Empowerment: Knowing Ourselves
Sometimes we need to engage the philosophical questions
It’s good to be back, everyone. This past month was a whirlwind of worlds colliding in interesting ways. I launched my philosophical counseling practice, I took a trip east to check on my parents (it’s been a few years), and ended the month with a much-needed trip to South Plains Leatherfest, where I had the opportunity to spend some quality time with members of my chosen family, and make some beautiful connections.
At SPLF, however, I felt the absence of friends and acquaintances I know from the scene. Some didn’t attend due to the rising expense of travel (VERY understandable!). But several didn’t come because they didn’t necessarily feel safe travelling.
That sentiment was echoed by some trans folks who did attend SPLF. I heard many heartbreaking stories about passport applications and renewals being rejected, and just the general awfulness of the political situation in general. The ongoing, chronic stress and fear is taking its toll. It’s hard to see, but it MUST be witnessed — and not just on Trans Day of Visibility.
I attended an “opening summit” called “Community in Turbulent Times,” which discussed the ::: gestures generally ::: current state of affairs and its effects on the kink community (particularly on trans, queer, and bipoc folks and all the intersections therein). The speakers and facilitators were excellent, but I was disappointed by a few of my fellow cis and/or het and/or white attendees who — albeit non-maliciously, but ignorantly — centered the conversation around themselves and their experiences, and/or offered the exact “solutions” that panelists had repeatedly said were not solutions …
Just an aside to my cis/het/white compatriots: saying the same thing using different words doesn’t make your “solution” any different or more effective. Also, just saying words is not a solution, even though our privilege may make us think so.
But I digress …
I went into this con (and the month of March in general), in a thoughtful headspace, probably because I’ve been accepting new clients into my practice and my brain is moving in more philosophical, existential spaces. And of course, at SPLF, I was thinking a lot about the questions of efficacy and belonging. Leather conferences — particularly ones where the entire hotel is booked for attendees only — can cultivate and sustain deep and profound feelings of belonging , validation, and empowerment … if we go in with the right attitude, and are fortunate enough to have good experiences.
I watched a lot of people at the con looking for that empowerment in different ways; ranging from simply dressing the part, all the way to trying to validate their sexuality by having as many scenes/encounters as possible. Obviously, some methods of self-validation and empowerment are better than others, and a leather or kink conference cannot and will not “fix” you (which is a class that Mercy and I will be creating soon!).
As good as I felt in my leather, nothing compared to being showered with kisses by someone in my extended leather family who was just thrilled to see me, or being asked by a leather elder to sit by their side and occasionally hold their hand for emotional support when they recorded an interview with the Carter Johnson Library. These were transcendent moments.
For Mercy and I, this was very much a conference for reconnecting with our community, and rekindling that sense of belonging that tends to ebb a bit when circumstances keep us isolated from the kink and leather scenes. The experience reinforced what we already knew: just as a conference will not fix you, a label will not create the structure you need to give you a sense of belonging. We can call ourselves “leather,” or “kinky” or a “Master” or a “slave,” etc., but those labels alone will not magically grant us an identity and/or make us comfortable in our skins, nor will it authentically empower us.
I think in this age of social media, we’ve forgotten just how to know ourselves. In my philosophical counseling practice, I have clients who are engaging in the deepest acts of self-reflection they’ve ever done, and doing so in a safe environment. Unlike therapy, we don’t dive headlong into trauma or psychopathologies. For some, I like to think of it as a form of “aftercare” following a client's time in therapy, career counseling, and/or life coaching. I help with those deeper, more existential issues of self (who am I? How do I give MY life meaning? What does a “good life” mean for me?, etc.). It’s an itch that sometimes can’t be scratched by the aforementioned (and quite useful and effective) services.
I believe that culturally, we’ve forgotten how to engage in the deeper questions because we’ve sacrificed the deeper thought that often comes from silence (and even boredom) to never-ending scrolls and streams of news, memes, and a constant barrage of narcissistic endorphin shots.
More accurately, it’s easy to lose sight of the importance of trying to understand ourselves before we look to others to define us. I don’t think this comes from fear or a lack of desire, I think it’s because many just don’t know how. We don’t want to sit with the discomfort of truly understanding ourselves. We’d rather have the answers given to us. And if we can’t understand ourselves, how are we supposed to understand others?
It takes courage to know ourselves. It requires a kind of mindful acceptance of ourselves. Some may be tempted to say “radical acceptance.” Now, what I’m about to say may be an unpopular opinion, but I think the term “radical acceptance” is misleading and potentially dangerous when referring to the self. I don’t think radical acceptance of ourselves is appropriate when we are trying to change behaviors that may be harmful to ourselves or others. Mindful awarenss on the other hand, shifts things more to a recognition of our faults (perhaps an acceptance that we have them), and a desire to change. So perhaps via mindful awareness, we can move from “radical acceptance” to “radical self-examination.”
To radically examine ourselves is to be prepared to look at seemingly integral or essential parts of our identity and shift, change, or reject that which no longer serves us. Meeting that challenge is empowering.
This is why I left academia. These are things that require one-on-one attention, guidance, and care. This can’t be found in a classroom.
I see both kinky and vanilla folks in my practice, and I’ve found that clients from the kink community tend to be much more self-aware, and much more willing to get their hands dirty when it comes to self-work. This does not lessen the existential depth that vanilla folks face, but kinky folks most often have already had to face deeper issues of meaning, identity, and self-advocacy simply through living the lifestyle (whether they’re successfully navigating those spaces or not is something they often come to me to help figure out).
The risks we face as kinksters for the lifestyles we choose, and/or the very lived experiences of queer folks, bring existential issues to the forefront. A gay leatherman of a certain age has most likely wrestled with the arbitrary nature of life and death via survivor’s guilt after friends, lovers, and/or chosen family members succumbed to HIV-related complications during the AIDS crisis. A polyamorous person who lives honestly and transparently has faced ethical questions regarding love and compassion that few others have had to engage.
Again, this does not discount the experiences of vanilla folks at all. But I believe that practicing kinksters (whether queer or not) are more likely to have encountered deeper issues of meaning in the choices that they’ve made to engage in their desires.
But just because we’ve encountered those issues, doesn’t mean that we have the tools to face them, or the help we may need to engage with them.
I’m making the case here for “knowing ourselves,”not in a pretentious way, but a practical one. We need to know ourselves so that we can be better people. That’s really the core of it. To be a better person will always be relative to the contexts of our experiences. Empowerment is contextual.
Just some observations here from your friendly neighborhood, kink-aware philosophical counselor (if you’re interested in what I’m doing and want more info, please drop an email to pleasekinkresponsibly@substack.com)
Thanks to everyone who spent time with us at SPLF, and a special thank you to the organizers, staff, and volunteers who made it possible.
And deep and sincere gratitude to our readers for their patience as we attended to the demands of our personal and professional lives.
Onward and upward.