"It Is Done."

On Friday, June 20, 2014, I submitted my resignation from a job which I’ve held for the past eight years. I have no new job lined up, I have no savings or safety net, and the job market in London is unfavourable.

Boy do I feel dumb.

There are all sorts of reasons I could have (and probably should have) talked myself into staying at a job which made me miserable every single day, but I finally decided that enough was enough. As of August 1st, I'm free.

Now to find something to pay the bills.

If you’ve been reading my blog to this point, you probably know that I intend to become a practicing Dom. This seems like as good a time as any to start. That’s not going to be my main focus, however. Long before I knew I had an interest in domination, I had been helping people, friends and lovers alike, to feel more comfortable and confident in themselves and their sexuality. Over the years I’ve learned a lot about men, women, and the nature of intimacy.

I would like to offer my services as an Intimacy Coach.

“What’s an intimacy coach?”, you might ask. I see an intimacy coach as a person who can help develop a person’s confidence in the bedroom and smooth the way for more enjoyable intimate interactions. Most of the women I’ve known have been unable to fully enjoy themselves during sex because their minds are caught up with what their partner might think of them.

A quick aside, even if you're 100% certain that your partner thinks the world of you, focussing on it in the bedroom will only keep you from engaging fully and enjoying yourself. How much more  this is true if you're worried that you don't look good, or that you won't be good at it, or that you might fart.

None of that matters, not really. Sex is about two people enjoying each other, and themselves. I will teach my clients to worry about their own satisfaction, and let the rest fall into place.

Becoming comfortable in bed isn't easy, and it takes practice above all. I'm here to help with the practice. From learning how to talk about sex and desires, to being comfortable being naked together, right up to orgasm, or not, and teaching my client, man or woman, that the orgasm isn't the point.

How far it goes would be completely up to the individual. If all you need is a sex talk, I can do that. If you want the full practical experience, I can do that too. Sex is a passion of mine. Not just having it or studying it, but teaching about the human body and how it relates to confidence. I hope that this has helped to explain my views and thoughts. If anyone out there thinks that they or someone they know might benefit from my experience, please point them my way.

Thanks for reading,

-Step

TransGenre

Well, NaNoWriMo is over for another year. Any of you who follow me on twitter should already be aware how I fared. For those of you who don't, YOU SHOULD, but also, I won! My final word count as of November 30th was 50 518 words. Now, I'm sure I'll need to add at least another 20 000 to properly finish the story, then comes the long and arduous process of editing, but right now, it feels good to have accomplished so much in one month.

Reading back over what I've written gave me pause for consideration. The novel I'm writing could cautiously be described as steamy. It involves sex, domination, and sensuality, but I didn't set out to write (nor have I created) a work of erotica. So we come to the topic of this post.

What separates Literary Fiction that centres around sex and self discovery from Erotica? How do you define Sci-Fi, and is it really a genre? What makes one modern novel about vampires Urban Fantasy, and another Horror?

Genre is a loose classification system which is really very arbitrary. If you get two readers in the same room, reading the same books, they’ll likely disagree about what genre a certain book fits into. I’ve looked all over a bookstore for a specific work, and then found it in the exact section I was avoiding.

For the purposes of this blog post, I’m going to be focussing on my first question. What makes something erotica, versus just Fic-Lit involving sex. The reasons for this are that my NaNoWriMo experience is still fresh in my mind, and I’ve got good examples to illustrate this point in particular, though I may go further with this topic in future.

The key difference between Erotica and literature containing sex isn’t whether you use certain words, or how explicite you get with your descriptions, nor is it the quality of the writing. I’ve heard people say that the thing which elevates Erotica into Literature is the quality, and that’s absolutely not true. I’ve read bad literature, and I’ve read good erotica. The real thing which separates erotica from other literature is the purpose for which it was written. Erotica is written to get people off.

Before I go any further, let me preempt any objections to that statement by saying that I’m not passing judgement here. In fact, people who think that I’ve somehow slandered Erotica by saying it’s just about getting off aren’t giving human sexuality its proper respect. In the same way that good science fiction should make us think and good literature should make us feel, good erotica should arouse us and help us understand sexuality. If you want to make a moral judgement, then that’s your business and I’ll have none of it here.

