Episode 59: Decolonize Your Gender (with Dayna Lynn Nuckolls)
In this one, Ev’Yan speaks to Dayna Lynn Nuckolls (The People’s Oracle) about what it looks like to decolonize gender and why we probably need to decolonize ours. They both speak about the binary and how harmful our gendered ideas of masculinity and femininity are, how language and labels flatten us, and the ways indigenous cultures have viewed gender and gender roles. Dayna also explains what it really means to decolonize something. At the end, Ev’Yan offers questions to get you curious about your own gender to help you parse through what was shaken up in this episode.
“If we’re going to talk about dismantling the patriarchy and capitalism, we have to decolonize gender. Every single system of oppression is perpetuated through the binary of gender.” —Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
The full transcript of this episode is below.
Also mentioned in this episode:
The Invention of Women - Oyèrónkẹ́ Oyěwùmí
Women, Race, and Class - Angela Davis
Yorugu - Marimba Ani
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls is The People’s Oracle. Born in Danville, Illinois and raised in Chicago, Dayna is an intuitive writer and teacher. They use oracles with skill and integrity as a means to liberation—Divination for Liberation.
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.
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Hello, sensual babes. I'm so happy to have you here on another episode of Sensual Self. Before we get into this episode, can I ask you for a quick favor? It won't take more than a couple minutes. But would you write a review of this podcast? I took a quick gander at my podcast stats the other day and I noticed that I haven't gotten any new reviews in like, a minute. I don't know too much about how podcast algorithms work. But I have heard that reviews are a big, big help and getting people to find the show and also letting the powers that be know that this is a podcast that exists and folks like listening to. The review doesn't have to be anything crazy. Just a couple sentences about what you like about Sensual Self, what you've learned about yourself since tuning in, and maybe mentioning one of your favorite episodes. You can do this on Apple podcasts or wherever you're able to review. And you can do it right now. Like right now. Go ahead, pause this episode, and write a little message of love for Sensual Self. I'll be here when you come back.
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I will be giving away one of my books to someone who leaves a review for this podcast. And I'll announce the winner on a new episode sometime in a couple of weeks. So go ahead, leave a review. Or leave another review if you haven't done one in a couple years. And thanks. Thank you again.
Okay, so today's episode, if you couldn't tell by the title is about decolonizing gender. It's about interrogating the language we have about gender, about what is masculine and what is feminine. And it's about us thinking and getting curious about who we are, like the beingness of our authentic selves outside of the binary. And the binary is in everything, y'all, not just gender.
Today I'm speaking with the sidereal astrologer and the people's Oracle, Dayna Lynn Nuckolls. And if you've never heard Dayna speak, you're in for a real treat. Because to me, she is someone who casts spells of liberation and power with her words. And she does it with this preacher cadence that feels deeply ancestral to me. And in this conversation, in particular, hearing Dayna speak about what it looks like to decolonize gender to reimagine our understanding of masculinity and femininity. It did something to me and confirmed why I wanted to have her on the show to talk about this. I've been grappling with my understanding of my gender and what it all means for years, sometimes on this very podcast. I actually have an episode on here from way, way, way back in the day with my partner Jonathan, about masculine and feminine polarity from a tantric sexual lens, I think it's episode five if you want to listen, but I do not recommend it.
Yeah, that episode is so cringe because it speaks very much to what I've been trying to decolonize within myself about my gender. This idea that masculinity is about having man qualities. And femininity is about having woman qualities. And as a nonbinary person, and someone who has grown a lot in their understanding of the spectrum of gender since that episode landed in 2015. That episode feels beyond outdated, and honestly a little harmful to my gender identity. Enough that I've contemplated taking it down. And maybe I still will, who knows? But anyway, even though I know that those ideas about masculinity and femininity, and gender, don't resonate with me at all, they're still in me. And I wanted to bring Dayna on because I knew she would bring in perspective about this topic that would help me and maybe parse out all of this through a liberatory lens. And she did, she really, really did. So much so that I'm still processing everything that came up for me from this conversation, including this specific part in our chat, where she very generously offered me some big words of wisdom and advice about my relationship with my mom, and how it's affecting my gender expression. And, yeah, it's deep. I don't really know how else to describe this episode. Other than that, it's deep, y'all.
And if you're at all curious about why we're talking about gender on a podcast about sensuality, I mean, I feel like it's pretty obvious, but I'll just say that when it comes to my sensuality, it has everything to do with my body, the way I inhabit my body, the history and stories my body holds the traumas that I'm healing within my body, and the spaces of softness and liberation I'm trying to claim within it. Sensuality is about the body. And my gender expression is about my body as well. Something that I've been thinking about a lot that I hope to touch on in a later episode, is how the depth of knowledge I have about my sensuality wouldn't exist if it weren't for the depth of knowledge I have about my gender. That it's because of what I know about the nuances of my gender, that I'm able to access deeper realms of experience and be fully in my sensual body. It's all really intertwined for me, and I really hope that that makes sense. I think that it does, but you can let me know if that resonates for you as well.
Okay, so sit back, relax. If you're on the go tune in a little deeper, wherever you are. Just try to find some space to savor the sermon Dayna offers us. I also recommend maybe pausing this episode, to allow her words to really land in your body. And it also wouldn't hurt to listen to this one a few times because it's decadent. Yeah, that's another word to describe this episode, decadent. And, you know, stick around 'til the very end of this episode for... you already know. All right, enjoy.
