Latest / Becoming Flame: Where Sensuality, Sovereignty, and Sacred Power Ignite / Pleasure Activism: Why Rage and Desire Are the Same Fire with Meena Bhasin
Transcript
- Kait Tregenza: Hi Mina, welcome to Becoming Flame Podcast. Meena: Hi, thank you. I'm really it's a pleasure to be here. Kait Tregenza: Could you sorry, could you just adjust your screen down 'cause you're like almost out of it? That's better. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool. Meena: I know. I was just noticing that. And yeah, let's just do ⁓ yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, there we go. I was I I thought it was gonna find me and it wasn't. Okay. ⁓ that's perfect. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. But it was like zooming in in a funny way. Okay, that's perfect. You wanna if you wanna restart, I'm happy to Kait Tregenza: No, it's not Zoom. Yeah. Hi Mina, welcome to the Becoming Flame podcast. Meena: Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure to be here. Kait Tregenza: I think when I first came across you and first found you, it was so interesting because there's almost zero in our story from a conventional perspective, I felt so connected to so much about you. It's like ⁓ I do have immigrant parents. I have not lost a parent. I have, you know, all these kinds of really big pillars in personal story. ⁓ And that got me thinking. About why am I so connected to this woman who lives across to the other side of the world from me, who has had an a remarkably different, you know, epigenetic physically experience from me. There's almost no interlap overlap from so many of these markers that we say this is how we connect with people. And yet it really highlighted me that there is a story. of mothers who see themselves in other mothers, of women who see themselves in other women. that made me realize something deep that I probably hadn't really connected at the at at a at a core I had, but maybe at a conscious level I hadn't, which is we really recognize incorrect, we label markers of sameness. ⁓ In general culture, you know, where ⁓ have to identify as this type of woman or that type of woman to have a sameness. And think what I recognized within you that was present within me was an alive, available woman. And I available as in available to all emotion, in available to all aspects of herself. And I guess for me I know the journey has hard. You know, it hasn't been paved with pleasure and joy ⁓ and yet my work and what I want more people to understand about pleasure is that it can it can be easeful But I pause and say, but it hasn't been for me. And there's so much of your story that I know wouldn't have been easeful for you. ⁓ And yet you're a one who's chosen to seek out pleasures, to seek out sensuality, to seek out Beauty in this world. I my personal curiosity ⁓ is and why. Meena: Hmm. Yeah. ⁓ yeah. I love I love you're describing in terms of that like sort of light or spark. that very connected magnetism or something that attracts you to someone else and has you know that like on a really core deep soul level there's a really strong and and similarity, I guess also, right? Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: a deep knowing and I absolutely felt the same way as I've been sort of diving into your work and what you're about and just listening to you yeah describe the world as you see it. yeah, just so much connection. So yeah I mean I I it ⁓ just to kind of pull that thread of like how we tend to categorize people a very simplistically kind of Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: labels on who we think someone else is. mean, there's so many labels that we don't think to do that have so much to do with our internal world. and I think for those of us who are deeply vulnerable have chosen to be deeply vulnerable, which I think both of us have, that there a there's a availability of the inner world that becomes like possible for a connection instantly, right? ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: And and for me, like one of the biggest markers there is a deep feeler and highly sensitive, I mean, you you there's a lot of ways to describe that, but things that I think have been true of me ever since I was, you know, it's just who I am. It's it's in my imprint, I think, ever since I can remember I've been like that. and so, you know, ⁓ happened to be something that came into my life. I mean, I started playing the violin when I was four. So having that world available to me, which was not always beautiful because the classical music training and upbringing can be very rigorous and very intense, and a lot less like finding the pleasure in it. However, I think that idea of like feeling really deeply, having a world in which Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: I could explore just like beauty and emotion in a way that like was such a good fit for who I think I am and who I've always been. so feel like that was that was kind of maybe the beginning of the of the self-expression in the sense of like, here's a that I didn't know at the time was about pleasure, but Absolutely is. You know, I mean, music is like one of the great places to be in pleasure and to to sort of like bathe ⁓ your emotional range and be held through in That's kind of like where I I have landed with what music does for and I think it does for many. yeah, connect with it. Kait Tregenza: Mm. I remember the first time I found out that people not everybody music to live. That was so confounding to me. I was like, ⁓ what's your world like? You know? And I started to understand, I I'm really fascinated with people who have what's it called? Synesthesia, where they see music. That for me is in that would be an incredible experience because it would be totally immersive. For me, me, it's a Meena: yeah, yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: is more of a feeling based thing and it's more of a like shift in state and mood and I don't know how you could not find beauty in life if you if you ⁓ didn't music as part of as part of that recipe. F for me it's like s it's like breathing. I'm not the though. I and and so I'm so curious ⁓ to know how Meena: Mm. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: being in a frequency of this art form you know so many people just love and naturally love. How does that change day to day life? You mean you're you're literally playing music probably daily, right? And you know, you're standing up in front of Anyone who's literally paid to be there, to experience you, to feel you, to know you, to see and feel and know your interpretation of music. And I'm curious how, because it's such a state shifter for others, how does how do you receive that as the artist? Meena: Hmm. Yeah, what a beautiful question. you know, I actually I I hope that maybe what I what I'm gonna share that people will be able to relate to it without necessarily being musicians themselves. Because you know, one of the things that I've always said as the greatest gift to me in my relationship to music is actually just my deep appreciation to So that's something that we can all do, right? I mean, I I feel obviously very ⁓ fortunate to have been able to go down a path where I could really express that way too. But but I think the greatest gift is the ability to feel the range that I do and that I think many of us do through listening. So you know, just to answer your your question, it's been a interesting journey because As much of our upbringings of of I think any kind, it doesn't have to be music. There's so much of a sense of performing for and being desirable for others. that of again, like ⁓ the music world does it, I think, sort of more acutely than some, in the sense of like, you know, it needs to sound exactly like this. And like, you know, there's a sense of perfection and there's a sense of You know, did I nail it? And like all these things really not being necessarily directly tied to the feeling inside your body and that sense of like have I expressed everything that wants to come through me? that that has not been the marker. at least, you know, especially in the training, right? Like I think there's a lot of just like, make it sound perfect, make it sound really, you know, beautiful. but absolutely to your point, as I've gotten older and as I've, you know, reclaimed. so much of my life for myself, so much more around what I desire to feel, not necessarily how I want others to desire me. ⁓ but that that has really shifted to to be much more of what you were just describing, which is like, what does it feel like to be received? What does it feel like for people to receive what I am expressing out? and actually one the I'm just gonna like riff on this because Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: one of the areas that I'm starting to play with a little bit more is spaces where I can improvise and and play, you know, music that's already written, but where people are actually much more in a state of recipe receptivity, I guess. So it's like, ⁓ you know, there's yoga mats, there's pillows, there's a sense of like really being like I'm here to be nourished, getting out of Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Mm. Meena: framework of the sort of, you know, sit in the audience in your seat and like, you know, have that dynamic of person on stage and person in the audience, but really interested in that exchange, as you say, right? That exchange of of frequency, of energy, of able to to really feel the audience as much as as as I can to really inform, to inform I'm putting out, but also to to like complete that circle, you know, of what we're really doing together when we bring an audience and performers together. anyway, I'll I'll stop there for now, but Kait Tregenza: Mm. So before you felt this well before you were starting this experiment, so to speak, were you receiving from the audience? Or was this a very directional Meena: Yeah. No, I mean, I no, of course. Like I think there is always energetics around that. And there is a real I mean, there's there's a lot that I love about performing. I think, you know, this is just this is my particular slice, right? Like I don't want to speak for you know, definitely not for all classical musicians. but I want to speak to the fact that I think many feel that sense of like now I'm getting up to perform ⁓ for these people. