A few minutes before I was scheduled to record an online interview with the renowned body-centered therapist Resmaa Menakem, I sat in my office, excited and nervous. I had thorough notes and a detailed agenda, meant to guide us through a rich discussion of somatic abolitionism, his groundbreaking work on unearthing and confronting the racism we carry in our bodies. As a Black therapist from Trinidad and Tobago, I had found this work to be seminal, both personally and professionally. But just as we were about to go live, a voice from deep within me said, “There will be no performance today. You will not perform.”
Any sense of confidence or stability I’d been feeling evaporated. In its place was confusion. I asked myself, “What does this confusion mean? What impact will it have on my conversation with Resmaa?” As he appeared on the screen dressed all in black, with images of famous Black entertainers and icons adorning the wall behind him, his smile was welcoming.
“Right before you came on,” I blurted, “I heard a voice tell me that there will be no performance today.”
As I got the words out, my chest opened, and I understood things more clearly. “Sometimes when we discuss issues like what we’re about to talk about today,” I explained, “if we’re not careful, it can feel like we’re performing. And I don’t want to perform today.”
Without missing a beat, Resmaa said, “Even if you are careful, you’ll perform. Performance is a protective mechanism for the Black body. It’s the way that the Black body survives white-body supremacy. It cuts off part of itself in order to—even if it can’t really do it—perform comfort for white bodies. So what came to you as the phrase, We’re not going to perform is the ancestor saying, ‘Just be here with your brother. Don’t worry about the white gaze right now.’”
–Akilah Riley-Richardson, “Reclaiming Black Imagination,” Psychotherapy Networker
I am experimenting with transporting my cultural-commentary blog from WordPress to Substack, where it might serve as an umbrella for any number of writing escapades and photographic expeditions. Check it out and let me know what you think. I invite you to subscribe. See here. It will mostly stay free except for labor-intensive deluxe entries.
Big thanks to Killian Melloy for this thoughtful interview he did with me for EDGE Media, talking about the work that inspired my memoir, “DADDY LOVER GOD: a sacred intimate journey.” You can read the whole story online here.
Krystal Orwig invited me to be a guest at her Must Love Memoir monthly reading series devoted to personal stories. I will be reading from my latest book, Daddy Lover God, along with Felice Cohen and Minda Honey. The reading happens Tuesday, October 10, at 7:30 pm at Jake’s Dilemma, a sports bar on the Upper West Side with a cozy event room in the basement. Come say hello! Free admission. Good selection of beers!
I took my first Body Electric workshop – Celebrating the Body Erotic – in July 1990 in New York City, taught by Joseph Kramer, founder of the Body Electric School. That workshop changed my life. It introduced me to the concept of sexuality as energy. It gave me a new paradigm for understanding my own erotic body. And the combination of breath, touch, and erotic arousal helped break through a logjam of grief I’d been storing in my body as a gay man living through the AIDS epidemic.
Intrigued by the glimpse of healing through pleasure, I took the workshop again two or three times in the course of the next year. And I sat down for a long interview with Joseph Kramer for an article I wrote for the weekly newspaper The Village Voice. In that interview, Joe Kramer talked about a concept he’d been formulating, the archetype of erotic pioneers providing a community service. He called them “sacred intimates.”
“It comes from what was called the sacred prostitute,” he said. “It weaves together spirituality and sexuality. In my work, I see all kinds of gay men who are sacred intimates. When they’re intimate with you, a transformation takes place. You feel your wholeness. There are plenty of prostitutes around, so you can go and get off with a prostitute. And the next day you have exactly the same craving. A sacred intimate is different. This is about being around someone who you’re transformed by. You either model him — that is, you see that vibrational energy and you bring it into yourself — or maybe there’s an energy that comes from higher places through this person into you. Or you have the experience of being with an unconditional lover, just for a while, that changes you and you learn what unconditional love can be.
“The place where the sacred intimate is most activated in the gay culture right now is as midwives to the dying. This is one of those sacred intimate roles. I think lots of people who sit with people while they’re dying or do hospice work have moments where all of a sudden, they recognize that they are living out an ancient profession: midwife to the dying. Tending to someone’s erotic energy is about the departure of that energy, too, leaving the body and going on.”
As I heard him spin out his fantasy of a vocation called “sacred intimate,” I felt myself falling under a spell. I heard in his words a description of myself that I had never heard before. It pulled together my childhood as an altar boy — a kind of temple slave operating behind the scenes of the Catholic worship service by carrying props for the ritual priest — with my experience taking care of friends dying from AIDS, and my long history of committed domestic partnerships with lovers, not to mention my enthusiastic career as an exhibitionistic connoisseur of communal revelry in sex clubs. Suddenly, Joe had connected the dots, and I got a picture of my destiny.