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Ev’Yan Whitney
Dayna, thank you so much for being here on Sensual Self.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Thank you so much for having me. I'm beyond excited right now.
Ev’Yan Whitney
Ah, me too. I've been wanting to have you on the pod for a while and I can't wait to dive into this conversation about masculinity, femininity, and just your take on it because I've heard you speak about it before in Clubhouse chats when Clubhouse was fun. Yeah, and, and I'm really really curious to hear more from you. But before we dive into that, I would love for you to introduce yourself to everyone. Because there's so I feel like I was gonna do it for you. But I feel like you're just so layered in who you are and what you do. And there's such a depth and a richness to your craft. So please tell us who you are.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Every time I get asked this question Ev'Yan I'm like, Okay, who am I today?
Ev’Yan Whitney
Yeah, that's right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I'll start with my name is Dayna Lynn Nuckolls, the People's Oracle. And today, I will say, because what I've been thinking about in terms of who I am and what I do is where I came from. I was born in Danville, Illinois, and shortly after my birth, I was relinquished by my birth mother and adopted by a Black family in Chicago, and through both my inherited biological lineage, as well as the one that I was adopted into his a long line of preachers, Baptist and Pentecostal, I was raised in the Pentecostal church. And so my initiation into my spiritual gifts, my capabilities in my voice occurred in the church. And it is from there that I learned about sharing the burden of survival, it is from there that I learned about liberation. And that is the core of what I do whether it is sidereal astrology, because I am the sidereal astrologist. If you're using that word and have references for it, trust me is because of because it didn't exist before. Um, you know, I use oracles all of them in the tradition of liberation of everyone who's come before me. That's what I think oracles are for they are for our spiritual liberation, our political liberation, our economic liberation, and so that's what I use oracles for whether it's Siberia, astrology, tarot dream interpretation, or just handling divinely inspired conversations. Like I think we're gonna have here today.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, I love hearing your background and I really appreciate you bringing in where you came from. I feel like I asked this question to people a lot and that instinct that impulse to honor where you've been or who you came from, and like what rooted you into everything you are today like hearing that you were raised by like preachers make so much sense when I like think about the way that I as much as they consume your content, but like, that's like yuck I don't really like that verbiage. But we'll just go with that.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I'd say encounter, engage with...
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, listen to it feel honored to absorb. But no, when, when I when I'm listening to you, on your videos, mostly I watched you on YouTube. It comes through and also on Instagram as well. Like, it just comes through as though you were speaking sermons. And so it makes a lot of sense that you were raised from that background. And that was something that yeah, that feels really that feels just perfect.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Yeah, I mean, my grandfather, my biological this will be my adoptive paternal grandfather was a deacon of the church for 50 years, what you would call a Bible scholar because generally black men of that generation were not allowed into academic institutions. And so his genius his intellect, was, the spaceport was in the church. And so I'm the beneficiary of that in terms of being able to explore outside the institution of church, which generations before me really didn't have the opportunity to do, you know, they couldn't go into libraries, they could not go into academic institutions. So I take that freedom very seriously. And of course, I can't help it. The preaching is in me, and if I'm talking about gender liberation, if I'm talking about, you know, decolonizing the survival instinct, it's gonna be in this voice of cadence. And I say, it's not necessarily my voice that's coming through. It's the voice of my ancestors and everyone and everything that poured into me.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, at that feels really clear for me, whenever I am listening to you speak about spirituality, this concept of spiritual liberation, that's like mixed with political liberation, emotional liberation, like all of these things. I mean, there's a lot of folks that I listened to via podcasts or, you know, reading books or on the internet. And there's something about the way that you speak within this cadence of like going to church I was raised in a Christian home, so I'm like, very, very connected to that. But there's something about the way that you speak that doesn't just rumble my own bones. I feel like it rumbles the bones of my ancestors, because they understand that cadence from you, but also what you're saying...
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Ok, I'm about to like bawl right now.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, but like what so so they recognize your cadence, right? And it's like, oh, yeah, Yes. And then you start to say things and they're like, you know, because it's so different from, you know, thinking about the patriarchy and thinking about white supremacy. Like I don't, I don't know if these are words or if this is a language that they are fluent in. I think that maybe there's something about it that that resonates because they understand it, like on some sort of level. But yeah, I just I'm really glad to hear you speak a little bit about your background because it definitely comes through and as I said it, like really, it really shakes the foundations of a lot of things and and a lot of people that are within me, so thank you.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Thank you like, that was a very unexpected moment of being seen. Thank you.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, well, there's so much that I want to talk to you about and like, yeah, I like I am like mad. I want to talk about sidereal astrology because you're, you're like the main husband to say the main bitch, but I don't know if that's kind of your language, but—
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I'm rolling with it.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Okay! You're like the main bitch of sidereal astrology. But the reason why I brought you here is to talk about masculine and feminine polarity. You had spoken about it in a Clubhouse chat, I think probably about a year ago at this rate. And I remember I was like, cooking in my kitchen, I was chopping vegetables. And I don't even remember what you said, Dayna. But I just remember being like, Oh my God, this. I don't think I've ever heard someone talk about masculine and feminine polarity. And the way that I heard you talk about it within those Clubhouses, and and since then, you know, you've sort of peppered in some of that within some of the other you know, videos, I've watched a view or conversations that you've had around what's happening astrologically. But I knew from then I'm like, Oh, my God, I want to talk to this person. And to hear more, because the way that I understand masculine/feminine polarity, I feel is a way that a lot of folks understand it, which is from this very gendered, gender essentialist lens, it's very I know, a lot of people will say that that's not the this is not the reason for it. But whenever I hear someone talk about femininity, I know that they're, they're speaking about womanhood. And whenever I hear someone talk about masculine energy, I know that what they're mean is manhood. And so I'm really interested in this concept of decolonizing, masculine and feminine energy, particularly because I have recently come out as nonbinary, and I'm trying to formulate new language about my own understanding and beingness within my gender. And before we get started, I thought it would be cool to just have you explained to us what it means to decolonize something. Because this is a word that I feel had so much meaning that has been stripped over the last few years as it is being used, overused, not properly used. I remember I was in a meeting a few months ago, and someone was talking about how, and it was a white person, they were talking about how their book was going to decolonize something rather and I'm like,
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
impossible.
