Photo by Anna Tarazevich on Unsplash
What is Erotic?
When I think of what is “erotic”, sex acts come to mind. Then, all the preconceived notions that our patriarchal, White, Western, capitalist heteronormative, Judeo-Christian system has pushed onto us: debauchery, indulgence, vice, sin. Eroticism, when limited to a sexual context like it most often is under these structures of power, is seen as something to be kept private at best, and something completely evil at worst.
Sex, and by extension, eroticism, should only occur between two monogamous, straight, cisgender couples…in the bedroom…perhaps for reproductive purposes…with no “kinky” desires…and with orgasm as the end all be all goal — if we cater to the White, patriarchal, White, Western, heteronormative, Judeo-Christian ideal.
This ideal is important, not because it can be lived up to, but because more often than not, it can’t be. This is how power structures work. We are presented with an ideal, through the way we raise children to the scenes we watch on television, and then systems are set up to privilege that ideal. We also police ourselves. We experience guilt and shame if we can’t fit the norm and in some cases, trauma, criminal charges, and even death.
Deviant Eroticism
To deviate from the supposed norm is to be deviant. I studied deviance in some sociological criminology courses in undergrad, and I realized that a deviant is simply someone who departs from social norms. There’s a broad range of formal/informal deviance and a variety of ways different societies choose to punish those they deem deviant. Time-outs, the death penalty, fines, etc. It’s social control whether or not it has positive or negative impacts.
I think there’s a lot of power in the act of deviating from the mainstream idea of eroticism. If we embrace a broader definition of “the erotic” instead of limiting it to sex between two bodies, we can be divergent. We are being transgressive — refusing the boundaries and binaries that the powers at be thrive on. I love it.
I think one of the easiest ways to attune yourself to what is truly erotic is with the help of Esther Perel. A psychotherapist who coined the term “erotic intelligence”, she’s an amazing resource if you’re interested in diving deep into today’s romantic relationships. Informed by work from sex therapist Gina Ogden, Perel asks patients to complete two sentences:
- I turn myself on when…
- I turn myself off when…
Often, answers move beyond the realm of the sexual. Turn-off responses include going on your phone too much or worrying about work. These things zap our energy. They aren’t very life-giving. Folks list activities such as hiking, dancing, watching a favourite movie, enjoying an ice cream, or noticing a cool breeze on their skin as turn-ons.
It seems to me that eroticism is a desire to attune yourself to your own aliveness then. It’s a lust for life not as it should be or can one day be, but as it is right now. It’s being in love with the ability to be mindful, to have fun, to be yourself.
Eroticism and Curiosity or Interest
When thinking about my answers to Perel’s questions, nearly all of my responses were linked in some way to curiosity. It turns me on to explore new places, to have debates with people, to read a new book. To be curious is to play, and to play, I think, is to be erotic. When you are deeply interested in the world and in people and in ideas around you, you’re engaging with the erotic.
After some reflection, I realized that the most attractive element of a person (for me) is if they are interesting. Do I want to know more about them? Is their worldview compelling? Do they challenge me in a way that is safe but powerful? This goes for romantic and non-romantic relationships in my life.
Furthermore, I think that to sustain attraction and intimacy with anyone, this interest needs to be fed as well. I’ve heard folks say they feel loved but not liked by their partners. I’ve heard friends say they feel like they bore their colleagues. Every single human is endlessly interesting — if you do the work to see them as so. If you do not show the people in your life that they are interesting to you, I believe those relationships can fall apart.
When I remind myself that my friends can continue to surprise me, that I cannot read my family member’s minds, or that there is always more to discover about people and places, it’s erotic to me! For example, when I ask my younger cousin what she did at school today, that is life-affirming for both of us.
It is life-giving when you witness the other while remaining connected to the self.
A Third Thing
I’d like to extend my thinking of eroticism even further, and bring in a point from John Green’s collection of essays, The Anthropocene Reviewed (2021). In an essay entitled, “Bonneville Salt Flats” Green speaks of an idea called “the third thing” (185). The concept is borrowed from Donald Hall, the husband of poet Jane Kenyon. Hall writes (and Green quotes): “We did not spend our days gazing into each other’s eyes. We did that gazing when we made love or when one of us was in trouble, but most of the time our gazes met and entwined as they looked at a third thing. Third things are essential to marriages, objects or practices or habits or arts or institutions or games or human beings that provide a site of joint rapture or contentment. Each member of a couple is separate; the two come together in double attention” (185).
!!!
I had to pause for a long time after reading that.
Later, Green realizes “one of [his] favourite feelings in this world — the feeling of [his wife’s] gaze and [his] meeting and entwining as [they] looked at a third thing” (186).
I’d like to extend this third thing beyond coupledom, although it may be most strongly recognized there. Think of the third things you’ve shared with friends, even strangers in your life. A concert. A protest. A sidewalk on the street. All of this can be collective interest — or curiosity.
While eroticism can be a bubble bath for one, or a moment between bedsheets for two, it can also be a you, a me, and a third thing.
Intimacy is interest. Remain interested in what it means to be alive, and the everyday can be erotic.
Helpful Resources:
The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green
On Being with Krista Tippett – Esther Perel: The Erotic is an Antidote to Death
Queer Phenomenolgoy: Orientations, Objects, Others by Sara Ahmed
emily coppella 