Now, back to my point. Erotica is written to get people off. My novel includes several scenes of domination and submission, mostly in the context of teaching, but there are a couple of straight up sex scenes. These scenes are written not for the purpose of getting people off, though I’m sure they might. These scenes are written to further explore the characters and themes presented in my novel. That’s the distinction.

To illustrate this, I’m going to use some written examples. If you’re offended by sex and sexuality or aren’t interested in reading my erotic content, just skip the rest of this blog post.

This excerpt is from my erotic short story series about a female submissive living in a home with several sister submissives.

“A tingle shot down her spine as she felt him grip her neck. He began to press and she relented, bending at the waist until her breasts and cheek touched the cool wood of the table. She then felt a foot between her ankles, and at his urging, she spread her legs wide, letting the table support her as much as her feet. He stepped back then, and she knew he was examining her. A feeling of slickness ran to her lips. His hands were on her buttocks, spreading them apart. She felt exposed, terribly exposed, gloriously exposed and naked to this, her Master. She had hoped when she came here to serve that he might take an interest in her body, but hadn't counted on it. Kitten was his oldest and truest, and since the new girl had appeared, she'd spent almost every night in his bed, worshipping him. Lady had always been in the background, more a pet to Kitten than to Kitten's Master, but this was her time, her turn to be seen by the Master.

She tried not to get too ahead of herself. Just because he was inspecting her didn't mean he was going to make use of her, but her body trembled in anticipation of it. Then the most amazing thing happened. She hadn't registered him sinking to his knee, in fact she hadn't registered anything except his strong hands on her ass, but all of a sudden she felt the hot slick probing of his tongue on her anus. God, it almost made her cum. That would have been a disaster, but she couldn't help her quick intake of breath on a moan. She'd never, NEVER been touched so intimately by a man in all her life. To have his tongue reaching into her ass... it would have been mortifying if it didn't feel so good.

His hands moved down from her buttocks to her thighs, and she felt his thumbs pry so that she blossomed open. Her clit felt like there was a dew drop balanced on it, about to fall. She bit her lip to keep from moaning again, and then whining as he pulled back to examine her closely.

"Why haven't I ever fucked you before?" he asked.

"I don't know Sir" she gasped.

"Would you like me to?" he asked, even though he could clearly see that she was ready for him.

"If it pleases you, Sir." came the trained response, even though her mind and body were screaming yes, yes, yes, GOD yes.

She heard the jangling of his belt as he loosened his pants one handed, his other palm pressing down against her tailbone, and his thumb dangerously pressing on her slick anus. She let go of her lip, knowing that tensing up would only make it worse for her. If he intended to take her ass, something very few men had gotten to do, she was determined to enjoy it. As it turned out, she needn't have worried.”

In this scene, there is definitely character development, but it’s clear that the point is to arouse. To contrast, here is an excerpt from the draft of my novel, “Novice”(working title) in which the protagonist has just learned that in order to take part in the society in which he finds himself, he’s going to have to undergo a spanking. He accepts, hesitantly.

“The slaps came quickly. It really didn’t hurt at all for a while. She was just slapping my skin to bring the blood to the surface, as she’d shown me. Every time her hand struck me I clenched my muscles and a thrill traveled up my spine. Then she began to get more serious. Still, it didn’t really hurt for a long while. It stung, it was annoying, but nothing I couldn’t take with grace, and when she stopped to run her hand across my cheeks, there was a tingle of sensation so intense it made me shiver.

“Wooh…” I couldn’t help myself. “That’s interesting.”

“Mm, yes. Isn’t it?” she said with a laugh in her voice.

The next moment my world was centred on a sharp tight pain as she slapped me sharply.

I set my jaw and tried not to react, but before I could process one blow, she'd landed another, and another. She kept her hand moving, never staying in one spot, and I found my mind engaged in the task of anticipating where she would go next. Most of the time I could tell where she was going, but a few times she caught me off guard, and it stung worse, as I hadn't braced for it.

I was too proud to cry out or ask for a moment to rest. She probably knew all about it. We men are proud creatures, I knew I wasn't the first she'd spanked.

She's too good to be new at it. I thought.