Ev'Yan Whitney
I don't think it works that way. So please, can you tell us what does it mean to decolonize? Something?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I love this question. And I think something that's kind of inside what you said here is that the progress of language is the work of liberators. And also the minute that those who are working towards liberation, and when I mean liberation, I mean survival. Right? The minute that something can be objectified into word form, it loses meaning. That's right, right. The doing is always existing, the doing has always existed, decolonizing has always existed. As soon as we got a word for it, it became a subject of conversation generally to have with people who were not doing the work. Right. So to decolonize to me, is this process of realizing all of the ways that you have not been seeing with your own eyes, you have not been thinking with your own mind and surely have not been feeling with your own body. That colonization is occupation, it is coming, taking ownership of, stripping of what it is, assigning something else. This happens to your body It happens to your mind, it happens to your eyes, it happens to land, it happens to culture, right? When we think of colonization, we think of, oh, Columbus discovered, right? As if these people did not exist even to themselves prior to being observed by whiteness. Right? So it's this idea that only through the eyes of power, which generally, power is white power, is male power, is cisgendered. It's heterosexual. Something is only real, and it only exist if it can be observed, and named, and measured and quantified through those eyes of power. And so decolonizing something is really fundamentally questioning. It's saying, why do I see it this way? Why do I see myself this way? Even when we're talking about gender—why am I girl? Like really ask if you ask someone that question, if you ask someone who, who identifies, as a woman, ask them, why are you a woman? And I promise you, the list of things is going to be a set of observable qualities, behaviors and perception of self that was given to them.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
It's not going to come from their subjective, authentic embodiment of their own consciousness, their own emotional being, their own experience. It's a belief system. So to decolonize is to challenge the belief system, it is to ask why, of everything, there is nothing off the table. Nothing. And if you if I asked you a question, and you give me an answer, I need to know why. And I'm not going to stop until you tell the truth. Because the truth is, is that someone's identity of womanhood, malehood, whatever it may be, is a belief system that they were given, and one that they are devoted to, because if they're not, their lives are in danger.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right. That's right. I love how simple this definition is of decolonization. Because even when I was thinking about asking you this question, I'm like, I don't even know if I have the answer to that, you know. And I, I'm thinking about that now, like, something about what you said regarding like, decolonizing has always been a thing. It's always been a thing that we've been doing. We've just had this word attached to it that has created some kind of mark in history in terms of like, now it is a thing. And now, yeah, when I'm sitting with myself now, and I'm thinking about that, that definition that you just shared with us around what is decolonization, or what does it mean to decolonize something, this idea of challenging of asking questions of getting to the bottom of something of not accepting what you've been given as a definition of something? I'm like, Yeah, that makes perfect sense. I don't know why I was thinking would be more convoluted than that. And maybe that's where the, the colonization of decolonization might be coming into play, you know?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Yeah, I would say to that, I think language is really funny. Yeah, you know, we watch it all the time, Queer people will innovate language for something, its meaning is hidden inside the experiences of a unique kind of culture. And then it is appropriated. And once it's appropriated, it's lost its meaning. So I think in many ways, once we have the language of decolonizing, it's lost its meaning, because now it's not subversive anymore. I think there's something about there not being a word or language for something keeps it subversive in some way.
Ev'Yan Whitney
I love that you said that because that's something that I've been thinking about when it comes to masculine and feminine polarity. How there's a concept of this that I think for me whenever I hear the word masculine and feminine, I just think about white people. And I, I don't want it to be that I don't want that to be my reference point, but I mean, whenever when I first heard of this concept of masculine and feminine energy, it wasn't rooted in anything other than this particular specific definition of what that looks like. And I'm, there's Oh my God, there's so much I want to say, let me just ask a question instead. Why don't you think that the concept of masculine and feminine energy, the concept of masculine and feminine polarity needs to be decolonized?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Hmm, that's a loaded question.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Let's start here. Let's start with the binary. Right? You said that when you think of masculine and feminine in these terms, you think of whiteness, and I don't think you're wrong. There's a book by Marimba Ani called Yurugu, and there's another book called The Invention of Women, by an author who I've now learned has some kind of oppressive views on gender. But one idea that is common in their writing, is this idea of what they would call like, a Eurocentric value system, belief system culture or the culture of whiteness, is obsessed with what can be seen. Right? And you identify, observe and legitimize based on visual observation. And based on visual, I mean, let's just get right to it right, based on visual observation. Oh, there's only two kinds of genitals. Yeah, some people may deviate. But we'll fix those. Right? There's only two kinds of genitals. And because there's only two types of genitals, then there's only two kinds of people. And you're either male, or you're either female. Right? And so what we get when we talk about masculinity and femininity is really just other words for gender, right? I know, we want them to they want to make it seem like they're talking about something that transcends gender, like, no, the implication is that if you have a vagina, you are feminine. And if you have any masculine qualities, you are deviating we're going to fix that.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right. Right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
So for me decolonizing gender decolonizing, masculinity and femininity begins with discarding the binary. This is very difficult.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, I was just about to say!
