The Power of Words

I've been musing about the power of words, as I often do. Last night Master and I made a trip to the store to pick up a couple of odds and ends and a new (smaller) pair of jeans for me. While we were in the checkout lane he asked me a question, I don't remember what he asked me, what I remember is my response. I responded very quickly and without thought "Yes Sir." It's not a common thing for me to do, usually it's "Yes Dear" or "Yes Boss". As soon as I realized what I'd said, within hearing of the checker, I felt self-conscious but I also felt a little shiver of pleasure at addressing him like that in public. I'm silly I guess.

I'm just very new to the whole honorifics thing. I've done it when prompted but I have always felt self-conscious, the words felt like an affectation to me. It's only been recently that I've felt driven to use words like 'Sir'. It felt natural last night, I only felt self-conscious because of the checker standing about two feet in front of me. It didn't feel like an affectation, it was a normal response to a question from my Master. It makes me feel very submissive using those words. Yet, when I "sir" and "ma'am" customers at work it doesn't. There is no submission just courtesy and politeness. With Master there is feeling behind a "yes Sir", there is deep respect, and profound love and adoration. I wonder if there is an audible difference between the two instances.

Master has never required honorifics from me and I'm happy that I got to come to it on my own. I wonder if the words would have felt as powerful to me if I were required to say them vs. feeling inspired to do so. I wonder a lot, we know this. It comes from spending a lot of time alone in my head with my own thoughts. ;-)

I watch and listen to others who use honorifics as a matter of course, some say it with feeling, some don't. I wonder what the point of using an honorific is if you don't have some feeling behind it. Is it to boost someone else's ego? If it's done to reinforce one's position I would think there would be feeling behind it even if you didn't feel particularly submissive to the person you were Sir'ing or Ma'am'ing. I don't know, I'm probably off base here and I don't have personal experience to draw from. I'm just theorizing and pondering things I've observed.