Episode 54: Pleasure Is the Point (with adrienne maree brown)
You are responsible for your pleasure, so what are you doing with it? In this one, Ev'Yan speaks with the brilliant adrienne maree brown about pleasure—the practice of it and why we must engage in the radical act of pursuing it. They talk about adrienne’s book Pleasure Activism, the importance of feeling yourself and your body, and how to create more pleasure in your life. adrienne also offers some potent words about emotional intelligence, working with somatics, and how to balance excess and boundaries with pleasure.
“There’s something around claiming my own pleasure and then figuring out—how do I make it possible that others can feel this?” —adrienne maree brown
Full transcription of this episode is below.
Also mentioned in this episode:
Uses of the Erotic as Power, by Audre Lorde
The work of Prentis Hemphill and Alexis Pauline Gumbs
adrienne’s upcoming workshop with Sonya Renee Taylor — follow their Instagram for information coming soon
adrienne maree brown is the writer-in-residence at the Emergent Strategy Ideation Institute, and author of Holding Change: The Way of Emergent Strategy Facilitation and Mediation, We Will Not Cancel Us and Other Dreams of Transformative Justice, Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good, Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds and the co-editor of Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction from Social Justice Movements and How to Get Stupid White Men Out of Office. She is the cohost of the How to Survive the End of the World, Octavia’s Parables and Emergent Strategy podcasts. adrienne is rooted in Detroit.
Transcription:
Hey, welcome to Sensual Self. I'm Ev'Yan Whitney. And this is a space for you to slow down, tune in, heal and feel the sensations and pleasures of your sensual body. Thank you for being here.
I am really excited to be here with you all today. And before we get into it, I want to take a second to say thank you, I want to say thank you for all of your love and excitement about the announcement of my new book, Sensual Self.
To all of you who have pre-ordered, to all of you who have sent me ecstatic, all caps messages about how excited you are about this book, to everyone who has shared on the internet and also bought copies for their friends—thank you. Thank you so much for your support. Thank you for your kindness. And thank you for spreading the word. I mean, my first book, I am just so excited, and I am so thrilled that so many of you will be able to hold this book in your hands really soon. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, if you're new here, please check out Episode 53, where I go in-depth about my new book, and also this new-ish podcast. If it's easier, you can also just click the link in the show notes.
Okay, so here we are officially beginning this new journey of sensuality, this new journey of embodiment and pleasure. And who better to get as grounded in this mission of slowing down and feeling good in our bodies, than adrienne maree brown.
She is the author of many, many books. But today we're diving deep into Pleasure Activism.
I've been curiously and seriously exploring what pleasure is for the last few years, both in my work, and also in my own personal experience of it. I've been wanting to know what pleasure is not just the generic definition of it that you might find in the dictionary. But what it is to me, like how a pleasure feels in my body, and what my body needs to release or open up to in order to fully feel into a feeling good. And not just from a sexual place. But from this platonic place. As I like to say this day-to-day experience, and practice of pleasure and feeling good.
Reading pleasure activism last year, got me on a track of authenticity with my own pleasure, it helped me to understand not just what it was, but how absolutely powerful it is how absolutely powerful it can be. And what I love about Adrienne Maree Brown's perspective on this is that this isn't about pleasure for pleasures sake, although there's definitely space for that. This has more to do with pleasure as a method of inspiring us to seek social justice, pleasure as a modality that guides us all to changing ourselves and changing the world.
It was actually through Adrienne's work through the profoundness of their writings about pleasure and body and the erotic that I finally found the courage to begin working with somatics as a deeper practice of healing and feeling into my body. This body with all of its sensations, complexities stories and intelligence, somatic system thing I've always wanted to get into, but honestly felt terrified about because I knew that it was going to open me up, I knew that it was going to have me excavating into the wild unknown of all of my traumas, and my own feeling potential. And I don't think they know this, but Adrian's work gave me the push to finally dive in and access deeper parts of myself. All in the name of experiencing what she mentions in this conversation. This idea of reclaiming and embodying the wholeness of myself.
So as you can see, this is a very juicy conversation. And we get into so much so, so much.
We talk about pleasure, of course, and the importance of feeling yourself, and not like feeling yourself like Nicki Minaj, Beyonce, but more like feeling your body, feeling your emotions, feeling your sensations. We talked about access within pleasure, and how to set boundaries around the things that make you feel good so that you can continue feeling good. We talk about emotional intelligence and somatics and making space for social justice within pleasure activism.
We talk about what pleasure activism looks like as a practice, one that guides us throughout our entire lives. And one of my favorite parts of this conversation was when Adrian decided to read to us from a passage of Audrey Lorde's essay Uses of the Erotic as Power. And this is a piece that is a really big foundation that pleasure activism, as an ethos, is swaddled in.
This conversation is so rich, and I invite you to take moments to pause and savor the wisdom that is in it. Which actually might look like you pausing the episode and taking a moment to let Adrienne's words resonate in your body, to feel into what it's waking up and conjuring within you.
And stick around till the end, as I will be doing with every episode on sensual self. I'm going to leave you with a practice inspired by this conversation that you can explore on your own that will help you begin to make pleasure practice for you. Enjoy.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Adrienne, thank you so much for being on Sensual Self today.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, I'm so excited to have this conversation with you. I have to tell you that I devoured Pleasure Activism, right when the pandemic started.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Oh, wow.
Ev'Yan Whitney
And that was a really interesting experience for me to engage in that book and to think about pleasure, while very unpleasurable things were happening, were happening in the world. So first, I just want to thank you for that beautiful offering of Pleasure Activism, that beautiful anthology.
And actually, before we get into the meat of this, of this episode, I wondered if you wouldn't mind introducing yourself?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Who is she? Well, and also, I'm like this first time ever talking in person, even though we've been in communication. Yeah, for the past year. So I'm like, it's Ev'Yan?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, that's right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Adrienne Maree Brown, I am a writer.
