by Hannah Jay
If you want to know more about the fashion business or interior decorating or public relations, keep an eye out for intern jobs. When jobs do come up, it is often the eager intern who has already learned the ropes, who is hired. Better still, use that mistress moxie and create an intern job where there isn’t one. Pick a business where you think you would like to work and where interning would teach you something you’d like to know, and pitch them your idea. Even if your only skill is enthusiasm, on the right day that might be just what they need. (One word of caution: that patron who happens to be the PR manager for a large company? Don’t ask him for an intern position. It’s awkward and blurs too many lines. You can ask if he knows of any PR shops looking for an intern. My bet is he will be thrilled to help.)
Volunteering
Very similar to interning, but usually more charitable - or service - oriented. For the mistress, a three-hour-a-week commitment visiting the elderly or helping at a food bank is unpaid time that is rewarding in other ways, and overall beneficial for her mental balance and general sanity. The mistress lifestyle can become unreal very, very quickly. Volunteering for a few hours will reconnect you back to the reality of the day to day. It also reconnects you with who you are as a person, not as a mistress.
If you want to gain by doing good, (tisk, tisk), volunteer to sort merchandise at your local thrift or consignment store. Most sorters are allowed to have first dibs on choicer items – your collection of stockings, vintage garter belts, girdles, and stunning sleepwear will soon be overflowing your closets. Some shops even have staff discounts. Because you are a mistress, you have the time to volunteer and so you should take advantage of the opportunity. Some girls who have the thrifting bug and a great eye, make a goodly amount of cash by reselling retro items for a substantial profit. Used(your city).com and your local craigslist are the way to advertise your goods for free and connect you with your potential buyers. So are E-Bay and Etsy.
Exercise
For obvious reasons, exercise is (or should be if it isn’t) a priority for a mistress. Staying in shape has more benefits than just a tight tummy and a pert bottom. It means staying healthy in a stressful environment. Even a daily walk in the park will make you fitter. Taking time away from your mistress lifestyle is essential for health and general happiness.
For some women, the gym is the solution. An hour every couple of days devoted to a stepper or a stationary bike will work off those high end dinners. Look at very light weight training. Nothing will tone up your arms and legs faster than weights but make sure you get good advice. Remember that getting sore is not the same as getting strong. Get help. Time with a personal trainer will let you set up the best possible exercise regime. And since you are paying for the equipment and the services, this monetary commitment encourages you to show up even when your motivation may lag. The gym scene is not for everyone, however, so look into yoga, dancersize, Pilates, and other fitness classes. Walking, running, and cycling groups will give you comradery and the motivation to move.
As helpful as group-driven activities may be, there is also a lot to be said for the self-propelled program. Doing your errands on a bicycle will give you a workout without really even noticing it. So will walking rather than driving. Sure, if you are going to a date downtown and you are wearing four inch heels, a cab is the way to go, but whenever you can, leave the car at home. Or, better still, if you live in a city with a good transit system, sell the car and save the money. Even budgeting for a monthly cab allowance is cheaper than gas, maintenance, insurance, and parking. And Uber.
Grooming
A mistress’s look is a key part of the package she presents. But even though grooming is important, it doesn’t mean it can’t be fun as well. A regular mani/pedi and wax for all the important bits is basic. But why not combine it with a facial, a good soak in a mineral- rich deep spa tub and followed with a full massage? Yes, spa services are an extravagance; but often if you ask nicely, you would be surprised at how many men would be delighted to fund your pampering as a prelude to their own.
A great haircut can rocket you several price points up the mistress scale; but you have to maintain the cut, the colour, and the condition. Again, yes it is pricy, but for a mistress, her grooming can be the difference between a reasonable allowance and serious money. Just a more polished, head-turning you. Play the game and look like you’re worth it.
Mindfulness
A huge problem mistresses face is burnout (anxiety, depression, lack of energy or ambition). Doing much the same thing day after day, especially where there is a good deal of intimacy with potentially unsympathetic patrons, and a lack of privacy, can all add up and leave a mistress drained at the end of her week.
To build up reserves of inner strength, a practice of Mindfulness is a habit a mistress can cultivate. It is not difficult and there is no right way to achieve it; rather it is the capacity to be still and reflect inwardly. It is a way to process the events of the day-- the encounters, the conversations, the actions-- to mull them over put them in their place, and have a state of inner peace about all that transpired. Meditation is another practice helpful for mistresses. To be quiet means silence in your environment and in your mind. Setting aside a few minutes every day to sit still and think about absolutely nothing takes you out of the world of goals, and achievements, and commitments. Interestingly, the personal benefits of both practices, also extends to your escorting business because it gives you an ability to handle yourself and others with a degree of gentleness and openness.
