One of the greatest things you can do for yourself in life is to have goals—ones you meticulously pour yourself into. Career goals, financial goals, fitness goals, whatever. But what's a goal without discipline and emotional regulation? In a world cluttered with constant communications, horrible news cycles, and burnout, it can be hard to stay aligned with what you actually want to achieve.
For me, BDSM has been the framework that changed everything.
For a little bit of context: I've been involved in some form of BDSM play for... well, long before I should have been doing those things. But over the last eight or so years, I've changed my relationship with it, and it's completely transformed how I approach goal-setting. BDSM has taught me discipline: how to commit to something, show up for it, and see it through. Not just because I've made a promise to a partner, but because I've made a commitment to myself. At the end of the day, I am my ultimate dom. And no, that isn't the brattiest thing I've ever said.
Before this shift, I was floating through life with vague aspirations but no real follow-through. I started small with water intake goals and small savings targets, then slowly built from there. Over time, especially during the pandemic when I was reevaluating everything, goal-setting and habit-building became central to my practice. Work hard, play hard, or whatever.
So here's what I've learned about using BDSM as a framework for discipline and achieving your goals.
Accountability
I assume the obvious approach would be to say that you set the goals with your partner, you track them, and you get a sticker or something. Which, objectively, is not wrong, and I think that works and is great. But I want you to think about your role in this.
Yeah, having a partner for accountability is nice—someone to check in with, someone who knows your goals and can call you on your bullshit. But you don't need one. Because the person you're really making commitments to is you. That's the thesis here. BDSM has taught me that I'm accountable to myself first.
When I started using kink as a framework for goal-setting, I began with small things. Water intake. Hitting a monthly savings target. Nothing dramatic. But the shift was in how I thought about it: I wasn't just trying to drink more water. I was making a commitment to myself to be more hydrated and to feel connected to my body and power me through the day. Not only that, but I was going to show up for it the same way I'd show up for a scene I'd negotiated.
In BDSM, you negotiate what you'll do, and then you follow through. The accountability isn't just to your dom or your sub, it's to the agreement you made. Same with your goals. You made the agreement with yourself. Now show up.
Lately I've been exploring this app called Dommi, which is basically a habit and goal tracker framed through kink dynamics. You can do it solo or with a partner. It's still in beta, and transparently I haven't fully dove into it as much as I'd like to. But I like where it's going and how they're thinking about accountability. Sometimes you need structure outside yourself, whether that's a partner, an app, a journal, whatever works. But the core remains: you're accountable to you.
Ritual & Routine
There's a structure to kink that I think gets overlooked. If you've ever actually done a scene—like, a real scene, not just spontaneous play—you know there's a rhythm to it. You set the scene. You're in the scene. And then there's aftercare. It's not just about what happens in the middle; it's about the preparation and the follow-through. That's how I've started thinking about my entire life.
I'm someone who really loves time blocking. But for me, having that structure, that ritual around my day, helps me actually show up for the things I say I want to do. My gym time is blocked. My work hours are blocked. Even my "fuck around and do nothing" time is blocked, because if I don't build it in, I'll just spend hours watching Ash Trevino on TikTok.
The intentionality of preparing for a scene is the same intentionality I bring to my goals. You don't just walk into a scene and wing it. You think about what you want, what you need, what the energy is. You create the right environment. For me that means applying this intentionality to my goals, setting them up, tracking them, adjusting as needed, and of course the reward. I don't just say, "I'm going to save money." I set up the structure: automatic transfers, budget check-ins, the whole thing.
In case you're wondering, I really love building a yearly board on Notion, breaking it up into quarters and breaking down my goals by sections—think career, finance, fitness, spiritual, creative, etc. I then on several occasions have been known to make fun little charts and spreadsheets, because why not.
And then there's aftercare. You don't just finish a scene and immediately go check your email. You take a beat. You process. You take care of yourself. I think that's what most people skip with their goals. They just grind and then wonder why they're burned out. But you need the aftercare: the reflection, the rest, the acknowledgment that you showed up.
Routine can be ritual if you let it. It can be your Tuesday morning tea while you review your budget. It's all about how you make it meaningful and healing to you.
Reward & Consequence Systems
Let me be honest: some of you losers need a star chart to track your fucking goals. And you know what? That's fine. Whatever works.
BDSM is built on reward and consequence dynamics. Good behavior gets rewarded, while bad behaviors aren't, and outright disrespecting the boundaries is an immediate pause. But the key with this is that you have to actually care about the reward or the consequence for it to mean anything.
When I hit a certain debt threshold, getting under a specific number I'd been working toward for months, I treated myself. Not in a "I deserve this because I'm special" way, but in a "this was the agreed-upon reward for hitting this milestone" way. I knew what I wanted, I set the goal, and when I hit it, I got the thing. It mattered because I'd built anticipation around it. I'd earned it through the work, not just because I felt like buying something.
The trick is being honest about what actually motivates you. If gold stars genuinely make you happy, use gold stars. If you need to see your progress visually, make a spreadsheet or use an app. If the reward of just hitting the goal itself is enough, great. But don't lie to yourself about what will actually keep you going.
Power Exchange In The Real World
Once you understand power dynamics in kink, you can't unsee them everywhere else. And honestly? That's actually helpful, not depressing... at least if you frame it right.
BDSM made power exchange explicit for me. Who has what power, when, and why. It's negotiated, it's clear, and it's a structure, not a personal judgment. You're not less valuable because you're submitting in a scene, and your dom isn't inherently superior because they're in control. It's a dynamic you've agreed to, and it serves a purpose.
