Giver or Receiver: Top Bottom or Versatile?

So what’s your preferred position in the giving and receiving game?

There is a time honoured principle in Faerie Community that No-one is Turned Away For Lack Of Funds (NOTAFLOF). Those who have easier access to financial resources are invited to give more than the break-even cost of events and those who don’t are invited to give less cash or none at all. This challenges the community to grapple with the dynamics of giving and receiving money.

It has caused me, personally, to reflect on how it is possible for giving and receiving- not just in terms of cash but in all energetic aspects-to settle into a balanced equilibrium and allow for harmonious inter-personal relationships within community.

In Faerie-space I have often received great pleasure from giving but there have been times when my giving has caused me to feel depleted and has not necessarily felt welcomed. As a recovering people pleaser and approval seeker I have struggled to be comfortable in the receiving position. I could also feel guilt or resentment that my giving was out of balance with my receiving. 

So I developed my own Faerie Acronyms GOAA-BAGS and ROAN-BARS. I determined to Give Only As Able-But Always Give Something and to Receive Only As Needed-But Always Receive Something. An effort to balance my giving and receiving on the basis of my ability to give and of my need to receive.

This was all fine and dandy until I came across the ‘Wheel of Consent', a model of consensual giving and receiving developed by Betty Martin. Within this model the concepts of giving and receiving are each partitioned into two modes and set within a framework of consent. 

Consensual giving can be both active and passive. When it’s active it is offering an accepted SERVICE and when it’s passive it is ALLOWING an agreed action of taking.

Similarly consensual receiving is active when it involves TAKING something that someone has allowed and it is passive when it is ACCEPTING an agreed offered service.

So, penetratively speaking, I can give by either offering the SERVICE of a thorough fucking (active), or by ALLOWING someone to take pleasure from fucking me (passive). I can receive by TAKING pleasure from being allowed to fuck (active) or by ACCEPTING the offered fucking (passive).

From all of this I have learned that even gifts need to be accepted or taken consensually. I have also become more conscious of my preferred modes within this framework. I can understand now why I’m happy to fuck as a service and to allow a fucking to happen to me (active and passive giving) whereas the taking pleasure from fucking someone or the acceptance of a good servicing (without fretting about the comfort of the servicer) -active and passive receiving- are still areas of growth and exploration for me….

Tough work, I know, but somebody’s got to do it!