The books that are out in the world right now are Emergent Strategy. Octavia's Brood. Pleasure Activism, We Will Not Cancel Us, and Holding Change. Most of them are about how we get in right relationship with each other, the earth and ourselves and how we liberate our natural capacity for joy, pleasure and love, togetherness, interdependence.
I also do some podcasts and yeah, I just moved down south, like, did a reverse migration. And so that's the some of the things about me. I'm a Virgo.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, you are a Virgo. I'm a Virgo too.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yes, of course we are.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah. And also, what are your pronouns?
Adrienne Maree Brown
I use she and they.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Wonderful. Cool. Cool. So let's start this conversation by just really defining and encapsulating if possible, what pleasure activism is like, what does it mean to be a pleasure activist?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah, so I think of it in kind of two realms. And, you know, I almost never speak of it without honoring the lineage of Audrey Lorde's essay, The Uses of the Erotic, [The Erotic] as Power because she's really the one who kind of put me on this path of like, what does it mean to reclaim and embody ourselves, but pleasure activism really is this idea that we have to reclaim ourselves reclaim our right to experience joy and pleasure which we are wired for, which is our nature. But we have been socialized to think that we are less than human, we have been socialized to think that someone else should have power over our pleasure, you know, oppression and repression and patriarchy and other things have really taken us away from that, that innate right, that we all have to experience pleasure. So part of it is that reclamation act as a liberatory act. And part of it is, from my work in social justice and environmental justice, is how do we make justice one of the most pleasurable experiences that we can have together. Particularly transformative justice, particularly transformation, you know, change, I think, is what we're here to do. So we resist it at every turn. And we really repress ourselves like we join in the experiment of repression,
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
So like, how do we actually say, this could feel good, it could feel good to be with each other in this changing process, it could feel good to be honest and authentic. So those are some of the things that pleasure activism is.
Ev'Yan Whitney
I really appreciate you spelling that out. Because I feel like there's a depth to pleasure activism, that I'm not sure I see people talking about all that much. I think that I think that I've seen some folks really grasp on to this concept of pleasure activism as like, you know, and indulge in your pleasure and your body and like, you know, center your pleasure, which is all beautiful and good. But I mean, what you're speaking to is like, sort of like a macro level of awakening and interdependence, and just reclaiming power, while also dismantling systems of oppression that have kept us separated from our pleasure. So I really appreciated that because I think that it can be really easy to sort of, like, take bite-sized pieces of it and be like, oh, pleasure activism, it's just about, you know, pleasure.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah, no, I mean, I think it's so important that people, you know, my worldview, which is in that book, and in everything I write, is that we're not really operating as individuals, you know, it's not just like, I just by myself, go take a bath. And that's great, right? It's like, there's something around claiming my own pleasure, and then figuring out how do I make this possible? How do I make it possible that others can feel this? How do I be in relationship around this?
I think part of what happens with capitalism is, we find ourselves competing with each other to get to be the one who experiences pleasure, the one who has the luxurious lifestyle, and that we can kind of climb that mountain of pleasure and look down at others from it. Like, you didn't make it up here. Y'all deserve this, you can, you know, clean the house while I take this bath, or whatever it is, right? Like it plays out in this leveling of society. And like, as, as descendants of enslaved people, one of the things that I look at is, oh, there was a period of time where the structure was that pleasure was the experience of white people and black people did all the labor so that white people didn't have to do any of that labor that there ostensibly their lives could be pleasure with a little bit of management thrown in, right. And that's not the first time that experiment was tried. Right, like this kind of vast economic disparity has existed in many, many ways throughout human history. Octavia E. Butler was another one of the people that I study and pay attention to talks about our fatal human flaw being intelligence plus hierarchy, that we use our intelligence to continuously create hierarchies amongst ourselves. And one of the spoils of hierarchy, ostensibly, is pleasure. So this is one of the things I'm always looking at and I see it, you know, people use the hashtag #pleasureactivism for all kinds of things. Sort of like, that is a pleasure practice, which is really important. And maybe you're giving a pleasure report, which is really important. Like I love the echo chamber of people claiming it for themselves. But there is something about justice in pleasure activism that feels important and not to be set to the side. There's something about being able to see yourself honestly, like those moments when we realize oh, shit, I've been socialized to be something other than myself.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
And that delicious feeling of returning to myself, whether it be you know, for me, one of the greatest pleasures has been recognizing that I'm much more introverted than I understood. And that my survival technology was to really be out and social in ways that continuously exhausted me. And were not actually of service. And now I find I'm able to provide so much more, I think, to the world. I feel so much more of use, because I turn inward.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Adrienne Maree Brown
so much more. Yeah. And I have much higher boundaries. So
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, I guess what's coming up for me is how it's so easy to focus on the pleasure and to sort of move away from the activism. Which, I don't know, I wonder if you could maybe just share what comes up for you, when you think about how, folks, it's so easy for us to be like, okay, pleasure, but like, let's move activism to the side. You know what I mean?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Oh, yeah, I mean, I think that we all want permission to feel good. And we're living in a really hard time, which might have been, you know, we might be in like a four or 500 window of really hard times. So it's, it's like we're inside of a difficult period of human history where we are mostly disconnected from earth. I was just in a conversation with Alexis Pauline Gumbs, where she said, it's like, capitalism is dissociation. Right? Literally, like disconnected from feeling the earth that provides food and water and life to us.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right, right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
And so in that traumatic state, then someone's like, feel good. And capitalism says as quickly as you can, as conveniently as you can, and spend as much money as you can, you know, like to get it.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