I could feel the heat radiating from my ass, my thighs, and I imagined they were bright red. If this was a simple hand spanking, what would the switch feel like? I wasn’t sure I could take it. I wasn’t sure I could take much more of this as it was. Then, she smacked me one final time, so hard that it forced a sound out of me. The shock of the blow was immediate, but as I waited for the next blow, something happened which I wasn’t expecting.

The pain was sharp, but faded slowly. It resounded, and I could feel my pulse flow through the reddened flesh. A warmth spread from the place she’d struck, travelling farther with every beat of my heart. I imagined the pain like a raindrop spreading a shock wave of warmth through my whole body, fading as it travelled further out.”

This scene is definitely arousing(at least to me), but it should be clear that the point is character development. Even the descriptions in the scene show how the character views the world. Now, it’s true that all forms of literature, erotica included, should use good description and incorporate the character’s views into crafting the world, but even though the journey may be the same, the destinations will be different depending on what type of story you’re trying to tell. In this case, and very few others, it’s not how you get there, but where you’re going that matters.

Thanks for reading,

-Step

P.S. If anyone would like to read more of my fiction, send me an email or comment below and maybe I’ll make it happen!

P.P.S. This weekend I’m going to be helping the lovely and talented purveyor of Angelique Trinkets pimp her fantastic jewelry at the Ottawa Pop Expo. If anyone out there reading my blog is going to be there, please stop by the table to check us out!

The Ides of NaNo (This one's for the writers out there.)

Here we are, November the 15th.

If you payed attention to my NaNoWriMo post you would know that that means I should be at approximately 25000 words.

So how much have I actually gotten written? 

21887.

That's right, I'm behind! Unlike this blog, however, I'm not going to just forget about it. With half a month left to go, I have faith that I'll be able to pick up the pace and get my 50000 written on time.

The question which plagues me is this. What if I'm not finished the book? What if I complete my fifty thousand words and I'm not quite at the climax, or maybe nowhere even close to it?

I keep going of course, but I mean according to the rules. Can you still win if you're not finished? Can you just fake it and call the rest editing? Is that really the point?

Of course not.

The point is to write, and that I have been doing. For any of you other NaNoers out there, keep it up! You can do it. Even if you don't have your full 50k by month's end, you'll still have a heck of a lot more than you did before you started.

Remember, it takes ten thousand hours of doing something until you begin to be good at it. Every word you write brings you closer to that ten thousand hours.

Keep writing!

Thanks for reading,

-Step.

P.S. If you need more inspiration, check out I Should Be Writing. You'll see that the professionals have troubles to work through, and also gain some interesting insights into the nature of writing and procrastination.

NaNoWriMo

I have no idea how often I'll be posting during this month of November, but I've decided that something's better than nothing, and nothing's what I've been putting up for the last six months.

We're already two days into NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and I've just decided to throw up some blog posts on the fly. Tomorrow is also my only day off until the middle of the month. Call me crazy.

For those of you who aren't familiar with NaNoWriMo, here's a little introduction. November is National Novel Writing Month. For those literary types out there, the goal is to write 50 000 words on a single project between November First and November Thirtieth. That works out to roughly 1670 words per day. I managed to do just that yesterday, and it looks like I'll accomplish a similar amount this evening. My personal goal is 2000 words per day, but I think I'll have to work up to that. I'm feeling a little rusty.

I'm also putting this blog post up without editing, so forgive me if it doesn't have the polish that you've come to know and love.

Anyway, this is just a brief note to say I'm back, I'm sorry it's been a while, and it feels good to write again.

If anyone actually is out there reading, feel free to drop me a line at blog.nextstep@gmail.com I always welcome feedback and suggestions.

Thanks for reading,


-Step.

Me Mask

I’ve recently had a number of conversations on this topic and it occurs to me, for the first time, to put this down in writing.

I am one of the shyest people I know, this stemming from a childhood of ridicule and exclusion. In the small town in which I grew up, it felt like I was the whipping boy. Everyone my age seemed to be my enemy. I had very few friends and thought of myself as “that weird kid”. This probably isn’t an unfamiliar story to some of my readers.

