#S2E9 | Erotic Lit for the 21st Century

Wild & Sublime Podcast Transcript

#S2E9 | Erotic Lit for the 21st Century

[Wild & Sublime theme music]

Meg Weber: At the time that I was writing this book, the whole "Fifty Shades of Grey" situation was blowing up everywhere. And I really wanted to write this story so that people would understand that actual, real human people do this kind of stuff, and we do it well.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Having informed consent if characters, whether in fiction or nonfiction, if individuals are taking part in something that involves risk —  all that's required in those circumstances is to have the negotiation leading up to it, so that people can look at that and go, "Wow, I don't need to skip over this part. This part can be sexy, this part can be fun."

Karen Yates: Welcome to Wild & Sublime, a sexy spin on infotainment®, no matter your preferences, orientation or relationship style, based on the popular live Chicago show. Each week, I'll chat about sex and relationships with citizens from the world of sex positivity. You'll hear meaningful conversation, dialogues that go deeper, and information that can help you become more free in your sexual expression. I'm sex educator Karen Yates. Today I talked to therapist Meg Weber about her BDSM memoir, along with her publisher Sienna Saint-Cyr, whose SinCyr publishing house produces consent-based erotica. Plus my Sermon on the Pubic Mound about hunches. Keep listening.

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Welcome, gentle listener. It is snowy here in Chicago, and my dear dog Sigrún has just had ACL surgery on her knee. Yes, it was just weeks ago I got her from the rescue facility, only to find out she had an old injury, which needed to be addressed. So here we are today — she with a "cone of shame" around her neck to keep her from licking her incision, and me with a large jar of peanut butter to make everything better. And it's sort of working. No, seriously — it's going very well, considering we're only in, I think, the first 36 hours here. I have very high hopes that she's gonna make a good recovery. So on to the episode...

Maybe with COVID, you haven't been able to get out. Maybe with the snow or the cold weather in your area of the world, you have been tucked inside. What a great time to peruse some sexy literature. But what to read? Well, I'm stoked to have on today two folks from the literary world: Meg Weber, a therapist and author of "A Year of Mr. Lucky," a memoir that recounts her yearlong BDSM relationship with a Dom she met online, and then subsequently met for some kinky play. The book comes out February 8th. We'll also be joined by Sienna Saint-Cyr, who runs SinCyr publishing, which published "A Year with Mr. Lucky." SinCyr spelled S-I-N-C-Y-R, produces consent-based erotica and romance. Later on in this episode, you'll hear about a very cool Valentine's gift to our Afterglow members on Patreon from SinCyr publishing that you can get in on yourself. Now, here is Meg Weber reading an excerpt from early on in the book. She has just made a connection with a Dom online, who eventually she will nickname Mr. Lucky. Here's part of their communication.

Meg Weber: [reading] "Thanks for the message. My dance card, and schedule in general, are alarmingly full these days. But I can usually squeeze in another word game, and a chance to see if we might have compatible play interests. You seem like an honest and sensible person, which is the kind I like to know. Plus, freckles. Before meeting, I want to hear what type of kink scenes interest you most. I've had a few dating app experiences in which everyone's time would have been saved by an early discussion of this stuff. Signed, [Redacted]."

"Thanks for replying, [Redacted]. Honest and sensible are accurate. You seem fun, quick-witted, responsible, and nefarious in delicious ways. Nothing like jumping right into the good stuff, eh? In nearly all of my kink adventures, I've bottomed to men. Rough sex in the context of a power dynamic gets me hot. I specifically enjoy being controlled, bossed around, tied up, spanked, used sexually to please my top, verbally teased and taunted. I'm a word slut. I like to suck cock, I like having my hair pulled, and I like to be fucked — hard. It's more about power exchange than physical pain for me. I'm not much of a masochist, but I enjoy pushing my limits to please my top, especially if I get praised for it, and then I get fucked. The intersections of pleasure, pain, power and desire are compelling. Does any of that match your desires, [Redacted]? Will you divulge more about what type of kink scenes interest you? Let me know if you're up for that word game and further discussion of whether we'd enjoy playing together."

And then his response: "That was a pleasantly comprehensive response. Seems to me that we have numerous common interests, and should certainly try out a meeting. I like your willingness to answer a direct and clear request for information. I have found that to be something good subs are good at. To date, I've only topped women. I like all kinds of spanking, slapping, and restraint, especially in the context of general servitude. Highlights include orgasm control, breast bondage, choosing attire — or lack thereof — verbal humiliation, begging. A favorite scenario is receiving cock worship while I accomplish some other task — for example, having a drink and reading the newspaper. I'm not a serious sadist, but I like causing some pain on occasion. Let's move forward with the board game plan. How about if we tentatively set up for the evening of Friday, 6/21?"

