Input:
Q: What inspired the authors to write a new edition of The Bottoming Book?
A: The authors wanted to write an updated and expanded edition of their first book due to the significant evolution in the culture of BDSM over the past decade. They have seen more people becoming involved in a wider variety of kink and being more vocal and communicative than ever before.

Q: How has the BDSM culture evolved in the past decade?
A: The BDSM culture has massively emerged from the closet, with dozens of books, endless information on the Internet, national and international conferences held in major hotels, and support groups everywhere. More people are connecting to S/M, finding others like themselves, and realizing that they are not alone with their kinky fantasies.

Q: What role has the Internet played in the evolution of the BDSM culture?
A: The Internet has become a major player in the BDSM scene, providing lots of information about kink and connection to like-minded people. It has also exerted a major influence on the content of BDSM, making it possible to engage in virtual play that would be difficult to manifest in reality. The Internet has also facilitated extensive dialogue about how fantasies can inform individuals about themselves.

Q: How has the dominance and submission (D&S) aspect of BDSM evolved in the past decade?
A: There has been rapid growth and evolution of the D&S aspect of BDSM, with extensive discussion of how the relationship dynamic between two or more persons can be expanded, intensified, and eroticized by a conscious and consensual shift in the workings of power and control.

Q: How has the growth in the BDSM population affected the scene?
A: The growth in population has made its own changes to the scene, with an increased market for products and services, offering much more support for the teachers, artists, and craftspeople of the community. However, it has also led to the emergence of separated populations, with support groups targeted to very specific members. This has resulted in the loss of diversity and less interaction between different groups.

Q: How has the language used in the BDSM community evolved?
A: With the expansion of S/M and extensive public discourse, new language and terminology have emerged to describe the experience. However, there is no agreement on the meanings of these new terms. The authors' approach is to assume inclusive rather than exclusive meanings for all the words used in the book. They also acknowledge more than two genders and that many people explore more than one sense of gender.

Q: How have the authors changed in the past decade?
A: The authors have matured, and their children are no longer children. Their careers have ripened, and their bodies have aged. One of the authors has even changed her name from Catherine A. Liszt to Janet W. Hardy. They also know more about their beloved world of BDSM and want to share everything new they have learned in the last decade.

Response:
**The New Bottoming Book**

**By: Dossie Easton & Janet W. Hardy**

**Foreword**

**Why A New Edition?**

Welcome to The New Bottoming Book. In the nearly ten years since we wrote the original Bottoming Book, there has been tremendous and wonderful evolution in the culture of BDSM. More and more people have become involved in an even wider variety of kink, and all of them are being much more vocal and communicative than ever was the case before. And we, your authors, are proud to have been part of this evolution. So we are writing an updated and expanded edition of our first book.

**What's Changed?**

S/M culture has massively emerged from the closer. There are dozens of books, endless information on the Internet, national and international conferences publicly held in major hotels, support groups everywhere - we are no longer the ghettoized subculture that we used to be. More people are connecting to S/M, finding others like themselves, and realizing that they are very much not alone with their kinky fantasies.

The Internet. The 'Net has become a major player in the BDSM scene. Along with providing lots of information about kink and connection to like-minded people, the Internet is also exerting a major influence on the content of BDSM. Many things are possible in virtual play that are more difficult to manifest in reality: for instance, we know individuals who are engaged in ownership relationships with people they have never met in person. And so new ways of playing are being devised, and participants are engaging in ever deeper explorations of the psychological aspects of S/M, including extensive dialogue about how our fantasies can inform us about ourselves. We discuss the

'Net and its ramifications at much greater length in Chapter Four.

D&S. Over the last ten years, we have also seen rapid growth and evolution of the dominance and submission aspect of BDSM, with extensive discussion of how the relationship dynamic between two or more persons can be expanded, intensified and eroticized by a conscious and consensual shift in the workings of power and control.

More on this in Chapter Ten.

More of Us. Meanwhile, as the scene has become more accessible, more and more new people are joining. This growth in population has made its own changes to the scene, and there is increased market for products and services, which offers much more support for the teachers, artists and craftspeople of our community.

A perhaps less desirable side effect of growth in the BDSM scene is that we are seeing more separated populations emerging. Support groups now are often targeted to very specific members: gay men, dykes, heterosexuals (with bisexuals and transgendered folks welcome to some degree in most if not all of them), with even smaller groups for crossdressers, fetishists and the like. While it may be nice to be able to join a support group exclusively composed of people like yourself, we mourn the loss of diversity. When we were coming out, we learned so much from people who were different from ourselves, and we miss the sense of a larger community and the stimulation and adventures we encountered.

Finally, for us this growth has offered an expanded opportunity in the form of a much wider audience for our writing. When we wrote the initial Bottoming Book, publishing in this area was so economically constrained that we had to keep the book under 120 pages because if it got bigger than that we couldn't afford to print it. How's that for basic? We are proud to announce that our books are now widely distributed, our publisher well established, and we can afford to speak our minds at whatever length we choose.

Language. With the expansion of S/M and extensive public discourse, we are also evolving new language and terminology to describe our experience. And do we all agree on what these new terms mean? Of course not! A definition can be visualized as a way to make a fence around a word so that we can clearly distinguish what is inside

and what is outside the meaning of the word. This works great for science and mathematics, but can be a problem when we are describing our physical, sexual and emotional experience — especially the experience between two or more of us. (See? We can't even assume that a relationship means only two people.) So our approach to language in this book is to assume inclusive rather than exclusive meanings for all the words we use. Furthermore, we acknowledge more than two genders, and also chat many of us explore more than one sense of gender. Common language usage has very few ways to denote the full range of gender expression. In the first edition of Bottoming Book we wrote "s/he" in an attempt to include everybody. In our later books, we alternated using he or she, mostly by paragraphs, which seemed to read more smoothly and provide interesting opportunities to challenge gender stereotyping, so we have rearranged this edition accordingly.

