When I try to describe what kink means to me, I find it useful to draw a comparison between being kinky and being a writer.

Both are deeply held identities as well as practices, things I do, but also things I am—and, sometimes, things I don’t do, but in their absence, the world feels duller and more lacking.

Both kink and writing are sites of creativity and means of expression. Both bring self-knowledge and self-discovery. Both are, in their own ways, lifelong pursuits with limitless potential for growth and learning.

Both are ways of being curious about and making sense of the world. Both are means of communication—writing with anyone who’s reading, and kink with whoever I’m doing a scene with.

This isn’t a perfect comparison, but I find it useful as a way of getting at where kink resides in my identity and why it matters.

It quiets the question of why I’m kinky. Like writing, kink is innate to who I am; neither needs (and neither has) an explanation.

It also makes clearer the cost of not talking about kink. I can, if need be, conduct relationships without disclosing that I am a writer, but avoiding the subject takes effort. It creates distance and ultimately leaves the other person with a distorted or fragmented impression of me. That’s to say nothing of how, if I don’t disclose that I’m a writer, I’m supposed to make connections with other writers, let alone find people to write with.

Okay, the subtext here is, as they say, rapidly becoming text, but I share this analogy to illustrate that having kink as an innate part of my identity and practice often means being pressured not to talk about key areas of who I am and what I do.

Kink, like art, is a way of making connections. But as with art—as with anything—I can only make connections around kink if I first acknowledge it exists.