That clarity changed how I see power everywhere else. Especially at work. I used to take things so personally. If I didn't get promoted, if a project got killed, if someone above me made a decision I disagreed with, I'd internalize it. I'd make it about me, about my worth, about whether I was good enough. But understanding power exchange helped me see: it's the structure. It's not about me as a person.
I can see now where I sit in the hierarchy, what power I have, what I don't, and where I can actually negotiate. And yeah, I'm still frustrated with the structure sometimes. I'm still angry when things don't go the way I think they should. But I don't hold it the same way. I'm not wounded by it because I understand it's not personal. It's just how the power is distributed in that particular system.
This has been huge for my career. I can advocate for myself more effectively because I understand the game being played. I know when to push, when to negotiate, and when to recognize that I'm hitting a structural limit that has nothing to do with my competence. And within that I am better able to understand when my goals are attainable, or worse, when they aren't. From there I can structure them significantly better.
Communication & Negotiation
BDSM taught me that "maybe" isn't a useful answer. You need yes, no, or "let's negotiate."
Before you can communicate your goals to anyone else, you have to communicate them to yourself. What do I actually want here? Why do I want it? Am I trying to save money because I want financial security, or because I want to feel important, or because I'm wanting a luxury purchase to affirm my status? Understanding your motivation matters because it helps you set real goals instead of goals you think you should have.
In kink, pre-scene negotiation is everything. What do you want? What are your limits? What's the plan? Hard limits vs. soft limits. Where can we meet in the middle where everyone's needs are considered? That same clarity applies to everything else.
At work, I've learned to negotiate the same way. "I can do this project, but not on that timeline. This is my hard limit. Can we push the deadline, or do we need to bring someone else in to help?" No hedging, no apologizing for having boundaries. Just clear communication about what's possible and what's not. It's the same with personal goals. If someone asks me to take on something that conflicts with a commitment I've made to myself, I can say, "I can meet you here, but I can't do that. This is my boundary." And then we figure it out.
The key is being honest about your limits and not pretending you have infinite capacity just because you want to please people or prove yourself.
Flexibility, Failure, and Reframing
Here's the thing: I don't reach all my goals. There are goals for a reason. They're what you're aspiring to. And then there are non-negotiables, which are the baseline things you will do no matter what. Understanding the difference between those two is crucial.
The goal might be to save a certain amount in six months. The non-negotiable is that you will save something every month, period. If you hit it in eight months instead of six, you're still saving. Yes, sometimes it's hard not to let those missed timelines cloud you and get you in a funk. I've definitely done that. I've overcorrected, gotten overly ambitious, and then gotten really upset when I couldn't maintain it. Some of it is just a learning curve. Having space to give yourself some slack is important, and will keep things light.
Candidly, I was someone who always had this goal of being C-suite at a tech company, specifically CMO. And part of that meant I really wanted a director title by the time I was thirty... and a Birkin to match. Which I understand is crazy and delusional, but that's who I am. And I obviously did not achieve either of those things. The tech industry went into upheaval, it became very different, I ended up getting laid off in a restructure, and I eventually left and started my own thing. That's not something I ever thought would be a reality at this point in my life.
But I had to sit down with myself, crunch the numbers, and be honest. Actually, it's perhaps better long-term if I put my investment here, in me. And realistically, I had to come to the realization that I probably am not someone they would give a C-suite title to. There are a magnitude of reasons why that's true, and accepting that allowed me to reframe entirely.
But it's not always that dramatic. Sometimes it's small stuff. I couldn't get my 5-mile hike in this week because some deadlines got moved around, and then a friend really wanted to hang out and I missed them. I decided it was actually a better energy investment for me to do that instead. Goal flexibility can be large or small. It doesn't mean I'm not going to hit my fitness goals. It just means I have to find a different way to get there.
Even in kink, sometimes you hit a limit you didn't expect. You recalibrate, check in, adjust. The scene doesn't become a failure. It becomes responsive to reality. Your goals deserve the same flexibility.
Intentionality & Presence
Kink requires you to be fully present. You can't be in a scene while thinking about your grocery list or what you're going to do tomorrow. You have to be in your body, in the moment, responsive to what's actually happening.
Your goals require the same thing.
Being present means showing up to the actual situation, not the imagined one. Not the fantasy of how things should be, but the reality of how things are. And that's harder than it sounds because we all have fantasies about our lives: what we should have achieved by now, where we should be, who we should be.
I had a fantasy about the C-suite path. I had a whole narrative in my head about how my career would go. And at some point, I had to be present enough to realize that narrative wasn't matching reality. I had to crunch the numbers, look at what was actually possible versus what I'd hoped would be possible, and make decisions based on that.
Being intentional means choosing where to invest your energy based on what will actually pay off, not what you wish would pay off. It means regular reality checks: Is this goal still serving me? Is this still what I want, or am I just attached to the idea of it?
Fantasies are fun. They're necessary, even. But you can't live in them. You have to come back to what's real and work with that. Kink taught me that better than anything else. You negotiate the fantasy, you play in it, and then you come back to reality and take care of yourself and assess what actually happened.
Look, I'm not saying BDSM is going to solve all your problems or magically make you a disciplined person overnight. But what it has given me is a framework that actually makes sense to me, one that's built on things I already value like clear communication, accountability, structure, and intentionality. It's taught me that I'm in control of my own life, even when it doesn't feel like it. That I can commit to myself the same way I'd commit to a scene. That I can show up for my goals the same way I show up for my partners.
At the end of the day, you're your ultimate dom. You set the terms. You hold yourself accountable. You decide what's negotiable and what's not. And yeah, sometimes you fail. Sometimes you have to pivot. Sometimes the goal changes entirely. But you keep showing up because you made a commitment to yourself, and that matters.
Work hard, play hard. Or something like that.
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