On another linguistic front, here is much public discussion and dissent about what to call what we do. Variously our perversions have been described as: BDSM, perversion, sadomasochism, S/M, dominance and submission, D/S, bondage and discipline, B/D, leathersex, kink, erotic power exchange, fetishism, wiitwd (what it is that we do), powerplay, shadowplay, topping and bottoming, sex magic and radical perversion. Similarly, the people who do these things are known as: perverts, tops, bottoms, masters, mistresses, slaves, dominants, submissives, Daddies, Mommies, pitchers, catchers, boys, bois, girls, leatherpeople, and players.

All these words have slightly different meanings, and you will definitely meet people who choose one of these terms and not the others because that is what best describes their desire. We, however, enjoy all of these aspects of our play, and would be very distressed to have to choose only one category. Thus, as we see it, pigeonholing limits our experience, and we are explorative girls who always want more. So in this edition, we will use all of these terms to describe the whole world of S/M play, except when we arefocusing on one particular aspect of play, and we will use these terms, as we do the gender pronouns, interchangeably throughout the text.

We've Changed Too. The two of us have matured, which we hope would happen for any of you in ten years. Our children are no longer children, our careers have ripened, our bodies have aged.

In fact, one of us has changed so much that even her name has changed. The one of us who wrote the first Bottoming Book as 'Catherine A. Liszt" did so under a pseudonym, because at the time she had minor children whose boundaries she wanted to protect. Now that her children have grown 10 adulthood, "Catherine" is now writing and publishing under her real name, Janet W. Hardy.

And we know more than we used to. So the final reason to make a new edition of The Bottoming Book is to share with you everything new that we have learned in the last decade about our beloved world of BDSM.

**The New Bottoming Book**

**By: Dossie Easton & Janet W. Hardy**


Input:
Q: What is the concept of "bottom space" or "sub space" in BDSM culture?
A: "Bottom space" or "sub space" is a state of mind that many bottoms experience during BDSM play. It is an altered state of consciousness in which their relationship with their own minds, with their partners, and/or with the outside world becomes different in some way. Bottom space manifests itself in many different ways, such as becoming nonverbal or chatty, docile and passive or resistant and bratty, serene and transcendent.

Q: How can someone determine their bottom space?
A: Before exploring bottoming, it's important to get a handle on what it means to you. This involves examining your real-life choices and how they may or may not be a clue to what your bottom space will look like. Some people's bottom space is an extension of their real-world persona, while others' bottom space is the opposite of what you'd expect.

Q: What roles do people take on in their bottom space?
A: People take on a variety of roles in their bottom space, such as victims, brats, babies, or other powerless beings. Some people's bottom space is an extension of their real-world persona, while others' bottom space is the opposite of what you'd expect.

Q: What are the benefits of bottoming?
A: Bottoming allows people to explore feelings, roles, and interactions that may not be a good fit for them in the real world. It also allows people to experience emotions such as loss of control, fear, passivity, forgiveness, resentment, sadness, and catharsis, while enacting various roles.

Q: When does bottoming end?
A: It's important to be aware of when your chosen bottom role is turning into a script for the way you live the rest of your life. Some people find that playing that role in the dungeon or bedroom can help make them more conscious of the ways that they're enacting it in the outside world, while others may find that this form of erotic role-play reinforces the outside-world behavior to an unacceptable degree.

Q: What is the identity of a bottom?
A: For some people, the identity they feel as a bottom feels like their primary identity. They understand themselves better as a submissive or a slave, and seek to manifest that sense of self in all aspects of their lives, including seeking out relationships with dominant people in which they can live in their chosen role full-time. Others wish to be in role only when they're playing a scene, because who they are as a bottom is not compatible with their needs and desires in the outside world.

Q: What is the "full-power bottom"?
A: When bottoms feel fabulously powerful, it contradicts the popular stereotype of a bottom. Standard mythology would have people believe that a bottom is a passive, disempowered, self-destructive, needy, whining wimp, but this is not true. Bottoming is a way to play with power for the fun of it, rather than a serious high-stakes struggle.

Q: What is power-with vs. power-over?
A: Power-over means that a person sees their power as the ability to control others, while power-with is based on the idea that we can all become more powerful by supporting each other in being more powerful. Power-over social structures tend to keep people struggling in a position of constant insecurity, while power-with creates a sense of community and mutual support.

Q: What is the difference between being passive and being receptive?
A: Bottoms are not a passive lot in their lives, as evidenced by the fact that many support groups and organizations in the S/M community were founded and are run by bottoms. The term "receptive" is preferred over "passive," as it implies an active choice to receive stimulation or sensation.

Response:
## Part One: Skills

**What Kind of Player Are You, Anyway?**

We think you're reading this book because something in your life - a fantasy, an experience, a partner who wants to experiment - has led you to a desire to explore bottoming.

But what, exactly, does that mean? There are as many different ways to be a bottom as there are to be a human being. An experience that feels intense, profound and highly erotic to you may do nothing at all for the next guy, and vice versa. So before you begin your explorations of bottoming, it would be a good idea to get a handle on what bottoming is, or could be, to you.

Many bottoms talk about a state of mind they call "bottom space" or "sub space," a kind of altered consciousness in which their relationship with their own minds, with their partners, and/or with the outside world becomes in some way different. Bottom space manifests itself in many different ways: Dossie gets very nonverbal in bottom space, while Janet chatters like a magpie. Among bottoms we've played with, we've been privileged to witness bottom spaces that range from docile and passive to resistant and bratty to serene and transcendent. Some people find that they go into different bottom spaces in different kinds of scenes - the bottom who is an obnoxious brat in a spanking scene may become a calm, centered nurturer while giving service.

We know people whose bottom space is an extension of their real-world persona — perhaps they're timid and shy in their day-to-day lives, and they like to be "small" and receptive when they bottom. We know others whose bottom space is exactly the opposite of what you'd expect — they're powerful and assertive in their real-life interactions but like to experience being victims, slaves, babies or other powerless beings in their fantasy and play lives. Some people's real-world hobbies and professions are a clue about their bottom space — Dossie likes to knit and crochet, and loves rope — while others bottom in order to have experiences outside their ordinary existences.

