We hear it all the time as submissives, especially when we’re new to the lifestyle.
“Know your wants and needs.”
It’s one of those phrases that sounds deceptively simple, but if you’ve ever actually tried to figure them out—really figure them out—it can be surprisingly complicated. What’s the difference? Why does it matter? And what happens when those needs go unmet?
These questions follow us everywhere in our lifestyle—from negotiation checklists to journaling prompts and even in online forums where seasoned kinksters remind us to “know ourselves” before giving ourselves. But here’s the thing: those questions can feel overwhelming when we’re just getting started. It’s easy to get stuck wondering what we should need, or second-guessing whether something we desire is “too much” or “not submissive enough.”
Let’s clear that up a bit.
Need: Something that is not negotiable for a relationship to exist. Things like security, trust, honesty, and monogamy (or non-monogamy) fall into the need category.
When we talk about needs, we’re talking about essentials. Think of them as your personal relationship oxygen—you can’t breathe, thrive, or feel safe without them. Needs are your non-negotiables. They’re what makes a dynamic work at the most basic level. For some, that might mean emotional safety; for others, it’s a consistent Dominant presence; for others, it may even include certain lifestyle structures like monogamy or a spiritual element.
Want: Anything that would be nice to have in addition to your needs, but they aren’t all required all/most/any of the time—things like cuddling, play time, frequent sex, date nights, the decision to have children.
Wants are beautiful. Wants add flavor, excitement, and comfort. They enhance your dynamic but don’t define its foundation. For example, you might want to be tucked in every night with a kiss, but if your Dominant works night shifts, it doesn’t mean the dynamic is doomed. An unmet want can lead to disappointment, but an unmet need often leads to deep dissatisfaction, emotional burnout, or even harm.
(Caveat – please know that your wants and needs are personal and unique. It’s possible that what I’ve given as examples could be in different lists for you. That’s okay!)
This is such an important point, and I want to emphasize it again: your needs and wants are not universal, and are not up for debate. Just because something is a “want” for someone else doesn’t mean it can’t be a “need” for you. Maybe daily check-ins are what help you feel grounded and secure—they’d go on your “need” list. Or maybe sexual exploration isn’t a major priority, and that’s okay too.
What matters is that you name them—and honor them.
Let me share why needs are so important to your overall health and happiness in a relationship and why settling for less than what you need is harmful to you and the relationship.
This is where so many submissives—especially those newer to the lifestyle—get stuck. We may believe that being submissive means being endlessly adaptable, or that we shouldn’t make demands. But identifying and honoring your needs isn’t about being demanding—it’s about being honest. A healthy D/s relationship is built on mutual care and intentional design. The dynamic may function on the surface without your needs in place, but it will lack the depth and emotional nourishment that allows you to thrive.
Let’s look at some foundational examples.
I will use the basic needs of security, comfort, and love for this discussion, but any needs you have on your list will apply just as well. Feel free to make this part of your personal analysis. This is for your development, and I hope it will help you see why needs are so important.
These three—security, comfort, and love—are among the most common needs we see in relationships of all kinds, not just in D/s. But how they show up, and how we experience them as submissives, can vary dramatically. As we go through each one, try reflecting on how it plays out in your life and whether your current or past relationships support it.
Security
Security is the first need that you should have met to live. This can be physical, emotional, or financial security. You can not easily go about your day without a sense of safety and security. Things that can threaten your security are unemployment, abuse, and terrorist threats. A breakdown of security can make all other needs unimportant until this one is rebuilt. Just think about how you would respond to the threat to your security if you lost your house to a flood. Would food or clean clothing be as essential, or would they take a back seat to resecuring a home?
In the context of a D/s relationship, security includes things like consistent behavior from your Dominant, predictable rules or rituals, or clearly communicated expectations. Knowing that your voice matters and your boundaries will be honored is especially critical for emotional safety.
Without that sense of groundedness, submission often becomes strained. You might find yourself walking on eggshells, afraid to express your feelings, or hesitant to surrender fully. It’s not because you’re “bad at submission”—it’s because your nervous system is trying to protect you. And that’s not something to ignore.