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
It's difficult to the point that people think it's not possible.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I've thought about this, right. What the binary erases is a foundational thing that I'm just going to call is-ness. Right? You are. I am. We're here. I see you, you see me - Hey! Right? Anything beyond that is assumptions I make about you, based on the limitations of language, historical, time, period, etc, etc, etc. Where I'm at on this decolonizing. And I think something I think we keep coming back to here is language.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Right? In a video, I talked about how, once I gender you, I lose my curiosity about you. I know you. There's no reason for me to ask you questions. There's no reason for me to get to know you. If I see you, I say oh, you're a woman. I've already decided the range of emotions, you're allowed to feel. I've decided how you should wear your hair. I've decided what your voice is supposed to sound like, what your gait is supposed to look like. And don't get me wrong. There's something rooted in survival here, but I wouldn't need it to be rooted in survival if the patriarchy didn't exist. That's a whole other conversation. Right?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
So decolonizing gender, meaning questioning why. Why is there gender? Has gender always existed? And to what end, right? I mean, that's where we start. And it's, people have reductionist answers again, they're going to go back to genitals.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
But again, who made that decision? And there's, there's evidence, and there is reality still existing, that there are cultures where that binary does not exist as it does here. There are cultures always where people have existed outside of that binary, where roles in society were not assigned based on that binary. And so I'm not sure if this is really answering your question, but I'll I'll land here- that we have to start with language. And I think we start with language by throwing away nouns. Moving into verbs.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Masculinity-ing. Femininity-ing. Because again, if I can tie this all together, it's like, okay, if I know what's real, only based on what physical observable, measurable, quantifiable, double-blind trialed, you know, observations that I can make, then of course, I'm going to land this binary. But everybody knows that there are things that exist that are beyond my consciousness, what I think what I see, patriarchy is obsessed with seeing and naming things, including you and me. And so if we take gender as- rather than a polarity, but a gradient of being that anyone can be, at any given time, we know this is a fact because what I might define as feminine today was not feminine 100 years ago,
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
So what's the reason for that? Why? So I mean, if we're going to talk about the patriarchy, and dismantling the patriarchy and capitalism, we have to decolonize gender because every single system of oppression is perpetuated through the binary of gender. They're selling me clothes and want me to buy money because I need to buy girl clothes now. I can't hand me down my boy clothes because I need the girl clothes. Like, come on. It's ridiculous. Right? I don't know if that answered your question. But I'm gonna stop there.
Ev'Yan Whitney
No, no, that was so great. I appreciate that this conversation feels very alive and that we're not coming into any like, definitive definitions of what it is or... yeah, like, it just feels like how can you put a finger on something that at its core was not designed to be pinpointed so easily?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Right.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, there's something very mutable, about gender. And there's something very mutable to me about masculinity and femininity. And I love that we're bringing language so much into this, because how could it not be connected to all of these things, but something that I've thought of as I have been trying to decolonize my gender, I feel like, I don't know if I can use the word femininity or masculinity anymore. Because it's been so deeply tarnished by this fixed idea and understanding of what that energy looks like, when it's manifested. That if I say it, it feels like it's still conjuring up those same images, and those same fixed definitions, even if I don't subscribe to it. So I thought, like, Okay, what does it look like for me to actually not use the word feminine to describe me? Or to not use the word masculine to describe part of my energy? What other words are there? Like, I feel like we're really fixed and focused on these two words that supposedly have flexibility and fluidity, but feel really fixed? And I don't have the answer to that question. But it's something that I've been thinking about a lot like, what are the other words we can use? Because the history of these words, and the oppression that comes along with these words and the confusion that comes along with these words, I'm like, maybe we should just throw it all away and start over.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
The question that I would ask back is, why do you need a word?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Hmm, yeah.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Language is a performance too. I mean, one of the concepts that I think we're circling around here is form, meaning what something appears to be versus function, versus what it's actually doing at any given time. And the performance of either one of those, that, essentially, language is a social product. And it's a way that I've talked to you about something that maybe you haven't experienced, or we're not experiencing now. Right? So to say, I am feminine, is implicitly saying, I ascribe to the specific set of behaviors past, present, future, there's that fixed thing, right? Which is why I'm kind of like let's experiment with verbs. One of the ways that this came up was talking about mothering and fathering and that these two things are independent of gender. Right. And we know this to be the fact. Because there are plenty of people who would identify as mothers, doing both. Even though culturally, the assumption is made is that there is no fathering happening, which is absolutely ridiculous. But it's also a way to uphold male power.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Mmhmm, right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
So I think of—this thing is tertiary, there is a pure something, I don't have a word for it. And then there is the gradient of ways it presents and functions. Right? So if we just say you're a person, you don't really have to say, masculine or feminine. In that moment, you are what you are, when you're doing what you're doing. And then when you're not doing that, right? I mean, I think what I'm getting at here is, we want to be understood, we want to be seen, we want to be validated. And language is a way that that happens. But at the same time, I think, where we are kind of moving collectively, in terms of liberation, and decolonization is understanding that language is really a tool of oppression. And it's a tool of oppression, because your ancestors did not speak this language. What was lost with that? There might have been a word or concept for exactly the thing that you're talking about. But it's lost not only because you were stripped of your language, and forbade to speak it, right. But also the ritual, the communal, the cultural, that that language emerged from, was also erased.