Something which compounded the problem, however, was that as I grew older, I was told by parents, teachers, and peers that I was arrogant or a know it all. I feel that my early attempts to share information were seen as my trying to be better than others, something which I still deny.

At some point my social interactions pretty much split into two parts, which each equally affected my sense of self. My online interactions grew up around changing my form and becoming a different person to fit each different situation so that I wouldn’t have to feel odd or left out. I learned to role play and act, to throw myself into a different mentality, which is still something I love to do. My in-person interactions were focussed on being hurt as little as possible while still connecting to the world around me.

The culmination of both of these streams was the development of my Me Mask. I retreated farther and farther inside the shell which was Me. It has become a character which I play and is in every way exactly the same as the real me. It has flaws, and can even discuss its flaws, and I’m okay with that because if people don’t like him, then they are simply disliking the character I’m playing, not the person I am.

I still wear this mask every day. I’ve only dropped it for any length of time with two people since I put it on. One of those people hurt me a great deal, and I think part of me (the stupid part of me) is waiting for the other to do the same.

I’m not sure if there’s a point in discussing this concept, but I figured since one person recently reacted to my explanation of my Me Mask with “OMG, that’s so me! I’ve never met anyone else like that”, maybe there are more of us. Maybe everyone’s like us, and we don’t realize it. Maybe we’re all walking around in a world of fragile, terrified individuals, and the ones who are warm and happy and engaging are simply wearing better masks.

Maybe one day I’ll be able to step out from behind my mask and let my friends and family get a good look at me. For now, I’ll find consolation in the fact that the mask at least fits perfectly, and is for all intents and purposes, transparent.

Thanks for reading,

-Step.

End of Month Update: April

Well, it finally happened. I failed. For two weeks, I have failed to update on Monday. I guess that means I should stop trying and throw in the towel altogether, right?

Failure is a hard thing to deal with, but much harder is picking up and carrying on when you’ve become discouraged. Even something which may seem small to others may have great psychological effects if you let it, and the longer you put it off or avoid it, the worse your discouragement can become. I’ve waited two weeks, and I’m using my monthly update as a jumping off point to carry on.

I could (and will) give you the reasons I found it difficult to update, but if I’d really put my mind and heart into it, I’d have been able to, no matter the opposition. The failure was mine, no excuses.

Now, on to my successes!

I’ve still been slacking on Fitocracy, so if anyone out there wants to motivate me, feel free to give me a poke. I am doing well with my weight however. Even after two weekends of bad food, my weight is back down to 295, and I’m hoping to keep on top of that. The fact that I have been ill over the past week probably had something to do with my weight loss, but I’ll get into that later.

My house is reasonably clean, but in need of work. I’m having my Kitten put together and prioritize a list of home improvements. I have my own list of course, but most of what I want to do requires money which I don’t have at the moment.

Business is looking both more and less feasible. Everything I learn leads me to three more things I need to work toward, and I’m not moving nearly fast enough. I’ve got someone who’s willing to teach me about fire, and that’s exciting. I watched a demonstration with flash cotton which was absolutely stunning. The thing which I need to spend time on at the moment, however, is attitude. I’ve been far too soft on my Kitten, and she’s begun telling me so. I need to work her harder and I have a few ideas of how to accomplish this. Wish me (and her) luck ;)

So that’s my health, my blog, my home, and my business and skills all dealt with tidily. Now I’d like to add a little more information about what’s been going on over the past three weeks.

After my post about birthdays, I got extremely busy. I’ve been letting my responsibilities slide over the last couple of months, due to depression and anxiety. This all came to a head this month as I’ve got to file my taxes. My built up anxiety was still there, however, and it started to direct itself toward my blog. I couldn’t face the prospect of writing for an audience, and I choked. I know it probably seems silly to a non-writer (writers may have a bit more sympathy), but the idea of someone else reading something you’ve written can be a scarey thing on a good day, nevermind when you’re already anxious.

Anyway, I skipped a blog post, felt terrible, and went on with life. The next week was fantastic. On Tuesday I went to a friend’s place for dinner, and then to a Munch, and then to a strip club with a group of sex positive friends and got treated to lap dances all night. It was a great experience. After that, I had to pack and prepare for the convention which another friend had invited me to on the weekend.