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: versus like now I am coming to share like my soul others. And this is a gift to share with them and for them to then like, you know, again, like almost like this circle, like for them to then kind of give me that full that that that feedback of like having received. And and to me, like when that really works, it's like a, it's a yeah, it's it's deep impact on someone else's soul. And like that being then why I do it, you know, like it's yeah, I mean that exchange is absolutely what it's about. I just I've I'm very eager to strip away all the other stuff that might get in the way of that. ⁓ Kait Tregenza: I think what you're saying is really fascinating because it's actually making me realize that my art form has always been the spoken word. And I just didn't know that until this conversation. so I was a debater, I was an actor, I was a public speaker. I and when I was younger, I think I was definitely that ⁓ without a cause. Meena: Mm. Mm. Kait Tregenza: Everything I see injustice everywhere. I could see the wrongness of systems and the wrongness of these limiting So ⁓ and you I would just I would take on the wrong audiences, you know, like my 85-year-old great aunt who was never gonna change, you know. or like, you know, people that generation who said racist slurs, and you know, that's that's That's not your audience for that. Like these people are not affecting the world anymore and they're also not going to change. But think that what I I realized as well in what you were talking about is an act of ⁓ a debater performs. know, I was doing mooting and and public speaking, and these are all prepared art forms ⁓ that you ⁓ Assume a character because even if you're debating, it's not your like natural speaking voice, it's not your natural way of speaking, it's it is a performance of some kind, I think what I'm realizing is that when you are so crafted your expression or in your art form through performance, undoing that your life and then going, okay, I'm now going to just speak as myself or play as myself or know paint as myself. That be really interesting. I can I can only imagine how much impact that's had on every other aspect of your life to stop performing and just be and receive. Meena: Mm, yeah, yeah, no, totally. Well, so I'm just curious for you, is has podcasting been some of that? Or maybe there were there were things before it that Kait Tregenza: No, it's interesting because I think that the challenge for me to have done this is, you know, it's this overnight project that's only taken, you know, a decade to think about, to do, right? and that I've ever recorded up until this year has been deleted or not shared or whatever it was, and not because It was performed it was so real, it was so me. It was the signature of my own personal self and the in that truth. both in a world I felt I I ⁓ never felt that another needed to be added to social media or another voice needed to be added to the world. And so I think it only got to a certain point where I was like the convergence my personal power and the power that AI and all other things were are now was true humans with truth to they can hold that in their body. This don't have a choice. It became a choiceless choice, actually. It became this point of like, this is not about me anymore. And I think that's the way that I elevated my to unfiltered, unscripted. And very, very, you know, emphas, you know, I I I don't script anything. I don't even know the topic that I'm going to sit down and speak about. I sit and I just feel the field and I allow words to come out of my mouth. And that's very vulnerable in the sense of it doesn't have always ⁓ in the traditional sense. It doesn't have a beginning, middle, and an end. Sometimes make my words come out of my mouth and go, What did I even say? What is the point of this? Sometimes I to go back and listen to it to get the point, and then you know. And by the this is what I meant. this is what I'm but I think what what's strange for me is like the embracing of femininity of present and receiving myself. That's why I'm so fascinated about receiving, is because I have not been traditionally good at it and don't think I've known what it ⁓ means. ⁓ Meena: Hmm. Yeah. Well, mean, what you're just disc what you just described to me sounds like a real act of rebellion as well. ⁓ right. Like just the like F everything. gonna come on and I I'm not like this is the antithesis of performing because I don't even have I don't even know what it's gonna happen. I'm gonna trust immensely in my self, in my wisdom, in my intuition. yeah, I mean, and yes, like Kait Tregenza: Yeah. Meena: lean so hard into that feminine energy of like it will flow it will go where it needs to go. So anyway, I just like, yeah, respect. Kait Tregenza: Well, that comes with a whole lot of looking at statistics, not looking at listenership and and realizing like why am why am I doing this? Actually it's a part of my s my creator's expression, right? And if I you to stop playing music tomorrow and you were never allowed to do that again, there would be a part of you that would be deeply unfulfilled as a as a creator, as an artist, as a ⁓ as an expressor ⁓ because it's your expression vehicle and if you can no longer express yourself beauty dies in your life right and so i had to make a decision really early on of like i'm going to do this as form of art as a ⁓ of activism rebellion and it's not becoming famous or it's not about getting listeners and it's not about doing any of that And so I made a commitment that I would release episodes before I ever looked at the statistic because I had at least 200 hours of things to say. And think truly served me because when people come and they write and you know, if they're on the show and they want all the statistics, I just gracefully say, I don't think the show's for us. For you, it's not in alignment. It's just a frequency match. This this is not what I'm doing it for. This is not A platform for you to come to extract. This is this is a platform for you to come to share the expression of you in such an authentic way that even the way that you've approached it through like, what will I get out of this? It's a mismatch. Like in and it and at first it was interesting because it's kind of tied to what you're saying about just your art form. ⁓ first, when those Meena: Mm. Kait Tregenza: Questions came, I was like, ⁓ my god, it's not enough. I would just be like, this is information. See? See how your body is already telling you. No guest and allows you be out of your You know, ⁓ no music director, no no, you know, whatever it is, is permitted to push me. out of my authentic expression. And I don't think that years ago I would have had the ability to recognize it, let alone know what to do with it. And I think you're in the hyper performance loop, you even because you've been trained that way. We've all been trained this way as women. Meena: Yeah. Kait Tregenza: To even to even see it as these questions don't have a place here. And my performance is not, you know, th this is not a performance for you. This is an expressive art form. That's taken long time to into. Meena: Yeah, no, I mean, that's beautiful. And I think also so it's great that you have the agency, the autonomy, the sovereignty to ⁓ just sort of be like, this is the container that I'm creating maybe it's for you and maybe it's not for you, but to be able to really sort of ground into what you want it to be and not feel like you have to be catering, shifting yourself. That feels so important. It also feels so important therefore for women who have done the work to unravel enough from that sense of how we're supposed to show up that those women be in positions of leadership and of creating the space for, you know, alternatives to exist because