And so I think in many ways, what we're seeing with the decolonization of gender and the emergence of new words, and language almost feels like every week to label experience, I feel is we're trying to piece together a something that we've lost. It's not new, right? We're trying to piece together a something that we've lost. So in the book, The Invention of Women, and I'm not even going to try to butcher this person's name. They talked a lot about how in Yoruba a culture right prior to the arrival, so you can call indigenous Yoruba a culture prior to the arrival of white people and all of that stuff. These roles of social standing in society were not gendered. These roles of relationship to each other were not gendered. So decolonizing gender and masculinity and femininity looks like- Why is the role that I play in your life gendered? Like people don't even think to answer that question. And, and the truth of the matter is, everything is reduced to genitals. And people just need to say that, like, let's just be real. No one wants to say that, though. That you're really just you're deciding everything about me based on the fact you assume I have a vagina, period. I mean, it's crude ish. But not really, it's the truth.
Ev'Yan Whitney
It's the truth. Yeah, I think about gender reveal parties, those are just genital revealing parties. Like, let's just call it what it is.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I mean, right. I mean, even to say, Oh, I'm having a girl, what are you really saying? Are you saying that you're having a baby who has a vagina? Why are you saying that? Are you saying that you are going to condition your child to be in a subservient position to men in order to survive? Are you teaching your child to take on the emotional labor of their community at the expense of their own health and well being? Is that what you're saying? Let's really, let's really get down to it. I mean, again, I have people I would say nobody wants to have this conversation. But it's really true. Like if I go to somebody's gender reveal party and be like, oh, so what you're really saying is, you're going to teach your child to be entitled to authority and to not develop the emotional intelligence to be the caretaker of their own body. That what you're saying? Oh okay.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, people don't want me to go to their gender reveal parties. I will ask them the questions that they do not want to ask.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
But it's true. It's true.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah. It's so true. I love that you sort of brought in ancestral indigenous understandings, kind of a little bit of what gender is, what gender wasn't, you know? And that's something that I've been thinking about too, as I've been trying to understand my own gender. And it's so frustrating. And I don't know if you have experienced this too, but it's like, I can feel that there is more. I can feel- like what you said about like, there is a word for the experience that you're having, you just don't know it, because it's not in your language, like, the fucking frustration of that. And how maddening it is because like, I, I'm with you, I would love to deviate from using words like masculine and feminine. But we don't live in a world that is open to or even has an understanding that there are other energies, concepts, states of being that we fluctuate through in a given hour, you know? And so I wonder, I mean, I know that you are someone who has roots deep in ancestral work, ancestral reverence. And I just wonder, like what you know, about the ways that our indigenous ancestors, how they saw gender, and how, maybe I don't even know if they even had the words masculine and feminine, but perhaps like, something adjacent to that, like what they thought when they heard or when they were being this verb of gender expression?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
You know, I really do not know the answer to that question. But what came to mind for me, was a book on my bookshelf, it's kind of common reading for many people in this work by Angela Davis Women, Race, and Class or something like that as the title. So Angela Davis is kind of a preacher to me in that when you hear Angela Davis speak, you know, she comes to you, and she says, ABCDEFG, and then she's going to lay out, right? In this, she doesn't have the preacher cadence, but in this very light, she's building towards something. So in this particular book, she's talking about where did feminism emerge from, and basically, she's like, white women appropriated this from Black women. She goes back to the Suffrage Movement and Sojourner Truth, and how they kind of just stole the movement from her. But one of the things that she talks about in that book, in terms of gender is actually very, very much related to how we began this conversation.
When you asked me about decolonizing, and how this is something that's always been happening, we just did not have a label or name for it. She talks about gender roles in the division of labor, and how, when we were enslaved, we did not have these divisions of labor. The house was kind of this somewhat genderless place where everyone is involved in the cooking, everyone is involved in the caretaking, everyone is contributing their skills to the care and keeping of the family and the household. And it's really only once Black men are given the so-called opportunity to harness the power of their maleness in society, that they want to make their homes like the homes of white people. Where either the labor of caretaking keeping of the children, etc. is exclusively the work of women. Or it's well yeah, or paid labor, which is still the work of women.
So I bring this up because again, I think it's less about having the language for something and more about observing experience. And I think specifically with Black people, gender performance is akin to code-switching. That the ways that we, dare I say naturally, embody gender are not the ways of the culture we are forced to live in. And we see Black people weaponizing gender against each other as a proxy for male white power, if that makes sense, meaning that if I see you, and I expect you to have a vagina and to be a woman and to fulfill all of these roles, I'm going to enforce that with the same fierceness that I would have enforced upon me as a Black person, my subservience and inferiority as a black person. Right? As told by Harmony is the person on Twitter who, who I've, I can't say this person originated it, but this is a conversation I've had with them about how cisgendered, like Black people can't be cisgendered. Right. I mean, and this is why it's so important to strip back to the just is-ness because implied in cisgender, this is whiteness.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right. Yeah,
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Implied in maleness is whiteness, and this is why I feel like okay, this is just like code-switching, right? For me to say I am a woman. Okay, let's really unpack what that is. What is this? What is the ideal? What is the ideal form and presentation of this? And I promise you, it's gonna be a white, blond haired woman person with a vagina. So again, I think it's, I think it's less about finding the words our ancestors use, and more about observing the evidence for what remains of our ancestors in us now. Which is the fact that you can see yourself as clearly as you do, existing outside of the binary is evidence of this thing that existed, and I would almost challenge you to quench the desire for language, and allow the being and is-ness. And I know it sounds really woowoo. But what I really am saying, and it's like, it's as straightforward as possible is to quench the desire to explain to people who you are, and let them experience who you are.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah—
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
it sounds hard.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, I'm like, wait, that resonates. But like how, though? But no, that's, that's really true. You know, something that I'm thinking about is, I haven't come out to my mom or anyone in my family about me being nonbinary. And one of the reasons for that is because of this language piece that we keep circling around is that I know, my mom is going to have a million questions, and she's gonna want—
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
—”Are you a girl or are you a boy? Or do you still like boys or do you like girls? “Like, what?"
