Getting Things Undone

That's what I’m working on next.

Unmaking some plans, undoing my hair, unbuttoning, unclasping.

Lounging luxuriously with library books. 

Unfollowing and unplugging.

Unfurling the hammock. 

Unmaking habits and responses that no longer serve my needs.

Unblocking distractions.

Saying no to as many requests as it takes to make room for all the yeses I desire.

As the iconic pleasure activist adrienne maree brown writes in "The Power in Pleasure" in the recent Pleasure Issue of YES! Magazine, which she guest edited, 

When I am happy, it is good for the world. My friends will tell you that I often have to reaffirm that I am a writer, because it brings me so much pleasure that I suspect it cannot also be my vocation. I am unlearning this self-denial. What astounds me, repeatedly, is that the pieces that are the most vibrant, passionate, and erotic to write are the ones the world reflects back to me as the most necessary. The practice is not just the writing or the sharing, it is letting the pleasure of my calling be the center of my life, which echoes into the pleasure centers of those who encounter and benefit from my work. To be clear, this is not about the individualistic happiness that we are sold as the elixir of elitism, which hoards or creates harm for others. I am pointing us toward the happiness derived from finding purpose in service to the world, which uplifts the collective spirit and eradicates the self-harming patterns of denial, repression, and self-negation. 

She also explains,

Your no makes the way for your yes. Writer and somatic practitioner Prentis Hemphill taught us that “boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” I have lived inside of this quote since I heard it. It has been my guiding star for navigating COVID visitation and travel; it helps me determine whom I can be in community with, and I believe it is one of the keys for unlocking a future where we are truly in right relationship with each other. My life is the yes. My love is the yes. Anything that isn’t fundamentally aligned with that yes has no place in my present. The boundaries I set maximize the miracle of my life. 

In "How to Build Resilience to Shame" in the same issue, neuroscientist Joaquín Andrés Selva explains why it can be so hard for us to access healthy joy and self-love: 

In the context of Western capitalism, pleasure is a luxury reserved only for people who are actively trying to make money. After all, getting dressed up for cocktails is OK as long as you’re exchanging business cards at the end. Having a hobby is OK as long as you’re monetizing it through YouTube or a podcast. 

And as we all know, there are few ways to kill the joy of anything faster than monetization. Selva prescribes authentic connections with other people as a way out of this cycle of self-centered self-denial:

As a trained neuroscientist and research psychologist, I have the following takeaways: Repeatedly denying ourselves pleasure in the pursuit of some impossible ideal—whether it involves our careers, our families, or our bodies—can lead to burnout. Although the world may tell us that every second not spent “bettering ourselves” is time wasted, it is important to try to tune out the nonsense and simply connect with the people around us who get what we’re going through.

For me, like for adrienne maree brown, writing erotic fiction can be a pleasure, a tonic, and a way to connect with others. All the main characters in The Grove of Thorismud pursue pleasure, but they all have different feelings about the moral value of their desires and their own worthiness to experience pleasure. 

My "Sleeping Beauty" figure, Princess Rosemary, is a sexually repressed insomniac with signs of a nascent eating disorder and a self-harming habit. All of her desires, for sex, food, rest, and emotional release, are wound up tightly in bonds of shame even though she is beautiful, rich, powerful, and believed by her kingdom as a whole to be blessed by God—she is the worthiest imaginable kind of person in her social context. I didn't need to give her piles of complex personal trauma to push her to the brink of self-destruction, just ordinary internalized sexism and a dreary set of traditional Germanic Christian values that demonize women's freedom and pleasure in general.

And so it was a great pleasure for me to bring Rosemary from the deathly twilight of self-negation into an awakening to her own pleasure, along with several other characters who get what they want without proving that they deserve happiness.

I referenced the Biblical Song of Solomon and other ancient texts that celebrate the divine feminine, the sacredness of shared sexual pleasure, and the unearned right to love.

I made The Grove of Thorismud available to whomever desires to read it, through Michigan library systems in both digital and paper formats, on certain bookstore shelves in Lansing, and through all major booksellers including my own Magic Nutshell Bookshop. It was my pleasure to write the book and to share it with all who need and want it. I didn't release this book primarily for money, but I do appreciate every purchase, which helps me recoup the costs of writing and releasing it... and allows me to buy more books. Thank you, fellow book lovers!