Domination & submission _ the BDSM relationship handbook ( PDFDrive )

balance” of D/s and BDSM be the goal of just about everyone in the lifestyle?
The answer, in a word, is no. There are plenty of people who want the
relationship without the whips and chains. There are still others who are all
about the whips and chains, but have no real interest in the trappings of a D/s
relationship dynamic. And yes, there are those who not only want both, but they
honestly cannot conceive of one without the other.
It should come as no great surprise to anyone that it is exceedingly difficult for a
member of one of these groups to understand and empathize with someone from
one of the others. It’s almost as if someone who cares only about love, to the
exclusion of sex, were trying to understand what motivates a friend who cares
only about sex, and not a bit about love. As difficult as that would be, imagine
further what might be the result if suddenly, those two individuals found
themselves in a relationship with each other? You might be tempted to laugh
off the possibility, since it’s hard to imagine how someone who doesn’t want
love would seek out a relationship, right? Frankly, it happens all the time in this
lifestyle.
Every day, thousands of submissives and slaves who are not emotionally
involved in any significant way with them are collared by their Dominants.
Often, Dominants will offer and submissives accept these collars without any
thought whatsoever to what their new partner hopes or expects to gain from the
arrangement, or whether they share any commonalities at all. One may be
seeking D/s, while the other simply wants BDSM. One may want love, the
other, sex. Both may be accustomed to calling the shots in a relationship, even if
one of them thinks he or she is a submissive. In short, they are unclear on the
concepts of D/s and BDSM.
There are sometimes those even in the BDSM lifestyle who confuse being a
“top” with being a Dominant, or being a “bottom” with being a submissive.
These terms are not interchangeable. Acting in the role of a top doesn’t make
you a Dominant any more than standing in the kitchen makes you a cook.
Similarly, the fact that you enjoy being on the receiving end of a lot of BDSM
play doesn’t necessarily make you a submissive, either. Topping and bottoming
are activities, not core character traits. Anyone who thinks, “I like to be
spanked, therefore I must be a submissive,” is unclear on the concept.
Incredibly, there never seems to be a shortage of people who are unclear on the
concepts of sadism and masochism. I have seen countless examples of