So that's our socialization. So I don't hold it against anyone that they're like, oh, pleasure. But I think what a lot of people here is actually hedonism. It's like pleasure, disconnected from each other pleasure, displeasure that's purely in the realm of sex and drugs, which, you know, most pleasure activism is about sex and drugs, it was what I was thinking of. And that was the territory in which I was learning. By Audrey talks about writing a poem, she talks about painting a fence, I get immense pleasure from tidying my home, I've been nesting. And I'm like, this is pleasurable, like figuring out exactly where a piece of art is going to go and get the light in the best possible way are watching my plants grow or things like that, right. So there are all these different pleasure practices we can be in. But I think the activism piece always scares people, because it implies responsibility,
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
that I am somehow responsible for what's happening in my own life. I'm responsible for the energy of my own days, and I'm responsible for the relationships I have around this. And that becomes really daunting for people. Like, I have people ask me questions all the time around, you know, does this mean we have to give up pornography? Or does this mean we have to give up binge watching trash TV? Or, you know, like, does this mean, right? Like, if we're gonna live in some value system around pleasure. And I'm always like, No, you know, it doesn't mean you have to give up anything that is authentic to you, that really feels true to you. But it does mean you have to be intentional about it. And, and to ask yourself, what shaped what you desire, right? So a lot of the book is about that, you know, like as a fat black queer woman, I was not taught to desire myself or bodies like mine on a number of levels in a number of ways. The activism has been intentionally reclaiming that rather than just going along with it and kind of being apologetic to anyone who ended up in bed with me, instead being like, wait, you know, why don't I think this beautiful body is beautiful? Why don't I think this miraculous body is beautiful? Why do I think that I need to apologize for my body. And I want to point to Sonya Renee Taylor has this beautiful book called The Body is Not An Apology.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Which, you know, being in conversation with her around this has been really elucidating but, you know, for me, it was like, I had to get intentional about who had wired me not to desire myself and who benefited from what I did. Like, when I didn't desire myself, I was constantly trying to change myself, I was constant trying to be something I couldn't be. And, you know, which companies benefited from those efforts to change myself?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
And, and then I, you know, just got interested in this idea of what it would look like to to seek myself out as a desirable being right, and not fetishize myself. But to really land in like, oh, there's, if I'm intentional about this, I can really see my beauty and I can see the beauty in other large woman and I can see that beauty and other black women, I can see the beauty of queer love and queer sex and I can see the beauty of boundaries. And I can see the beauty of things that are not centered around the penis, and you know, like, there's just so many intriguing places you can go to with it. And with from an intentional place, I can also allow myself the fantasies, right, like I can have the fantasy where I'm like, I'm the daddy now or whatever it is, you know?
Right.
And all of those things are possible. But for me, I find that it it... It changes everything when I've been intentional, and I'm choosing where my values come into it. Where I have an understanding of what the history of something is, and what the current practices are, and that I deserve a place in that conversation.
Unknown Speaker
Mm hmm.
Ev'Yan Whitney
This is making me think about what you brought up regarding Audrey Lorde's uses of the erotic and I've been wanting to ask you, what was it about that piece that created the foundation of Pleasure Activism for you? I mean, it's a wonderful piece, and if anyone has not read it, heard it, you absolutely should. But I'm really curious about like, what it was about that piece that like sparked this. This inspiration for you?
Adrienne Maree Brown
I'm gonna read you the paragraph.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, please, please,
Adrienne Maree Brown
That for me, it was like this one paragraph that was I was like, oh, that changes everything for me. And like it made me have to reckon with my life and my and what I was up to differently. So she says here, let's see, where should I start to get it.
So she says, We have been raised to fear the yes within ourselves, our deepest cravings. But once recognized, those which do not enhance our future, lose their power and can be altered. That was like a lightbulb for me and I was like oh! I don't have to go that way. The fear of our desires keeps them suspect and indiscriminately powerful, for to suppress at truth is to give it strength beyond endurance. The fear that we cannot grow beyond whatever distortions we may find within ourselves keeps us docile, and loyal and obedient, externally defined, and leads us to accept many facets of our oppression as women, 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 the 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's not based on human need, let alone in individuals. 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 that so often seems like the only alternative in our society. Our acts against oppression, become integral with self motivated, empowered from within, in touch with the erotic I become less willing to accept powerlessness are those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self effacement, depression and self denial. So that's, those are Audrey's words. And every time I read it, I'm like that part. Because what what she's saying to me there is, we are of nature. The erotic is how we hear our nature, our natural instincts, our natural selves, our natural power, our natural joy, our natural connection.
What we have been given to live within is this tiny box of depression and self denial. And I know that I know what it feels like to try to define myself on someone else's in someone else's worldview and find the space lacking and find myself depressed because I'm so contorted inside of someone else's perspective on what I should be. And to be in communities that feel like we're all trying to fit inside these tiny cages we've been given right existence, and I have felt how the erotic burst open those cages and burst open those limitations. And, and then I'm like, No, literally, no one can oppress me now. Like I have such a grounded and rooted and powerful sense of myself. That someone can come externally and try to manipulate and create limitations, but from the inside out, I know my power. I know my being I know my nature, I know my right to exist in a way that is non negotiable. And every time I read it that stands out to me so beautifully that we all have that. And then we all have some work to do to reclaim it.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right
Right. I loved that you added the peace to Pleasure Activism, because I'd read it before but in this new context are through this this lens of pleasure activism, I felt like I could actually finally apply those words from Audrey Lord, and in a way that just resonated with my body, and with the desires of my body in different ways that I don't think I had access to. So I really appreciated that you like, you know, had that be a part of of the book. It was like one of the first pieces I think that you had in the book, and I was just like, oh, wow.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah, it's it's the foundation. I was like, let's start there.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Yeah. And I'm so glad you did. I'm so glad that you did. Coming back to Pleasure Activism. You in the book, you talk about how there's certain like, tenants of it.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yes.