Karen Yates: Meg Weber, welcome.

Meg Weber: Thank you. Thanks so much for having both of us on here today, Karen.

Karen Yates: Of course. Sienna Saint-Cyr, welcome.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Thank you also for having me on here.

Karen Yates: Absolutely. Absolutely. So, Meg, "A Year of Mr. Lucky" chronicles your time with a Dom that you nickname Mr. Lucky. Tell me about your journey to realizing you wanted to write about this.

Meg Weber: So he and I did quite a bit of writing back and forth before we met in person. In order to turn it into a book, I had to whittle the heck out of those emails, because there were a lot of them, and I'm really wordy. But already in the banter back and forth between he and I, I was having so much fun crafting these responses to him, because I wanted to be compelling and alluring, and I wanted to keep his attention. And that meant I was working at the craft of these emails more than I'd crafted any writing in a really long time. And it was working: we were having a great time. And so, in the beginning, we emailed for about three weeks before we met in person. And I was having a great time with that. And then once he and I met, and I started to fall into the relationship, I needed something to do with everything I was feeling and processing. So I started writing a private blog that was where I processed a lot of our relationship. And a lot of those initial blog posts ended up being source material for the narrative pieces of the book.

Karen Yates: And I really appreciate those parts. Because you also include a piece of writing you did even before you met Mr. Lucky, and emails you didn't send — like we all write these emails we never send. That was pretty cool. So it's coming at the relationship from many different ways. And, you know, the banter, back and forth writing, can be a very hot endeavor.

Meg Weber: We found it that way. There was also a whole other thread that he and I were doing, where we were writing erotica. I was convinced the whole time we were writing erotica about he and I. He tried to say later that it was just characters — which was a bunch of B.S., but that's okay. And originally, that was also in the book, but it just never really fit. But yeah, that was really fun. We were having a good time with that. And in terms of writing emails I don't send — I'm a therapist, and that's advice I give my clients sometimes. And I often find myself in situations where I should probably do what I tell my clients to do. I should take my own advice.

Karen Yates: Which leads me to the next question. So you are a therapist, and here you are, you're writing a very explicit sexual memoir. Once you realized it was going to be a memoir, who did you think your audience was? Were you writing it for yourself? How did you determine who your audience was?

Meg Weber: At first I had to write it for myself. I had to write my way through it, so that I could process the relationship and hold on to myself in it. At the time that I was writing this book, the whole "Fifty Shades of Grey" situation was blowing up everywhere. Which just — I had so many feelings about, because it's terrible, and everybody was devouring it. And I really wanted to write this story, so that people would understand that actual, real human people do this kind of stuff. And we do it well, and we actually know how to communicate about it, and we understand consent, and we use it. And I wanted even a quarter, a third, an eighth of the people that are reading all of that stuff to read my book and see how people actually do this kind of stuff.

Karen Yates: As I was reading it, many things were striking me. One, it's a memoir of process — there's a process, a deep process going on, on a number of levels. The process of getting to know someone, the process of negotiating scenes, the process of working through emotions, as you developed feelings for him, and then the process of coming to terms with the end of the relationship. And as you're writing it — I mean, you were just talking about "Fifty Shades" and its impact on culture, learning about kink — or not really learning about kink, as the case might be — the Hollywood version of kink. Did you think your book was going to help people? Was that part of it, showing what consent and negotiation in scenes looks like?

Meg Weber: That was one of my goals. I wanted people to see that not only is consent necessary, but it can be fun. He and I had a great time negotiating and planning those scenes. And to me, that's really important, and it's something that I talk about in my clinical work with clients, that not only is transparent, clear communication essential, but it doesn't have to be drudgery. That can be part of the fun of a new relationship, or a new sex or play partner.

Karen Yates: So my next question is, for the kink and the vanilla people that you've given this book to to read, what is their feedback in both populations?

Meg Weber: The kinky folks that I've had read it tell me that it tracks. They appreciate the ways that I'm showing these conversations about consent. The kinky folks that have read it think that it's hot, which is gratifying. And the vanilla folks that have read it, one of the consistent pieces of feedback I get — like, if I'm in a writing group or something, and I'm workshopping this type of story — is that I take  really good care of my readers. Even though there's a lot of kink, and stuff that might be scary to vanilla readers, consistently they tell me that they are not afraid, that I present things in a way that doesn't scare them off. I'm really happy to hear that. Because I'm not trying to scare anybody off. I would love people that aren't familiar with this world to be able to read this and say, "That's not for me, but I can understand what they're doing and why it matters to them."

