New to everything - no idea where to start

[PureDom27]

Hi everyone,

I've dealt with Depression/ADHD a lot throughout my life, and as a result never really had the chance to focus on things outside of getting through each day and doing my best. Unfortunately, this means I've been left as a virgin at 27 in almost every way other than a one-off experience at a BDSM munch 6-7 years ago - mostly due to my lack of ability to take hold of opportunities.

Now that I've finally gotten a better hold of the reins in my life again, I'm looking to explore more aspects of myself, including what I consider a major part of me which is my sexuality and its nuances.

I've heard of mentorship in the BDSM community but I have little knowledge of how it works or how to ask for help with it. I was also considering looking for an interested sub to experiment/explore with.

Does anyone have any advice on how to approach this? Is my situation very rare? Should I learn to play the dating circuit and see if I can slowly explore things there?

[ey****]

Mentorship isn't as common these days. It still exists, to a degree, but you basically don't go round approaching people to be your mentor.   It also should be someone you're not engaging in play with.  

Generally, there's so much resource on the internet these days that a lot of 1-to-1 mentoring is less required. But it may be if you meet people and make friends there might be someone happy to show you a few things or help you out with your knowledge above a lot of just learning through talking.

Your situation isn't all that rare in the sense there are many people who want to explore kink but don't really know where to start or even what that means to them

A lot of munches are starting back up again - go to some, make friends  But also with so much info on the web, take some time to learn what you might want but it is important to divide fantasy/fiction from reality.

[ge****]

Can't really add a great deal to what eyem has so concisely said to be honest - I'd just add not to have any great expectations but try to remain open minded - get along to munches and even Fet Clubs that have demo evenings/afternoons and network at them - get to know people as people, not with a view to anything more.