Take a moment to ask yourself: When have I felt truly secure in a relationship or dynamic? What helped me feel that way?
Comfort
Comfort is also an important need for people. With comfort, you add food, clothing, and other material goods. These are things to enhance the security of your life. Nourishment of your body, mind, and heart comes from providing comfort for yourself. Comfort in a relationship could be trust, honesty, openness, and commonality. Without comfort, you could experience malnourishment, depression, and other physical and emotional stress.
Comfort doesn’t always get talked about enough in D/s, but it plays a huge role in how sustainable your dynamic feels over time. Comfort might look like having space to decompress after a scene, sharing your emotions without fear of judgment, or even just laughing together during the day.
Sometimes, submissives feel uncomfortable because they think it’s “part of the role.” While certain forms of consensual discomfort (like edge play or humiliation) can be explored intentionally, your day-to-day relationship should not leave you feeling emotionally unmoored or chronically stressed.
It’s okay to want comfort. In fact, it’s essential for a lasting connection.
Love
Love is the last need that I’m going to cover here. Love is relative to each person and is not restricted to intimate spousal love. Friendships and familial love are also important in your life for balance. It’s hard to be happy if you feel unloved. People who feel unloved can experience depression, stress, and some have taken their own lives. Love is just that important.
Love is one of the most misunderstood needs in power exchange relationships. For some, love looks like words of affirmation or long talks about your day. For others, it’s acts of service—like making coffee or kneeling with intention. Whatever your love language is, it’s vital that your dynamic supports it.
One important reminder: D/s alone is not love. A Dominant can be strict, powerful, skilled, and still not loving. That doesn’t make them a bad person, but if love is one of your core needs, that dynamic might not be the right fit.
Submissives often worry that needing love makes them “too vanilla” or “emotionally high maintenance.” It doesn’t. Love is a human need. Period.
As a submissive, you may have more base needs that a dominant provides. I can think of the sense of control from your partner. In order for you to feel whole in your submission, you may need a dominant to exert control over you. This is considered a need; you can’t be submissive without it.
That’s a big one, and it’s worth sitting with.
For many of us, the act of submission itself is a need, not just a want, not a fantasy, but a deep psychological or emotional orientation. We need structure. We need to feel someone holding the reins. We need to feel claimed, protected, and guided.
And that doesn’t make us weak. It makes us submissive.
Need Deficits
A lot of what we experience as stress and depression, and a sense of lacking, is due to our needs not being fulfilled. These deficits impact us in different ways, but over the long term, the lack of having our needs met can make us ill, very unhappy, and frustrated. For example, what happens if your greatest need for affection wasn’t being reached? Would you feel unwanted, alone, frustrated, or unhappy? Of course, you would!
Sometimes, when struggling in a relationship—or even just feeling “off”—we first look for external causes. We blame it on stress at work, poor sleep, hormones, or just a “bad week.” And while all of those can certainly contribute, it’s also worth asking: Are my core needs being met right now?
In D/s dynamics, it’s easy to become laser-focused on the protocols, the play, or keeping your partner satisfied, without realizing that a deep personal need is quietly going unmet.
- You might crave praise but receive only correction.
- You might need physical closeness, but you live in a long-distance relationship.
- You might need a consistent structure, but your Dominant is inconsistent.
These situations don’t always signal a bad relationship, but they do signal an opportunity for communication, adjustment, or deeper understanding.
When a need is chronically unmet, it can feel like a subtle erosion of self. The submissive who once felt vibrant and engaged might slowly withdraw, become less responsive, or feel emotionally empty. That’s not drama—it’s depletion.
Not all feelings of sadness, frustration, or depression have to do with a lack of satisfied needs, but most can be a lead back to a basic need or desire being ignored. It is my belief that more divorces happen because someone’s needs aren’t being met than for any other reason. An open and honest conversation could have prevented some compatibility issues in many relationships.
This is especially true in long-term relationships where people assume that because they’ve been together for a while, everything should just “work.” But needs can change—and so must the conversations around them.