Karen Yates: One of the things I really appreciated about the book was that, in a certain regard, this was the universal story of what happens to us when we fall for someone who might not have the same level of feeling for us, or might have complications in their life. And then you break up, and what are you left with? And how we deal with our overwhelming emotions. In some regards, for me, it transcended whether you're into kink, or you're not into kink —  there was that going on. And plus, there's a lot of erotic content as well, both from the banter, as you read in the beginning, but then you also really chronicle each scene that you did with him. So it works on a number of different levels.

Meg Weber: Thank you. One other thing that came up from readers is they really appreciate the scenes where I'm in therapy in the book. It was important to me to include that, because it is a memoir of healing and of process, and I'm a therapist, so I believe in the process of therapy, and getting to do that work with somebody that can handle that content. There's scenes in the book where I'm just so thrilled that I have a therapist who I can talk about all this kinky stuff with, and she can go there with me. And to me, it's important also in my work, to be able to be that kind of therapist to my clients, so that they can come and talk about the relationships that they're in with power exchange, or where they're doing kinky stuff, and they know that I'm not going to judge them, and I'm going to be able to ask them appropriate questions related to that content.

Karen Yates: Excellent. I also wanted to ask you — the tension of being a therapist, a writer, and having a kink, or just being a sexual creature, the tension of these three identities coming together in this book. Did you ever feel like you were walking a tightrope? Or was it easy for you?

Meg Weber: I definitely still feel like I'm riding a tightrope. The part of the process I'm in right now, where I'm marketing this book and putting it out on my public social media accounts, is terrifying. And bridging these different aspects of my world. One thing that is helping the tiniest bit is that the name that I use professionally in my counseling world and in my teaching world is not the same name I'm publishing this under. They're both my names, but I have a tiny shred of separation between my personal name that I use and my professional name. And that has been really helpful for me. I'm not telling my clients, with one exception, that I wrote a book, because I don't actually want them to read it. They don't need to know what things I find hot in the kink world; they know that I'm kink-competent and aware, and that they can talk with me about kinky stuff in our sessions. But they don't need to know what gets me hot. That crosses a boundary that I don't need to cross with them.

Karen Yates: But at some point, there is a potential for clients to find out.

Meg Weber: There is. I like to pretend that potential is really unlikely. And I know that it's not. The world is not that small, Portland is tiny, the scene is tiny in Portland — I can't really hide. But I like to pretend that I can, or I wouldn't be able to do the marketing that I'm doing.

Karen Yates: Right. It is interesting. It's a strange process of — it's not denial. I mean, I know for myself, it's more like, "Oh, I'm just sort of spouting off about things, about sexual matters. And I'm telling the whole wide world, but I'm not really telling the whole wide world." It's a strange conundrum.

We'll hear more from our guests in a moment. We have some exciting news. As a Valentine's gift to you, all new and current members of The Afterglow on Patreon will be able to select one book from the SinCyr catalog for free download, including Meg Weber's book "A Year of Mr. Lucky." Everyone will find something of interest: tattoo erotica, office sex, sex and healing, queers in kilts, and other erotic collections. Just sign up for our monthly membership program at any level, starting at $5 a month, on or before February 28 to get this amazing offer. The link to The Afterglow on Patreon is in our show notes. Now, let's return to my interview with author Meg Weber and publisher Sienna Saint-Cyr.

