findom

“I want to weaponize my kink against myself to become a better person.”

It was an early message from someone I’ve been playing with for a few weeks now. He knew he was into findom, feet, girls who are just a little mean to him. And in the past it’d just been another thing that he felt bad about, controlled by. But what if—what if—he could use the reward system his brain responded to to move toward his goals?

He brought his hopes to me like an offering, laid them at my feet.

He wasn’t the first and already wasn’t the last. And I fucking love it.

I love it because it’s how humans work. We seek rewards. We want to feel good. And when we can tie those rewards, that good feeling, to doing good—we do good. Be that good getting in shape, tackling challenging problems, caring for those around us, honing skills, or something else entirely.

Growing up, Pizza Hut had a program called Book It! Kids 6^th grade and under could get free pizza (huge kid reward – huge me now reward, if I’m honest) for meeting reading goals. Which meant more reading. Which meant more pizza. Win, win, win, win.

I don’t know about you, but the kids in my circles did way more summer reading when there was pizza involved.

Same logic behind getting a lollypop after getting a shot, treating yourself at your favorite pastry place after doing a thing you were avoiding, promising ourselves that once we hit x milestone, we get y thing we’ve been waiting for.

Obviously, it also works with kink. I had a sub tell me it would take him three days to clear out his workout area in the basement. Alright, I said. You can’t orgasm until it’s cleaned—and once it’s clean, I’ll send you something special.

You want to know how fast that man cleaned out his workout space?

Take that three days and make it three hours. And three hours of me relentlessly teasing him and trying to slow him down.

In short: we gamified a task he needed to do. We added challenges, rewards, and a multiplayer element with me trying to slow his progress and teasing him about the pain and suffering my slow-downs were going to cause him.

And the reason we could do that was because we used his desire for kink to move him toward a goal.

I also love this approach because it gives us space to love our kinks. Instead of something taking our time, holding us back, or keeping us trapped in a shame spiral, they become an active part of bettering ourselves.

Think about how healing that is. Taking a part of your authenticity (because your kinks are part of your authenticity) and embracing it instead of trying to hide it or run from it or hate it.

In the same way that I love sweets and I could just beat myself up for that in a society that is obsessed with being anti-sugar and pro-diet culture (ew)—instead I can use sweets to motivate myself. And I can prioritize sweets that leave me feeling really satisfied and delighted (instead of hiding in a corner and stuffing mediocre candy in my mouth in shame, I take the time to make my favorite cookies or walk to the good pastry shop).

In that same way, why can’t we all use our kinks to motivate and then give ourselves real space to enjoy and revel in them? Not as something we sneak away in shame to do real quick—a hate-jerk in a dark alley—but as a treat we’ve earned, the best version of the thing, a playful moment of escape from the mundane, a pop of sugar on the tongue.

That’s it. That’s what I’m getting at here.

A pop of sugar on the tongue.

A twitch in the pants.

The orgasm you’ve been craving.

The bright, heady feeling of being seen.

And all that on the heels of the satisfaction of a goal met, a job well done, a step toward being the human you want to be.

This summer, I rescued a kitten from the undercarriage of a car. She was screaming for her mother and it brought many of us running—people on the street, neighbors with open windows, shopkeepers with open doors.

All of us wanted to save the kitten. To coax her from her dangerous hiding spot, guide her safely off the road, and make sure she was okay.

Myself and the other women on the scene were on our bellies partway under the car, coaxing kitten with treats and chicken, kitten noises playing on our phones. Come out, little baby. It’s nice out here, with treats and friends.

The men in the group—equally well-meaning—had a distinctly different approach. Without any real discussion between them, they all began to shake the car and shout. The theory: we can scare the kitten out and into our arms.

Well-meaning as they were, I think you see where this is going: it didn’t work. The terrified kitten retreated farther into the car’s undercarriage and would not come out.

I sent everyone away and promised I would come back for kitten in a few hours when she was calm again. And I did: early the next morning with little traffic and almost no people on the streets, I played kitten noises and tempted her with chicken and eventually she came close enough for me to grab.

I tell this story because it’s a tiny example of a larger societal pattern. Women are socialized to care and collaborate and de-escalate. Men are socialized to solve problems with force. That force can be caring and well-intentioned and it is still force.

And because our culture (it should go without saying, but allow me to say it anyway: wrongly) associates masculinity with dominance and dominance with violence, even here in kink spaces, dominance is so often seen as a violent act.

Outside the bedroom, we “dominate” by making war. We “dominate” by enforcing our will. We “dominate” through physical overpowerment.

This so-called dominance is “because I said so,” and it is “don’t question me,” and it is ultimately an act of fear. Authoritarian government. Authoritarian parent. Boss dangling unemployment over your head.