As a preliminary experiment, Joe told me that the Body Electric School would be offering a ten-day training for sacred intimates the following summer at a retreat center called Wildwood in the Russian River resort area north of San Francisco. I signed up for that training, as well as two of the next three that followed. So I like to think I was present at the creation of sacred intimacy.
I was one of the few people brave, inspired, or simply foolish enough to take Sacred Intimate Training as vocational instruction. My new book, Daddy Lover God: a sacred intimate journey (Joybody Books), chronicles my experience participating in Body Electric workshops, launching my own sacred intimate practice, and finding my way through the struggles and discoveries that go with the territory of sexual healing. The book also includes the complete transcript of my interview with Joseph Kramer, which has come to feel like an essential historical document.
At the Body Electric Town Hall on September 24th at 5 PM ET, hosted by Craig Cullinane, I will share some passages from the book and answer questions. In addition, there will space for participants to share stories from their own experience of sex work. It is my experience that, if you scratch the surface of any sizeable gathering of LGBTQ+ folx, you will find a number of people who have engaged in one form of sex work or another at some time in their lives: erotic massage, escorting, sacred intimacy, go-go dancing, stripping, camming for cash, appearing in adult videos (porn), OnlyFans/JustForFans, hosting sex parties, selling used underwear online, etc. And we all have stories to tell. What circumstances brought you into sex work, and what, if anything, made you cycle out of it? What did you learn about yourself in the process? What were memorable triumphs or debacles for you? Bring a story to tell (5 minutes or less) or let yourself be interviewed by me. Connoisseurs of sex workers also welcome to share.
Forgiveness requires the wrongdoer to apologize, ask for forgiveness and provide restitution if possible. Only at that point should the wronged person forgive the one who wronged them. This process may even lead to a deeper relationship, since the past wrongs will be removed from the relationship. In the absence of such an apology, the one who has been wronged may be able to understand that their anger and hurt harms them and they will want to let go of the wrong. The ability to put the wrongdoer’s behavior into a larger context may help, but this is letting go and not forgiveness.
How often do you find yourself saying, aloud or to yourself, “I’m too old to (fill in the blank)”? How often do you find yourself saying or thinking, “I’m NOT too old to (fill in the blank)”? Whether we face the subject with defiance or dread, grief or gratitude, cringing or curiosity, aging happens to all of us, if we’re lucky. What tools have we gathered, individually and collectively, to equip ourselves for the challenge and the opportunity of aging gracefully?
The intention of this pilot program, conducted by me with Michael Mele, co-founder of Il Chiostro, is to re-write the book on aging as gay men. Our tribe doesn’t necessarily have a lot of role models for navigating this season of life. Some of us have family structures to provide continuity as we age. Others of us rely on peers and partners for support, camaraderie, and a sense of belonging. How do these things change over time? What sustains our capacity for growing in mind, body, and soul?
In the lovely atmosphere of a mid-winter getaway to sunny Mérida in Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, we will gather for a week-long adventure with other soulful gay men, exploring best practices for not only surviving but thriving in our golden years.
I had the honor recently of being invited by Kirk Prine and Donny Lobree to appear on their podcast, “Conversations with the Queer Tribe.” Kirk and Donny are bodywork practitioners in the Bay Area who co-facilitate the Flesh & Spirit Community, which presents events both online and in-person for queer people exploring the intersection of sexuality and spirituality. I met Kirk many years ago at one of the first Sacred Intimate trainings offered by the Body Electric School. His interest in my new book, Daddy Lover God: a sacred intimate journey, inspired him to invite me on the podcast, which was attended live by a number of Queer Tribe elders and has now been posted online for anyone to check out. You can hear me talk about the landmarks in my spiritual journey, what the phrase “queer tribe” means to me, and my vision of the future for this community.
Damon Jacobs is a therapist, sexual health educator, and a strong advocate for gay male community. He hosts a popular YouTube series called “Tub Talks with Damon,” and it was my pleasure to spend an hour in the bubble bath with him talking about my new book, Daddy Lover God: a sacred intimate journey. He asked excellent, thoughtful questions and our conversation ranged far and wide. It was also amusing to conduct a promotional event as naked as I am on the cover of the book. I guess I’ve announced to the world that I’m available for other skyclad promotional events. Invite me!
The New York City launch of my new book, Daddy Lover God: a sacred intimate journey, will take place June 29 at the Bureau of General Services — Queer Division. Save the date!
food for the joybody 