Ev'Yan Whitney
“Does it mean, you're transitioning? Are you going to keep your name? What do you do with your hair? Like, do you not want me to call you daughter?” There are so many aspects, the way that I feel at home in my body and in my gender is when I am able, I have the space, the safe space allowed for me to do exactly what you said, which is to allow people to experience me without a word without presumptions. So yes, and then I also think about my mother who and I want to give her space and compassion for like this being a very big paradigm shift for her maybe a paradigm that she isn't fully understanding of. And I know that the questions that she would ask me would not be coming from a place of trying to be violent or whatever, but it would feel like that for me. And so I'm like, Okay, when I can get to a place where I can answer those questions in a way that authentically aligns with me and doesn't fix my gender in or doesn't fix my gender experience in then I think I'll be able to come out to someone like my mom. But for now, I'm like, I don't know how to talk about gender to someone whose full experience of themselves and the world around them is within the binary. Yeah, it's, um, because I would love I would love to just be like, Hey, Mommy, I'm non binary. And that's just like, cool. Have fun with that. I'm excited to see, but I know that it's going to be a lot of questions.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Okay. Okay. So this is—oh, I'm so glad that you're sharing this because I think there's a mirror here. And the word that I keep coming back to—well, one of the words I keep coming back to, especially when you described questions you imagined your mother asking you, we're all about how will you perform nonbinariness?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Uh huh. That's right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
How will I knowthat you are nonbinary? What are the visual cues that I can observe? To know that you are non binary?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Which is like, hmm. And I think the ways that we internalize the gaze of other people is very core to the function of gender.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, so right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Even you being authentically yourself as nonbinary conjures up this way that you have to see yourself through the eyes of your mother. And to that... And I know this is really wild to say, but why? You know what I mean? And I think that the tension with this language versus just being has to do with how will I legitimize my existence to other people? When the fact is, you exist, and therefore you are legit. Dare I say too legit to quit. Right, but it's... Tell me if I'm wrong. But I think the fact of nonbinariness in and of itself is about you being who and what you are, when you are what you are.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
And to have to observe yourself through someone's eyes so that someone can understand you—it is an act of violence. Again, it's not malicious.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right. Right. Right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
But to have to explain your existence. It's like I'm here in front of you, you know? See me, being cute—That's where I wanted to go with this too. That even in having this hypothetical conversation with your mom in your head, right. There is this drive this tension of I got to pin it down to something she can understand. And then that feels inauthentic. Because the whole point is that I'm not either of those things. I'm all of them, whatever.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah, exactly.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
And that's really the simplest explanation, which goes back to verbs over nouns. Right? That I am being or I am femininitying sometimes. I am masculinitying sometimes. And sometimes I do them both at the same time. And that's what the binary of gender erases. The fact that both can be there simultaneously existing at the same time, because there's no visual cue for that. There's no visual cue for things existing at the same time. And the fact is, even if I identify as a woman and call myself feminine, I'm only doing that because if I try to do both, I'm going to be subjected to violence. And even if I'm just doing one, I'm going to be subjected to violence. We cannot disconnect gender from survival. Gender performance from survival. Even the language of gender from survival. I mean, that may not necessarily be a dynamic with you and your mom, but I'm most certain imagine and this comes up a lot with my clients like the ways that the mothers are the enforcers of patriarchy in the household. The ways that mothers bequeath to their children the behaviors required to survive male dominance and violence. And unfortunately, a lot of that child parent dynamic for many people is about my mom's worried about me. She's gonna be concerned. Yes, there's some curiosity there. But beneath the curiosity is, well, how are you going to have kids? And how are you going to get married? And how are you going to be financially secure? How are you going to secure your future? Are you going to marry a man? Are you going to who's going to write? I mean, because that's really at the bottom of all of those questions.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right? Survival. Yep.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Yep. Yep. And parents being worried. Yeah. Which the fact of the matter is, you know, there's a concept in sideereal astrology that I have observed through sidereal Scorpio, actually, which is this concept of being too different to hide, right? In contrast with passing or conforming to the dominant culture, right, there is a way that Blackness is too different to hide. I can change class, I can change my name, I can go to different schools, I can change my cadence and my tone of voice and how I talk, but my face is still Black as hell. Too different to hide- this is the kind of queerness.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Whereas people who can conceal their differences, right? I assign this to sidereal Taurus. This capacity to pass for the dominant culture. And many times it's often just class. For black people, it's access to capital, it's the middle class, going to specific schools, knowing this person, HBCUs, Greek culture, all of that stuff that allows them to disarm the oppressor by appearing to not be as different as they actually are. Right. And so even with language, even with language, we conceal the queerness. And I feel this fight of let me just be get to know me, experience me, build a relationship with me. Because whether we're doing that in our families, again, or our intimate relationships, or broadly with people who may not be blood related to me, that's the path to liberation. The path to liberation is to know me beyond the label to become curious about me, rather than to assume who I am, because you observed me. Be with me, then you can know me.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
