How to negotiate BDSM play

One of the reasons I write my ‘How To’ Femdom Guides is because we talk a lot about the ‘what’ of BSDM-related things, but it’s very hard to find the ‘yeah but how do I do that’ level of detail in a way that we can use or adapt for ourselves.

There are many many reasons for this, including nuance and complexity and the fear of being ‘one true way’-ish, but what that means is that we often never really get the ‘how to’ level of information that we crave for understanding. That’s the level that can give us the ‘ohh, I see how that can work now’ eye-opener.

We can, of course, buy books and look for class and learn from friends, and that can often get us there. But sometimes it takes a certain way of seeing it, or multiple different ways, for that ‘oh I see now!’ moment.

Which leads me to this: How to negotiate BDSM play.

We talk about BDSM play negotiation a lot, as we should.

We probably all know about BDSM checklists (here’s mine), and I’ve given a few examples of how I do opt-in negotiation with casual play partners (here with a rope partner, here with a kissing date partner). But they are super basic tools, because I’m kind of a basic bitch (made myself laugh :P), and the play examples there were very limited and uncomplicated.

But I just found this delightful and playful video of Midori and Dr Lindsey Doe walking through a detailed negotiation ‘how to’ and it’s so good!

How to take negotiations well beyond ‘ticking off a checklist of activities’ level, how to make it fun and hot and intimate, how to use it to make play better, to flirt, to build anticipation. It’s just wonderful. Also it’s Midori, soooo… *heart eyes*.

As a bonus, here’s a piece Midori wrote about negotiation, The Art of Negotiation.