The room smelt of fresh paint. He was getting a small office space painted and redone in a suburb of South Delhi. I was going to his office, after letting a friend know – someone who stayed closeby. Simply because I needed to ‘know’ pain. I needed to understand whether wanting pain was just a fantasy in my head, or was it something I would like on my body in reality. I had chosen this sadist dom because he came with references, and he was OK with asexual kink.
I was 26, a late bloomer, a virgin, and had never had sex with anyone. I wanted to keep it that way. He stood tall, lean, bald, his stance firm, and a cane in his hand. These were the days, when we did not have hand-crafted leather toys available easily. Owning toys was a source of envy, makeshift toys the norm (yeah yeah, I’m ancient 🙂
“Ready?”, he asked. His voice low, clear, and even kind, but it sent a chill down my spine.
It was surreal. The first stroke. For someone who writes for a living, I have never really been able to ever truly define that moment. The only words that have ever made sense are – “It was like I found a key to some hidden lock in the abyss of my soul.”
Impact play can be quite cathartic, you see. Just that, it has to be done well.
Doing impact play well
But what does doing impact well really mean?
Does it merely mean the skill, the flick of your wrist, your ability to show off your martial arts training? Does it mean a pretense of spanking someone, just because it’s kinky and raunchy? Does it mean having various impact toys and using all of them? Does it mean building the intensity gradually? Does it mean beating someone black and blue? What does good impact play really mean?
Consider
Over years I have played with quite a few Impact Tops (or Sadist Doms if I might call them that). Their desire to inflict pain on my body, and mine to receive from them has been a function of quite a few factors:
- Trust – Did we both trust each other? Did I trust them to stop if I uttered my safe word? Did they trust me to utter my safeword when I needed to? Did we both trust each other to not hold grudges against each other for things that could potentially go wrong?
- Negotiation – Detailed negotiation and post that, erring on the side of caution goes a long way. Just like everything else, impact play also needs detailed negotiation. What toys will be used, how will the pain threshold be determined, what’s their style of play like?
Someone once told me I was being too anal when I asked them about the implements, the intensity, the build-up etc. They told me to shut up and take it like a good sub / masochist. “Experience it in the moment. I know what I am doing”, they said. I ran! - Awareness– These may not sound like the obvious choice for something as tangible and physical like impact play. But knowing that impact can send a sub floating in the subspace, also means knowing how to communicate in a manner that doesn’t wake them up rudely from their reverie.
Very early in my journey I once played with someone who saw I was floating and still pushed me to get ready and go home, because they were scared of their wife returning. I had also played with someone else just around that time who had refused to take me beyond a certain point despite me literally begging them, because they were to take a flight the next morning.
My lesson? Do not play if either of you doesn’t have enough time for aftercare. Do not play with someone who doesn’t have empathy.
- Actual impact skills – These are of course critical. Knowing where to hit or not, knowing which implements cause what kind of pain, marks, bruises, etc., knowing which bruises take how much time to typically heal, knowing what first aid to keep handy, these are not TECHNICALITIES. These are MUST-KNOW!
While all of this sounds very exciting, or to some even theoretical, knowing what to do, and what NOT to do goes a long way!
Learn
But where to learn this must-know? Well, there are books, and of late even videos, demonstrations (I don’t mean porn). And then there are workshops, individual practitioners who coach and teach. Go, ask them, join some workshops, attend local events, talk to people who have been doing it for a few years now.
Speak to both tops and bottoms. It gives you much needed perspective. In fact, even if you’re a top, ask another experienced sadist to top / hit you. It helps you understand the physical sensations.
There’s no denying that no matter how much you read or watch impact play, it won’t send you in the resulting Domspace or subspace. So, observe. Practice. And, err on the side of caution.
On a parting note
Impact play is not just about strokes on naked human flesh. Consensual impact play is a dance. Between the energies of someone who enjoys receiving pain, and another who enjoys inflicting it. The intent behind impact play is not to be destroyed, left unattended, but to feel that headspace where you can trust your top, where you can float on cloud 9 because of your rushing neurohormones.
Impact play is about a connection between two bodies. It’s skin-to-skin connect, deeply intimate during a hand spanking, the spark that flies with the whip, the dull thud when the paddle strikes, the sharp bite of the cane, and the overwhelming distribution of multiple strands of a flogger.
Consensual pain is a vast space – where a deeper bond between the top and the bottom. Impact play – an oak door that leads to its hallway!
Enter prepared. Play safe. Fly on the high.
With Love,
Writer Asmi