That's what you would say to anyone else. Right?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, absolutely.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Right. And that's, that's how you would...Right? I mean, because the fact of the matter is, Mom doesn't know this, you. And it's not a you that she can put in a bio, or on a piece of paper or gather some labels with it's a you that has to be experience because guess what? You may not have a language because you're curious about you now. That's how you landed at non binary, because it's like, wait, this feels kind of good over here. But But Oh, huh. So intimacy means being with you.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Damn. Oh, Dayna. Dayna. I have so much appreciation and admiration for folks who, when I ask them a question in any space, but particularly on the podcast, they don't answer they just ask me five more questions. And that helps me to think like, oh, actually, because you know, one of the philosophies is in my work is that I believe that you are the expert of your own experience. That you are the expert of your sexuality, you are the expert of your body, you're the expert of your gender, even if you don't think that you are like, I believe that that is that is what's true. And so whenever, you know, I asked a question that I'm like, I don't know the answer to and then you ask me five questions back, I feel like that's, you're giving me permission to also access the expertise of my own gender and my own wisdom around these topics, which... Yeah, I just damn, thank you.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
It's my pleasure. And this is that thing that I was talking about, with, we were talking about your moon sign placement and kind of how that shows up in my life that there's this thing of experiencing something is a valid way to know, not just for you of yourself, but for other people of you as well. And I think that there is a kind of, you know, I think of modern American English as a capitalist language of efficiency. And often the efficiency is, I don't have time to get to know you.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I don't have time to engage with you deeply and intimately. And some of that is true. Again, especially when we're talking about survival. I don't have time to sit and think about whether this person across the street from me as a man or not. My survival is at stake in this culture in this society, men are likely to be dangerous towards me, right. And so I use those assumptions to protect me. But that only happens when you're on the weaker end of the power dynamic. When you're on the other end of the power dynamic, those assumptions are used to maintain the power dynamic. Right? I forgot where I was going with that. But yeah, I'm gonna leave it there.
Ev'Yan Whitney
It's great. It's great. I could literally talk to you forever. Yeah, there's so many things. And I would love to have you back on the podcast, actually, to just like, continue to dive into these depths of decolonization of gender, of body, of Blackness. Like, I'd love—oh, my God, I love what you said about Blackness being inherently queer, because it's something that I think about a lot. There's so many things, but to close this particular conversation, I want to know... You know, we're talking about language here. And we're talking about what it's like to experience and be curious about yourself, and have other people experience and be curious about you. And I want to know, like, if there are any questions at the top of your mind, that can help other folks who are in this process of decolonizing their gender, or decolonizing, their sexuality or decolonizing their body, any questions that can help them to be curious about their own experience, outside of these defining fixed labels, words and language that I think we are all accustomed to using, because that's just the way that it is, you know?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
This goes back to the why in the decolonizing. And what that might look like. I think, is when you arrive at a judgement. And you arrive at a conclusion, ask why. Oftentimes, even when we're interacting with other people, we come to the conversation with our judgments already formed. And because we do that, we miss out on an opportunity for intimate engagement, where we can mirror to other people, the curiosity that we have about ourselves. One of the things I talk about with a lot of my clients recently, is about self doubt. And often how we interview people, and we take polls, and we ask for other people's opinions and we read books, and we do research because we want to know what language is out there, what concepts are out there. But in terms of this decolonizing and this why, this piece of being curious about yourself, I think, is about questioning every judgment that you have formed. One of the phrases I say frequently is that identity is a belief system and it's being weaponized against you. Right. That there is a cult of womanhood. And there is a cult of manhood, and I really dare someone to disprove it. It is a set of beliefs about who the adherent is, that they must subscribe to, even to the point that they will abandon their own experience of themselves and the world around them to maintain the doctrine of the identity that they have been assigned.
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
It is enforced with violence. The consequences for not adhering to the binary of gender is violence. Anything that must be upheld with violence must be decolonized and must be questioned.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
If you land on any behavior or assumption about yourself, that has been enforced with violence, that leads some questioning. That needs some decolonization in gender, really. I mean, and it's not just violence from other people. It's self mutilation in the form of cutting out of me any emotional experience that has been deemed a herecy to whatever this gender thing is so so this curiosity thing is about asking why. And it is also about clinging to those who encourage you to trust yourself. Not everyone can be trusted with this journey. Because you will soon become a projection screen for their own self doubt and insecurities. Because the real issue is if you are non binary, what does that make me? If I'm attracted to you, what does that make me? If you are an other what does that make me?
Ev'Yan Whitney
That's right.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Why does my identity have to be a statement about yours? I think that's the question to land on.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Hmm. Yeah. Wow.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
And why is it my labor?
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yeah.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Why is it my job to work that out for you? Well, yes, because if I don't—violence. Again, not necessarily the mother-child relationship. If a cisgender male finds themselves attracted to a trans person, the violence is because they refuse to acknowledge some kind of statement that being attracted to that person says about them. That's self mutilation. And then you got to externalize that because you just cannot hold that in you.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Right?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I'm gonna stop there. I could go. We could go on.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Oh, girl, listen. When I tell you the spirit of our decolonized gendered ancestors are in this in this conversation. Ah, Dayna, thank you. Thank you so much for not just sharing your wisdom, with me and with everyone else who's listening, but for also holding the space for me personally, around these complicated questions that I have about my beingness. And my is-ness. And I just I feel after this conversation, so much permission to continue to walk on my journey, without being—so interesting, the 10 of Wands just popped into my head without being like labored and and like, broken down by like, the daunting task of figuring it out. Like what does it look like for me? And for everyone else to just like, be, you know?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
That was my card of the day this morning, the 10 of wands.