Someone to Talk To
People in high performance, high pressure, confidential jobs - lawyers, doctors, judges, spies - are encouraged to have a professional confidential listener available to them. Professional listeners range from psychiatrists through counselors all the way to priests and spiritual directors. Professional listeners let the people they listen to unload their "stuff" in a safe, private, non-judgmental setting. In some cases the people they listen to have real issues which they are working through, in others the listening is not issue driven.
As a mistress, you often join the ranks of the professional listeners. You hear your patron's secrets, their hidden fantasies, how their marriages are faring and, from time to time, you provide consolation and, often, healing. But who hears, consoles and heals you? Sometimes meditation, mindfulness, and exercise are just not enough to relieve your stress. If being a mistress is something you prefer to keep private, friends are sadly not part of your support system. And your patrons are not paying you to talk about yourself. So, who do you talk to? Who listens to you?
For an hourly rate, there are lots of counselors whose job it is to listen. No judgment, just the occasional question to keep the ball rolling. Checking in once or twice a month for an hour’s chat about how you are doing can make the difference between burnout and a healthy, unconflicted attitude.
No money to spare on such a session? Or not really wanting or willing to? Buy a pen and a notebook. Start a journal. Talk to yourself in the pages. You will be amazed at how, in the act of writing your life, things become clearer, problems start to sort out, and you gain a fresh, new perspective. After all, nobody knows you better than you do.
Chapter 15 | Man Talking – The Art of Conversation for Mistresses
While many men see their mistress for sex that is often not the only or even the main reason a man seeks a mistress. As the lovely Joni Mitchell wrote,
“He comes for conversation
I comfort him sometimes
Comfort and consultation
He knows that's what he'll find”
Men are both terribly complicated and deeply simple creatures. For a mistress the deep simplicity is understood and, in a way, the complexity is simply put to one side but both create the opportunity for conversation and not a little comfort and consultation.
At its most fundamental the mistress/patron relationship is confidential. Even if a man takes mistress to a White House dinner – and it has been known to h
appen – no one but the mistress and her patron have any idea that money has changed hands and that there is a greater than zero chance of intimacy after dinner.
At every level of the paid companionship business, from cheap and cheerful service providers to mistresses and courtesans, a client is looking to have his needs taken care of quietly and discreetly. The more of those needs a girl can service the happier her patron will be and the more likely he is to tip and give those delicious presents on top of her allowance.
A man seeking a mistress is usually looking for several things at once: first the obvious and I will not dwell on that. Second a step outside his ordinary life.
As a mistress, a girl needs to realize much of the attraction of a mistress experience is it is not “every day”. It is clandestine to a degree, transgressive – those marriage vows are being broken along with any number of taboos – more than a little “naughty” in that it flirts with exposure and the possibility of real reputational harm. At the same time visiting his mistress offers the possibility of a safe, private place in which a man can talk about his needs, desires and fantasies with a woman who, in theory takes a professional, non-judgmental view of what she is told or asked to do.
Why are you here?
Just as a surprising number of men ask escorts the old chestnut, “What is a nice girl like you doing in a business like this.” a surprising number of mistresses don’t bother to ask their patrons “Why are you here?” Which, as in counseling or the legal profession or medicine, is always the most important question to ask.
Conversationally, “Why are you here?” is an open ended question which is to say that in asking it the mistress is not presuming any particular answer. She might get a rather explicit answer from some of her friskier clients but as a general rule, asked kindly, “Why are you here?” gives her patron a chance to speak openly about his expectations and desires for the their encounter. Over time this will be less important but it is critical for the initial dates
This is very much a “lean in” question for a mistress. She wants her patron to hear the question and her body language should tell her client that she is interested, genuinely interested, in his answer.
Active Listening
People who listen for a living – from psychologists to focus group managers – develop the capacity to do something called “active listening”. It is a learnable skill and a huge plus for any mistress. “Active listening” is nothing more than the listener giving the speaker clues and cues to continue speaking. Some of these are the obvious verbal, “Tell me more.” or “And how do you feel about that?”, some are nothing more than body language – leaning towards the speaker, facially responding to what they are saying – and some are surprisingly subtle: for example, sitting with your arms crossed tends to shut down conversation, putting your elbows to the side and holding one or both palms up looks invitational. A good mistress tends to develop great skills reading other people’s body language but it is just as important for a mistress to pay attention to her own.
Using very basic active listening techniques and body language a mistress can create a safe space in which her patron begins to be able to speak comfortably. This is a huge gift to give a man because, as he becomes more comfortable, he is able to relax and actually begin to enjoy himself.
