“just pay attention, then patch
a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway
into thanks, and a silence in which another voice may speak”
From Praying by Mary Oliver
As a fairly new but dedicated pupil at Rebstudiet, I have kindly been asked to write about kinbaku and my own experiences in rope. I hope you would like to follow along and join in the conversation. I am but one voice.
I am a dirty, flirty and nerdy rope bottom/model and the female half of the profile TetheredFeathers, which I share with my husband and rigger. Our rope journey began in January 2025 and since February 2026 we have been regular pupils at Rebstudiet. Rope is our kink and a deep part of our sexuality. Here we explore, communicate, play, fuck, discover and evolve. Kinbaku has now become an integrated practice in our life and marriage, and Rebstudiet is where we have found our “home” of rope and where we have lost our hearts to semenawa. My husband and I have been together for 22 years, we started from scratch on this journey together and we do not tie with a lot of other people. Therefore my experiences and our approach to kinbaku may look completely different than yours.
Studying, practicing, reading and writing are a big part of who I am in both my professional life, my private life and my kink life. My professional background is in academia, where I have a Master’s degree in Scandinavian Language and Literature and Dramaturgy. I tell you this because it influences the way I approach kinbaku. My background in theatre gives me a playful, sensuous and somatic approach to kinbaku and my background in literature gives me an analytical and reflective approach. Humanities and arts are the lenses through which I view, experience and analyze the world, and you will feel this in my writing. This does not mean that it is the truth but it is my truth as of this moment in time.
Besides my foundation in literature and theatre I have become increasingly interested in Zen philosophy and Zen aesthetics which I actively study and use in relation to kinbaku on a practical and a theoretical level to both add depth and perspective to my own practice and my understanding of it.
Also I like to have fun, to be loud and laugh a lot — also in rope. Does it sound contradictory? Well, welcome to me. I am very passionate about authenticity! Being myself and using my voice to create space for reflection and sharing of experiences is important to me. I am perhaps a little bit of an activist and a purist, but I do not use AI in my writing. I will not voluntarily silence myself by handing over my voice to an algorithm. I am human and I think, read and write to become human. I write about my lived experiences, my reflections, my feelings and thoughts, and I do this both for myself and in the hope that anyone reading them will hear my voice and feel inspired to use their own. It might be messy, it might be flawed and it might be biased, but it will be authentically me.
Writing with your own voice should never be a contest “but the doorway into thanks, and a silence in which another voice may speak”.
Disclaimer: TetheredFeathers has complete autonomy in her writings and is not under editorial supervision from anyone other than herself.