Ev'Yan Whitney
And I wonder if you could just share with us some of some of the tenants of pleasure activism?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah. So you know, I always try to find, like, what are the core things, right, because I want people to be able to walk around and say, like, I have at least a basic understanding that I can begin to practice into myself, and that I'm not mysteriously figuring it out. So one of them is what you pay attention to grows, which overlaps with the emergent strategy. But the idea is, in our lives, we can pay attention to the struggle and the suffering and the depression elements where we can bring our attention to what satisfies us. What brings us joy. And I I asked the question, which I was asked by one of my teachers, once, which is are you satisfiable, which was for me, again, a tectonic shift of a question.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, yeah,
Adrienne Maree Brown
I was like, I'm not. There's, there's no, at that time, I really was not satisfiable. And as soon as I had attained anything, whether it was a job or a writing achievement, or relational connection, I was always looking for the next thing or the more, you know, there was a constant need need need. And I have been in a deep practice of paying attention to what is abundant and enough and fecund in my current life, and how can I be satisfied with with the present moment, even if that means I have to make different requests, instead of sitting in resentment that people didn't read my mind. Something you pay a lot of attention to. So we become what we practice is one of the tenants of this, that it's not enough to just ideate about something but there has to be a point where you put things into practice and practice is hard. Yes, we're practicing all the time. And mostly we're practicing things that someone else told us to practice. So we become what we practice particularly we start to take on our own practices. And I say this to people where they're like, I'm an anti racist. I'm an anti capitalist I'm in this you know, I have all these beliefs I'm like, tell me your practices around that not just that you say it you think it
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
What do you do in your daily life? Right?
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
The next one is yes is the way and there's a counter to this which is your no makes the way for your yes so really listening inside yourself for like what is it you have an enthusiastic and kind of an uncomplicated yes to right? That when you hear it, you're like, hell yes, I want to do that. And then what are the things in your life you need to say no to which I think the know is usually for most people pretty clear as well.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
But we get scared of saying no, or we think we're gonna hurt someone's feelings if we say no, a lot of things can get in the way of our no but are no makes the way for our Yes. Make justice and liberation feel good. Right, like how do we actually create movements that feel like sanctuary and celebration and, and a living embodiment of the worlds we want to build and generate? And then I love this one, when I'm happy it's good for the world.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
I think a lot of us are again, socialized against this, right? We're really like, when I'm happy, I'm taking something from the world or I'm being selfish or Yeah, I don't deserve it. And, and I think the opposite is actually the truth is that the more of us who self realize and to find that joy, the more we're able to bring that into every relationship every structure, every vision we hold those are the main ones. Oh, the deepest pleasure comes from writing the line between commitment and detachment. Right? committing yourself to the process, detaching yourself from the outcomes. And then moderation is key.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, moderation is key, I actually have a question for you about that. Because whenever I'm in space with about talking about centering your pleasure and all this stuff, one of the first things that comes into their minds that they speak to me about with clients, students, whatever is like, well, if I open myself up to pleasure, if I begin to center my desires, and my body and my happiness, I'm going to be in hedonism, territory. And, yeah, I would love for you to speak on this idea of excess, because there is such thing as excess in terms of pleasure. But I think a lot of us are, I think a lot of us are a little scared of really pushing the line when it comes to what our pleasure potential is, because we're so afraid that we are not going to have enough self control.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Well, and I think it's, it's wise, right, one of the things I speak to in the book is that a lot of us are really scared to indulge or engage in pleasure. Because the model we have for people who actually give themselves room for pleasure, is this very small, elite and hyper greedy body that actually take it too far. Right, right, right yet access, and then they, they become obsessed with accumulation of more and more and more and more. And that's the model we don't have a lot of models of people are like, Oh, they have enough, and they're satisfied with it. And that's great. What I find, particularly with Black women, is we're nowhere near the place where access is one of our problems. We're like in a zone where we're like, I took two whole days off last year, and it was amazing, you know, I'm like, No, no, no, you know, like, you need so much more time than that. So I think there's something around not having that capitalist orientation of excess and constant accumulation. And the growth is the only good man actually being able to pivot into that that piece of moderation. moderation is like there's a balance, you know, there's equanimity. There's a, there's actually a sacred balance to all things. And I practice it in my body a lot. Like lately. I'll give an example. I've been in a moderation practice with ice cream, because I love ice cream. And I love like cow milk, dairy ice cream. And I'm lactose intolerant as almost all the Black people are and so, you know, I, I have wrestled with this. I've like tried giving up dairy completely multiple times. And it just doesn't seem to be my life. I was talking to my therapist, and she was like, well, maybe try moderation, you know, and I bought these little mason jars. And I just divvied the ice cream up. So instead of sitting down with like a pint of ice cream, I sat down with like, two to three bytes in one of these containers. And I find myself satisfied as I eat that whole little container, right? Like, yeah, I'm having the thing I actually want. I savor it, right because it's not just like a mindless eating of the whole pint. But it's rather a mindful engagement in something I really enjoy. Now, excess means that my stomach's gonna be upset and bubbling out is not going to go. It takes away from my sexy, you, there's just all kinds of stuff that's going to happen and my go too far. Also, I have arthritis, so my whole system will get inflamed, right? But if I just have this two to three bites, I'm good. Right? I can breathe easy. I can rest easy, I can still move around my tummies. Okay. And it's really beautiful to notice all that data, right to like, take in all that data, that it's, it's not an either or black white thing. And it's not like I have to deny myself the things I most want. But indulgence is not the only other choice. You know, spectrums, and every aspect of life is figuring out for each person like what is the particular place on the spectrum that I fall for everything?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right, right. I was I was like feeling for you because my I have a I have a problem with pastries, like baked goods, cookies, cupcakes, cheesecakes, cakes, I mean any of those things I love. I often tell people that the way to my to my pussy is through pastry, because I just I love them. So much, but also excess, if I eat too much I feel cracked out because the sugar goes straight to my bloodstream,
Adrienne Maree Brown
Right? As it's designed to do.