There is an old joke about the egomaniac who says, “Well, that’s enough about you, let’s talk about me.” A mistress does not talk about herself, rather, like the Japanese geisha her job is to let her client say what he needs to say. Many men are effectively silenced – at their jobs they have to be careful what they say, at home, after a long marriage, their wife has heard their stories and their children pay them little attention. The very nature of a fragmented, noisy, distracting, world means that a mistress’s patron may have not managed to finish a sentence in weeks, much less have his words attended to.
So while many people mischaracterize men who keep mistresses as paying for sex, a better characterization of the mistress relationship is that her patron is paying for the mistress’s full attention. Her willingness to place her patron at the focus of her attention is one of the hallmarks of a successful mistress.
A clever mistress is careful to set the stage for her encounters. A simple thing like turning off the smart phone ringer and the email alerts sets the mood. Her patron, after he is comfortable, perhaps with a refreshment, can see by his mistress’s preparations that she is now entirely focused on him. There is nothing more flattering than the full attention of a pretty woman.
Active listening sets the stage for conversation and conversation lets a client know his companion is actually interested in who he is and what he thinks. Conversation is the engine of seduction and seduction is why mistresses are given their lovely allowances and perfect presents.
Without being entirely cynical about it, a savvy mistress will try to steer the conversation with her patrons to the places they want to talk about. And she’ll tease. After all, in any but the shortest dates, the main event needs more than a few preliminaries. Each of these can have an escalating level of erotic frission; but there is no point in chatting about adult activities until a man is actually ready. Taking the time to put your patron at his ease, to actually ask him why he is there, to find out how his day or week has gone, breaks the ice and tends to ensure that the other activities very much are of a piece.
Taking charge
Part of the art of feminine conversation, and a part which is too often neglected, is that a mistress is very much in charge. She takes the lead and sets the pace. Remember that many of the men who can afford a mistress’s allowance, spend most of their working day leading. They are the “go to guy” at their law firm or in their company. It is pressure which many men have simply internalized. They don’t even notice they are required to be in charge from the time they hit the office door. Other men spend their time selling. And selling, just like leading, is all about taking the initiative, answering objections, closing the sale.
For successful men an hour or two in which they are not expected to be in control, not required to lead the discussion or win the meeting is a hugely welcome change of pace. Simply by asking easy questions and listening attentively to her patron’s answers a mistress is able to guide the conversation and control the pace of her encounters.
Can a mistress flirt? Of course she can. And she should. At an early stage in a date, as she is leaning in to show how closely she is listening to her client, it never hurts to lightly touch his arm. Nor will it detract from the conversation if a mistress, engaged in listening, dangles a high heel or undoes a button on her blouse. If her client comments, so much the better. But a quick deflection with, “Plenty of time for that a bit later.” will pique his interest.
A twenty minute conversation between a mistress and her patron can easily move from strangers passing small talk to an intimate conversation about what the patron enjoys about women. If the mood is set that intimate conversation can move from words to action with the mistress leading the way. We will draw a discreet veil over the activities of consent adults and move on.
After the Fireworks
The end of the encounter, the few minutes of dressing and leaving, are, conversationally, where a mistress can go a long way towards making sure her patron is thoroughly delighted with her. Now, it is a well known phenomena that men, having been serviced, often want to scoot out of the encounter or have his mistress leave almost instantly. Part of what they think they are paying for is avoiding the intimacy which a non-mistress date pretty much demands after sex. It is an almost physical male response.
A clever mistress recognizes this but also understands that her patron would be delighted with praise for his performance and reassurance that his more exuberant activities, or his particular desires, were very welcome indeed. The key here is to realize that psychologically, once a patron has been serviced he steps out of his fantasy about his mistress experience and into a moment of potential buyer’s remorse. Getting pa
st that moment will create a hugely positive memory for the mistress’s client.
In this post-glow conversation a patron may be particularly aware that to his mistress the earlier activities were “just business”. Which they were, but a clever mistress will find ways to push that fact to one side while she pursues her own agenda. And what is that agenda?
Getting past the buyer’s remorse is about establishing a connection with a specific person who has a name, a set of preferences and techniques and a life which you have, if you have been clever, gained a glimpse of.
Start with another open ended question, something like, “I just had a wonderful time, what was your favorite thing?” It doesn’t matter what the answer is, as an active listener, you will be ready to follow up with a simple but enticing response, “Perfect. That’s one of the things I just love doing for a man. Next time you are here we can really explore. First times are always a little awkward for me.”
What this sort of sequence does is put the patron in a protective role. She is asking him for his affirmation and most men are terrifically flattered to be asked. Rather than scuttering out the door, many patron will take a little time to reassure their mistress. As they do they are powerfully convincing themselves they have had a wonderful time and that their mistress is worth every penny.
Yes, this does take a little while. Call it five minutes rather than two; but it is the most effective marketing a mistress can do for herself because now she has her patron looking forward to their next encounter.