Emotional Masochism and Sadism
Sadism is the condition in which one’s sexual gratification comes from making another person suffer. Its counterpart is masochism, where a person’s sexual pleasure comes from experiencing pain. Most of us can accept the idea that physical pain can enhance a sexual experience, but what about mental anguish? Emotional masochists experience pleasure from feelings that many people would consider negative, among them objectification, humiliation, jealousy, and abandonment. Emotional sadists get off on delivering and observing this torment. I will talk about my experience with this type of play and why it is appealing and fulfilling for me. I will answer questions like: Why are people interested in emotional S&M? Is this type of play abusive and does it permeate an entire relationship? How do you recover from hurt feelings? How can you tell when you are pushing emotional sadism too far? What are some skills emotional masochists and sadists need? In addition, I’ll show you different ways to hurt someone’s feelings, and give examples of emotions that can be made into scenes. I will close the class with a demonstration of what we hope turns out to be an intensely emotional scene and a Q&A.