So your real-life choices may or may not be a clue to what your bottom space will look like.

Some people have negative judgments about bottom spaces that don't look like the kind of bottoming they have in their own fantasies. Unless you're considering playing with someone, they don't get to vote on your bottom space at all. If it's someone you're playing with or would like to, then may need to give you some direction as to what feels sexier to them (talkative Janet is fine with tops telling her that now would be a good time to shut up, thank you very much), or some compromise may be in order. But whatever your bottom space might look like, if it feels real to you, it is real.

What Do You Want From Bottoming? Bottoming gives us a chance to explore feelings, roles and interactions that may not be a good fit for us in the real world. So when you bottom, you may want to experience emotions like.

loss of control, fear, passivity, forgiveness, resentment, sadness, "smallness", nurturing, being nurtured, humility, power, shame, catharsis, competence, anger, helplessness, martyrdom, rebelliousness, objectification, victimhood, redemption, neediness, innocence, lust, abandonment, belonging, pathos, humiliation, You can experience these emotions while enacting variety of roles, too. Maybe you want to be a...

victim, brat, baby, saint, good girl/boy, fixer, cherished possession, object, target, scapegoat, drama queen, captive, rebel, orphan, sex object, servant, whore, animal, sissy, pleasure slave, nothing, "proud beauty", child, prisoner, criminal, bad girl/boy, martyr, wild thing

When Does It End? It is, unfortunately, not too rare for these roles or emotions to be so potent that we find ourselves, consciously or unconsciously, trying to enact them in pl aces where they don't work out too well for us.

For example, you may find yourself so attached to the role of "fixer" that your need to fix things for other people is getting in the way of getting your own needs met, or so fond of being a "bad boy" that you're alienating your friends and coworkers.

If your chosen bottom role is turning into a script for the way you live the rest of your life, this can be a big problem. Some people find that playing that role in the dungeon or bedroom can help make them more conscious of the ways that they're enacting it in the outside world, thus giving them better boundaries for when to play the role and when to leave it alone. Others may find that this form of erotic role-play reinforces the outside-world behavior to an unacceptable degree, so that they may decide that this role is too risky for them to play right now and is better explored in therapy.

For some people, the identity they feel as a bottom feels like their primary identity. They understand themselves better as a submissive or a slave, and seek to manifest that sense of self in all aspects of their lives: they tend to seek out relationships with dominant people in which they can live in their chosen role full-time. People living in full-time D/S relationships have created many clever ways to satisfy the needs of healthy living in a role-defined lifestyle: you will read more about this in Chapter 10.

On the other hand, some bottoms wish to be in role only when they playing a scene, because who they are as a bottom is not compatible with their needs and desires in the outside world. Dossie is one of these: in her bottom space she is very much the passive victim (when she isn't being a brat), and in the rest of her life she is an assertive, outspoken professional.

Neither of these choices, nor any of the gradations between, is inherently more "real" or more valuable than any other: your success will depend on your ability to make your choice work, and your willingness to work hard at it.

Either way, it can be very illuminating to examine why we choose the roles we do, what turns us on about them and why this particular role is so very very hot for us.

**The "Full-Power Bottom"**

When we bottom we feel fabulously powerful. This is the experience of most bottoms we know, and it is in complete contradiction to the popular stereotype of a bottom.

How can bottoming make us powerful? Here is Dossie's description of how she gains power from a flogging: When I'm being flogged, early on I often come to a place where I need to stretch to take in the intense sensation, where 1 struggle and wonder if I can take it at all. That struggle seems to make me stronger and soon I feel intense energy running through me, as if all the force with which the whip is thrown at me is injected into me — becomes my energy to play with. While my tops throw the whips at me as hard as they can, I take in their power and dance in the center of the storm.

Standard mythology would have you believe that a bottom is a passive, disempowered, self-destructive, needy, whining wimp. We hope you will refrain from believing these things about yourself. We suggest that you see yourself as a full-power bottom.

Are You Really Powerless? Most of us in our everyday lives struggle constantly with power, striving to empower ourselves, and to protect ourselves from being overpowered. We are always working to find, increase and express our power.

In S/M, in contrast, we play with power for the fun of it - pulling its fangs to turn it into an exciting, erotic experience instead of a serious high-stakes struggle.

S/M has been described as "power games for fun rather than profit." Playing with power offers not only a relief from the tedious battle for power we're stuck with in the so-called "real" world, but also a way to learn and explore

by trying out new and different experiences of power and powerlessness.

In order to play with power safely, it helps to understand the concept of "power-with" as differentiated from

"power-over." Most of our culture's systems run on power-over, with sexism, racism and militarism being some ugly examples.

Power-over means that a person sees his or her power as the ability to control others, and thus always sees this power as relative, either greater or lesser than other people's power. People who operate on power-over see the world as a series of hierarchies which rhey must ascend. Power-over social structures tend to keep people struggling in a position of constant insecurity, as there are alway s people with more power in some arena or other.

An extreme example of the sexual mythology of power-over can be seen in prison sex, where the person who penetrates is believed to gain power, while the person who gets penetrated is believed to lose power and become degraded. Similarly, in traditional sex roles, many people believe that the man's ability to penetrate confers power, while the woman who gets penetrated is seen as losing power. (Janet's reaction when confronted with this belief:

"Oh, you mean like when an electrical plug penetrates a wall socket?...") The mechanism of power-over lies in the belief that I can increase my power by taking some of yours. The way I get to feel big is to make you feel small, and the way I get to feel secure is to make you feel insecure. (Sound like anybody you know? Janet says it sounds like her ex-boss.) Power-ove r is achieved by belittling others.

The sad thing about power-over is that it doesn't work. I cannot build a solid foundation of internal security, self-esteem and empowerment by stealing yours.