So let's bring Sienna into the conversation. Sienna, one thing I'm interested in is to set context. I would love to know what led you to set up SinCyr as a publishing house, to found it, and how you came to this mission of having the publishing house publish books about healing trauma through sexuality.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: I was actually healing from my own trauma — sexual-based traumas — and one of the ideas that my therapist had at the time was to start writing about very erotic encounters, anything where there was a power dynamic. And I'd already had an interest in that as well. So, very much aligned with an erotica press later. And the more that I started writing about this stuff, the more it became clear to me that I didn't really understand consent, or healthy boundaries, or proper relationship communication. And so, I talked to her about it, and started looking for examples in novels, in television shows and movies — basically, anywhere that showed me "this is how you negotiate consent, this is what actual consent looks like." Even just asking someone if they would like a hug before you just reach in and hug them. All of that was completely foreign to me at the time. And the more that I looked, the more that I found all of this media that I'd been consuming, very little illustrated actual consent. In fact,  I realize some of my favorite shows had components in them like, somebody thought their partner was cheating, and so they got onto their cell phone, or got into their little black book, and started going through all of their stuff —  and just huge boundary violations. And then other circumstances, where someone would just look across the room and they would see someone they were attracted to, and the next thing you know it cuts to a scene and they're having wild, passionate sex in the bed. And there's no transition from "I am seeing you" and now "I am fucking you." So, I kind of set out on this mission to start writing my own content. And that's what I did, started of writing my own stories that taught about consent, and thought about relationship communication, setting and respecting boundaries. And then at some point, I realized I can only produce so much. So I started getting published — that maybe was happening a couple times a year. And  that really drove me to opening a press. Because when I thought about the fact, like, I could have hundreds of authors writing stories that illustrated healthy, negotiated consent, informed consent, enthusiastic consent — then that was really the only place that I could see myself going. And that is really my most important goal with all of this publishing stuff, to just put out a lot of content that gives people different ideas of what consent can look like, or what relationship communication can look like. So sometimes it's a circumstance where maybe there's a begging scene, and that illustrates what enthusiastic consent can look like. Or if it's just, "Let's have a verbal conversation," having informed consent — if characters, whether in fiction, or nonfiction, if individuals are taking part in something that involves risk. I've had several authors already write about things like rape fantasies. And so all that's required in those circumstances is to have the negotiation leading up to it, to have all of that consent lead in, so that people can look at that and go, wow, this is what this looks like, I don't need to skip over this part. This part can be sexy, this part can be fun. In fact, it's ideal, because my needs get met. So that's pretty much my driving force. And I also love publishing authors. I love working with authors. I love creating and just putting out content. So it's a great fit for me.

Karen Yates: Yeah. You know, you anticipated one of my questions, which was: so much of the erotic comes from these dark — I don't  like to use the word "dark" — but these kind of inchoate, mysterious places, that can include rape, they can include things that turn us on that we would never do in real life. But, you know, one of my questions was, does sending a message, using a publishing house to send a message, somehow get in the way of great erotica? And it's interesting, because yeah, if it's a fantasy, you can watch people, you know, and negotiate it before the fantasy actually gets enacted. And that's just as hot in its own way.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: One of the things that I do for my editors is, I have a Zoom conversation or a phone conversation, something with them before they take on an anthology or a project that they're going to be editing for me. And I explain to them, these are the requirements. As you're editing, you have to make sure these key consent components get hit. And then I get sent back manuscripts more often than I would like to have happen, where they're still missing consent, or they haven't added the consent in. I even had a situation where an editor had submitted a piece, and it had to do with a roofie scene. And I'm like, "Whoa whoa whoa! Somebody who's been roofied can't consent." So, a lot of where I find sort of the darker things crossing with the consent is just where people have missed, because they're so used to certain things being the norm or the status quo. So it's not necessarily about there's this taboo topic, or our darker, primal side coming forward is now getting in the way of consent. I don't find that, as much as I just find the  little missing pieces of "Oh, I didn't even think about that. But yeah, they should have a conversation before they do this thing."

Karen Yates: Yeah, I'm really glad you're bringing this up. Because I think the idea of consent is still pretty new in our culture, and what it looks like. And I think a lot of people think it looks a certain way, when there's just many ways to go about consent. I mean, there's non-verbal consent, there is verbal consent, there's negotiation, which is more prevalent in the kink world, but certainly everyone can do it. You know, you're reminding me — and then there's the messages of the patriarchy, which are so woven into standard culture that I think people are sort of hypnotized that this is the way it looks, unless it's really on your radar. And you're reminding me that when I was in my 20s, I was a romance copy editor. I was an editor of historical romances. Little-known fact about Karen Yates. And I remember one day editing a romance where the hero had sex with a sleeping woman. And I was so disturbed I had to leave my desk and just like, "What the fuck?" You know? And I actually ended up going into therapy because of it. So I guess there's a happy ending for me. [laughs] But yeah, that's a very interesting story. When you wrote the editors back, it was simply like, "Oh, I see. I see. Now I see it." Is that what—?

