When we live outside ourselves, and by that I mean on external directives only rather than from our internal knowledge and needs, when we live away from those erotic guides from within ourselves, then our lives are limited by external and alien forms, and we conform to the needs of a structure that is not based on human need, let alone an individual’s. But when we begin to live from within outward, in touch with the power of the erotic within ourselves, and allowing that power to inform and illuminate our actions upon the world around us, then we begin to be responsible to ourselves in the deepest sense. For as we begin to recognize our deepest feelings, we begin to give up, of necessity, being satisfied with suffering and self-negation, and with the numbness which so often seems like their only alternative in our society. Our acts against oppression become integral with self, motivated and empowered from within. In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness, or those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial. — Audre Lorde, Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power
I’ve been working my way through adrienne maree brown’s book, Pleasure Activism, which I mentioned to you all in a newsletter a few weeks ago. It’s been slow going, not because the book isn’t fascinating, but because I am in such a heavy season of paying work that I can barely find the time or the focus for it. I did come across this passage in an essay by Audre Lorde, however, which brown includes in her volume, that struck me as important to our conversation here.
The only way to sustain a joyful integrity practice, rather than one that is ruled entirely by external duty, is to root deep down into our own erotic yes. From that anchored place, we may find resonance with belief systems that originated outside of us. We may find belonging in community with like-hearted folks. But we are always grounding our discernment within, rather than trying to source it from ideas and people outside of ourselves.
I don’t know how to instruct folks to root down into their erotic yes. I can tell you it is a deeply embodied thing, which is related to, but not solely expressed through, our capacity to claim an authentic sensual pleasure. But an erotic yes is bigger than that, as enormous as that is. It is a knowing, an instinct, felt in the gut and the chest, communicated through the breath. It is a natural turning towards— like sunflowers following the sun— a person, place, job, idea, piece of art, or experience.
We, particularly women and femmes, are trained out of this natural turning towards, and the converse, instinctual turning away, which is our equally erotic no. Instead, we are taught to be accommodating, pleasant, helpful, and reverent in the face of systems of power. For me, to begin to hear the voice of my erotic yes has been a long practice of allowing myself to say, “I want that” and “No, I don’t want that” and not balking when my wanting or refusal causes discomfort or inconvenience for other people.
Not, obviously, as if I get to have everything I want, or take things that are not mine to claim. So sometimes it is seeing something I want and realizing I might have to put some work in to provide that thing for myself. The ability to delay gratification and commit to the necessary physical, mental, or emotional labor to claim and integrate a newly desired thing is part of erotic integrity.
I am reminded of people I have known, mostly women, who could not answer in an affirmative way the simplest of questions connected to their own embodied wanting.
”What do you want to eat for dinner?” “Oh, whatever. You choose.”
“Where do you want to go this afternoon?” “Wherever you want to go.”
How precarious, to place the fulfillment of your wanting entirely in the hands of others, while not giving them any information about what you want in the first place! I suspect people who affect this sort of people-pleasing, self-effacing manner don’t believe they deserve to have what they want, and I can’t decide if that makes me indignant or brokenhearted. Honestly, it’s both.
To pursue an integrity practice does not simply entail getting clear on your beliefs and mustering the courage to live them. It also involves knowing, on the most basic, instinctual, and embodied level, what you want, and being willing to own that wanting. To admit it to yourself. To proclaim it without apology to others. And to commit to whatever work you must do to have whatever it may be.