Ev'Yan Whitney
No, really?
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Yes. That was my card of the day today.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Wow.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Well, before we close today, can you please tell us where we can find you, where folks can book a session with you, where you're on the internet streets. Tell us everything.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
I am all over these internet streets. You can find me (I'm tweeting a lot) on Twitter @PeoplesOracle. Same handle on Instagram @PeoplesOracle. Lately, I'm posting pretty frequently on YouTube. You can search The People's Oracle on YouTube for that. While I don't necessarily open my books frequently because I'm tired. I do have lots of content in my online shop. My goal is is for you not to meet me because it's too exhausting for you to meet me. I can't. I can't I can't read everyone. So I create tools so that people can can be their own astrologer and not in some like corny kind of way. But I feel like your personal intimate knowledge of your day to day life is actually what equips you to be the best astrologer I just give you some worksheets and tools so that you can translate that into astrology and next thing you know you don't need me and I'm so glad about it. You can find all of those things on my website ThePeoplesOracle.com just click "shop". And if you're curious about your sidereal birth chart, there's a link there that shows you how to cast your sidereal birth chart. And lots of stuff in my online shop that can help you in that process.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Yes, I cannot wait to have you back on the pod to talk about sidereal astrology. Yes, please come back so we can have more conversations.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
We should do a live thing.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Ah, yeah. I would love that. Okay, y'all stay tuned for that. Yes, yes. When we get past the slump of the 10 of wands,
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
Whew, clearly we're both there.
Ev'Yan Whitney
Literally, thank you so much, Dayna.
Dayna Lynn Nuckolls
This has been my deepest, deepest pleasure. Thank you for having me in creating the space for this wonderful conversation. Again, thank you so much.
. . .
Ev'Yan Whitney
Okay, do y'all see why I called this episode deep and decadent? I mean, did this conversation, shake the foundations of everything you thought you knew about gender? Or was it just me? I hope it's not just me. I have a feeling. It's not just me. And yeah, wow. Big, big, big thanks to Dayna for the veracity of her words. And for this sermon that is still resonating in my own body. I'm really looking forward to continuing this conversation with her in the near future. But let's move on to today's sensual practice—actually, I think what I'm going to do is I'd like to invite you to take an intentional breath with me. We moved through a lot during that conversation. And it feels like we could offer the body a little grounding, and a little more space to process through our breath. So wherever you are, take a slow and steady inhale through the nose, filling the low belly, expanding into the chest. And exhale, all the way out with a sigh. Once more, inhale gently through the nose, and into the low belly. And exhale, completely mouth open with a soft sigh.
Thank you. Thank you for doing that with me. And thank you for doing that for yourself.
As for our practice today, I'd like for us to continue to follow this thread of generating curiosity about ourselves as a means of decolonizing who we think we are, and who we think other people are. So some questions I have for you. The first one is what sensations, thoughts, feelings, or memories were coming up in your body or mind as you were listening to Dayna speak? Maybe that was some resistance or elation. Maybe there was some tension in your body. Or maybe there was a feeling of relief. Just do a quick body check in.
Next question, what beliefs good, bad or neutral, do you have about yourself? About the identities that you claim? And about the gender you have? What assumptions do you tend to make about yours and others masculinity? What assumptions do you make about yours and others femininity? What stories do you hold in your body and on your tongue about who gets to be masculine? And who gets to be feminine?
A couple more questions. In what ways do you feel boxed in by language and labels? And where do you want to break free? Where do you want more space to be created so that you are an energy and an experience rather than an idea or definition to be consumed or flattened by understanding? And how will you start making that space for yourself? How will you start being curious about who you are?
And a fun bonus question for all the cis folks out there—that's cisgender folks, folks who identify as the gender they were assigned at birth—what is it, besides the genitals between your legs, that makes you a woman or a man? What does it mean and what does it feel like to be a woman or a man if the external things you were taught that defines womanhood or manhood didn't exist for you? I'm really curious about that really, really curious.
And look, I don't have the answers to a lot of these questions. And it's okay, if you don't either. I mean, gender is weird. And what we're touching on here is bigger than an idea or concept. It's really like a new paradigm that, if you choose to take it with you, is designed to seismically shift everything you thought you knew about yourself and the world. That's what it means to decolonize something. And that shit can be scary, and it can be really overwhelming. So be easy on yourself. As you hold this space to process through these questions. You can do them in your own journal on your own time. Or you can make a voice memo of you talking out loud about what's coming up for you as you parse through these questions. No right or wrong answers. Just remember to stay curious.
Oh, and before I go, I want to let you know that Sensual Self is going to be taking a short break to rest and prep for some very fun stuff that is happening as we close out the year. One of which is the exciting launch of my book, also called Sensual Self which you can pre order now wherever you find books. You can also join my newsletter to stay in touch with me while I'm away. Here is where you'll find that and I'll put that in the show notes.
And yeah, I'll be back in your feed really soon with more sensual inspiration for you. But in the meantime, stay soft and be kind to yourself.
. . .
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/podcasts. 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.