Erotic Icon: Audre Lorde – Full Spectrum Aliveness

In 1978, Audre Lorde delivered a speech that would become one of her most influential essays. “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power” reimagined the concept of the erotic, transforming it from a term often confined to the sexual realm into a source of profound personal potential. Today, this work continues to inspire us to tap into our innate, limitless wisdom and use it to fuel our individual and collective evolution.

At the heart of Lorde’s essay lies a critical reframing of the erotic. Moving beyond conventional understanding, she presents the erotic as a deeply feminine source of power, rooted in unexpressed or unrecognized feeling. This power exists on a spectrum encompassing not just sexuality but also the aliveness we find in service, creation, expression, and connection. By reclaiming this broader definition of the erotic, Lorde reminds us that our liberation lies in the erotic and that eroticism is fundamentally existential.

Suppression of the erotic serves as a tool for oppression, particularly for women and marginalized communities. When we are disconnected from our capacity, our bodies and feelings, our erotic genius, and our love, we are weakened and harmed. This makes the personal act of connecting to one’s erotic power into a statement of reclamation, rebellion, and resistance against those who try to deny us our pleasure – which is critical to our overall mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being. The erotic emerges as an antidote against our embodied shame, sense of unworthiness, and systems that profit off of disconnection from ourselves and each other.

To touch on the explicitly sexual, the erotic invites us to overcome the pornographic (which Lorde emphasizes in her essay), the hustle and overwhelm of modern life, our past conditioning, and negative experiences and guides us towards a sexuality that centers mutual dignity, respect, pleasure, meaning and even transcendence.

I believe orgasms are moments of enlightenment and that holding sexuality with sacredness offers us the opportunity to experience and explore ourselves in ways we can’t elsewhere. It is a portal into the deepest parts of yourself. It is an arena where we can do so much: learn, be challenged, evolve, express, explore our bodies, power dynamics, emotional patterns, fantasy, play, and more. Establishing, building, and nurturing that erotic connection within yourself electrifies your relationship with all of reality and impacts every area of your life.

In an era where disconnection, fear, and shame are all too common for women, Lorde’s vision is a beacon beckoning us into our full-spectrum erotic aliveness. Here, I’m making her unforgettable essay available to inspire or support your erotic existence. You’re invited to sit with these ideas and be curious about the role of the erotic in your life.