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Yeah, everyone always responds well. No one's been like, "No, I'm gonna argue this is consensual." Usually, people are like, "Oh my gosh, how did I miss that?" And then it opens great conversations after that, because then they start looking at other things. And like, where else have I missed this? And we really kind of come up in what I would call more "rape culture." And I'm just trying to shift all that to "let's focus on consent culture." Let's start working toward that, and see what that looks like. And everyone's responded well so far, thankfully,

Karen Yates: Talk a little bit about the breadth of books that you publish. I was really impressed, because SinCyr is not just an erotic press. You publish a number of books. Tell us a little bit about them.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: I really wanted to cover a span. And I didn't want to tie just — like romance, for example, to contemporary romance, or erotic romance. I really wanted to give a lot of options there, because for me, it wasn't just about the consent portion. It was about having healthy relationships, knowing how to talk through issues when you've run into them. Especially, I know a lot of people, and myself am in an open marriage, and  those involve enormous amounts of conversation and negotiation, just in normal relationship, day-to-day type things. So I really wanted the most options for reaching individuals, and letting people see what healthy relationships and communication can look like. So the romance aspect of the press, it's focused on anything from like, I've got superhero romances, I've got one coming out in March that's a polyamorous superhero romance that's got some steamy components to it.

Karen Yates: Yeah, pretty hot three-way! [laughs]

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Pretty hot three-way. There's also a storybook retelling of the Light Prince, where — it's called The Light Prince — a retelling of The Light Princess. And it's really about the female in the story being in the place of power, rescuing the prince, having sort of the agency that usually in fairy tale stories, the female is the one rescued, and doesn't really have much agency. So that's kind of the romance side of things. And then, moving into the erotica, there's also a pretty broad spectrum there. I mean, I really wanted to show what it's like to own our bodies, and really be in our bodies. So some of the anthologies that I've published have included stories where there was body positivity, where maybe a character works through something that was a struggle. Or sometimes it's just the person had  a larger body, or maybe they were nonbinary. And in those circumstances, the characters got to just own their sexuality, own their gender, own who they are. And then there's also some more classic styles, where it's just sex at work, having that office crush and sneaking into the back room and having your naughty time. But with consent. With illustrated consent, or verbal consent, or, you know, whatever component that author chose to put in that story. And then it goes to nonfiction, nonfiction and memoir. So for memoir, I really love individuals healing through sexuality. I think that orgasm and sexuality in general are kind of a life force. I just feel like we get so much healing when we can tap into that part of ourselves, and let ourselves be free and open to experience those pleasures. And so, anytime there's a memoir, or a nonfiction story where someone has grasped onto that and uses that as a tool to heal from a traumatic experience — or even just for enjoyment. I mean, this stuff's fun, too! It doesn't all have to be about trauma for me. So, you know, between Meg's book, her memoir, really going into depth about that loss and longing and healing, and then Janet Hardy had kind of a similar story in her book. I love putting that out there.

Karen Yates: Yeah, I was noticing — so, you published a memoir of Janet Hardy, and it's interesting. A couple of episodes ago, I read an excerpt from "Ethical Slut." They're one of the co-authors of "Ethical Slut." And I saw with delight that you had just published their memoir, and I'm really looking forward to reading it. So who found who? Meg, did you find SinCyr? Did you find Sienna? How did the whole thing come about?

Meg Weber: I first encountered SinCyr when I submitted a couple of pieces to different anthologies that Sienna was just talking about. I sent some stories that were involving me and a character who I call Molly at the end of this book, who becomes someone entirely different to me. So I had two pieces accepted for two different anthologies. And that's how I knew Sienna. And I tried to go the traditional publishing route, in terms of finding an agent, and trying to place this book with an agent was really tricky. I had several agents who were really interested in it and thought that the writing was good, and the story was strong, but they had no idea how they would ever sell it. Because it was erotic content, but not strictly erotica. And it was a memoir, but it was kinky. And these agents just kind of threw their hands up and said, "Yeah, good luck." And so I realized, well, Sienna accepted these other stories of mine. So I'm just gonna pitch my memoir.

Karen Yates: And then Sienna, what was your feeling when you saw the manuscript?

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Well, at first I was excited, because I knew when Meg had submitted some of the other stories for the anthologies that she'd been working on another project. And I was like, is this connected? So I was excited, because I obviously enjoyed those other stories, I picked them up. And then when I started reading, I pretty much fell in love with it right away. For me, it wasn't just — I suspect this is why some of the vanilla folks have had a good response to it — it didn't scream, "this is about my BDSM experience." It really screamed about, "This is my life, this is a personal growth experience I've had." And all that vulnerability was just splashed all over the page. And so it just made my heart go, "Oh, this is perfect!"