In fact, one of the strongest signs of relationship health isn’t that you’ve never argued or that all needs are met all the time. It’s the ability to notice when something feels off, name it, and explore it together.
A Dominant can’t meet your needs if you’re not sharing them. And a submissive shouldn’t be left guessing at whether their emotional world is valid or worth tending to.
As with all D/s relationships, communication is encouraged anyway, so make sure your needs are communicated as well. If they change, let your partner know. The power exchange has to do with needs as well as everything else in the relationship, so use it to get what you need.
One helpful practice is to build a regular “needs check-in” into your dynamic. That could be monthly, quarterly, or even seasonally—just a dedicated moment to revisit what’s working, what’s feeling shaky, and what new needs might be showing up.
You might be surprised by what emerges. A need for more guidance. A longing for stillness. A desire to feel wanted, not just owned.
And here’s a gentle truth: you are allowed to have needs even if your dynamic seems “perfect” on the outside.
As submissives, we sometimes hesitate to rock the boat. But a Dominant worth their title will want to support your full well-being, not just the version of you that follows orders.
Settling For Less
So you’ve found out what your needs are and are entering a relationship. What if you can’t meet your needs in that relationship? Do you settle for less than what you need? How do you cope? As I’ve said before, getting only some of your needs met can have negative consequences and could mean the end of the relationship.
This is one of the hardest truths to face as a submissive, especially when you care deeply for your partner or when everything else seems to be “good enough.” You might have incredible chemistry, play well together, or even share the same values, but still feel a persistent ache for something more fundamental that’s missing.
When that happens, it’s tempting to tell yourself things like:
- “No relationship is perfect.”
- “Maybe I’m just being too sensitive.”
- “They give me so much already—how can I ask for more?”
But unmet needs don’t disappear just because we love someone. They don’t shrink in silence. They tend to grow louder, show up in unexpected ways, and eventually reshape the relationship in ways we never intended.
When it comes to needs, you should never settle for less. There is a reason why you have made a list of needs compared to wants. Needs are just that. You have to have them to be happy. Make sure you share your needs long before your wants hit the table.
This is why clarity is so powerful.
If you’ve clearly identified a need for emotional consistency, sexual compatibility, and a certain level of Dominant control, then compromising on that isn’t “being flexible.” It’s setting yourself up for quiet suffering.
Sometimes, we downplay our needs because we’re afraid of being seen as too demanding or ungrateful. We might convince ourselves we’re just lucky to have someone, especially in kink spaces where compatible partners can feel rare.
But let me be clear: you are not asking too much by wanting what you actually need.
There is no gold star for staying in a dynamic that depletes you. There is no submissive badge of honor for enduring a relationship that doesn’t feed your soul.
Understanding your needs and the importance of certain ones in your life is key to finally reaching happiness and fulfillment. Take some time this week and talk to someone you care about about your needs for a relationship and personal goals, and see where they are as far as their own needs. Set up accountability partners if you can to ensure you stay on track with your needs and protect your current and future happiness.
This is your reminder to bring your needs out of your head and into the light. Share them with a trusted friend, a therapist, or a mentor. If you’re in a dynamic, talk with your partner—maybe even create a practice around reviewing your needs every few months together.
Needs are not a one-time discovery. They shift as we grow. What wasn’t important five years ago may be essential now. And you deserve relationships that grow with you, not ones that hold you hostage to outdated agreements.
The next time you take a look at your needs list, make a note of how important that need is. You can always scale them so that you can make sure your base needs are being met. Never settle for less than what you need. Submissives have needs, too; make sure yours get met.
A great tool for this is to rate your needs on a scale of 1–5:
- 1: Nice to have, but not essential right now
- 3: Important, but negotiable depending on other factors
- 5: Essential—I cannot be happy or fulfilled without this
Use this scale to check in regularly, especially when entering a new relationship or evaluating an existing one.
And remember: your needs aren’t a burden. They’re a roadmap to better relationships, deeper submission, and a more grounded, joyful life.
originally published 4-23-2014, updated and expanded 5-28-25