolen boek NL:
Witte Tijgerin +
Het boek Benjamin, verzameld werk Engels en Nederlands

Witte Tijgerin (€5) en Het Boek Benjamin (€45) zijn ook te koop bij de Feeks 
Zij regelen ook de online bestellingen.
Als je yogales bij me volgt in Nijmegen kan ik het ook voor je meenemen naar de les.