Getting Started

Where or how do I go about getting into this way of life?

This question is asked all the time with people from both roles and genders that have been drawn to read up and create a profile but not sure how to get active. Almost all the answers when this question is posed on a message board is to become active in your local community or read up as much on it as you can.

I feel those are too quaint and are like handing a paint brush, paint and canvas to a person who asks how to be a painter. So with my ability to be long winded and show off a know it all attitude I will dive more in depth here.

Get to know yourself

This is it. This is what will separate a good chance at success from certain failure ranging from short term to long term. There are many things that are needed to know one in order to truly get to the place you want to go in some sort of power exchange relationship. Here are the things that often are not well thought out or more importantly we have thought about ourselves.

What are you meant to be power exchange wise?

Congratulations something has called to you to want to get into this way of life. I say the more the merrier personally and do not think it cheapens me in any way to have more people in the life. But this life is actually a huge tent and not one size fits all. What you are about within this life is critical in knowing.

Now I am not saying you will need to pinpoint yourself down to exactly what you are about or wanting but you should have a pretty good idea of what you think you are and wanting if you having giving it some serious reflection. To me there are three areas that depending on how you are drawn to them or if you are drawn to them that can go a long way to finding what you want to pursue.

1) Control – You should have some strong idea if either giving up control or controlling another person appeals to you and how much. It is either going to appeal to you specifically to give up control or take control of certain or many things especially decisions that involve the other in our life. For a submissive does it appeal to you to have a person tell you where we are going to go eat and would rather go someplace we hate then go someplace where we love but know our other would just prefer not to go. As a dominant can you make decisions easily without much input or factoring too much where the decision is based on what you think the other would like.

Many people often think of control in terms of in the moment examples of thought about power exchange situations but the truth is without one day of experience you should have some idea if you are a person who needs to give control or wants to take control of a situation WITH a person you care for. This is not just about the other person being happy with what you have done but wanting to know you are doing what they want you to do.

Obviously the more control you want to give over or have over someone the more severe power exchange relationship you are looking for and vice versa.

2) dominations/submission – On some level do you enjoy one or both of these aspects.

Domination and submission are two very different things. So a person must understand if they are into one or both. Domination is about forcing or being forced in some way doing something that you or your other may not have done if it was totally up to them. It is an active thing a dominant can bring to a power exchange relationship.

Submission is about enjoying or seeing your other enjoy doing things for the dominant. This is more of the day to day obedience type aspects of a power exchange life. It is about things rarely talked about once set up but is just done in the relationship. Yes, we submit to being dominated but submission is a much larger part of the day to day life.

3) Motivation for the kinky things – Why have some of these things turned you on?

This should be rather clear if you think about it. Does the pure physical nature of the kink the actual draw or the intensity of doing the kink to or for the other the draw? Obviously they can be both but there should still be some clear thought on what your thought of doing those things does for you. For example for me sensory depravation is awesome because it prevents feedback to my Master so I know he is doing things to me solely for his enjoyment and this relaxes me greatly and gives me pleasure knowing he is having fun with my body. There are plenty of others that love sensory depravation purely from the increased intensity of how it directly feels.

Basically if all of your interest lies in what you directly get from kinky play then you are more of a top/bottom and to pursue a more significant power exchange relationship just in order to get this is foolish on your nature. Same with a person who gets more from these things by feeding off the dominants pleasure/reactions or a dominant who gets off on seeing a person helpless and suffering just out of love and devotion to you that to be paired with just a top/bottom will not be good.

Without thinking these things through often you can get into any relationship or spend too much time with other compatibility factors and find out you are not compatible. Not knowing and being upfront what you are about can only cause problems. This is where you see dominants wanting a significant power exchange complain about do me subs and submissive looking foe severe control complain about dominants who are passive wimps.

Need to know how you are in being with people

This is fairly straightforward. Generally there is going to be two types of people.

1) No problem with casual relationships. Generally a person that will does not have to be deeply in love or be with a person in general that could be our one in order to be in a relationship. If you are like this then it gives you the option to explore more directly in figuring out what type of power dynamic is best for you.

2) You can only dominate or be submissive to someone you love and think could be the one. This is self explanatory and will require you to be as sure as you can in what you seek out power exchange related. What dynamic and how severe is a compatibility factor in a relationship. Investing months in falling for someone then finding out you are not compatible in the power exchange dynamic can and has happened a lot. This is why it is critical to have some solid understanding of what you are about and not do see where this takes me adventure like attitude if you are only going to dive into it in a serious and possible long term relationship.

What is the best way to go about things FOR YOU!

Everyone will love to give you an opinion, me included, of what they think is the best way to do this or go about it but in the end the journey is a personal one.

Maybe you are an outgoing hands on learn by seeing talking and doing type then you are pretty much then going to be interested in getting active in your local community. Maybe you are shy, very private and/or not close to a vibrant local community then learning and pursuing on the Internet is the best way for you.

In my FAQ blog I wrote about these posts on the good and bad of both local communities and the Internet if you want to read more of my know it all words.

I will just expand on a few things there are no one size fits all steps in power exchange relationships. They are like any other type of relationships and you will see all types with all kinds of people. Some you will scratch your head and wonder and some you will identify with strongly. Some go running in blind others go in at a glacier pace and anywhere in between. Some can do long distance until it is time and can move others cannot handle being farther away from the other by ten miles. For some it might work to start out as just fun bottom play and progress from there and for others it is 24/7 total power exchange or bust.

Each of our paths is different in life and this includes our journey into the power exchange life. The best way is the way that works for you and not someone telling you this is how you should go about it.