Free The New Bottoming Book by Dossie Easton, Janet W. Hardy

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Responsibility

    The real skills of bottoming lie in how you interact with your partners - what kind of communication you do and what kind of support you give to the wonderful people you play with. A good bottom does his end of the work of developing a scene.

    So who is responsible for what? You are responsible for knowing your limits and making sure your top knows them, for communicating clearly, explaining what you want, keeping agreements, supporting your top, and helping your top get his needs met. Your top is responsible for knowing and setting her limits, respecting yours, maintaining safety, and communicating his wants and needs. Both of you are responsible for scripting, for clear negotiations, for maintaining scene space, and for closure after the scene is done.

    A responsible bottom figures out what she wants, and what her limits are, and communicates this information to her top. If you're a novice, you may not have all this information just yet - but you still have to communicate what you do know about your fantasies and limits, and to share new information and insights as you gain them.

Where Is Your Power?

    Right inside you, where it always is.

    A bottom's power may not always look like power. Sometimes being powerful is about triumphing over a difficult stimulation or struggling heroically against impossible odds. Sometimes it's about calm, competence and devotion. Sometimes it's about being secure enough to let yourself feel scared or vulnerable or small, knowing that more conventional power will be there for you when and if you need it.

    Whatever kind of power bottoming brings to you, that is where you'll find your center. When you grasp your power firmly as you enter a scene, you may be surprised to discover that your sense of your own power intensifies as you play. Submission, sex, pain play: all raise power. Maybe it's part or the endorphin effect, or maybe when we feel so extremely sexy we cant help but feel magnificent. So when you are a mass of nerves contemplating your first attempt at bringing your fantasy into reality, remember this: as the power of the play overcomes the
    self-consciousness, as you and your top get more excited, as the juices begin to flow, you will feel incredibly powerful.

    We grasp our power in order to share it. We share our power when we give the control over to the top, and together we become enormously potent.

    When we fail to grasp our power, we may become overly passive or overly directive, either too needy or too
    demanding. The passive bottom fails to grasp his power, and the demanding bottom, clutching shreds of power for dear life, disempowers her top: neither situation could be described as an erotic power exchange.

    Bottoms who get stuck at the passive end of the spectrum come off sounding whiny, dependent, needy, clinging - tops may feel claustrophobic around them. They are often reluctant to let a top know what they like or want ("I just want to please you!"), which leaves the top out on a limb, without a clue as to what will work for this bottom, and stranded with the entire responsibility for deciding how to play. The top in this position is not adequately supported by the bottom.

    Bottoms who err at the overly directive end of the spectrum can be bossy, entitled, nagging, sometimes childish, demanding "do-me queens." You have a right to get your needs met, and the responsibility to get those needs met by grownup tactics and straightforward communication. When you manipulate your top, you fail to support his role as top, undermining his authority and ultimately the scene.

    If you feel you are being overly passive or directive, what can you do? We suggest you start by asking yourself: Why am I not giving myself permission to ask for what I want directly? Do I have some fantasy that nothing counts unless my top spontaneously wants to do exactly what I want? This is a common hitch for some folk.

    Be reassured - smart tops discover early on that when