First Control Yourself

Power exchange.  It isn’t everyone’s kink.  It’s easy to feel like that is such a common flavor, it can seem like it is mixed in with everything.

But it doesn’t have to be.

Take me, for example.  I absolutely adore smackin’ dat ass.  I will happily have an hour + long aerobic workout comprised of nothing but hitting someone with stuff.

But that’s it.

I don’t want to tell them what to do, or even tie them to something, since binding still implies power in the hands of the person doing the tying.  The minute that’s on the table I nope right out.  What I give is in service, and while my inner sadist certainly enjoys it, it is nowhere near the land of In Charge.  I certainly don’t call myself a Switch, and only rarely even mention that I have done some minimal service topping.

From the bottom, though?  From there I want no power.  That’s part of why I’m so picky about scening with people.  Giving away my power is not something I take lightly. It will only only go to someone responsible that I can put a heavy amount of trust and faith in.

To be clear, I’m not discussing educational bottoming, when we are demoing flogging or teaching someone and I give them pointers to assist with their strikes.  I don’t see that as an intimate exhange, and in those cases, generally the person doing the hitting rarely hits me more than ten times or so.  What I’m talking about is when I’m consensually engaged in some sort of bdsm activity with someone I trust.

Once upon a time I had a “dom.”  I say that in lower case and with quotations because in my opinion, he was a top who also liked to bottom.  We didn’t have a contract or an official dynamic set in place, but he considered himself dominant to me.  He wanted to play at being in charge when it came to the bedroom, but the minute I wanted him to take charge of something in our regular life, he threw it back at me.  He couldn’t control his temper or any of his other emotions, and he wouldn’t even take care of simple things like contacting the cable company or the phone company to clear up an issue.  I made the money, was expected to handle any issues which arose, take care of dinner at night, and then suddenly flip a switch and become obedient in the bedroom.

Needless to say, I lost respect for him as our relationship progressed.  I discovered that while I can physically do the things we do in the shadows with someone I neither respect nor defer to, it also means spending a great deal of time in the quiet place in my head.  I didn’t trust him to take care of life, and I sure as hell didn’t trust him with my safety or my submission.  When we split up, he still thought I was a top-leaning switch because I spent so much time efficiently handling our business.

I’d had a fantasy most of my life of having a partner who embodied the masculine traits that society deems valuable while still nurturing me.  I pretty much thought it was exactly what I called it – nothing but fantasy.  No way was I going to find someone who had the inner strength I was looking for.  I wanted someone with their shit together, who knew what they wanted and how to control their temper.  I wasn’t looking for emotional outbursts, passive aggressive behavior, or broken promises, which are really just using another word for lies.

I wanted someone who could communicate and someone who understood himself, because someone who couldn’t control himself did some serious damage to me once upon a time.  Frankly, I can easily see the connection in hindsight, and the last thing I plan to do is repeat mistakes that leave scars that big.  Pass.

Want to call yourself a capital D and not just a top or a sadist?  First, learn to control yourself.  Then maybe you can take the steps to learn how to build a healthy power exchange with a person.

Perhaps.  That level of responsibility isn’t for everyone.

About the Author

Christmas bunny has been exploring kink since she was legal to do so.  Her serious writing started in college, where she accidently got some of her papers published in educational journals.  She has recently expanded her writing to include her kink journey.  She began writing in the physical realm, but shed some of her inhibitions and began sharing those entries with others.  She now keeps an active blog of her personal growth and her relationship with her Master / Daddy Dominant and writes helpful educational posts on a variety of subjects.