While the journey towards becoming a competent rigger is fairly clear, the journey towards skillful rope bottoming isn’t such a well charted course. Yes, you can learn about nerves and circulation in shibari. You can learn about communication strategies in rope. You can attend classes that are geared towards riggers but that benefit you as well (I make every uplines class I ever teach free to any rope bottoms who want to attend). And still, the fact of the matter is that bottoming in rope is a very internal practice.
Whereas a rigger can look at the friction of their teacher and compare it to their own, watching another person be tied brings up all sorts of comparison points that are not easy (nor particularly helpful) to try to rectify. Ultimately, the way you feel in rope is going to be a unique-to-you experience, and cultivating a sense of yourself in rope in all of your beautiful complexity is a very valuable skill to develop. I think journaling is just one way to get at this valuable self-knowledge, and I’d like to share some prompts for you to use or adapt as you see fit!
Illustrator: Jo Richardoz What makes a skillful rope bottom? Before I dive into my pitch of journaling as a useful practice for rope bottoms, I want to interrogate a bit what I even mean when I reference a “skillful rope bottom”. And I want to preface that I deeply believe that anyone who wants to be tied is able and deserving of being tied exactly as they are. You don’t need to look or move a certain way to be skillful. You do not need to hang serenely in minimalist suspensions to be skillful. I do believe that there are skills attached to rope bottoming that can be cultivated. I’m using the word skillful to describe a rope bottom who has an idea of what they want out of a rope encounter, the ability to communicate about those wants, and the capacity to stay attuned to relevant safety cues throughout.
Journaling can be a great way to develop some of the skills contained within this picture of a rope bottom. The following prompts are just suggestions. I encourage you to take what works for you and leave (or modify!) what doesn’t.
What to include in a rope journal Who? What? When? Where? Start by answering your general “who, what, when, where” questions. Who were you tying with? What’s the nature of your relationship? If this person is a familiar tying partner, maybe just a name will suffice. If this person is newer to you, you could say more. What made you want to tie with them? What did you negotiate?
You could also include notes on yourself. How was your body feeling that day? Well-rested? Injured? Stuffed full of a burrito 10 minutes before you started tying? Did you have any jitters or anxiety about the tie and the person you were tying with? Describe your physical, mental, and emotional state.
Then describe the tie. You could describe the specific harnesses and broad sequence if you were doing a suspension. You could also just describe specific moments/shapes and the overall arc of the scene. This would be a good point at which to note how the rope felt. Were there moments early on when something felt not quite right? Did it become a bigger problem or did it settle?
Illustrator: Jo Richardoz Immediate reactions and things of note Best session ever? Crappy communication? New passion for predicament play? Make note of it!
This is the most customizable section of all. What reactions, thoughts or feelings do you want to record in this moment? That could be the entire prompt, or you may discover that, over time, certain types of observations keep bubbling to the surface. Noticing what surfaces here might be a great clue as to what sorts of things you really value in a rope scene, so I’d encourage you to keep this space in your journal a little loose for a while!
Problem solving Did anything go “wrong”? Were you and your rigger able to course correct and continue the scene? Did something cause an abrupt ending? Was there anything that you kept to yourself but would like to have happen differently in the future?
This specific prompt might be answered with your rigger’s input. This could be especially useful if you’re a bottom who doesn’t tie. In the beginning of your bottoming journey, you might only be able to communicate problems in terms of “something hurts” or “this feels wrong”. As you evolve as a bottom, your communication will grow more specific: “the tension here feels imbalanced” or “I need the rope on my left shin moved up”. Checking in with your rigger after the fact might help you to figure out if there were ways you could have communicated more effectively to facilitate the scene continuing smoothly.
By debriefing with your rigger post-scene, you might also learn more about how rope works. In the heat of the moment, it’s easy for both parties to get flustered and end a scene early if anything goes awry. Once the rope is off and the moment has passed, discuss if a rope could have been moved or a position changed in order to relieve the problem. By having this debrief, you’ll learn more about what you could suggest the next time you find yourself needing a change in rope.
Highs and lows What were your favorite moments? When did you feel the most [insert-desirable-feeling-here] ? What were your greatest moments of challenge within the scene? I find this specific prompt to be deeply important, because it is so easy for rope bottoms to feel something go wrong and start to engage in negative self-talk: My body isn’t as strong as it used to be. Why can’t I take as much pain/minimalism/sadism as that other bottom over there? Did I disappoint my rigger?
Illustrator: Jo Richardoz I’d like to suggest here that if negative self-talk came up, this is a great opportunity to intervene. Take a moment and reflect on the descriptive questions above. Were you set up for success? It took me years to realize that some of the scenes I looked forward to the most (and subsequently placed the most pressure on) happened in spaces that were the least conducive to me sinking in and having a good time (think dungeon spaces with LED lights and loud music, etc.). Because I wanted so badly for these ties to be great, when they went poorly, I was quick to blame myself and my body.
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