Then it slips into BDSM, this violent idea of what dominance is. It’s “shut up and send, piggy,” in the first conversation. It’s the “dom” men in my DMs telling me their violent fantasies of me forcing them to submit.

And god, how boring, how narrow this vision is.

It leaves behind the reality that peaceful protests have dominated authoritarians right out of power (see: Nepal, see: Ukraine, see: the Singing Revolution). It leaves behind the utter dominance of a nurturing mother. It discards the electric power of the small to defeat the large, of good ideas to defeat violent ones, of the underdog we all are rooting for. Of the quiet power we submit to because we long to do so.

I am not interested in being your Stalin, your Napoleon, your because-I-said-so mediocre dad.

I am interested in the same thing I wanted for that kitten: to overpower her fears and take her through the hard feelings into the safer place.

I am interested in your surrender as healing, as trust, as a gift given freely.

I am interested in breaking down your ego because it’s in your fucking way.

I am interested in you surrendering because of who I am, not what you fear I’ll do if you don’t.

You put yourself in my hands because they are strong and steady. You show your vulnerable parts because you know I won’t look away. You wrap yourself around my finger because it is safe there, warm, full of purpose. You serve and send because you admire and respect and long.

I am not interested in society’s broken ideas of dominance. The way it’s been gendered and narrowed into a violent box.

(I’m not saying there is no violence in D/s. There very obviously is. But you don’t serve because you fear it. You serve because you crave it or because you want to find your limits near it or because you want me to stand with you through it.)

So come out, kitten. Come to me through the dark. Come to me because your trust is larger than your fear of me. I am interested in leaving you safer than I found you. Less fleas. Less scrawniness. Less fear of the darkness, the unknown. A knowledge that you can do the brave thing and what you find there in the scary place is rest. Authenticity.

Yourself.

What you find there is yourself.

“How do I let people know that I’m safe?”

It was the topic of a big discussion in my circles awhile back. How can men signal to women that they are safe? How can strangers signal to strangers that I’m a person who will help if you are in trouble? How can I communicate that you can tell me things, trust me with things?

People were looking for symbols, secret passwords, a rainbow flag to pin on their backpack—so to speak. Like when queerness was underground but you could find each other by saying you were a friend of Dorothy. A shortcut to flag how safe you are.

I understand the conversation well, the desire for those around you to know you are safe. But I think we’re all asking the wrong question here.

It’s not: how can I let people know I’m safe?

It’s: how can I be safe?

How can I—every day—do the work to become a safer person?

Because the truth is that you don’t have to scream it from the mountaintops. You don’t need the rainbow flag pin. You don’t need a secret password.

Can symbols help? Sure. Do they sometimes act as shorthand that can identify you to people who are ideologically aligned (or misaligned)? Certainly.

But the real work isn’t flagging your safety to others. The real work is recognizing that no matter how wonderful your intentions are in the world, it takes work to be safe (in any context).

Safe isn’t a pin, a label, or even an intention. It’s how you show up every day in your actions.

People don’t feel I’m safe because I say that I am. They feel I’m safe because they saw me opening my home to the community during the power outage across all of Portugal, Spain, and parts of France in the early summer—feeding everyone from the backyard grill because no power means no cooking for most in the city.

People don’t feel I’m safe because I bought the right t-shirt, wrote the right line in my bio. They feel I’m safe because they were at the table with me when someone started joking about violating another person’s consent and I was the one who said “hold on a second.”

Safety is not passive. It’s active. It takes intentional self-education and care. And it’s a skill cultivated over time.

So let’s turn the question on its head. It’s not how do I prove I’m safe or how do I let others know?

It’s how do I become safer every day in a real, tangible sense?

And as you do that, the result is this: you don’t have to tell anyone anything. They feel safe because you show up as you, as the person who cares about being safe.

I recently wrote an essay on humiliation as play. Which is one of my favorite ways to think of it—as a way to go back to our essential selves and be free of the constraints society puts on us as adults.

But, of course, that’s not the only way to think about it. And another that I think about often is this:

Humiliation as exposure therapy.

If you aren’t familiar with exposure therapy, the idea is this: Therapists will take a client who has high anxiety, fear, or triggers around a specific thing and safely expose them to the thing in order to reduce the intensity or negativity of those feelings (which also often come with things like compulsions, physical symptoms, and real-life consequences).

For example, someone with OCD might have intrusive thoughts anytime they walk across a bridge. Terrifying, debilitating thoughts of “what if I threw myself off?” One of the ways therapists deal with this is by safely exposing that person to the bridge to teach their nervous system that it isn’t real.

No, you won’t actually throw yourself off.

Yes, you are really, truly safe.

I think for some, humiliation and degradation in BDSM operate in a similar way. They are a safe place to face down anxiety, discomfort, fear.

