DELVING INTO DISCOURSE: DEVELOPING KNOWLEDGE OF BDSM

An article to read & Review

BDSM Is Not an Answer, So Embrace the Uncertainty

"In art, one must throw one’s life away in order to gain it."

Gustav Janosch – Conversations with Kafka (https://www.amazon.com/Conversations-Kafka-Second-Directions-Paperbook/dp/081121950X/)

I think there are many different motivations for seeking out BDSM play or a BDSM relationship dynamic:

• a drive to satisfy kinks or fetishes

• novelty

• escape from societal constraints

• sense of purpose

• a sense of completion from someone with complementary traits and I’m sure there are many other reasons.

I’m personally not self-aware enough to know what drives me to seek out M/s, SM and the variety of kinks I explore. It would be nice to understand it, but it is probably a complex mix of all of the above.

What I am aware enough to do is accept the attraction and harness it for personal growth.

EMBRACING FEAR AND UNCERTAINTY

American Tibetan Buddhist nun and teacher Pema Chödrön writes in When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times: (https://www.amazon.com/When-Things-Fall-Apart-Anniversary/dp/1611803438/)

"Fear is a universal experience. Even the smallest insect feels it. We wade in the tidal pools and put our finger near the soft, open bodies of sea anemones and they close up. Everything spontaneously does that. It’s not a terrible thing that we feel fear when faced with the unknown. It is part of being alive, something we all share. We react against the possibility of loneliness, of death, of not having anything to hold on to. Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth."

Is it Topping from the Bottom?

No-one is going to deny that Tops need feedback in a scene. This commonly includes the bottom communicating needs, discomfort and safety concerns. or communicating and processing their feelings in aftercare.

At the same time, a basic working definition of topping from the bottom might be: “an attempt by the bottom to steer play or the power exchange in a direction they want”.

The distinction might be clear to you, and I do think that each of us can make that distinction in our own encounters, but laying down firm boundaries between the two is difficult, and communicating to our partner where that boundary is is even more difficult.

In a scene, if a bottom were to say “I think that would feel more intense in bent over position than upright” is that feedback? In many people’s dynamic it is. Or is it an attempt to top? In many people’s dynamic it is.

IS THERE A CONSENSUAL AGREEMENT?

Drawing a boundary between feedback and topping from the bottom rests on an assumption that there is a mutual understanding of what communication we, personally, consider good or bad. Effectively, we are saying that topping from the bottom is communication that violates that agreement.