Today, I want to share with you a story that begins on Sunday April 21, 2013. 

I was up early that day to make my way into Central London. I was volunteering at the London Marathon. My job that day was to wear a high visibility vest and keep the spectators separate from the runners at an important point on the course - near a bank of portapotties.

I remember that day so clearly. The sky was blue, shot through with a few white clouds. The air was crisp - it wasn’t warm outside, I arrived dressed in layers. 

I had a front row seat to this incredible race, from watching the elite runners flash by to cheering the charity runners dressed up as dinosaurs or rabbits.

I remember that day in so much detail because it was the last time I would feel normal for months.

A few days later, my marriage ended. While getting the actual divorce would go on to take nearly 2 years, the actual end came that week.

If you haven’t been through a huge breakup like that, it’s hard to fully communicate just what it felt like in the days, weeks, and months immediately after. The closest I’ve come is to say it’s like someone has died and you enter into a grief process in much the same way.

There were many reasons why we were ultimately incompatible as relationship partners, though back then I would have struggled to articulate them. We didn’t share the same values on things. He didn’t see me as fully human, or rather didn’t accept and love the fullness of who I was, instead loving the role that I filled.

One of the starkest areas of incompatibility was related to sexuality, and ultimately this was the straw that painfully broke the camel’s back. While I was aware that we didn’t see eye to eye when it came to sex, and that this caused me a tremendous amount of pain, I didn’t have the words to say what actually was wrong.

I didn’t have the knowledge to understand what happened. I didn’t have the skills to prevent it from happening again.

And for most of 2013, I was frozen. I was lost. May, June, July, August, months passed in a haze. It felt like the future was dead along with my marriage, that I looked out upon a shapeless horizon that had once been populated with hopes and dreams and now was just a landscape of desolation and destruction.

Looking into an empty future felt so depressing. I started to wonder if life would be worth living.

I retreated. I stopped engaging with the world. I was filled with shame, guilt, and regret. 

I had a friend at work, someone I was close to who knew what was going on, who reached out to me through this fog at some point during that summer and mentioned that there was this dance group she participated in and the leader was polyamorous and maybe that’s something I should think about, maybe that’s what I wanted.

She sent me a link to the website, I read a few blog posts, signed up to the newsletter, and promptly forgot all about it, returning to the depths of my despair and spending several nights talking to the lifesavers on the Samaritans helpline, a suicide prevention hotline in the UK.

Fast forward to that Fall, when I received a newsletter from that dance group announcing that new classes were starting and inviting sign ups.

Something in that moment struck me. Sure, I could just delete this email like hundreds of others I received… but something stopped me. 

I’d spent months stuck in a place of self-loathing and hopelessness, wanting the pain to end and not knowing what to do about it. 

Well… I could sign up to one of these classes and meet some of these polyamorous people. That’s something I could do.

Friend, the amount of fear that welled up in me when I considered that possibility, actually considered signing up, paying money, and going to hang out with… with sexual freaks…

Wouldn’t they be able to smell me from a mile away, someone without a clue, totally unattractive, maybe even desperate seeming? Would a sad sack like me ever possibly fit in a place like that? Would it be embarrassing? Would I get humiliated? Would they just reject me and kick me out?

Right then and there, I made a choice that, looking back, continues to surprise and delight me to this day.

“Fuck it,” I said. I clicked the button and signed up for Circus Skills.

I decided to do something I’d never done before in the hopes that I might get to experience something new, or at least a change from this pit of sadness I’d spent months within.

That moment of choice was the beginning of the next chapter of my life. That first action is ultimately responsible for where I am now. My life is unlike anything 2013 me could have even dreamed of… hell, so many of the things I’ve experience I didn’t even know existed or had words bck then.

That dance community full of “sexual freaks,” by which I mean sex-positive people, led me to other communities, teachers, and experiences. Step by step, I followed my curiosity and continue to do so to this day. Surrounded by others on a similar journey, I came to realize I wasn’t alone and that it was possible for things to be different for me.

I want you to know that, if you also want to experience something new when it comes to dating, sex, or relationships, you can also make the choice to do something you haven’t done before, rather than repeating the same patterns over and over.

Throughout this season of Slutty Activism, we’ve explored how not only are most of the standard approaches to dating, sex, and relationships pretty inefficient, if not downright ineffective at helping you to have the experiences you want, they aren’t inconsequential or unimportant. 

Those mindsets and behaviors also facilitate fascism. They are part of how this system we are part of reproduces itself. They are roadblocks to real, lasting change. They antagonize the work of liberation.

Now that you’ve had a chance to explore all of this through this anti-fascist, liberatory lens, I’m curious:

What are you going to do about it?

That choice is going to be individual to everyone. You might decide that you’re going to stay put for now, that making a change is too much. If that’s true for you, hey, that’s fair enough. I want to honor that caring for yourself can include making the choice to say no for now, even to changes you can see the benefits of making.

We all must work within the constraints of the energy we have, the capacity we have, and the time available to us.

What can help, as you consider what comes next, is to begin with (can you guess?) desire. What experience of your sexuality do you want to be living 6 months from now? A year from now? What kind of relationships do you want to experience? What contribution do you want to make to pushing back against fascism?

It’s also worth remembering that, while everything comes at a cost in terms of time, money, energy, and attention, everything also has an opportunity cost, that is, what it costs to not do the thing.

What would it mean to you if, 5 years from now, you were to look up from the day to day of your life and realize that you are in the exact same spot that you are today? 

Most of the time, once we’ve got that inkling that change actually is possible, not only generally but specifically for us, and if we have the spoons available to us, action follows.

For me, once my friend had cracked open a door by giving me a word - polyamory - it was only a matter of time before I went and did something.