the only way it's gonna change. Kait Tregenza: And what you just said is deeply important because the ver just we've said we need unravel from ⁓ performance and performing for others, for you know, for the monkeys who make us dance, or or we the monkeys, whoever knows, the lead the unraveling yourself from the definition of leadership is equally important, right? What we collectively accept as as someone is heralding us into a new dynamic or whatever paradigm, do they have the core of them an alignment to the same reasons that we seek leadership in them? And that could be at a political leader, as a corporate leader, at a community, you know. Like it it's amazing how these false ideas of leadership trickle down into just like you've got five people under you and and there's this tyrant energy of this extraction energy. And so I think what you're doing as a found at as a foundation to life, to living, to art, to expression, to sharing, it changes everything the world. And so I guess that's the segue into Meena: Yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: Pleasure activism and what that what that even let's start with what what is it first for people who don't know and why why is this something that you feel so passionately about? Meena: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, okay. So I'll start with just because I think we all may define pleasure differently. ⁓ I think if someone's listening to your podcast, I'm sure that they have some sense already of what pleasure is and what it isn't. But for me, I of pleasure as the feeling of aliveness. deep satisfaction in the body that is felt when it's when you're receiving through your senses, the gifts of your senses, and you are really present in the moment. so you know, it requires real slowness, a real sort of attunement to what exactly is coming through in that in that to really be received as pleasure. So the idea around pleasure activism I I mean, there I think there are a lot of different ways of sort of thinking about it. And actually it's really interesting because you came across the term, maybe through me using it. ⁓ I had of started thinking about these two words together, and then I actually came across Adrian Marie Brown, who's an incredible activist author. ⁓ speaker leader. and she has a book called Pleasure Activism. and so it was one of those moments that, you know, I think many of us have had where you're like, I thought I thought this myself. Like, I thought I came up with it. And then there's a feeling of great validation also of like, okay, this is this is a thing, you know, and I'm not the only one. And and her work is also very much inspired by Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: Octavia Butler, and then also Audrey Lorde. And Audrey Lorde has ⁓ an incredible essay called of the Erotic, Erotic is Power. and is also just sort of foundational to all of this before it was sort of officially called Pleasure Activism. But so there's kind of two, I don't know, two different directions I want to talk about this, in which I want to talk about this. One of them is this idea of kind of flipping on our on its head we are here, like literally as a species. Like what is life for? And do we source all of from or where can we source our energy from? and really, and think you even have spoken to this, but like the the idea of like, I mean, when we talk about pleasure, we're talking about the frequency of love. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: We're talking about literally hormones that are love hormones, oxytocin, serotonin, dopamine, all these things that like are about forming attachment are about literally running that energy love through our bodies. You know, when we're running pleasure, that is just like the tool to get to love. And energy is incredibly powerful. I mean, it's the energy of ⁓ creation life itself, right? So what could be more powerful than that? And the idea that. We are here to work before we could, you know, be in pleasure is just to me feels like it literally is flipped upside down. Like that the that the whole paradigm is just we've been duped, you know, we've been totally fooled into how the world order ought to be. And absolutely someone who thinks pleasure before productivity, in the c the context of like, well, where are we sourcing our energy to do any of the things. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: Do like let's source it from this incredible, abundant, endless, free source that lives within our bodies. That we are absolutely, I mean, it's just so undeniable that we are here to be in pleasure, look at our anatomy, and and at how easily we receive when we actually just slow down for a moment through any of our senses. so I just so that's my like one of one of my things around pleasure activism is just like. flipping the narrative, changing whole orientation of how we structure the world, how we structure our days, our know, entire purpose and existence of being here. you know, with what creates life as a very obvious indicator to ought to be bring brought into all acts of of creation on this planet. So That's one aspect. And then I think there's also a whole other aspect of deserves pleasure. There is no hierarchy. There is no sense of certain bodies being more having of a right to it. I think you then get into all sorts of real political stuff. you know, ⁓ get into right. I mean, all all the things around patriarchy, white supremacy, capitalism. I mean, There's there's so many structures that have been built. To tell us who deserves it and who doesn't. and so the whole idea of pleasure activism being a sort of real equalizer of you can't buy it. I mean, can't you we are we are sold the lie that we need to buy it. we need to buy happiness, we need to buy pleasure. But actually, like once you really tap into the body, you realize like it's all right here and and everybody's body, know, is is worthy and deserving, and we need to structure. world to reflect that, right? So that some people aren't left with no time, to be able to tap into that pleasure. so that's of, I don't know, the slightly messy world that revolves around this, but you can imagine that there's so many different directions, so many different like kind of threads to to pull from to go more deeply and and explore. Kait Tregenza: I didn't know the term, but I guess what I had been saying and I didn't know the you know, the history of this, but I guess what I had been saying and feeling and and knowing deep within me was The consciousness that created war is is a match and is equal to the consciousness of protest. so you are amplifying at that same level of or separateness separation. And there's, you know, there's we can say it's priest peaceful protest and they almost ⁓ never end up peacefully. And you can always say, ⁓ yeah, but it's the law enforcement or the armed guards or whatever that brought that in. But it was the the the agreement of the protesters to be in that space as well. And I know that's very controversial, right, to say, but that's where I started to really look at what does agreement What does agreement mean? And it's not, hey Meena do you want to go and have a sandwich for March? Yeah, I agree. Yeah. I agree, Kait Let's do that. That's obvious agreement. That's we all understand that. And it's different to consent as well. I think what we're agreeing to by going to a there's a ⁓ of agreement that the war exists. That it and we to fight ⁓ that. And so the energy of fighting, the energy of Talking about war, centering war as the focal point about whether you're in a disagreement to it or whether you're in agreement to it, is that the center of that entire reality is that the war has been and will be continuing. And not just this war, but that war. And I'm not naming any of them because the energy of war is Similar no matter which war we're talking about. That when really sat with my own self and my own connection what I believe is true in my body, the answer came, and nobody told me this, so that's why I trust it. Was if you live the ⁓ most divinely pleasure-based, beautiful existence where you simply dedicate yourself. Not to love and light, but to actual real love, where nothing is safe in the sense of 3D material world. The in the 3D material world is get married, have a white picket fence, fill your house with stuff, go on a whole you know, all of these kinds of things, work for one company until you die. That's safety in that system. What I'm talking about requires an enormous amount of What I'm talking about requires an enormous amount of bravery to center pleasure, to center truth and coherence to what you know is right sourced from within you. bravery center pleasure, to center truth and coherence to what you know is right sourced from within you. Do you know why we call those women in a different time? Witches, we institutionalized them, we incarcerated them, we burned them. And this is held within our bodies, Do you know why we call those women in a different time? heretics. You know, we institutionalized them, we incarcerated them, we burned them. And