Why Every Woman Should Experiment With S&M At Least ONCE In Her Life
BDSM can help you connect with your body, heart and mind in a meaningful way.
weheartit What is the lure of BDSM and dominance and submission (D/S) for women? And why is it that many women relegate it to fantasy only instead of exploring it in reality?
Hali, a divorced mother who has begun experimenting with consensual BDSM in a serious relationship says the lure for her is "heightened passion."
"When my boyfriend straps me down and takes me, I'm forced into the present and everything else gets tuned out. I never would have experienced this with my former husband," she says. "I was young and insecure about myself and body back then. I wasn't open to it one bit. Plus, had he suddenly tried to be more dominant, I think I'd have ended up laughing."
For Tara, a 40-year-old mother of two, the allure lies in having her partner "plan" the event and use his imagination.
"There's a build-up to the experience. I anticipate it, wonder what's going to happen and what he may or may not do," she says. "It's the mental side to sex that's really exciting for women. I don't think men are wired this same way. They can look at porn and magazines and experience the same excitement. So, in their books, nothing's missing."
My curiosity around BDSM and D/S stemmed from having re-watched the movie, 9 1/2 Weeks. There was just "something" in how Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke connected. There was something about how he seemed to see her, intuit her, push her beyond her boundaries and in turn, empower her to know herself more.
It wasn't until I started talking to Sir John the Dom, a sexual Dominant from the United States, that I realized this movie was about BDSM and D/S. I remember John telling me that from a neuropsychological perspective that it makes sense for women to have a "submissive" side.
"For the sake of simplicity, I want you to imagine the human brain in two parts: the upper brain and lower brain," he explained patiently. "The lower brain is our old brain. We've had it since the beginning of time and throughout evolution. It's where our instinctive, primitive thinking lies, like the fight or flight response or the biological urge to have sex and reproduce.
To understand how our lower brain functions, you simply need look to other less-evolved primates," John continued. "Like gorillas, for example. One of the behaviors you'll observe amongst female gorillas is their jockeying to win the alpha males in the pack. The females prefer to associate with the stronger, more dominant gorillas. They want to submit to an alpha, knowing that he improves their chances of survival. It's about safety, protection, and well... having his babies.
This same lower brain activity is still active in the human female brain. The difference is that you also have this evolved upper part of your brain. The upper brain is where you store your values, beliefs and morals, which have been compiled through social conditioning.
As women of Western culture, social conditioning teaches you the exact opposite thinking to your primitive brain: that women are men's equals, that submission in any form is a bad thing, and that you can be as strong and dominant as men are, which is true in most respects.
But what sometimes happens is that the two parts of a woman's brain are at war. She knows she is an independent, self-sufficient person, capable of forging and managing her own life. Yet, secretly or subconsciously, she may dream or fantasize about submitting to a man sexually all the while berating herself for doing so because she judges her thoughts as weak, clingy or abnormal," John explained.
John's explanation not only resonated with me but it left me yearning to learn more. I had falsely thought that D/S was about one person abusing another. I also thought it involved extreme and kinky behavior like hanging from the ceiling tied up or wearing a dog collar and licking men's shoes.
In its truest form, a D/S relationship is all about the submissive: her wants, her needs and her fantasies. The dom's job is to build a bond so strong with her that she feels safe enough and connected enough with him to unleash her creativity and explore her innermost self.
Through submission, she actually becomes empowered because she connects with her body, heart and mind in much deeper ways. And, whew! What's not alluring about that?