Pleasure, Permission & the Right to Desire
“Pleasure is the point. Feeling good is not frivolous, it is freedom.”
― adrienne maree brown, “Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good”
Hunger. Desire. Want. Feeling good. Expansion. Pleasure. Creativity. Satiety. Satisfaction. Fullness.
Notice what you feel showing up reading these words. Emotionally. Physically.
Is it a longing? An awkwardness? A pushing away? A foreignness? Shame? Scarcity? Relief?
Whatever your response is, slow down, and take a breath. See if you can invite in some curiosity toward your response.
No judgement, just noticing.
Chances are, your response makes sense if we consider all of the context (i.e. the body you live in, how you were raised, your perceived gender, societal norms, etc.).
Now, notice the word permission. How much permission do you have/not have for those words?
What allows this? What gets in the way?
Who decides how much permission you do/don’t have for those words?
Permission from the world you live in? Permission from yourself?
Is it possible that permission from the world for you to have those things could actually be irrelevant?
Can you give yourself permission to have these things? To have pleasure?
Oftentimes, a person’s relationship to pleasure also impacts their relationship to their body, to food, to their inherent right to want, to desire.
Notice again what’s coming up at these questions. And take another deep breath.
What does the word pleasure mean to you?
Pleasure isn’t just sexual. It isn’t a bad word. Pleasure is feeling enjoyment and satisfaction. This could certainly be sexual. It could also be laughing with your best friend, watching your plants grow new leaves, biting into a warm chocolate chip cookie, savoring delicious food, playing with a puppy, a juicy yoga stretch, laying down to rest when your pillow is *just* the right temperature of cool, hearing birds singing, dancing to your favorite song…pleasure can be so many things.
What is it like for you to experience pleasure?
To really, really lean in to what feels good for you? You’re allowed to do this, ya know.
In our society, denying pleasure is so normalized (especially if you live with marginalized identities!!!). Some common forms of this might look like: dieting, sex education that doesn’t include information about pleasure, restriction, staying busy, covering up the shape of your body, people pleasing, staying distracted, being given a role to care for others before/over yourself - shrinking yourself physically and symbolically.
In her book “Appetites: Why Women Want”*, Caroline Knapp discusses a shift that often happens for girls/people socialized as women, when they stop being asked what they desire, and start being taught that it matters to be desirable to others.
Oof.
Pleasure
the right to desire
“There is no way to repress pleasure and expect liberation, satisfaction, or joy.”
― adrienne maree brown, “Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good”
The path to pleasure and permission for so many is not an easy one. It’s rocky, complicated, loopy and confusing. Again, so much because of the society we live in (and the patriarchal, cis/heteronormative, values it’s made up of), the culture we grew up in, the body we inhabit, and the experiences we have navigating the world. So much of this work includes unlearning and untangling, involving a lot of questioning and restructuring your internal consent and your relationship to yourself.
And, it’s possible.
As a trauma therapist, my work is not only about helping survivors decrease trauma symptoms. It’s also about stepping into the other side of healing: exploring what pleasure, permission, and desire get to look like now. If any of this speaks to you, working with a trauma therapist can be helpful.
* Trigger warning: the book “Appetites: Why Women Want” discusses disordered eating and may not be appropriate if you’re currently struggling with this.