this is held within our bodies, because it's not that long ago. And I think now we have a different platform era of disseminating disinformation. No one's really going to burn me alive for saying the things that I'm saying, but it feels like they will. It still feels like they will. And so the work that I discovered was not fighting. And I think now we have a different platform era of disseminating disinformation. No one's really going to burn me alive for saying the things that I'm saying, but it feels they will. It still feels like they will. And the work that I discovered was not fighting. The men that weren't coming was embracing the pleasure within me to feel those truths The men that weren't coming was embracing the pleasure within me to feel those truths it didn't feel pleasurable to feel the truth of love. It felt scary and it felt dangerous and it felt like this is not a pathway that I want to go forward in. And had to learn the difference between nervous system safety. Meena: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: Which everybody thinks is like just let your body lead. But your body is leading, it's communicating, it's just that. Sometimes we have to be available to really unpleasant sensation in the body. And that's where I found pleasure and pleasure work as antidote. And that's how what was happening within me to fight the wars within me, I understood what the first original message was of you don't fight war with protest, you fight war with love. with pleasure, with joy, and with truth. And I think what activism is. I don't Meena: ⁓ I love that. Okay. I love I love where you brought it, brought it full circle. Yeah, I mean, I resonates deeply. I think the what all what I heard in what you were describing is so there's a woman who whose work I've really admired. Her name is Valerie Korr, and she has something called the Revolutionary Love Project. Or it's yeah, like her revolutionary love. ⁓ But she into some of some of this stuff. There's there's elements of what you were describing. but she talks about practicing the world as it could be. ⁓ you know, adjacent that, you know, well, ⁓ yeah, she says that's right. There's another thing that's like, what if it's not the darkness of the tomb, but the darkness of the womb? In terms of like, you know, obviously there's a there's a darkness, there's a feeling of death and darkness, but there's also like where things are birthed and Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Meena: You know, a lot of what I'm I'm hearing you say also is just this like let's focus on what we are birthing. I mean, obviously there's like there's this sort of death and destruction and and protest and and my god, what's the word? Not resilience. resistance. Thank you. Like you know, we the resistance to that, but at the same time that we're resisting, we absolutely need Kait Tregenza: Resistance? Meena: what are we fighting for be like really coming alive and the what are we fighting for is yeah, entirely gonna be born from pleasure, gonna be born from love. ⁓ And I this this is feeling very adjacent or like I feel like we're dancing also a little bit around this idea of like the relationship to ra rage and Eros and you know, yeah, sacred rage and and desire and like they're like it it's it they're all so interrelated that they feel like two sides of a coin. you I ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Or a a bowl of twine that just can't separate, right? Meena: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Totally. Yeah. And I mean they're they're both these like incredibly red, passionate energies that are so full of fire and so full of love. I mean, right? Because you think about I mean, am I how do you feel about cursing on the podcast? ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Try to avoid it as much as possible so I don't get flagged by Spotify. ⁓ Meena: Okay, that's good. Okay. So if you think of this is this is why I asked. but you know, I think about the the sacred rage as this like F energy. ⁓ And think about, you know, desire, Eros as F yes. And they're just, you know, one is protecting, know, rage is protecting that which we love. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: Eros is creating that which we love. I mean, there's this kind of like they are one and the same, right? and the the I feel one of the most powerful energies to play with in our bodies is actually around rage because you w when you bring pleasure to it, and I know we haven't totally gotten into this this sort of idea of embodiment work and moving these energies through, moving pleasure through your body, but there's something so alive bringing pleasure to anger, to the of yeah, like I'm not okay with this. I'm gonna like, you know, sort of stand, put a you know, put a stake the ground and like show you where this line is and it's gonna feel so good as I do that. And like that power that can come through us in that sort of connection of the two is just like, I mean, I really think that is what is gonna change the world is women in that turned on state being so aligned with their Huh. Well, what they stand for, but like just like so true to what kind of mother energy is, which is like we are protecting life above all else. Like all human life is sacred. Just like standing so true in that and so embodied in our sense of of worth and self-love and yeah, beauty. Kait Tregenza: And and I think that's what the here is that mother is mother energy because I've never heard a mother counsel their son or daughter into hateful acts. I've never heard at the playground a mother coming up to a child saying, You are playing too nicely together. Go and get that rock and throw it at that little girl. She's done nothing to you, but she might. right? And so we this lack of mothering in our incarceration systems, in the way that we see wrongness in the world as this black and white thing. And we never trace that back into how did we end up with people who were so disconnected from themselves that they Made these actions that are ultimately not in their benefit, nor in the benefit of others. instead of seeing these as in desperate need of mothering, as in desperate need of greater connection to love and belonging and community, sourcing that outside of the biological mother into a Meena: Mm. ⁓ Mm-hmm. Kait Tregenza: Community of mothering. We don't do that. We lock them up. We punish them. We imprison them. And we take them further away from connection, community, and belonging, than bringing them in. And so all we do that is activate thing that we want less of. And that's how I see war. And that's how I see the prison system. ⁓ And it's like every single that we have in society, whether it's work systems or whatever, even education. Meena: Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: There is this deficit of And when I even see mother in society, she is not in her full, erotic, pleasure-filled life. And so it even starts at for me now. The question is: does it start at filling up mother? Does it start at bringing mother back to Eros? And so she can find the rage. ⁓ Against all these systems because I think women who are not in rage and intolerance of these systems, because they're not alive. Meena: Yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: You cannot stand for injustice when you're alive. Meena: Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean I agree. I agree so much with all of it. It's actually reminding me of mean, you know the the big s sort of story around the website, CNN reveal around this website with like thirty-two million viewers of men. well, so that the name so the men basically raping their wives, right? name of the right, right. Kait Tregenza: I And getting a high five from other from others. Mm-hmm. Meena: And the name of that website was Motherless. there is a really great article that I'll I'll share with you if you haven't seen it, around this, written by a priestess. and and yeah, mean, just so much of what you're so much of what you're saying as like the reason that we find ourselves at this particular ⁓ really sort of world state that we're in. I mean, it's absolutely this motherless epidemic of the entire world. we're seeing it come out in these really grotesque, you know, horrible ⁓ ways full display for the world to see. And yeah, I I I think that's such a beautiful visual approach of like how okay, so how do we start to tip the like how do we come into balance again? And like, you know, what are like, is it about filling the mother with with eros? Is it about like first like filling her system up so that she can I mean I'm doing this, you can't see me, but like, you know, that she can like start to be full enough to like, you know, over overflow. Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: And as we do that, like right, because it's not it we're talking about energies, right? I mean, we're talking about it's not just like every mother in the world needs to do this. But so like, you know, even within men, the feminine needs to start to be f filled up a little bit more. And like, how do we bring that that mu that healed mother energy? Cause that's the other thing that like I it can feel almost like more disappointing, doesn't even quite do it justice. But like That feeling when you do see a mother of as a pawn of the patriarchy. ⁓ you do see them in a role that's like, you know, where those those who want to show the feminists that like it's not just about putting women in power. Look, you can put women in power, but they can they can actually be worse, you know, ⁓ terms of doing the job of the system and furthering, you know, what actually is not good for women. So I right a lot of this is about like. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: sort of the healed feminine energy being able to come in and heal all of those who who need who that that mother wisdom that that that energy source that has been so lacking and in so many who have who have been motherless. ⁓ so yeah mean I I love how you're kind of describing that energy infiltrating, slowly kind of filling up so that the world can receive Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: More of it. Kait Tregenza: experience with losing connection to my Eros and then finding it again reminds me actually you just need the smallest amount and a willingness to more. It's like you just need to step into the tiniest little bits and then say, you know, I like I surrender into this. Like bring it to because I don't have life force. I don't have a pulse. I don't have connection to myself anymore. And you just find one millimeter like the tiniest little ⁓ entry point in and eros to it to you. And sometimes I that it's an easier point to understand Eros as just life, just life force, just like the energy of aliveness, you know, because we're still stuck in these really outdated definitions that the erotic is, ⁓ you know, should behind a closed curtain and Meena: Yeah. Kait Tregenza: you know, not suitable for children and I think these they they're they're so important to upholding the capitalist structures that we all serve or have been serving because there's no reality where resourced, fully alive women allow capitalist extractive to continue untouched. Meena: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. I don't know if you've already shared this on the podcast, but I'd be so curious for you that like one millimeter, where did it where did it begin? What it what like sort of mode did it come through? Kait Tregenza: My child. Yeah. Yeah. It was the knowing that she deserved she deserved me to be alive again. And The understanding what love actually in service to another compared to self-love and do your and you know wear your florals and gonna go out to brunch and have rose I think we've really missed a lot what actual love ⁓ is it doesn't in in pink bows and roses. It know, we've ⁓ about what that is on in Valentine's Day and everything. For me, love was that clawing ⁓ of it would be so easy to die here. Like it would be so easy to life is hard. Let me die here. I'm good. And I had this fully formed who needed more than that and who deserved more than that. And I I learned to love myself the way that she loved me. Meena: Mm. Kait Tregenza: And I let her be my teacher, like I let my pride just go. What the decisions that I made in terms of choices, life choices, all of that, even though they were all very in one version of reality, they had still led me to the greatest collapse of my life at the same time that it should have been the happiest moment of becoming a mother. And I let ⁓ those synchronicities lost on me. And I said, Okay, so here Here's the greatest point of my life. This is this is the purpose of my life. And it's what if it's more than just being somebody's mother? What if I'm here in this way where I've I've always been erotic and I've always been alive and always been centrally you know, I'm the kind of person that I left my country when I was 18 and I traveled for 15 years and always somehow had money ⁓ businesses and experiences and like. This huge life and no one ever taught me how. And it was just all by intuition and all by flow. at the convergent point of finally having a child, I found myself in the absolute of like dark night the soul on ecstasy. Like deep, deep, deep. Like, how did I get here? And it was easy to question ⁓ my choices and blame myself and be guilty and you know. Take all that responsibility. And then the shift came of like, but she's not a mistake. maybe this isn't either. And so I just really to learn a new definition of ⁓ what Eros, what because if the erotic that I had known could be lost, was it true? Meena: Hmm. Yeah. Hmm. Hmm. Kait Tregenza: So I think I rebuilt it through unconditionality her innocence, her truth and her connection to I guess a coherence with nature that I had lost as life went on. Meena: Yeah, which is so which is so sad because that's so true for so many of us. I mean, that's definitely true for me too. just in terms of it was there and then where did it go? And then how much, you know, what does it take to realize? how many people don't ever even realize that they've it to re you know, to reclaim it. it's interesting. I mean, it sounds like both of us have had fairly alive sort of Kait Tregenza: Mm. Yeah. Meena: been been sensually alive and aware of it enough to to kind of know that this is something that exists and that you you know that can be yours and all this stuff. I think so many people don't even have that to then come to. So they don't realize like what they're even, you know, that it exists in this kind of way. ⁓ Yeah. Kait Tregenza: And that's why I think losing it was valuable because now I could pinpoint how I lived my life and what people said was luck was this. And the absence of that, it's like the the magnetism of of of those terrible things happening is just as powerful as the magnetism of these beautiful things happening. And ⁓ Meena: Yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: That's why I kind of know like if you can claw your way back to that 1%, Eros wants to serve you. And I'm saying it like it's this force outside of you, but it's it's you, but you're supported in that. Meena: right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, totally. I one of the practices that I love just as like a very simple thing is coming of coming home back home to myself through. I mean, it's just like it's like putting on some music that I know I love and like, you know, taking myself through a little bit of just ⁓ like coming, you know, coming back in with my breath. But then really just like listening different of my body, like just listening in for what they might have to say to me. And it's always that sense of like. Kait Tregenza: How to explain. Meena: ⁓ thank you for touching me. Like, thank you for ⁓ I miss you know, like I mean that's when you said like it just wants to come through. That's kind of that's where I went in my head of like as soon as I am able to listen and like tune into different parts of my bot physical body, I start to hear like the voice is always that. It's just like, like you. I'm here. ⁓ Like, more of that, please, you know? yeah, which is both like Kait Tregenza: Mm. And so I'm curious, like you're a mother, and there's so many women out there who'd like, great for these childless single women to do. But here are two mothers who have responsibilities, who have all of the things that we need to do every single day. I'm curious how you bring your sensuality into your life in a sustainable way, in way that affects your family, your children, your relationship. Meena: Yeah. Kait Tregenza: your music, your art, like what does your sensuality and your pleasure look like in your life? How do you how do you how do you bring that in? How do you bake that into your life? Meena: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, even even as a pleasure activist, self-proclaimed, I it's still like there still have to really swim upstream. I gotta say. I just just wanna like normalize that because I think often we also like look to these people who are like, ⁓ they're just like that. And it's like, ⁓ they've figured it out. but but it's we are going against the grain of everything around us is telling us that like Kait Tregenza: Yeah. Meena: No, productivity first. the things that need tending to, like how dare you take even five minutes out, you know, for yourself. I mean, I the voices in my head are so strong still after years of practicing this and believing in it. so I just want to say that. I mean, I absolutely do have practices that I that I just like have built into an arsenal to I don't like using that word, a toolbox. to, you know, to be able to like dip into so that I'm not like, what how do I do this again every single day? You know, so it's like there's certain I mean, again, for me, music is such a it's such a incredible like it's like a response that I now have in a way. Like when I listen to certain tracks, it just because I because I've spent, you know, I've done it a number of times where it's like there's certain music that grounds me that just like I put it on and I'm like, okay, I know