Latest / The Priestess Temple Podcast / Ep 22: Let's Get Naked! Reclaiming Identity Through Burlesque
Transcript
- Embodied By Jenna: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Priestess Temple Podcast. I am your host and dark feminine embodiment guide, Priestess Paradise Rain. This is your space to come home to yourself as the goddess through learning about womb wisdom, somatics, and identity work. So that you can heal from heartbreak and have more intimate and fulfilling relationships. I am so grateful that you are here. Hey goddess. Today I wanted to talk about how the art of burlesque and being naked with my friends has helped me embody a new identity. Yes, I said being naked with my friends. Over the past year and a half, I have been immersed in different performance arts groups in the city of Buffalo. And if you know anything about Buffalo, New York, it is a small Blue collar city where sexual expression isn't really embraced, especially out in the open. And so this journey for me has been a reclamation of my sensuality and sexuality as I have been getting over the fear of being seen. I want to say that being naked with my friends. Has been one of the most healing experiences of my life and has helped us all come home to ourselves on a whole other level that has been quite unique yet similar for each and every one of us. Throughout this journey over the past year and a half, I have had the pleasure of going through this transformation. With four performers just like me who started out feeling really scared and unsure of themselves as they were diving into performing the art of burlesque. Well, fast forward a year and a half later, we just had a show this past Sunday, and it was crazy to me how different each and every one of us was. As we walked up onto the stage to perform, as we stripped down into our underwear. Yeah, it's like, where the hell did the fear of being seen even go? Right. And I wanted to talk to you today about my experience of performing burlesque and being naked with my friends, and how it has helped me to embody a new identity. And then I wanted to share. Exactly what myself and the other performers did so that you can take the steps in your own personal life to work through any challenges you're having with your body confidence or identity to come out on the other side feeling hotter and sexier and more confident you ever have before. So in 2025, I was pole dancing at a fitness studio called Everybody Plus. And I had been pole dancing for a while, but I had never shared any of my videos online because I had the fear of being seen and the fear of being judged, especially because I live in a community that is quite conservative. Well, I have always been a very Sensual and sexual person, I felt like I wasn't safe to express myself in that way in the public eye. And so I kept my pole dancing under wraps, even though I had invested thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours training to perform at the level that I was performing at. And so when I was practicing pole dance. At Everybody Plus, I saw that there was a burlesque boot camp series that was going to be taught by a local performer, Crimson Eve. She works with a troupe called the Foxy Thrills. And while she has changed her name to Sophie Scarpetti, at the time, she was working to help new burlesque performers. Get their debut on the scene because performing burlesque had changed her at such a deep fundamental level. And so I really wanted to showcase my pole dance. I signed up super excited, ready to perform in front of a crowd of 50 people. And when we showed up on the first day of the boot camp, there were maybe 10 of us who signed up. We were all there for different reasons, right? Being in this culture of oppression in Buffalo, New York, some of us wanted to reclaim our sexual expression, especially after being raised in religious households in which we were shamed. Others wanted to explore their gender identity. testing the waters to see if they felt more like a man or a woman or a non-binary person. Others wanted to have more body confidence, right? Like after being raised in a society that values thinness above all, some of us felt that we didn't fit the conventional beauty standard. And so practicing burlesque was a way for us to have. More body confidence and self-acceptance. And some of the people in the group were new mothers and felt like they had really lost themselves after having a child and wanted to do something to find who they were again after becoming a mother. And so while everyone's intention for practicing burlesque was different, all of us did the same thing. We worked on learning dance moves where we were shimmying and bumping and grinding and caressing our bodies. We were seductively peeling gloves off of our hand with our teeth and rubbing boas in our crotches. We were gluing rhinestones to our underwear so we could have a more visually interesting aesthetic during our performance. And we were dreaming up our alter ego who we would perform under as we embodied a new identity. We even had to plan out our own choreography. And I am telling you, everybody in the group was so freaking nervous. Like we all were terrified of getting on that stage and performing in front of that group of 50 people. I even waited until the very last minute to choreograph my routine, to the point where I was so down to the wire because I was overcome with fear and perfectionism and procrastination. The day of the show