For those of you ladies who are new to RPW or just read The Surrendered Wife, I wanted to share something I have come to understand about my captain and men like him. He is laid back and not overly controlling. This used to frustrate me because how was I supposed to be submissive if he wasn't giving me specific orders and desires to submit to? Why couldn't he just tell me what he wanted for dinner so I could submissively cook it for him? Why wouldn't he decide what we should do on a Friday night so I could submissively go along with it? Ohh, how frustrated I was getting.

Then I realized that there is a difference between being laid back and passive, and a difference between being controlling and in charge. The problem is never that my man is willing to eat whatever I feel inspired to cook without his input, or that he is happy to delight me by considering whatever would make me happy on a Friday night. There certainly would be a problem that comes from ME if he did express a preference and I did not defer to it. But absent of that, there is no problem in our relationship dynamic unless I create one, which is entirely possible if you consider how emasculating and demoralizing it is when a man gets criticized by his woman for not being more decisive. Getting frustrated with your man for being laid back (and therefore "not manly enough") is going to undermine the very thing you're after, and it's very disrespectful to him anyway.

Instead of getting frustrated when he is willing to go along with whatever you decide, THANK HIM. Thank him for allowing you to do whatever makes your little heart happy. Seeing his indifference towards decisions like these in a frustrating light just means YOU ARE PERPETUATING THE POWER STRUGGLE, and a sign that you have so much more letting go to do. This work is on you, not him.

In other words, don't try to subtly (or not so subtly) dominate him into being more dominant. Your job is not to teach him how to be a better man. Make yourself a better woman and leave him alone. Accept that you have an awesomely laid back man and be sure to defer to him when he does have an idea, plan, or preference.