Power-with is based on the idea that we can all become more powerful by supporting each other in being more powerful. We, your authors, like this idea. We are eroticized to power, so we want you to be powerful because that turns us on, and we want to play with your power. We want you to be turned on to our power too: after all, it doesn't take much of a top to take down a wimp.

Do You Really Have No Choice? The truth is that you are always making choices, whether you admit it or not.

Just as no one can actually magically steal your power, your power is always with you whether you want it or not.

As a bottom, it can be very sexy to believe that you have no choices. "Poor me! Forced to endure all this intense sensation, turned on against my will!" To keep this fantasy hot and safe, it is important that we understand that it is a fantasy, and if it is not hot any more, or safe, or feeling okay, then we do have a choice. We can stop the scene, we can ask for something different, we can tell our playmate about the problem we are having. In a worst-case scenario, we can choose a different playmate.

Dossie remembers a scene that strongly highlighted the contrast between fantasy and reality: The fantasy was that I was tied in the tyrant's bed, available to be fucked at any time against my will. My friend the tyrant indeed did wake me up at four in the morning, as per my request, and fucked me. The problem was, I was exhausted and quite sore from earlier activities, and could not get turned on. I kept turning my mind back to the fantasy of nonconsent, frantically hunting for my turn-on somewhere in there. But this time, in my sleepy state, I convinced myself that I really had no choice, and that this was nonconsensual (all this time my poor friend is dutifully plugging away) and I became genuinely scared. My perceptive tyrant figured out that something was wrong and stopped, and comforted me with good grace, and was also very gracious about not completing the fuck till morning. I got very embarrassed, and got to learn yet one more time that even the hottest fantasy may not play as well in reality as it does in my mind.

Are You Really Passive? We never have liked that word passive — we prefer to think of bottoming as "receptive."

Bottoms as a class are not a passive lot in their lives, as you could see at any social event where you would find out that borroms might be lawyers, doctors, therapists, corporate executives, police officers, entrepreneurs and other high-powered types. Many of the support groups and organizati ons in the S/M community in San Francisco and elsewhere were founded and are run by bottoms.

Most tops are uncomfortable with bottoms who are excessively passive. Janet, in her Lady Green top persona, occasionally gets letters from men who proudly claim "I am a wimp." Her response: "Oooh, makes me dry."

Behind the sarcasm lies a very real discomfort with the idea of taking power from the powerless, and for the unsatisfying scenes that would undoubtedly ensue: why climb an anth ill when the world is full of beautiful mountains?

In terms of planning a scene, bottoms very quickly learn that tops cannot read our minds, and that if we want to get our needs met anci have our dreams come true, we had better learn how to take an active part in designing and realizing a scene. Bottoms who do not learn this lesson often get very frustrated and wonder why they cant get their needs met. Failing to tell your partner about your needs is also a set-up for finding yourself in a scene you may hate now or regret tomorrow.

Even within the scene, bottoms may be rebellious, resistant, sexually aggressive, loudmouth (or even switch: many bottoms, like Dossie, are excellent tops). Active or interactive bottoms are actually quite popular. Passive bottoms who give little feedback to their tops may leave their tops feeling insecure and clueless: such scenes, while possible, are particularly demanding for the dominant. Thus, on those rare occasions when we get to act very passive in a scene, it feels like a precious luxury.

Do You Really Have No Limits? Good bottoms know their limits, and can communicate them clearly. This is not only a right, it is a responsibility.

There are always limits, whether you state them or not. There are limits of physical safety, limits of understanding, and the all-important limits of what does or does not turn you on. If you haven't already figured out what your limits are, later on we'll explain more about how to find them.

Janet was once involved in a discussion with a woman who was a slave in a full-time master-and-slave relationship:

She told me, "No, I really have no power, I really have no limits. Whatever my master wants is OK with me." I proposed, "Suppose your master woke up tomorrow morning and told you, 'I'm tired of this S/M stuff. From now on, we're only going to have gentle, consensual, egalitarian vanilla sex.'" There was a long pause. Finally, sheepishly, she answered, "You win. I'd be out of there in a minute."

Pretending to play without limits, in our experience, tends to produce less intense scenes, as without a clear understanding of the bottom's limits tops most often wind up doing much less than the bottom can enjoy, just to be on the safe side.

Accepting your limits is about accepting yourself. If the power exchange of S/M consists of giving your considerable power to a top, or giving your self over, then limits are about the parts of yourself, or your reactions, that are beyond your control (like ticklishness) and thus beyond yo ur ability to offer. You can still give all you have to give of yourself to that wonderful person who wants to take all of you that she can get.

**Bridging the Gap Between Fantasy and Reality**

The common thread that seems to run through this section is that fantasy is not reality. Good players learn to handle reality first and use it as a foundation on which to build r eally hot fantasies. When you confuse fantasies with reality, you distance yourself from your power. Since S/M players eroticize power, you, as a bottom, must bring your power along or you have none to share.

The origins of our deepest urges toward BDSM, and the most profound of the roles we like to play, do not come from the responsible and adult part of us. The archetypes and emotions we explore arise from our primitive, uncivilized and shadowy parts. This is why the boundary between fan tasy and reality is most important to understand and accept, so we can play in psychological as well as physical safety. And as we play deeper, this boundary can get blurred, and our play can seem more "real" than reality. So how do we establish boundaries for emotional safety?

It helps to be conscious of the boundary between "scene space" or "in the game" and out. We arrange to deal with reality outside of scene space so that we can enjoy the fantastic within it. You can even use the tension between fantasy and reality to heighten the excitement — often the heat is where the friction is.

How Real Is the Role? There is some difference of opinion within the BDSM world about choices between temporary and full-time roles. In some communities, rigid hierarchies are observed and full-time roles are the norm — tops in particular never bottom. It is very difficult to stay in role all the time, and such tops sometimes complain of getting tired and wanting some relief. It is equally difficult to bottom all the time, especially if nobody is topping you.