Karen Yates: Yeah. Because Meg, what also struck me is, you know, you even your family, you weave in your sister and her passing. And there's a lot — I mean, as Sienna just said,  you have the world of your life, and then your relationship with Mr. Lucky is a part of it. And I thought that was really laudable. Sienna, the other thing I wanted to talk with you about was the anthology about healing from sexual trauma, Kintsugi. Can you talk a little bit about that book?

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Powerful stories of healing trauma, that kind of came about because I was working with a friend of mine. She is also a therapist, and I am in grad school to become a therapist with a focus in trauma. And we really wanted to put something together that allowed people to start their healing process, or share whatever they wanted to share at the stage they were at. I find that — both from personal experience, and just from things that I've learned so far in the field — a lot of people will try to dictate how you should heal from trauma. And I don't find that helpful, I find it counterproductive and damaging. So we really set out with this anthology to try to, for one, accept as many of the stories as possible, so that people could really tell their story and be part of that fuller narrative. Kintsugi also is, you know, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold, to make it more beautiful. And so the concept behind it was, as we heal, you know, let's not get rid of these cracks. Let's not cover up these things. Let's just beautify ourselves, let's look at ourselves as a whole. And realize that all of us is beautiful, every aspect, the way that we've worked through something, where we've come out on the other end. And I was so surprised. We got so many submissions, covering this huge span, from like, some medical traumas, some were body dysphoria, others were bullying, and then a huge amount of sexual-based traumas, people were sharing their different steps in their healing process through that. And I was quite surprised to find  so many people that were male, or identifying as male, having had so many sexua-based traumas. So  it's just this kind of fantastic narrative, I guess, where all these different people have put their stories together, they've become part of this whole piece of healing, where they all kind of share in that process. And then there's also journal pages, and we left those in so that readers can, as they're going through it, if something sparks, they can flip to one of the journal pages and write their own story out, and become part of that healing narrative.

Karen Yates: That's fantastic. Thank you so much for being on. I really appreciated both of your contributions.

Sienna Saint-Cyr: Thank you for having us.

Meg Weber: Yes, thank you.

Karen Yates: To purchase "A Year with Mr. Lucky," or any SinCyr title, go to sincyrpublishing.com, or any major book outlet online, or go to our affiliate link in the show notes. Purchasing through Bookshop helps both independent booksellers and Wild & Sublime.

Wild & Sublime is also sponsored in part by our Sublime Supporter, Chicago-based Full Color Life Therapy, therapy for all of you, at fullcolorlifetherapy.com. If you would like to be a Sublime Supporter, showcasing you and your business and supporting us at the same time, contact us at . And now it's time for my Sermon on the Pubic Mound.

You heard in the interview just now, when I mentioned in my 20s, when I was a copy editor, getting up from my desk after reading about the scene in the historical romance where the hero initiates sex with a sleeping woman. This led me to therapy, because I was so disturbed, and I didn't understand why. But the disturbance was so deep, I knew it wasn't normal or typical. With a therapist's help, I came to realize that the first time I'd had sex, it had been completely nonconsensual. I had been in denial, and reading that romance scene rang a kind of bell in me.

Another time, I had a hunch about something I wanted to try sexually. I didn't know if it would even benefit me, or if it would turn out to be a complete catastrophic failure. Yet, I got a bunch of info online about it. And after thinking about it, I went and did it. And it changed my life for the better. It was a complete turning point moment. As I looked at the SinCyr book catalog before recording this episode, with its wide variety of erotic offerings, I thought about people stumbling onto things they may never have known were turn-ons, and how cool that idea was. Following breadcrumbs is sometimes how we find the greatest change moments of our lives. They can lead us to new pathways, insights, or experiences. It might not be a linear, logical or even an articulated thought. But it's our intuitive self throwing us a bone and saying, "Hey, let's play. Let's go in this direction. What do you think?" So the question becomes, how deeply are we willing to listen to ourselves? Do we trust the messages we're hearing? And if not, why? Trust itself is one of the first stepping stones on a winding lane that leads to liberation. We'll never know the outcome. But treading the path is the actual reward.

Thank you for listening. If you know someone who might be interested in this episode, send it to them. Do you like what you heard? Then give us a nice review on your podcast app. You can follow us on social media @wildandsublime, and sign up for newsletters at wildandsublime.com.  I'd like to thank associate producer Julia Williams and design guru Jean-Francois Gervais. Theme Music by David Ben-Porat. This episode was edited by The Creative Impostor Studios. Our media sponsor is Rebellious Magazine, feminist media at rebelliousmagazine.com.

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