comes and we're all there dressed in our rhinestones and our corsets and our heels looking fabulous. And even though we were all scared, we Did the performance. We got naked in front of a crowd of people, and everyone cheered and congratulated us. And the performances went amazing. It was such a rush of adrenaline to be able to come out on the other side of that experience feeling seen and safe and celebrated in our authentic self expression. many of the performers in that group loved it so much that they decided to dive into their burlesque journey head first and started performing with local troops Myself, I was so triggered by the experience that I didn't continue with my performance art. In fact, I had hurt myself from procrastinating so much. And practicing my routine a million times within the two days leading up to the show. And so I had to take a break from pole dance, which made me really sad. And I ended up getting into a relationship in 2025 that ended in a traumatic breakup at the end of the year. And so after going through that breakup, I really wanted to find myself again. And I really wanted to feel Feel that same community connection and confidence that I had felt during my burlesque performance. And so I ended up joining a group called Underground Buffalo. And that group changed me. I am telling you, I was so nervous and so triggered when I started training with Underground Buffalo. And through working with that group of women over a five month period of time. My whole identity transformed. Being seen and celebrated and supported in a group of women who were learning the same choreography together and working to produce a really high quality show was life-changing. And at the end of the season, I got to do a little cameo. In the performance where I went up on the bar and did a trick coyote ugly style in front of hundreds of people. After having the fear of being seen at the first rehearsal with Underground Buffalo to then being showcased on the bar, I felt on top of the world. I was so freaking proud of myself For sticking with it and coming out on the other side. And after that underground Buffalo season was over, I had a friend who was in my first burlesque boot camp reach out to me to ask if I wanted to join a different burlesque program. This one was called the Buffalo Burlesque Academy. And it was hosted by a lovely performer. Named Sugatush, who is the leader of the Glam Vamps. And while I was a little reluctant to perform, I dove in with my friend who encouraged me and supported me to continue on the journey. And I cannot tell you how different my experience in this burlasque boot camp in 2026. Was to the experience I had in my first burlesque boot camp at the beginning of 2025. In just a year and a half, I have completely transformed as a person. and it has been because of the community support that I have received through Dance and Burlesque. We had so much. Fun in this Buffalo Burlesque Academy because I saw how some of the people who were in my first program had found new body confidence. They had found more stability in their gender identity. They had reclaimed their authentic sexual expression without shame. And they had found who they were as an individual woman. Who also happened to be a mother. And at the final practice, when we were getting ready to perform our group dance, we were all stripped down, into our pasties and our underwear. And we were all running together to pose as a group for the final moment. And when we went to pose, one of the people in the group accidentally smacked the side of my boob so hard that everyone heard it, and we all started dying laughing. And in that moment, there was so much joy, there was so much freedom, there was so much connection, and it just felt so good. To be silly with a group of adults who were alleviating the shame that we had been taught to feel about our bodies and about our sexuality from such a young age, growing up in the conservative blue collar city of Buffalo, New York. And in that moment, I just looked around the room and I felt so different. Like the version of me who first opened the door to exploring burlesque in 2025 would be in shock of the woman that I am today. And as I was getting ready for the performance that just occurred on Sunday, I felt so calm thinking about going on stage. I felt really excited. There was no fear. There was no nervousness. There was just pure joy. And I had felt so supported by the community of dancers that I had been working with. And As I looked at the performers that had been on the journey with me over this past year and a half, I could see the same change within them. They were different. I was different. And I really want to share with you what we did to help us find this level of freedom and confidence. Confidence in our bodies and in our authentic self expression through being naked with each other and practicing burlesque. So the first thing that we did is that we moved through our triggers, okay? We were all nervous and scared as hell on that first burlesque performance. I remember all of us. We're so unsure. We were shaking. Our nervous systems were activated. And what did we do? We moved and we performed, anyways. And so that is the first tip I want to give you. You have to make yourself uncomfortable. If you are going to embody a new identity, it means that you are moving into uncharted territory. And our nervous system can see. Something that's unfamiliar as being unsafe. And this isn't