In other communities, roles are mostly dropped outside a scene, with some light roles assumed for purposes of flirtation, humor, and comfort. Many players switch roles with facility. Inevitably, some confusion and arguments arise as to when the players are in role and when they are not, which role they are in, or what they do when they both want to bottom or top at the same time.

You will hear a lot of judgments and criticism between these approaches: some folks proclaim that people who drop roles are not "real" tops or bottoms, while others complain about the rigid and oppressive quality of their communities. We believe that you can do good play from either position, or anywhere in between, as long as you are willing to be flexible and tolerant, and willing to support each other at those times when the "rules" don't give you an answer to a difficulty you are having, and you need to stumble around by trial and error until you find your own solution.

Rule # 1 of S/M: The rules don't work every time.

Thinking With Your Head And Your Gonads. The reason we cannot make rules that will protect us every time, or tell where the boundary should be in every situation, is that the d esires we play with are not rational. The desire you may have to be utterly bottom, to be operated by and operated on by another, to be very small, to be owned: this desire is not reasonable. It is, however, powerful, and even the best bottoms have many a desperate argument with themselves on the subject of lust versus sanity.

Janet remembers:

I did a scene once in which I'd gone under very deeply although my usual bottoming style is "powerful masochist," in this scene I'd gone into a very submissive, dependent, passive state of mind. When the scene was over, I began to cry uncontrollably. My partner was afraid he'd done something wrong, that I was angry, but when he got me to talk, all I could say was "I didn't want to come back."

Similarly, when we top we often need to rein in the part of us that wants to be godlike, and that becomes annoyed when our bottoms have the audacity to fail to enjoy what we have so graciously deigned to do to them!

We bottom in order to go to places within ourselves and with our partners that we cannot get to without a top. To explore these spaces, we need someone to push us over the edge in the right ways, and to keep us safe while we're out there flying.

The games we play have the power to bypass our customary psychological defenses, giving us access to amazing experiences and awarenesses. For emotional safety, we establish ways to take care of each other while we are defenseless. Bottom power comes from the gut-level realization that you deserve respect for your vulnerability, and care and support from those who take you down... and thus get to ride along with you on your journey.

Writing New Rules. What makes S/M work at all is that, in order to play, we intentionally alter the customary rules of personal responsibility, and enter into a ritualized codep endency. The ritual is what makes it possible, and safe, to travel in the uncharted psychological territory of bottom space. Janet says: When I teach my classes for novice tops, I say: "Normally, you have a 'bubble' of protectiveness you put around yourself to prevent yourself from being physically or emotionally hurt. When you agree to top someone, you've

just agreed to put that bubble around you and your partner for the duration of the scene."

Time and experience usually make tops and bottoms better at operating these boundaries — so if you're feeling desperately confused right now, don't worry, it'll undoubtedly get easier soon. Experienced players become adept at dropping out of role or scene space to take care of a bit of troublesome reality, and equally skilled at dropping right back in to continue having fun. A ritual - say, putting on an d taking off a collar - can serve to define the rules of play and the boundaries between you. Many different rituals will serve your purpose. Don't worry about which ritual is "correct," but look for the rituals that work for you.

We have both found that experience has enabled us to explore more deeply and profoundly, playing roles that involve going down into very primitive parts of ourselves. The deeper the play, the more risky - and rewarding - it can be.

In its finest form, S/M is a form of psychodrama with tremendous possibilities for self-knowledge and transformation, which is why some players say that S and M stand for sex magic. We must remember that this is a very powerful form of magic, worthy of our greatest respect.

Somewhere between fantasy and reality lies the full-power bottom's role in S/M. When we give up our power, we feel more powerful. When we give up control, we feel freer. We encourage you to bring your full power and all your greedy, nasty, raunchy, intense and horny lust to your play, u ntil you pull up enough energy to devour the planet.

**Staying Safe and Happy**

Before we launch you into the nitty-gritty of how to be the bottom of your (and everyone else's) dreams, we want to do a quick check-in to make sure you know some of the basic ideas and skills you'll need to stay physically and emotionally safe while you follow the advice in the rest of this book. If you're an experienced bottom, much of this material may already be familiar to you, but the fundamentals always bear repeating - so here goes.

know Thyself. Before you can communicate your desires to a partner, its a good idea to know them yourself -not always easy when your head is full of a tangle of fantasies, beliefs and rumors about romance and sex and BDSM.

One of our favorite exercises to help straighten out the tangle is called "Yes/No/Maybe" - sex educators everywhere use it as a way to get people thinking and talking about their sexual needs and desires. You can do it by yourself, with a partner, or even with a group of friends.

We commonly do this exercise in groups or workshops to help people discover their desires and their limits. First, take a big piece of paper and make a list of all the sexual and BDSM activities you can think of, including those that you would not choose yourself.

Prefabricated lists now can be found in books and on the Internet... and we still recommend you make your own.

Pay attention to how it feels to speak the words for forbidden and exciting acts of pleasure.

After you finish making the big list of all possible activities, take a regular piece of paper and mark three columns: YES, NO and MAYBE. In the YES column write all the items that you know you already like or clearly want to try. The NO column is for those things that are definitely outside your limits at this time, the things you do not want to try at all. The MAYBE column is for those things that you might like to do if it felt safe, or you were turned on enough, or your partner was confident enough, or you were confident enough. This is the exploration list.