what I need to do. It's about stillness. It's about like breath. It's about like grounding, you know, and and just starting from a place of like, how do I connect? Literally just connect with my body like first. And then be able to kind of be like, okay, what am I, what am I feeling like I need? What does my body need right now? I mean, that's just like a very I think Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: I mean, one one distinction that I want to make, I think, between meditation what see this pleasure work ⁓ as, it is a form of meditation, right? But I think a lot of what we around is it it's yes, it's a quieting down, but it's also this kind of like separation from thought. I mean, least that's kind of what I've been, right? It's like observe your thoughts. This is a little bit. Kait Tregenza: Yeah. Meena: A little bit the opposite, which is to say, like, yeah, yes, like deep connection with body breath as a way to actually connect with your body more and listen more into what the desires are, what the emotional landscape is that's like, you know, that you're occupying that's moving through you. so it's a little bit less of like the observe it, like yes, observe it, but then like actually engage it. and like bring it in and invite it in and lean into the tools that we have through through our bodies to actually like move and play with the energy that wants to come through. I mean music is the thing that I use to really indulge that because I'll like really into like a whole playlist of grief, for example, if I'm just like, like I'm feeling so like Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: Dark and deep and like, you know, something, you know, it's like, great, let's play with that. Like, let's go all the way in. the energy of of self-love into being like, I welcome you, darkness, you know, and like I I'm gonna love on you and let me feel where you are inside me. And it's this like real indulgence, actually, that we're giving ourselves, so that we can love through it and allow it to to to move through, right? Instead of ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: feeling like something's wrong and it's getting stuck. moving in many directions here, sorry. Kait Tregenza: So when you so take, you know, something like grief or we've invented rage anger or hate, like these really intense emotions that come. Are you sort of just going, all right, this is how I'm feeling, I need five, ten, fifteen minutes, an hour, and you just go into your room, you play your music and you start like listening to your body, feeling what it needs ⁓ to do to release that. Or yeah, how's what's your what's your personal practice? Meena: Yeah. Yeah. So sorry. I went I went a little bit like different different tangents there. yeah, so okay, so let's let's I'll I'll I'll about two things sort of separately. There's this sort of like morning routine I really try to tap into in terms of like inviting arrows in, which often ⁓ is mean I I was saying I have like sort of a toolbox of things. Often it'll be if I don't know what I want to do, I'll just start with a couple of grounding songs and see where I want to go from there. I have a gratitude journal that I have actually welcomed welcomed in fairly recently. relative the other work that I've been doing, I realized I was denying I was I was my relationship with gratitude was a little bit historically like I had seen it as this very like you should just be happy with what you have. And like, you know, kind of as a way of almost cutting off the relationship to desire. But I'm now I'm now playing in a different way with it. And I'm finding that this particular gratitude journal I have is all about savoring. And so it really Yeah. So it really invites in the idea like, okay, think about, you know, your intention for the day, think about a few things, specific things you're grateful for, but then take one moment to really savor. And that also is a practice that starts running. Kait Tregenza: Savoring ⁓ Meena: you know, the frequency of love through us, right? It's it's it's inviting in something that like you're tasting even more, you're being with in the present moment. You're allowing yourself to really occupy in this, yeah, in this beautiful, love-filled way. ⁓ that's like one practice. I also have a solo sex practice that I like really you know, absolutely feel like so essential to to everything we're talking about, in terms of self-love in terms of running Eros, Eros as the energy, as the fuel for your day. I mean, I can't think of a better way to like fill your body with like all those hormones and feel like you're coming from a place of overflow. Feel like you're also able to kind of tap into this this sense of, I don't know, for me what it does is I stare out my window at the flowers that that I have planted kind of right outside of my bedroom window. And I just like feel this deep Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: gratitude towards Mother Earth deep connection with just being another being on this planet, you know, another alive thing. So there's there's, you know, that taking it both my is self a self love, but also just filling myself with with this hormone that just makes me feel so, so connected to all things that are alive. So anyway, so there's yeah, there's practices like that. And then you know, or I yes, yeah. Yeah. Kait Tregenza: Mm. So before you move on, I just wanted to interject and ask some practical questions. So, where are your kids when you're doing a morning practice? Meena: Yeah, so I've tried to do the thing where you get up before your kids and do that. It doesn't work for me. I mean, I some people are early morning people. Great. and I get it with a solo sex practice, that would be tricky. Even then, you'd need a really private space. I do once my kids go to school. Yeah. my God, that's true. Yeah. I mean, yeah, great. Whoever whatever works. Kait Tregenza: A really open policy in your family. I don't know. Meena: No, for me actually it's a good question because I basically once I send them to school and they're they're school aged, so I get that this works differently for everyone. once I send them to school Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. So is this something that you couldn't really do until school age or you did it previously? Meena: I just I would do it when they weren't home. I mean, I you know, so I I love the idea of like a sort of sensual sacred start to the to my to my day, my sense of like this is now my time. What am I doing with it? and and a lot of that involves sitting at my computer and doing work in a very conventional way, although I do work from home. It's sort of a mix. so there that, I guess. I know that I don't go to an office. So there, you know, I'm just sort of speaking to that. Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: But I also feel like, I mean, there are absolutely ways to bring pleasure in just, you know, even just like moving your body. I mean, we talk about like even in a bathroom stall and being able to like, you know, put a song in your ears or you don't even need to do that, but like be able to just like ⁓ connect your body in these ways that are, I mean, I'm just kind of like doing some of it now. But you know, that that just like that connect you to your aliveness and your turn on. Kait Tregenza: Hmm. Meena: and will start actually sending different like hormones through your body. So you are shifting ⁓ you know, alchemically what you're what's what's coursing through you and that has a major impact. ⁓ you also can't be in fight or flight, you know, you can't be in stress when you're in pleasure. It's it's they're like they don't they can't coexist. So it does, you know, just allow you to kind of reset ⁓ to be more in the frequency of what what you may want to be operating from. Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: You know, even if it's going into that meeting or, you know, whatever in practical terms. but yeah, I mean, if you do, you know, ⁓ if do have a space or a time that you can kind of take for yourself at the beginning of whatever your work day is or whatever your day is, I think are variations on what you can bring in depending on how much privacy have, how much time you have. but I think there, I mean, even even like truly, even ⁓ like a minute or two of like running. I mean, part part of it is like we're not used to touching ourselves. Like we're not used to thinking about like I can actually give myself the love that I am hoping that someone else will bring to me. Like I I want to be touched this way. It's like, well then great. Like try doing it even for yourself and hear what your body says as it receives. ⁓ yeah. Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Hmm. It's interesting because I'm you know, I said that my teacher became my small little person that I birthed, and she is so affectionate with herself. She is so affectionate with herself. She's always touching her body, she's always touching her hair, her face, and she's to me all the time. I've learned to accept it and receive it and to mirror it. But it's always this beautiful contrast because when we go to the library or to the park or see other people, ⁓ and we also go to a lot of women's festivals where, you know, these kinds of values are lived out ⁓ a or however And she doesn't know that women shift and change themselves for this festival because her reality is this is how women are, this is how life is, and this is how I already am, and I'm in the same you know, connection to to that. And so when shacts with people who are outside of that world, she's stroking their face when they're, you know, she'll s she'll take a book to some stranger in the library and she'll be like, Hello, you read this book to me? And ⁓ so confronting these grown adults to be touched so affectionately and and yet innocently, Their mind goes to, ⁓ my god, this child is touching me in a in a whatever way, that. And they often say, Okay, we don't touch other people, you know, and and I'll accept their boundary because it's good for her to understand that you don't touch just anyone. But is fascinating as an anthropological ⁓ insight how disconnected we have become from other people's. ⁓ Meena: Yeah. Kait Tregenza: touch and and and connection and it brings a different perspective to this consent right? You know, are we consent because we're outside of our own bodies and because we're outside of our own self-touch? Or is it, you know, ⁓ obviously I'm talking about, you know, grating. I'm I'm talking about just ⁓ s you simply touching and simply connecting. Meena: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Kait Tregenza: And these kinds of things, when you look th at the world through the eyes of innocence, you start to really understand or at least see the contrast between what innocence does what loaded definitions of lived experience and and learning ⁓ does and and how and how that gap is widening through age. Meena: ⁓ so true. Can I can I ask how old your kid is? ⁓ Kait Tregenza: She's three. Yeah. Meena: Yeah. No, I wow. I mean, I love I love hearing what you're describing like how she is. And I absolutely also, yeah, the witnessing of societal norms from such a different lens when you have a child. Like you're kind of going through it from the beginning again. And you're like, why, yeah, why do we have this? It's funny to your a little bit, I mean, definitely related to what you're saying. My kids, I have a Kait Tregenza: Mm. Mm. Meena: is seven and a half, almost eight-year-old girl, and then a six-year-old gender non-conforming in many ways, boy. And ⁓ they just you know, the questions around like why do we cover certain parts of our bodies and why are there different locker rooms for boys and girls? Like this is something that has like come up as a real I mean, I think they've just noticed, or even bathrooms. I mean, all of it, just the sort of the The need to d to separate and the like yeah, I mean, just th the the rules that we've put into place for essentially. I mean, I think, right? It's a lot of like in order to make sure that people don't do things that are bad. I mean, that's what it feels like to me anyway, as I've as I've sat with it more and needed to explain it to them. but what it yeah Kait Tregenza: And have they been part of your sensual morning practice or any of your sensual practice? Meena: you know, the let think. I mean, I guess n short answer no in terms of like the, you know, the time that I take that really is for me. However, I think I've really tried to bring them into just the idea of like moving, you know, our bodies in certain ways. Touching ourselves, like like you're saying, that your daughter does like so instinctually and naturally. And I think different kids are different, right? Some of them will want to do that more than others. But there's a practice that I found really fun to do. with I did it with my daughter when she was maybe, yeah, three or four. and yeah, we I we should do it again. I brought it up to her recently, but it was just a like ⁓ a little I think were calling like a treasure box of pleasures. And it was just like you know, finding little things that we love for our senses. The idea was like one per sense. you know, so like something you really love to smell, something you really love to touch, something you really love to taste, like, you know, and then music, I know it's a little more challenging to put in a box, but you know, and then just gathering, just noticing what are the things that feel really good to our senses and just like starting to kind of I think one thing I have been doing is really trying to Bring pleasure as a real necessity of life and real important piece of what we're here to do, what we're seeking. just like finding, yeah, ways to bring that word in and to experience it together. I think that has felt really important. Kait Tregenza: your vision ⁓ pleasure activism? What what would you if you had a wish and you could make a what what would that be? Meena: yeah. I mean, I have definitely had the thought experiment many times of this idea that everyone starts their day from pleasure. I mean, it sounds so it sort of sounds so simple in a certain way. And also it sounds a little bit like how how would that even happen? And like what would that you know, it's it's like both both things are true, but I have I feel like Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: I feel like what I what I love about that idea is that it both like shifts the whole paradigm on its head, right? It says we can start with something that feels really good to us and and we can and we must essentially. Like this is the way that we wanna lead and what we wanna prioritize societally or or you know ⁓ in our species. So it does that, but it also has the possibility of actually just seeing how people show up differently. I think I'm really fascinated. I'm I'm fascinated with the idea of collective power. That's something that I've like always put out there as something that I'm just so curious. Like what happens when we all kind of come together in our you know, once we've found ourselves and once we've really like done this kind of work, once we've like whatever you want to call it, whether it's healing or or reclaiming or, you know. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: peeling away the layers, but finding that like real, true, authentic, beautiful, eros-filled self. And then what happens when we ⁓ come together? What do we create together that is even more powerful? so I think I love that idea that each person is starting their day in a way that feeds their own bodies, but then the sort of like ripple effect, the spillover, the overflow, and then the kind of synthesis. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: of what that actually looks and feels like. I'm just really like fascinated by that does to change energetically kind everything, you know? Coming from right? Yeah. Kait Tregenza: And think, yeah, and I think these conversations are so important, and why I'm here for it is we are fed the dystopia the time. We need to start fueling and activating and powering up the utopia and belief that could different from this. And most importantly that we all individually hold the power to create that. Because there's a very big myth that power exists in or presidential, you know, buildings, and that the people don't have it. And the fact that time and time again revolution has been taken from the people, it's only ever to erect a similar system. Meena: Mm. Kait Tregenza: And so I don't think we're calling for revolution in same sense. We're calling for this this pleasure revolution, we're calling for this pleasure rebellion, pleasure activism, where what is replaced actually sustainability, actually has the the centering of of women and children. Because when you center women and children, they naturally want to serve all of those and their community and around them. And the reinstatement of mother energy, which I think is basically the the point of this conversation. And you know, I think what's really useful for women out there is you are a woman who has centered sensuality, pleasure, eros in your life. What is your life now that you do that compared to when you didn't Because sometimes it's like you don't need you don't need any more sticks, you need the carrot, you need the activation of intrigue, curiosity, and desire. So to just the way in which you live now, the the feeling state, the the creative state, but also the having and the and the doing in terms of the What is what does your life actually look and feel like tangibly that other women who that inspiration could actually latch on to as a first initial inspiration step? Meena: Mm. yeah, no, it's such a good question. I feel like there's so many aspects have shifted in me since allowing eros to come in and kind of as you say, like, you know, just even allowing little drips of it, and then it just like, you know, opens you further and further. I mean, would say that there's such a ⁓ so much self trust and so much more looking like looking inward than looking outward for kind of everything that I want and need and am this