necessarily so. It's just that we have to train our body to become familiar with the unfamiliar. And the only way you can do that is by being scared and doing it, anyways, making yourself uncomfortable and then repeating that process over and over and over again. And this is the second tip is that you can't just do something once and expect yourself to become embodied in it. Okay. When I look at myself and the other performers that I have been on this journey with over the past year and a half, we have all practiced a lot. These other performers have done so many performances I can't even count. And I have attended hundreds of hours of dance practices between now and then. And so the repetition is something that you cannot. Skip. If you truly want to embody a new identity and get over the fear of being seen, you can't just be triggered and move once. You have to do it over and over and over and over. But what I've realized is that once you do it all the time, it just becomes the person that you are. And that's how I feel. And that's how the other performers feel too. It's not that we're nervous for these shows now. It's something we're excited for and it's something we're known for within the community. It has become our identity through the repetition, and the trigger is no longer there. Another thing that really helped all of us as we were working towards becoming burlesque performers, we created an altar easy. Ego okay, so as you're embodying a new identity, it can be really, really helpful to think about who you want to be and what traits you would desire to embody, and then create an identity based around that person. So Paradise Rain was alter ego. When I started with Underground Buffalo at the end of 2025. And through consistently showing up in the dance room and moving through the world to embody the traits of her, I have become her. And the same thing has happened with all of the other performers in the group. They literally thought about who they wanted to be as that. Bitch who got up on stage and stripped down into their underwear to working their booty cheeks while people were throwing dollar bills at them. And now guess what? That's who they are on social media, on flyers, at their performances. So if you're really looking to transform and embody a new identity, an alter ego can be really helpful. You can also have a totem for your alter ego, which is something you wear to help you get into that mindset. So for me, I wear a special ring and a bracelet when I am embodying paradise rain. For you, it could be wearing a certain signature scent or a pair of earrings. You get the idea, right? something that helps to switch into that other state of mind can help you embody your alter ego and transform into this person you desire to be. And last but not least, we had to be willing to let. Parts of ourselves go. Like for me, I really joined the burlesque troupe to get over the fear of being seen. And so when I first started in the boot camp in 2025, I was playing really small. I didn't want to be judged. I didn't want to be shamed. In my sensual and sexual expression. And so, in order for me to embody a new identity, I had to let those old parts of me die. I had to kill my inner good girl who was playing small and being nice to accommodate everybody else's comfortability. And so I really had to. Allow myself to be disliked. And I had to allow myself to be misunderstood and perceived. And while those parts of me who didn't want to allow me to do that kept me safe for a time being, they also kept me inside of a cage. And so you have to be willing to let it all go. So you can move forth and make space for something new. The other performers, some of them had to give up their previous gender, right? And embody a new gender. Some of the other performers had to let go of their religious conditioning and embody a new train of thought. And in this death, we find that there's a period of grieving. That ultimately creates space for you to cultivate something new. And we've all found this beautiful rebirth and sense of freedom through practicing burlesque and being naked with one another. I am telling you, when you get to know yourself on a deeper level, the patriarchy crumbles. And we all heal together. Because what I saw this past Sunday was absolutely mind-blowing. The amount of power and expression and authenticity and joy that was radiating from all of us on the stage was something that was so special. And I don't think I will ever forget. And I really want everybody to be able to have this type of experience in their life. Because I think society conditions us to be who we should be, but not be who we authentically are. And so if you really want to embody a new identity, you have Have to be triggered. You have to repeat moving through those triggers over and over again. You have to be willing to let certain parts of yourself die. And you have to dream up who you desire to be on the other side of this transformation. But I'm telling you, if you do Exactly what I taught you to do in this episode. You will embody your alter ego and have a hot, sexy glow-up in record time. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Priestess Temple Podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, please share with members of your community. Comment, rate, and subscribe to the podcast so we can continue having these amazing conversations every week. I will see you next Thursday. And until then, remember, you are the goddess.