Ev'Yan Whitney
As it's designed to do. And I love that you're talking about this from a place of both. And like, you can have that indulgence, you can enjoy that pleasure. But also be mindful about what your body needs. Because ultimately, if you have enough pleasure, it gets to the point where it's not pleasurable anymore.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Right. I mean, I think this is the case, like, I find this to be true, if I have total access to something all the time, it no longer feels precious, and I don't really want it that much, you know, there's something about finding the balance at which something still feels special and still feels enjoyable. And I also think there's a piece of this that is related to harm reduction. For me, just like, I am always trying to figure out like, how do I reduce the harm from these things? And I have to be realistic with myself if there's things where I'm like, I just cannot fuck with that one at all. Yeah, like, there's certain things like, I learned, I had an allergic reaction to like a spider bite. And I was hospitalized for it. And while I was hospitalized, they put me on intravenous drugs. And, and they were so wonderful. But I really, I was just like, I can never fuck with that. Like, it's not an option for me, it feels too good. And it and it made me lose, you know, just for the three days or whatever, that I was in the hospital in that state. I was like, I have no interest in anything else. I just want the next. Like, when are you giving me more of that? And it was so instructive for me. Because I was, you know, at that point in my life I had, I had, you know, tried a variety of things. I'd never tried anything that was like a shooting it up. Right drug. And it just made me like, okay, like, this is good to know. So for me, I don't I'm not trying to find like, what's the moderate way that I can have that experience. It's like, that's, that one doesn't align with me being alive and me being living a life that I want to live. And so it's also it's figuring out, there's some places where there do need to be harder boundaries. There's places where moderation is possible. And there's places where, you know, I'm like, the things I'm super indulgent with or like, I'm trying to figure out how to do that with things like swimming. Right, where it's like, if the sun is out, I'm going swimming. I never feel like I went swimming too much. Like, I This feels great to my body. It doesn't feel like I'm exercising, it just feels like I'm being a mermaid. And it's, it's you know, so there's places like that, too. I'm like, Where can I just give myself more than I could ever imagine?
Ev'Yan Whitney
What would you say for people who want to be able to have those boundaries within their pleasure? Because I feel like, it's not enough to say, you know, just try it. And once you get to that place of access, you'll know. Oh, yeah, yeah. Like, what, what advice would you have for people who are like, okay, I want to dive into giving myself pleasure, and satiate the desires of my own body. But it feels really scary, because I don't have any boundaries around.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah, I mean, boundaries are like a lifelong learning journey. You know, a couple of things I would offer. One is this beautiful quote from Prentis Hemphill that I live by it is actually in the second and second and whatever ongoing editions of the book, but "boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and myself simultaneously." Which basically is like boundaries are an act of love.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
So for me when I'm thinking about setting a boundary, now I think of it as like, how can I love myself in this moment? What is the thing that you know if it's a limit, or it's a request, or whatever else that allows me to love myself in this moment? And in order to love yourself, I think you have to feel yourself. So a lot of what I'm telling people all the time is like, what is your somatic practice? What is your embodiment? practice? What is that is that you do that helps you feel yourself. And there's options both Prentis and I and others have put out centering practice that is really just like, you do it every day and you learn how to feel your center and feel your emotions. But there's other ways too. You know, like, I've seen a lot of people do this to a yoga practice through a Tai Chi practice by working with a somatic practitioner or body worker. And the idea is that you get to a place where you can experience an emotion and then get curious about that emotion rather than being completely controlled by it. So you know, I'm like, I have a longing, right. I'm like, I want ice cream. Now I'm in a place where I can check in with myself. Do I want this ice cream? Because there's something missing? Do I actually need a hug? Do I need to talk to my mom? Like, am I in pain? Am I scared? Is there something else? First going through that, you know, just checking in on my emotions. And this happens pretty quickly now because I do it a lot. I'm like, what's this ice cream longing about? I get I let myself have ice cream. And I'm like, it's just about wanting ice cream. Right. And for me, the boundary I've set with myself is that I also want to check in on all those other things. And sometimes it'll be like, like, Just now I went through a big move, it was kind of a traumatic move, it was impossible. Trying to move during COVID is really not cool. And so when I landed out for a week, I was like, I just need ice cream. Like, I just need ice cream. Because this is hard, you know, but it was helpful. Just be like, This is hard. Yeah. So it's actually the moderation is really important. Because the for me when it's hard, or when it's really, really good. Like when I'm celebrating, those are the times when it's the hardest for me to have a sense of like, how do I love myself in this moment. And the other thing I would say, with practicing boundaries is practice with others. You know, you can invite a good friend or coworker or whatever to be a boundary partner. And just be like, I'd like to practice setting boundaries more explicitly in our relationship, I'd like to tell you about a boundary I'm trying to set and be able to process it with you once a week, you know, as I move through setting it, like I have these two boundaries, in my mind, I'm like, I'm going to set this boundary. But I haven't set them and I have a friend who checks in with me regularly is like, How'd that go? And like it did it? You know? And I get to process that right? Like, yeah, because our boundaries have impact. And I'm learning all the time. I'm still learning about this. And I think I think we have to be patient. I tell people all the time too, like, of course, you don't know how to set boundaries, like we live in a time. I mean, part of how capitalism thrives is that it's constantly traversing boundaries, so that there's no it wants no separation between us and and what it wants us to desire or purchase. So, you know, sometimes it's easy to forget and be like, Oh, yeah, just Google is in my bed, you know? And then they like, Wait, hold on, I want something that is my own. Right? I want the phone out of the bedroom. I want a space that is mine that is not online. I want to have whole emotions and experiences that are not for the gram. I want to set boundaries. Yes, I have found that to be really, really a liberating practice. And the more you do it, the more you realize the boundaries you actually need, and the easier it gets to set them.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Like at first you really think you're hurting everyone, because you're setting boundaries. But then eventually it's like, okay, we all have needs, we all need boundaries. They allow for so much more to happen. Like the last three books I've done. I'm like, I've been able to do those books, because I have good boundaries. Everyone doesn't get to just drag my time all over the place.