Just in case you didn't think of them, here are some activities that appear on the NO lists of many experienced players:

• Temporary marks like bruises, welts or shallow cuts

• Permanent marks like cuts or burns or tattoos

• Flowing blood of any sort

• Play with piss or shit

• Play with guns or knives

• Sexual or genital play or penetration

• Unsafe sex

• Parts of the body that don't want to be touched, hit or whatever

• Gags or breathing constriction

• Use of intoxicants by top or bottom

• Health issues like poor circulation, allergies, joint problems

• Triggers (like "don't slap my face, it reminds me of my abusive father")

• Emotional limits (like "don't tell me I'm bad," "don't tell me I'm small," "I don't play with abandonment")

• Hypersensitivities (like tickling, or "don't touch my clit right after 1 come," or...) After the list is made, give yourself some time to think. Go back over your YES list, and mark with an N those items that you feel you NEED, in the sense that without these things the scene is not worth doing. For instance, for some people a scene needs to include some orgasmic activity. A scene may not be a scene without pain, or without bondage, or without service. Your needs are the items that are essential to you, and are not negotiable: if a prospective top doesn't want to do these, you probably wouldn't hav e enough in common to play with that person.

You can mark the remaining items, including some in the MAYBE column, with a W for WANT - these are the fascinating challenges that constitute the icing on the cake, and while we can get along fine without any one or two or three of them, without any icing at all that cake may become kind of, well, plain. Try writing all the items on your MAYBE list on cards and putting them in order from what feels safest to what feels scariest. You may learn something about yourself, and when you are ready for some risky exploration, start with the easiest item.

We strongly encourage you to try this exercise. You might also like to check out any of the good "negotiation checklists" available in other books and on some web sites - we like the one in SM101: A Realistic Introduction, but we're prejudiced. Exercises and checklists can help you to know and accept your desires and limits: self-knowledge makes for powerful bottoming, and powerful bottoming makes for hot play!

**Negotiating for Bigger and Better Scenes**

So here you are, you've made your list and so has your top, you're ready to play. Now what?

Negotiating a scene is basically mutual scheming. What you want to do is compare notes on the things you like till you come up with a list of things you would both enjoy or be comfortable doing, and then you get ro do them. So you start by proposing the things you're interested in (remember the YES-NO-MAYBE list?) and asking your prospective top what sorts of things she likes. This always starts the negotiation out on a positive footing since talking about sexy filthy dirty forbidden things that you might wan t to do is, although embarrassing, a tremendous turn-on.

Don't forget to ask your top what he would like to get out of the scene: too often negotiation is all about the bottoms likes and limits, which is to say about the things the top should and should not do. Inviting your top to tell you what she likes and what her limits are will help make you a popular bottom.

Negotiations must include your limits and any physical or medical problems that require special attention (people with heart problems may do better lying down than standing up, asthmatics need to be able to breathe freely, etc.).

Negotiation also must include a discussion of your practices about safer sex, and how you will protect each others health. If this is difficult for you, we suggest you go to a workshop on safer sex risk reduction: your local AIDS

program can probably direct you to one, or check the Bibliography for good books on safer sex. We are a sexually active group, and it is imperative that we learn to protect each other from the transmission of diseases: there are no exceptions, and no acceptable excuses. We do note that the aspect of our practices that is about high-tech sex makes us really clever at reducing the risks of transmitting unwelcome organisms: many toys can be sterilized much more easily than people, and the more abstract joys of mental domination pose no risks of disease

whatsoever.

It is also a good idea to bring up and discuss your and your top's customs regarding the use of intoxicants. We strongly recommend that you do not play when you or your partner is stoned or drunk. An intoxicated top is a dangerous top, and a bottom who is so stoned that she cannot tell what is going on is asking for injuries. We advocate moderation or abstinence. If you are so high that you are "feeling no pain," you're probably not feeling much pleasure either. We prefer to play with all our faculties intact because we like to be able to feel everything.

Do let your prospective top know what you don't like: individual di fferences are valid and important. For example, one man might hate any kind of pain on his scrotum, while another might adore it. Sometimes these differences are surprising: one of your authors hugely enjoys havin g her nipples bitten and pinched, while the other can't tolerate the lightest touch there.

If your scene will include sex, it's a good idea to let a new partner know the particulars of what works for you to reach orgasm. Do you need clitoral stimulation? A firm grip? Lubricant? A particular position?

Finally, you want to tell your partner how you get turned on, and y ou want to know how to turn your partner on. A play date is, after all, a commitment to get together, get turned on, and do lots of hot stuff. But what if you get nervous and you can t find your turn-on? Well, nobody gets turned o n by magic. If you think about it, there are activities that get you there: the sucking of ears and stroking of necks is a common route. Or maybe tell me a dirty story, or take your clothes off real slow, or take my clothes off real slow... Many of the routes to finding your turn-on when it doesn't show up simply from the magic of opportunity can be discovered by simple common sense. Start with sensual stimulations that pose no challenge: massage, light flogging, touching of less sensitive parts of the body are good warmups for most folks. Intense stimulation and direct stimulation can come later.

So there you are. Stan out getting turned on talking about what you like, tell them the necessities in the middle, and then get hot again with what turns you on... and you're ready to play.

Can You Negotiate In Role? Good negotiation is best cone between equals. You may find communities in which this principle is not universally adhered to, but we believe that y ou can play more, with more people, more safely, and go further out on the edge, if you start from the position of two equals negotiating something they both want to do. They do not become tops or bottoms until the scene begins.

Negotiating in role is not actually an exception to this principle of negotiating between equals, as long as it is understood by both parties that the top has made a commitment to hear and respect the bottoms limits and desires.

Remember that you, as a bottom, still deserve complete respect for your limits and desires.

However, there is an increased danger of missed communications when you negotiate in role. Consider, for example, this dialogue. Top: "Seems to me you deserve a good spanking with this hairbrush, my little slut."

Bottom (in role as obedient slave): "If it pleases you, sir or madam" — or bottom (in role as reluctant victim):

"No! Please! Not the hairbrush!" In either case, the top has no guide to the bottoms real feelings, and the poor bottom, who may have been nonconsensually brutalized by hairbrush spankings as a child and be terrified of anything with bristles, winds up safewording out of the scene while the top wonders what she did wrong.

Partners who have been playing together for a while may understand one another's limits and communication style well enough to overcome these obstacles, and all of us sometimes need to negotiate in role in when something unexpected comes up. Experienced players accept this need and develop a language that works for them.