In fact, there are some things I’d done immediately that summer, the first of which was to read the blog posts by that dancer my friend had sent me. I went on to spend many days Googling the word ‘polyamory’ and reading everything I came across.

Sometimes a hot wave of shame would wash over me and I’d slam my laptop closed.

Other times, I’d feel such a strong sense of excitement and arousal at the prospect that I’d notice I was becoming turned on while reading decidedly non-erotic texts. 

Before too long, I’d built up a good theoretical understanding of what polyamory was, that it was a relationship style that existed, and that real people could relate this way.

This was incredibly powerful and important. Learning that something other than relationship escalator monogamy existed was so powerful and important.

At the same time, what really changed my life was when I moved from theoretical understanding to action taking. When I went to that dance class, met real people, and joined communities centered on sex-positivity where I showed up to participate and contribute, each of these steps moved the needle.

And you know who was right there with me as I set up my very first online dating profiles? My friends from Sex Positive London. As I took my first imperfect steps into dating not only as an adult, but as a sex positive, high libido, kinky, newly out bisexual, knowing that I had support make it less scary.

No jokes it was still scary, and still.

And you know what happened?

I had my very first hookups. I had sex with a woman for the first time. I went to my first orgy. I found friends with benefits. While it wasn’t always smooth, each imperfect step brought me closer to the experiences I wanted to have.

By the Fall of 2014, many things that had seemed impossible not only seemed possible but were things I had done.

All this to say that information is important. Without it, it’s hard to even know which direction to point yourself in to get moving toward what you want. 

And at the same time, if you don’t move beyond information to implementation, to taking action, you won’t get to bring your desires to life or luxuriate in the experiences of pleasure that are available to you.

There’s a reason why a lot of folks don’t make the leap from theory to practice - it’s scary. Doing new things is hard. 

That’s true of dating, sex, and relationships as much as it’s true of anti-fascist praxis, by the way. Deconstructing from systems of oppression is hard, whether it’s patriarchy, white supremacy, imperialism, capitalism, or ableism, to name a few. Recognizing where we’ve been complicit hurts. Deciding to take new action, especially when it means giving up some of our unearned advantages, is a leap of faith.

Sustainable action in the struggle for liberation, be that your personal sexual liberation or the liberation of our world from oppressive forces, requires support.

If nothing else is clear by now, I hope this season of Slutty Activism has driven home the message that none of us are islands, our destinies are interdependent, your relational interactions are hugely impactful, and our strength multiplies when we come together as a collective.

Doing the multidimensional inner-outer work of Dignified Hedonism, in order to create the greatest impact as a Slutty Activist, will challenge you. It will require you to build new skills and strengthen existing ones. 

Dignified Hedonism, belonging as it does to the work of liberation, goes against much of the socialization and indoctrination you’ve been exposed to.  

This kind of work is hard to do alone.

In a nutshell, that’s why I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing since 2016. My work is the support that helps people keep going once they get started on the road to ethical hedonism.

Supporting people in this work is an immense privilege. It’s hugely moving to witness people reckon with the lies they’ve been told about sexuality and make different choices from the ones set out for them by the dominant culture and society.

If you want support and guidance as you take your next steps as a Slutty Activist, you have several options available to you. One of them is to work with me in the capacity that’s right for you. Consider this your official invitation.

There are two ways I support people through this life-changing, world-changing process of Dignified Hedonism: through 1:1 Elite Coaching journeys or through a membership community called The Union of Slutty Activists and Other Sex Positive People (or The Union, for short).

Both offer access to all of the exercises and materials that make up the Dignified Hedonist framework and a systematic approach to building the skills that allow you to live a Desire-Led, Sex-Forward, Pleasure-Focused life. 

Both equip you with the toolkit that you can use over and over to create satisfying, fulfilling, deeply pleasurable relationships in a way that honors the dignity of all involved. 

Both will leave you feeling calm, connected, and confident dating, sex, and relationships.

Spaces in 1:1 Elite Coaching are limited. This is a good option if you want the quickest possible path to transforming your dating, sex, and relationship life. In Elite Coaching, you complete a fully customized journey through the Dignified Hedonist framework, focusing only on the areas you need most to experience the results you are looking for.

The Union is an always open, experimental, explicitly anti-fascist space where we engage in the work of deconstruction and where we build our skills collectively from within the Dignified Hedonist framework. The Union also offers additional support and resources for community organizers, to take this message and spread it further.

Joining the Union is a good choice if you’re up for the challenge of this transformation and you want to do it in community, as part of a collective. Union membership is a great compliment to 1:1 Elite Coaching - you can do both.

To find out more, head over to SluttyActivism.com and find out how you can get started changing the world with pleasure and fighting fascism with your genitals.

Ultimately, friend, the best reason for you to join me, on a 1:1 Coaching Journey or as a member of The Union, is simply because you want to.

Desire is the only good reason to do anything, and that includes embarking on creating change in your sex and relationship life.

Desire, as we discussed before, is the energy of new beginnings, the energy of origin. 

Earlier in this episode, I asked you what you are going to do about everything you’ve learned here. You now know more than the majority of people on the planet about how intimately our interpersonal, sexual relationships are intertwined with systems of oppression. You know that sexuality can become a site of resistance, and what’s more, one of the most effective sites of resistance for you as an individual.

You know that connection is our salvation and that it doesn’t have to be a grind. You know that the choices you make as a sexual being have an impact that extend far beyond you.

While it’s provocative to ask what’s you’re going to do, and it’s a question that’s phrased to get to thinking in terms of actions you can take, it’s not really the best question.

Because I’ve decided to save the best for last.

My friend, what do you want to do?

If the answer is that you want experience more pleasure, more connection, more joy, more honesty, more confidence, if the answer is you want to be a Slutty Activist and change this world with pleasure, then come join me!