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right. Right. I really appreciate you speaking to that. And I also love how beautifully interwoven somatic awareness, somatic mindfulness, just feeling into your body is so deeply interwoven into this process and practice of pleasure. And that's something that I've been really diving into with my own personal work, because it felt so discombobulated to separate pleasure as like this one particular act without thinking about my own body, and like what my body needs on a day to day in order to feel safe and good and pleasurable. And so I wondered, how do you see the link between somatics and pleasure activism? Why are they important to each other?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Well, you know, for me, I spent 10 years in the study of somatics to generative somatics. So I spent 10 years in this process. I went in at someone else's recommendation, like I was just like, I'm curious, I'm always trying to learn. And I had no idea how much I needed to study in order to feel my own body. Like, I was a sexual being I was. I knew that I liked being connected to people in that way. I, I did drugs and, but I needed things to be fairly like extreme and dissociated for me to even experience them. And my life was lived that way. I was on a plane every day. I had lovers in multiple places. I was working constantly. I was always engaged. like everything was always happening, and somatics slowed me way down, so that I could feel that I was overwhelmed so that I could feel that I was burning out so that I could feel that there were some lovers I wasn't even interested in and that didn't really deserve to cross the threshold of my sacred intimate space. There was drugs that I didn't actually even enjoy. Right. And, you know, I was like, I don't really like sativa, you know, like, there's just different things that I I learned through that traumatic process. And I learned that there were things that I thought were core to who I am that were actually traumatic imprints that were shapes that I had taken on because I had been hurt. Yes. And that I had agency over whether I wanted to continue being in that shape or whether I wanted something else. So that aspect of learning to feel yourself feels so crucial to pleasure activism. Because that the numbing, that intentional numbing it, it's counter active is counter, it's the counter to pleasure, right? Like, I really think, you know, it's not like it's pleasure or like, destroying things. It's really like, feeling, and numbness is the spectrum. Like not feeling. And even numbness is a feeling right, like really recognizing that there's a fog over your system. There's a gauze between you and others, that nothing is actually touching you, you know that you're not letting it in. I mean, it's so tender. I've heard people talk about this who've gone through different abstinence programs, celibacy programs, you know, 12 step programs, that there's something about setting down the substance or the activity that has been a coping mechanism, and then feeling all that you actually need to feel. And then you can figure out like, is there a way to be in right relationship with that substance or activity again, and I talked about this in the book, that I went through that with celibacy, where I was, like having sex. And then I went through this period of celibacy. I was like, I'm, I'm concerned that I don't even actually know how to feel desire. Because of the social structures, I was very reactive. I was like, Oh, you desire me, then you shall have me. And I didn't have a sense of my own value, my own worth, or what felt good to me. And celibacy, made me slow way down, and get really curious, like, What does arousal actually feel like in me? How long does it take? What do I want to happen? Once I am aroused? How does arousal interact with love? How does arousal interact with friendship? How does arousal interact with trust? I slowed so far down, like I was literally like a little sloth, you know, just like. And it was such a sensual time. I was feeling so much. And I, I really was like, I'm really aroused by the natural world, like the ocean could get it any time. Like, it's just like, we live in a beautiful, beautiful, abundant, wet, sexy place.
Ev'Yan Whitney
We really do.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Right? And I'm of that. And that really transformed. I think, my whole sexual identity, my sensual identity. And so when I think of pleasure activism, like, Oh, my grandmother didn't have time for this. Right? Like she was working as a domestic worker, she was raising seven kids, like, she did not get the space or their permission to sit by herself, and take time and just be like, what, what do I feel and what feels good to me. And my ancestors, you know, I've done ancestral traveling and ceremony and prayer. And I'm like, this is what I hear from them, is they didn't get that. And it makes me think, well, if I'm one of the freest Black women to ever live, if I'm one of the freest people of my lineage, then how do I be in that, and for me, it's that combination have to be able to, to actually be in my body feeling in real time.
I also want to let listeners know all the time that people think pleasure activism only feels good. But you have to actually open the Pandora's box of all emotion, to be willing to feel the full the full range of emotion. And there's a line in the Prophet by Kahlil Gibran, which is my joy carves out the space for my sorrow. And that same space that sorrow carves out, can be filled up with my joy. I'm paraphrasing, but I think of that, that my grief fills up with my pleasure. My sadness and depression about the state of the world can fill up with my pleasure. And as I carve out more and more space in pleasure, there's so much more that matters to me because I'm really alive and present and I can feel how precious at all is.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
And I can grieve, you know, so it's that full range of emotion Lately, I've been doing a lot of play with anger and pleasure.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, that's a good one.
Adrienne Maree Brown
That's a really important one. Yeah, anger is such a raw, powerful emotion. It can scare us a lot. And I have been finding a lot of pleasure and actually expressing anger in real time, like letting my body go into anger, be in anger, be curious about the anger and let it release. It gets orgasmic, to release anger in the safe, safe ways. Right.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for that. And I listening to you talk about how you came into somatic work, is I'm like, I'm in it right now.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah. I'm glad.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, it's it's beautiful. It's such a beautiful experience. And it's also is very overwhelming because I was someone who thought like, I'm a cancer, Moon. I feel feelings. I know all about emotions. So I started I sort of went into the somatic work thinking like, there's nothing really more that I need to learn because I'm a feelings bitch. I feel all the time.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Right.
Ev'Yan Whitney
And through this work, I've realized, Oh, my God, there are so many things that I am not feeling. There are so many things that I am I have numbed myself off to or I think is a particular feeling. But actually, that isn't the feeling. It's something else.
Adrienne Maree Brown
That's right. Like a lot of us give ourselves permission to feel one thing.
Yes.
Right.
Yes.