Sometimes the bottom might say 'I will do that if it is your desire" which, by agreement, might mean "I really don't want to but I also don't want to mess up this scene." The old convention of having the bottom kiss the whip offers an opportunity for the bottom to evaluate his readiness for the particular object in mind, and, again in role, might offer: "Sir, I could probably take more of that for you if you flogged me with the soft one first." Because of the possibilities for misunderstanding, and because one of your authors becomes conspicuously nonverbal the minute she gets turned on, we do not negotiate play in role with new partners or novice players.

If you have to interrupt a scene to negotiate something, is this necessarily a disaster? So none of your clever

communications in role managed to get across that your left foot has fallen asleep and you cant ignore it any more, or that your top needs to excuse himself to pee? So its time to take a time out, and organize reality to better support your fantasy. Our experience is that this is not that diffi cult to do. If you stop the scene and fix whatever needs fixing, you will soon learn that a level of turn-on that took you both an hour to achieve in the first place is not lost, and can be easily reestablished in five or ten minutes.

Negotiations can also be handled in role when a top forces a bottom to reveal his or her most embarrassing fantasy, along with limits and other pertinent information. The top who insists that you tell him or her what you were too shy to say in the first place supports you and gives you p ermission. The embarrassment makes this very hot: tie me down and force me to reveal my heart's desire? Oh, poor me!

Negotiation can also be done in writing or by e-mail (although we counsel caution in sending e-mail from non-private locations like your workplace). Some dominants order the bottom to write out one or two or three fantasies, including information about his limits and desires. A letter or e-mail has the advantage of being a kind of private communication, reducing self-consciousness as it forces you to think clearly about what you would like.

It gives the top time to think and prepare a response, and allows a scene to be set up where the roles are in place when the bottom comes to the door.

Thanks But No Thanks. Sometimes what you learn from a negotiation is that you and your prospective partner do not have enough common ground to develop a successful scene: not enough items in common on your YES lists, or one of you has a need for something that is outside the others limits. Maybe you don't want to play the same game. Or your relationship needs and expectations are too different. Or maybe, during the negotiation process, you do not feel comfortable or safe with some aspect of this tops approach.

It can be tempting, in this circumstance, to try to push for agreement that doesn't really exist. Or to start operating on the assumption that something is wrong with you if you don't want what this other person does. Or to be untrue to yourself in order to please another.

This won't work. If you cant negotiate a scene honestly, then you need to not play. However embarrassing or uncool or unsatisfying or disappointing it may be, it is important to be able to say NO.

Saying no to sex or S/M needs no reason beyond not wanting to. No excuses arc required. All you need to do is say no. No, thank you. No, I find you terrifically attractive but I don't think we want to play the same game. No, I don't feel that there's chemistry between us. No, that's beyond my limits. No, I don't want to. Thank you for offering, but no.

Remember, its emotionally far easier to say "no" before a scene than to stop one in progress... and the time you're wasting doing a scene you don't want could be better spent doing the scene of your dreams with someone else!

Where Does Sex Fit In? Take some time to look at the meaning of sexuality in your concept of a scene. Many players take this issue for granted - either assuming that there will be sex, or assuming that there wont - far too often. And there is a lot of variation from one individual to another. For some people, sex is the reward they get after successfully completing an intense scene, so after the great beating or whatever the top becomes more of a nurturer arranging for the bottom's pleasure. For others, sex is submission, more a part of how they get into bottom space and how they feel dominated by their top - if this is your picture, then waiting for the end of the scene to get fucked won't work as well for you.

And if your fantasy of giving service includes a little sexual viol ation now and again, then it is probably better to let your play partner know about this than it is to wait patiendy f orever in a state of unfulfilled yearning. On the other hand, if your hot fantasy about this is that your top is with holding sex from you because she likes to see you yearning, its a good idea to check that out with her, because that may not be her idea. Your top cannot read your mind, and unfulfilled yearning (sighing, heavy breathing, etc.) doesn't really look that different from terrifically turned on.

Your authors tend to like a lot of sex in our scenes: foreplay, middleplay, afterplay. We find that for us, sexual

contact increases the intimacy of a scene and can generate an almost psychic intensity.

Turning Fantasies Into Realities. To script scenes from your fantasies, start by recognizing that you already have a lot of skills in manipulating fantasy that you have practiced over and over while playing with yourself

-masturbation is a great learning tool as well as good fun. You probably already know how to pace and time the story, to rewind, or play certain parts over and over, and to fast-forward to the orgasmic part at the right moment.

Real play can benefit from these skills as you adapt the timing of your mental images to the exigencies of reality, including the needs of a real partner of less-than-infinite strengt h, technical expertise and sexual capacity.

If you try to make your scene look exactly like your fantasy in eve ry detail, you're scripting too tightly: your top will find it virtually impossible to play with you, and you are very likely to encounter interruptions and disappointments as reality stubbornly refuses to conform to your fantasy. Fortunately, you can help reality along by running the complicated or excessive parts in your imagination. You probably already know how to fantasize while you are driving a car, or at work, even while you're having sex. This is a good way to deal with those frequent occasions when you want more than is really possible: as Dossie puts it, "Sometimes my eyes arc bigger than my cunt." Fantasizing while you play also can help you get into your part as slave or kidnap victim or what-have-you (or possibly who-has-you), because you can change you r experience of yourself. You knew how to do this when you were a kid: your Batman costume made you a superhero, even with no Batmobile. That's why we call it "play."

Your authors once did a scene together in which Janet was an evil pirate and Dossie her helpless kidnap victim.

Janet confessed afterwards her concern that she wasn't providing enough appropriately piratical dialogue, but Dossie reassured her that she had the ship firmly envisioned in her head, and Janet's chuckles of genuine pleasure were all it had taken (besides a little creative costuming and appropriate bondage) to convince Dossie that her cruel captor had malicious designs on her, and to keep the pirate fantasy alive. And so what if one of us thought Dossie was tied to the mast, and the other to the wheel? It was actually some eyebolts on the wall anyway.