UBCon is held at the University of Buffalo every year and Josie, the creator of Angelyque Trinkets, had a table in Artist’s Alley this year. She needed a second person on her table, so she asked me to help out. It was a fantastic experience and I’ll likely be doing it again sometime soon. I would like to think that I helped her sales (which were record breaking!) with my friendly and competent demeanor, and I’ve been told since that I make good eye candy, which I suppose means I’m going to have to believe people who tell me I’m attractive, despite my own opinions on the matter.

Upon returning home of course, I was afflicted with Con Crud, and had to spend some time recuperating in bed. I used that as an excuse to further put off updating my blog, and the guilt started to return. This, added to the fact that the boss was away at my day job and I was primarily in charge, and my Kitten was out of town on her own adventures, all added up to make me a tightly coiled ball of stress. I managed to level out near the end of the week, however, and was quite affable by the time my dad came to stay this past weekend.

I don’t get to see my Dad very often, and neither of us are much for the telephone, so having him come and stay was a rare treat. We went for a long walk, spent some time in the garden, got creative in the kitchen, and shared a few pints.

Three fantastic experiences. The Tuesday outing, the convention, and my father coming to visit. Even with the stress and the sick in the middle I’m feeling much better and, what’s more, rested.

I’ve been looking back over the blog, and recognize something I’ve been avoiding for some time. I started this thing to spark conversation, to voice the unpopular opinion, and, in my own small way, to change the world. I’m not going to accomplish that if I keep shying away from the posts I want to write for fear of what people may think. It’s inexcusable that I’ve gone this long without speaking on the topics of Feminism, Pornography, Marriage, Mass Media, Global American Influence, Internet Stupidity, Intellectual Property, and the like. I’ve got strong opinions, and I’m going to have to start voicing them if I want this to go anywhere. Look forward to it!  ;)

Thanks for reading,

-Step.

Spinning Our Wheels

Sometimes no matter how hard we try, we just don’t have the power to gain traction and dig ourselves out of a rut. As the owner of a small car in Ontario, who can’t really afford snow tires, I know this all too well. When I’m spinning my wheels (thereby making things worse), it can really be disheartening to see the lack of progress. Sometimes, if I’ve got the presence of mind, I’ll remember to gear down and take it slower. More likely, I’ll remember that rocking the car to build up momentum can help me get over the edge and into the clear. When neither of those things work, however, I have to rely on someone else to give me a push. Be it a helpful passerby, a passenger on my journey, or a friend who is willing to show up to help out, there are just some ruts I can’t get out of on my own.

Moving this problem to the metaphoric, I’ve been running up against old bad habits and emotional lows for the last few weeks, one of which will feed off the other in a never ending cycle. I’ve tried to slow down and take things easy. I’ve tried switching between work and play, rewarding work with play in an attempt to promote a healthier, more enjoyable outlook. I’ve even tried pushing myself just a little harder, to see if I could keep going through the worst of it. All that does is cause me to freeze up entirely.

There’s only one solution I haven’t tried. I need to ask for help. I’m not even sure of what kind of help I need, but starting today I’m going to make an attempt to open up to the people around me and see what a little outside influence will do. I’m starting here. If you have any comments or suggestions for me, please feel free to send them along. The comment button is below, or you can reach me at blog.nextstep@gmail.com. I’ll be happy to hear from anyone, and also if there’s something you feel I can help you with, or a question you have, send those along too. We’ve all got flaws and problems. It’s hard to admit it, but unless we do, we’ll never improve.

Next I’ll be asking my friends and family for support, which I should have done a long time ago. It’s just so much harder to open up to someone I care about rather than a complete stranger. I have no personal investment in what a stranger might think of me, but the possibility of disappointing someone who cares about me is scarey.

Finally, I’ll think long and hard about what’s worthwhile in my life, and what I might need to change sooner, rather than later. I know I’m being vague and mysterious here, but nobody said I had to tell my dear readers everything. Here’s wishing you all have smooth dry pavement on your travels, but if you hit a bump and get stuck in a rut, remember to slow down, think about what you’re doing, and ask for help if you need it.

Thanks for reading,

-Step.