Like, you know, like, I have a very deeply loved one who like anger, is their one thing that they were allowed to feel and that they gave themselves permission to feel, for me was sadness, like anything that happened and I'm just like, I'm crying. And I feel sad about it. But I'm like, actually, I'm angry about that. And like, there might be some sadness there too. Because emotions are complex, and they're they're borderless, but it was, you know, it's been so helpful to be able to give myself more range. You know, the cancer, right? It's just like, okay, cancers, and Pisces, Aries are mad, Tauruses mad or whatever it is. But it's like, no, everyone feels the full range. That's right, all of it. And that's part of how we know we're alive. And what I'm delighting in is trusting myself to feel more emotions. And that I can also trust is changing my relationships with other people so wonderfully, because I'm like, oh, like when someone tells me they're annoyed, I'm like, Oh, I don't have to think that you're angry. I can trust that you're annoyed and the you know, you're annoyed. And that annoyance will pass. Right? Or I can say, Is there something you need around that? And someone says no, like, they check in with their feelings. They say no. And I can trust that. Like, the more I learned my own emotions, and learn to trust my own emotions, the more I can also learn to trust those I'm in relationship with to have their own emotions and be responsible for those and they were in a relationship. I mean, it's so interesting then to be in relationship with another human being. Okay, we have multiple other human beings like I'm like, I have a fiance, I have my siblings, I have my goddesses, I have my woes. I have all these people that I'm like, Oh, wait, you are your own being like, I don't try to manipulate your feelings. I don't need to let you manipulate my feelings. Like we both just we both have the autonomy to feel here. And then find what is connecting inside of all that. And that is actually an exciting and truly intimate experience.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
And that can include sex or not include sex, but it's it's like the intimacy is being honest and emotionally present.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right. That's right. I've definitely been feeling into that the deeper that I go into this work and also just how, how beautiful it is that that awareness can come in even though it is very overwhelming for me, it's like oh, wow, now that I'm feeling now that I've like, melted this icy exterior that I thought that I never have, but apparently that I do. I'm feeling so much more and it's it's overwhelming, but it's also like, Oh my god, what an honor to be able to, to feel all of these things. And you know, my practice lately has been trying to just allow those emotions, those feelings, those sensations in my body to just be what they are, without me trying to make meaning or create a scenario. Just to like trust that my body knows what to do and can process and sort of flow through these emotions and that I will come out from the other side because that's the way that it always is. You know.
Adrienne Maree Brown
I love that Ev'Yan and I do think probably in our Virgo nature. You know, what was so overwhelming for me early on in my somatic journey was that I was faced with how little control I had on the whole world and all others.
Ev'Yan Whitney
You're speaking my language and also telling on me? You are so telling on me. Yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
You know, I think for many of us, especially who are like overachievers, or were the helpful ones, or were the ones who we provide the care for everyone, we make sure everything happens, whatever it is, there's so much deep control, you know, control resentment, like is its own special concoction. And I felt overwhelmed, as I began to realize that the only thing that I had any power over was my own reacting to the world, my own responses, and what I chose to shape and where my attention, at first, it seemed so small, because I had been in such a big container in my own mind, you know, my imagination where I was, like, I've got to save the world, right. And to shrink from that, to like, I have to be present in myself, like, that's a totally different life work. And it's been so beautiful to relinquish that control. It allows my relationships to be so much more authentic. And, you know, I've had such a huge impact, like, I, I don't know if that's the right way to say it. But like, the response I get from the world, to the work that I have done since I started landing that, since I was like, I'm not in control of anyone, like, I just have to feel and channel and be and, like, just be a good human, you know, not on a good-bad spectrum, but like, just fully living into what it is to be a human in relationship to other humans, like that's the work and it's feeling leads that work, I get so much more response from the world, you know, like, people are like, Oh, I can feel you. You know, I have people now who are like, I didn't even realize I couldn't feel you before. You know, I used to use humor to deflect, I used to run away from everything, I was very sarcastic. And I still use it for fun. But now I'm like, I'm really here. And you're really impacting me. And like, and I'm not holding any grudges, I'm expressing things in real-time. And they move and they're processed, and they're handled, and then we move forward. And I think the last thing I want to say about this piece is, is there's so much freedom. On the other side of this like control cages the controller, control cages, the controller, like you, you know, I think of the prison guard, right? Where I'm like, you're just as in prison as anyone else, like you are guided by these hours, you are guided, you're in these concrete walls, you are having to enact harm over yourself over someone else. And, and then there's something so liberating about saying, like, I'm not in control of someone else, I'm not in control of of changing this whole world. I do get to be mindful about the choices I make. And those are fluid. And I'm changing all the time. You know, like, I keep laughing these days, because I'm like, What gender Am I in this second? What gender am I now? Now what sexuality am I? You know, like, I just like, oh, the labels are all falling apart, like leaves in the fall. Yeah, you know, and I'm just like, I'm everything. All the things like being a human means you do have access to anything, anything that you can bring your attention to, you can dream it, you can visualize it, you can experience it, you can build relationships that affirm it. And I wish that liberation for everyone.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes. Oh my god. I just, I'm so full hearing you speak to the Virgo experience. And I feel like you see me I see you. It's Yeah, it's it's so real. It's so real. And I'm just so grateful for folks like you who are in this space of doing this work, or inspiring other people to do this work to soften and to feel and yeah, softening has been a really big one for me, because I always thought that I was so soft. And this work around somatic and around trauma resolution and trauma healing. I'm realizing like, oh, there's much more softness to me that that needs to be uncovered.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Oh, I feel that I wanted to tell you, I really see that in you too.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, thank you.