Feelings Game

In this shibari tutorial, Lief and Icky share one of their labbing-for-better-rope games to help you and your tying partners build better communication when tying: the Feelings Game.

The Feelings Game is an adaption of an exercise developed by the Devil Mask Society as part of their tying Cell curriculum. That curriculum is open source and can be found on their website: devilmasksociety.com

In shibari, we often speak of rope as a ‘language’ for communicating intent, so how do you make sure nothing gets lost in translation? As Lief and Icky explain, conveying and receiving feeling are the two halves of intent-driven, rewarding rope scenes, and building an effective communication practice and style will better help you feel, well, the things you want to feel. The Feelings Game is a fun and exploratory exercise in building a rope language together with your partner, combining pre-scene negotiation, non-verbal communication skills during tying and, of course, working to convey the desired emotion as clearly as possible.

This class is divided into three parts: a pre-scene negotiation where Icky expresses three feelings they would be open to feeling in ropes during the scene, the non-verbal tying session in which Lief picks one of the negotiated emotions to try to convey, and a debrief interview where we find out of Icky can guess which emotion Lief chose based on their tying alone.

This exercise is suitable for all levels, as long as you allow your own skill set to guide you. Effective communication in ropes doesn’t require complicated techniques or advanced skills – the more you play this game, the more you will come to learn just that!

Not sure what you want to feel in ropes today? Check out this list for some emotional inspiration.

* Captions available for this series: English