What happens if she laughs at me? What happens if she sees me as just a wallet? What happens if I’m only a footstool? If I don’t matter?

What if I am rejected?

Isn’t that what it sometimes comes down to? A sort of immunization against rejection. Against being laughed at. Against the fear of not being enough.

In this space, I can see you and make fun of you and tell you you’re a total loser and wtf did you just do…and then I can exit the scene and ask how you feel. And I can show up again next time, telling your psyche that actually yes, you are safe. To be the weirdest or stupidest or grossest version of yourself.

It’s kink. It’s sexy. It’s a craving for a feeling society doesn’t think is pleasant. And sometimes that is about play, connection, making another person laugh. Sometimes you haven’t thought that deeply about it—all you know is it makes your pulse race. And sometimes, I think, it’s about this. Inoculating yourself against rejection. Teaching your body and mind that they can be brave, they can be seen, they can do the stupidest things that pop into their head, show the hard versions of themselves, and walk out relieved instead of destroyed. Seen instead of invisible.

A day or two ago, I played a game with a man who loves a little public humiliation.

I sent him a photo of myself in a challenging pose: on my knees, feet toward the camera, hand on hip, a slight twist in my body. All feet and curves and tights with hearts of them.

“Duplicate it,” I told him. “Try to take your own photo with a pose like this.”

His first attempt earned him a second attempt. And then with his second photo in hand, I told him I wanted to take it to a vote. I’d post the photo in our Discord server and we’d let the group decide who did it better.

The game was very obviously rigged. For my win and our mutual pleasure.

The dommes did not disappoint. He was teased mercilessly. Fondly. Publicly. Laughing emojis and laughing people. The atmosphere: jovial. His heart: racing.

Everyone’s day was a little better because of kitten’s kink and courage.

(Very much including his day.)

When I think about humiliation, this is one of the things I think about.

Joy. Laughter. Play.

I think about the ways that teasing can make a person feel seen. How making others laugh can make them feel they belong. They matter. Their silliest, most vulnerable parts are a gift.

I think about how so many of the things we do on the “silly” side of humiliation are simply giving permission to play. To make animal noises. Cosplay a ballerina. Wear something that makes us feel goofy or vulnerable. Be silly–all things that are off the societal script for adults, but that I think many of our souls truly need.

This isn’t the only way to play with humiliation in BDSM, of course. But it’s one I love because what I find in it is an expansiveness. A way for someone to step off those scripts for a moment and play. Stop performing at adulting or masculinity or seriousness and just be themselves.

And that play can feed their joy as well as their arousal.

I think that’s fucking beautiful.

As a confident, traditionally attractive woman, my whole life I’ve gotten attention everywhere I went—most of it unwanted.

Men lick their lips when I walk past them on the street. They make excuses to talk to me when I’m trying to mind my business. They find my phone number in group threads and text me without consent.

More extreme, they stalk me. They block my path so that I cannot leave. They touch me without permission.

And they force me, in those moments, to put them in their place. To assert my boundaries, often firmly. To – in short – expend energy I did not agree to expend.

The power systems out in the world are entirely in their favor. And reversing that power in every interaction takes energy, time, and space from my life.

I do it and I will continue to do it, but it is not something I choose. It is something the world demands from me. To become their villain by asserting boundaries, by refusing to stay silent, by standing in my power.

Which is part of why femdom and findom are so centering, powerful, and delicious to me.

Not because they are the only places I assert my power but because they are where I choose to assert it and it is appreciated instead of demonized.

My power in this space is begged for. It’s sought after. It’s valued. It’s recognized. It’s rewarded.

Not as something handed to me. But as something I built, I maintain, I wield.

Outside this space, I wield it like a weapon. Inside this space, I bestow it like a gift. I use it not to harm but to hold.

To hold your submission. Your truths. Your fantasies. Your secrets. Your darkness and mine.

Here, my power is fully mine, fully realized. My beauty, too.

Here, it is not yours to demand; it’s mine to give – or more usually, to withhold.

You will not touch me. You cannot touch me. I do not have to stop you. I do not have to place you underneath my boot.

You climb under and beg for the pressure. For the pleasure or pain I choose to give you.

Outside, I put men in their place because they force me to. Like a mosquito in my ear.

But not here.

Here, when I expend energy or give attention, it is because I want to. Because you have submitted, exchanged some of the power society handed you, acknowledged that that power never should have been yours in the first place, submitted to the power I have cultivated despite all of society’s efforts to crush it.

That is the power you long for. The one that comes from love, not hate. The one that comes from acting, not reacting.

The one that pulls you in like moth to flame, lets you know you can trust the boot you place your face under. It will only crush you as much as you want to be crushed. It will only push you as much as you need to be pushed.