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Just in the time that I've been paying attention to your existence in the world, I've seen that softening and that transformation happening and I want to applaud it in you. You know, I think that in each other that there's there really is my friend Morgan Bassichis. and I were talking recently about being musicians or being you being a songwriter and the difference of thinking about writing a song versus actually sitting down on the keyboard and playing it and singing it and letting it come through. And I feel like That with softness or vulnerability or, you know, being connected. It's like there's the idea of it. And for years, I think I coasted on the idea. And the projection of being warm and soft and authentic and amazing. And, you know, like, whatever it was, and now I feel like I'm like, Oh, I just am sitting at the keyboard of my life loving myself. And that is a soft thing to be in. And loving others, which is a soft and vulnerable thing to be in. And I'm astounded sometimes at who I am on any given day, and I like cool, that's, that's what's happening today, you know, and just, this, this pandemic has been a softening too, you know, keep having rigid expectations like, Well, next month, I'm going to be able to do this. And then I said to be like, or not, you know, this may or may not be possible. And it's all good. You know, like, because this is still my life, this is the, these are the years that I get, I'm not going to waste them, you know, but I have a much more interior life than one would expect for, you know, like, I was like, in 2019, when Pleasure Activism came out, like I was booked, touring, and I was, you know, with rooms of hundreds and 1000s of people. And I just thought that that was going to keep growing and growing. And instead, like most of the lifecycle of this book, I have spent in rooms by myself, continuing to feel pleasure, you know, continuing to pursue it. And I'm delighted by how that feels. And I'm daunted by the spiritual lesson of this this time, and I need room to feel all of that. So, thank you for making space in your life and in your work and out of your offer, to teach people about softness and listening and, and being in their bodies. The pleasure that is available there.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Thank you. Thank you so much for those generous words. It's always, it's so funny that you actually speak them to me today. Because my partner said to me yesterday, I've noticed that you have been standing a little taller lately. Because I've been working on my posture a lot. And not from a place of like, my posture sucks, but more like, what is the shape that my body is carrying? And why is that shape? You know? And so he gave me this beautiful gift yesterday of feedback and saying, like, you're, basically you're doing the work, and I can see how that shape is shifting. And so I just, it's what you said is coming on the heels of what he said yesterday, and I'm just so grateful for you to say that to me. Thank you.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Good. Yay. Yeah, I think about the inch so much. I like I wrote a short story about it. About for Black people reparations would show up as literal inches in our body.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, yes.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Yeah. And I'm just like, you know, there's been so much shrinking and cowering and, you know, trying to make ourselves small. Yes. White sociopathy could handle us. And it's like, oh, no, the unfurling back into that dignity for all oppressed peoples and you know, for white people, right. I'm like, all of our dignity has been impacted by this mess. And for those of us who are interested in continuing this human experiment, I think that reclamation of those inches matters. Spiritually, physically. Yes.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Adrienne, thank you so, so much for your time today for sharing your wisdom and your own softness. It's been such a pleasure. And before I go, I just want to ask, like, where can people find you? What are you working on right now that we can get excited about?
Adrienne Maree Brown
Instagram is my place like that I like if I'm going to do anything on social media, it's usually there. So @AdrienneMareeBrown on Instagram. And then next month, September is my birthday month. And my first novella is coming out. Oh, I'm sorry. This is like my birthday present to myself is this, this experiment in fiction, and it's about black grief in Detroit. And we'll see how it's received. But I'm excited about it. And then I have a collection of spells and fables. That's coming out in 2022, early 2022. So the next few years, I mostly planning to just publish fiction, like the novellas, the first in a trilogy, and then the short stories and other stuff. So I'm excited by all that and I hope others are as well. Then your listeners might be particularly excited Sonya Renee, Taylor and I are crafting a course together called the Institute for Radical Permission. And we'll both be sharing the word about it on our pages once it's ready to launch. So that'll be coming soon.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's exciting. Yes, please give me the link when you have it. I would love to plug it to folks so that they can connect to that work. But yes, thank you so much again, for your time and for this beautiful offering of pleasure, activism.
Adrienne Maree Brown
Thank you, love.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Ah, what a beautiful conversation, what an extraordinary experience to feel into the sensations that are in my own body as I revisit these words, and I revisit the space that Adrienne held for us and invited us to play around. And I'm so grateful for this opportunity to speak to her. And I kind of want to invite us to linger a little longer here, to continue to explore what was brought up in this space, and to embody these invitations that Adrienne was giving us to feel ourselves.
Pleasure is a word we hear so so often. And sometimes when we hear a word a lot, it can get stripped or flattened of its meaning, and not just its meaning in general, like what you would find in a dictionary, but its meaning to us to our unique selves, and how we might express that word to its fullest spectrum. And so for this sensual practice that I would love for you to explore this week, I want to invite you to be curious about pleasure. And I have some questions to help you with that exploration.
So the first question is, what is pleasure? What does pleasure mean to you? The second question, how does pleasure feel in your body? Like, how do you know when you are in the vicinity of feeling good? What sensations come up in your body? What feelings come up emotionally for you? What images pop into your mind? And also, what are some things that never fail to get you feeling good in your own body? And again, focusing on not just sexual pleasure here, but ordinary pleasures?
Take some time with these questions, and begin to open yourself up to them. You can answer these questions in your journal. You could make a piece of art in response to these questions, or you can sit with them as meditation prompts. whichever you choose to do, whatever is your pleasure as you explore. I wish you so much pleasure as you play with them. And let me know how it goes.
Sensual Self is created and hosted by me Ev'Yan Whitney. It is edited and produced by Tribble. Music is by Melodiesinfonie from his song, Just Healing. For everything you want to know about this podcast, including previous episodes, show notes, transcripts and resources, go to EvYanWhitney.com/podcast. You can also follow the show on Instagram @Sensual.Self. If you have a moment, I would love it if you rated and reviewed this podcast. It helps others find the show and as a result, it helps them uncover their sensual self. As for me, I'm on Instagram @EvYan.Whitney, and if you want to know more about me and my work, go to EvYanWhitney.com.
And please check out my book Sensual Self Prompts and Practices for Getting in Touch with Your Sensual Body. To preorder, go to EvYanWhitney.com/sensualself.
Thanks so much for being here and for creating the space for yourself. I'll see you in the next one.