S/M players are schemers. We are always scheming ways to take the most outrageous of our imaginings and experience them in reality. No matter how impossible a particular fantasy of, perhaps, extreme violence, or unlikely adventures like sprouting wings and flying, or science fic tion extrapolations - the question is simply how to figure out a safe, consensual and do-able way to make it happen.

At any time, in any scene, it may feel right to do part of what you want, but not all of it. Then you can choose whether to grieve over the part that wasn't there, or delight in the part that was. Please remember - there is always the future. Anything that is worth doing in the first place is worth waiting for the opportunity to do it right. And if it's really worth doing, then it's worth practicing and doing it over and over till you get it right. After all, once you do, you'll probably still want to do it over and over again because you got so good at it! We hope you will rejoice in the riches you have today while you scheme for the even greater riches you will enjoy tomorrow.

**Keeping It Consensual**

Safewords. Since we all agree (we hope!) that BDSM should be consensual, we need ways to ascertain that everybody involved is still consenting once the scene is under way. One of the easiest and most flexible ways to do so is with a safeword.

A safeword is a code word that players agree on to mean "Stop, something is wrong." The reason we need code is that lots of us like to pretend we don't want to have all these amazing things done to us, and we may pretend by joyously shrieking "Nononononono," so we need another word to mean that. Or we may become incoherent and need a one-syllable way to communicate.

Safewords come in many forms. Many players use "red" to mean "stop, something is wrong," and "pink" or

"yellow" to mean "I don't want you to stop but could you please do that lighter or slower or something or we will have to stop." "Green" also can come in handy when what you want to say is "more, more, more!'

Some safewords do not have to be in code: "My right foot is asleep" is a perfecdy clear message, "May I speak?"

is always a polite form, and "I need a little break now or soon" is also good communication. If you don't want to use words, or you do want a gag, a rubber ball or jangly keyring, held in the hand, can be dropped or thrown to let your top know there is a problem that needs to addressed.

Using a safeword is a difficult decision for a player, particularly an experienced one. Good players know that when their partner uses a safeword, she is often feeling disappointed, chagrined and inadequate over needing to do so. This is an important time for mutual support and affection. Whether the safeword has been invoked by the top (yes, tops use safewords too) or the bottom, it means somebody is having a hard time, and needs and deserves caring support and validation. Dossie was once subjected to ridicul e for using a safeword, of the "Aw, c'mon, can't you take it?" variety - and, she says, "It turned me into a real bitch real fast." She never played with that top again.

Never allow anyone to tell you that you were wrong to use a safeword; the judgment of when to use or not use one is purely your decision and is not debatable. Even if you've given consent to an activity in your pre-scene negotiations, you are entitled to withdraw that consent if the acti vity isn't working for you — if its too intense or if you're reacting in a way you hadn't anticipated. Although a top may feel disappointed by your use of a safeword, she doesn't get to express anger or reproach, or put you down for safewording. Your safeword is your mechanism for taking care of yourself and nobody but you can tell you how to take care of yourself.

It can happen (and probably will) that in some scene or other, you may fail to safeword, then on later consideration wish that you had. You may have gotten so deeply into the role that you forgot that you had choices, or you got so nonverbal you forgot about speech, or you may have been too embarrassed, or maybe you just kept putting it off... most experienced bottoms will admit to having made all these mistakes. This can leave you in the very uncomfortable position of having played heavier (with, perhaps, some bruises and welts to remind you of it) than you would have if your top hadn't turned your brain off for yo u like you asked him to.

This is not an occasion to blame anyone, not your top or yourself. It is an occasion to arrange to talk later to the top so that she doesn't continue operating on the assumption that you liked something that in fact you didn't.

We have met bottoms who say they don't want to negotiate a safeword because "if I have one, I use it before I'm really ready for the scene to stop." Our experience has been that as you learn more about your own limits and about your partner, you'll learn how to "stretch" and allow your limits to be pushed further and further. There's also no reason why the use of a safeword should mean that you have to stop playing entirely, unless that's the specific meaning you've negotiated for your safeword: you can safeword, drop out of the scene, do whatever communication is called for to make the scene work for everybody, and then go right back to stretching those limits. Don't give up on safewords... simply learn more about your own capabilities and desires.

We have also met tops who want to dispose of safewords for certain scenes, such as punishment scenes ("How can I push limits if my bottom's just going to call safeword on me?"). We strongly suggest that you not allow this to happen with you. A possible compromise might be an agreement that you will do your best not to use your safeword because of intense sensation, but that you still have it i n place if you need it due to extreme emotional distress (such as unexpected age regression or violent rage), an awareness of damage to your body, physical illness, or similar emergencies.

Playing without a safeword may seem like a hot scene — that's the fantasy - but the reality is that in consensual BDSM there are always safewords or safeword-equivalents. They may be subtle, or based on a couple's knowledge of each other, or they may be normal speech or messages in the code of bottom and top roles, but they still function as safewords. When no form of safeword has been agreed on, the bottom has to resort to shrieking

"Stop this scene you are a crud I hate you stop NOW!" to get the point across. We think safewords are a more civilized choice.

We have met players who structure scenes by playing heavier and heavier until the bottom calls a safeword. This is not an appropriate goal for a scene: for most bottoms, using a safeword is associated with feelings of failure and shame. Most of us would rather end a scene by succeeding in taking some intense and difficult stimulus. Then everybody feels like a winner. Besides, any fool can do things to y ou that you dont like - why bother to play at

all?

We hope it never happens to you that you have to call safeword because your top has purposefully and maliciously violated a limit. But if it does, there may be no point in trying to continue the scene; trust has been broken. It may or may not be worthwhile to spend some time later in non-scene space trying to explain your feelings to this top, in hopes that he will learn something from the experience. Or you may find that later, when you're not in role and not under stress, you no longer perceive the top's actions as malicious - in which case you owe him an apology.