Monday, July 5, 2010

Jack Rinella: On Dark Play

I'm reading Rinella's The Master's Manual aloud every Thursday evening. I'll post some of the more provocative excerpts.

To repress and deny that we have dark sides to our personalities is to deny stark and very "real" reality. To be Pollyanna is foolishness, dangerous foolishness at that. Repressed, denied, hidden darkness only festers until it vents itself in some other way. Just as uncontrolled bliss, lightness, and goodness is unreasonable, un-experienced evil is an illusion. What we need is a balanced, healthy, and manageable dark event. Such experiences allow us to understand ourselves and our motivations, to give expression to those motives, and, so, reduce their power and their drive. (p. 46-47)

Sadists in the leather community then are those who inflict pleasure. It is pleasure of an intense degree, skillfully induced with necessary caution, measured speed, and careful recognition of the masochist's responses. (p. 48)

Experiencing one's limits, anguish, alternate ego, and suppressed desires is a learning and cleansing process. We face our fear, our selves, our lusts and our raw power. Our deeply hidden drives find expression. So we resolve our doubts and passions, giving vent to them and bringing them into a manageable, understandable light. (p. 83)


The Master's Manual on Amazon.com

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