lifetime. I feel like you know there's way less of a need to people please. There's way more of a sense of like what does it feel like in my body and ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: that being the litmus litmus test for success. you know, I absolutely want to there's certain aspects of like external accomplishment that I still really want to achieve in my lifetime, but is because it feels so purpose driven and it feels so much about like what I feel in me, I want to share with the world, which is feels very different than this idea of like. I'm supposed to reach this benchmark and that's the way that I know that I'm enough and validated. I have a very strong sense at this point of not that I'm gonna I mean this is very this is deeply personal, but I think I ⁓ knowing that not necessarily gonna be received by everyone. that actually there's a sense of like there's there's wisdom in me and there's a knowing what the world could be in me that people are maybe not ready for. ⁓ feeling full in my knowing like this is so true and so real because it's so felt. And I came to it ⁓ like you, I from my own just lived experience, that it just feels like I didn't need to be taught it. I mean, yes, I needed a door open. Like I definitely, you know, I give credit for sure to people who have really mentored me and helped me find myself in all of it. But like. the wisdom of the body and of of Eros as leader, like is just so full of like knows. ⁓ It and I'm just kind of like fought like along along with it for the ride and and trusting so that like I am here serving a role ⁓ yeah through that flow. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: with with love. I this sounds so out there, but I I'm just I'm just trying to think of like, you know, that person that was the other side of this awakening of sorts and how I outsourced my how much I so much of like what I I thought d my direction was meant to be and I was okay and like just just it's just there's just such a deep grounding in like everything is right here. Everything is right, you know. and just it's just tapping into it. And pleasure such an incredible way to tap into our wisdom and our intuition. Kait Tregenza: And sort of what I'm piecing together from this entire conversation and and ⁓ from you is when you believe that you are the source of your own self and universe and answers everything that you need, and ⁓ unpleasant from that source, can also approach with pleasure. You also approach that with eros ⁓ and with openness. So it's My rage not a crazy person having a rant. My rage is sacred. My rage is information. My rage is here and present and mine. What I now do with it? So it's it's what learning from you and what you've really communicated so beautifully in this call is not only is the presence and the grounding possible because of pleasure and earls, ⁓ but it's Because you do not edit who you are in presence that come to be. When you're listening to your body, you don't go, well, I don't like that. So that one can be pushed down or exited or suppressed or whatever. It's like the presence the listening has to be all-encompassing. And when those emotions that typically may not wish to feel, it's well. Meena: Mm. Kait Tregenza: Pleasure can still be applied. Pleasure is still relevant here. And I think that's a, saying it again, ⁓ know, as a reminder for people listening, if if they missed that point, because it's all well and good to say I'm present in my body, I listen to my body, I'm grounded in my body, I source my own, you know, everything that I need for myself. But you only get to that point through. Full and total radical acceptance what present in your body. And you don't get to pick and choose. And you get to only do love and light. And you don't only get to do cookies and sundays. ⁓ You know, it's real. And it takes enormous amount of bravery to know yourself. And Pleasure can help with them, bravery, but it is a choice that I think that if you're editing not open to what is coming up, no amount of pleasure will ever really override that. Meena: Yeah, no, I I I'm so glad that you're bringing bringing it, bringing all this together, sort of synthesizing. think I'm just thinking like, so I think of pleasure as like a tool, and as like almost almost like a a lubricant, actually, which it is. I mean, we think about yeah, I mean, you think about literally what happens, right, when you're in pleasure in the body anatomically. I mean, there is this kind of lubrication layer of to it, right? And it's sort of allowing through beauty and through for you to open into things that might feel deeply uncomfortable. So ⁓ think the thing that I love about the practice that I do a lot, which is around music and movement, is you know, I'm basically leaning all way into these ⁓ these deep emotions. I actually had, I used to lead a course called Pl finding pleasure in darkness. And it was very much about like pleasure as like as a separate thing, but actually as a tool to bring into the uncomfortable feelings. and and to really you know, when when we start to like, I mean, music, I I'm just if it's okay for me to just indulge this for a second. I don't know if you're listening, if you've had this experience, and for you, Kate, if you've had this, but Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: the sort of angsty teen years for me were filled with you know, blasting songs repeat that felt like they were about unrequited love. where I was my God, I like this person so much and they don't like me. And it was like this, you know, sort of deeply sort of frustrated, griefy, sometimes ragey feeling. And I would turn to music. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: you know, listen to music that would just like allow me to wallow in it. Like this is bringing us back to the beginning of like talking about being a deep feeler and sensitive and and actually like that's kind of what we're talking about here. It's like, you know, the the feeling of like this hurts so good, like allowing yourself to feel it, but be held by this beautiful container of music, of self-touch, of like moving in ways that just like feels so good to Kait Tregenza: Mm. Mm. Yeah. Meena: to expand into that feeling and say, like, I I can take this, like welcome in more and more and more to the point where it actually does start to actually move. Like that energy doesn't stay there forever. And you invite it in and actually doesn't mean that more of it is there. It means that it can then move through you and you can get to the other side. So you know, I think we're the I think the the disservice that we I mean there's many disservices in our education. ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Mm-hmm. Meena: But like we don't get an education on any of this, like on how to actually like be with our emotions, which we all have, which are all information, as you say. and and actually like learn from them and get their wisdom. And, you this is this is a practice that I just find to be incredibly it's not just like take your medicine, like show up to the therapist office and like work through that emotion. It's like make it feel so Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: good as you do it. So your heart starts to be like, okay, actually I can feel. I my capacity to feel I mean, I I one last thing I want to say on this is like I have noticed that in the context of like taking in the news, for example, I mean it's way too much. Like at point, it's I I get it. Like it's way too much for any person to be taking in. However, the idea of shutdown and numbing out is also not really an option. Like we can't just be like, too much I'm out. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Mm. Meena: We have to be able to engage and know to some degree. And there's, you know, hygiene around that too. But how do we do that? How do we like allow ourselves to actually feel compassion for these people who need us to show up, who are not as privileged, towards not, you know, and to stay open to just feeling it, to just having a feeling of empathy or connection or compassion so that we can then take. Kait Tregenza: Mm-hmm. Meena: the action that we individually are here to take. We can none of us can take it all on, but we can do something that, you know, and we need to be alive and, you know, to actually engage with the world around us. and so how do we do that? What are our tools? What are the ways that we can yeah, like continue to show up and not just check out and not just numb out. And I I find that pleasure is this just incredible. Kait Tregenza: Hm. Meena: vehicle tool, to yeah, to be able to be our fully our full selves as big of a part as we can be. Kait Tregenza: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ I've received so much from you in this call. Like, am I really pleasure as much as I could? You know, am I really Touching my body with reverence, with sensuality, with just desire to connect to I be on this planet, you know. And And I love I love that you are saying this because you also have a husband, right? You also someone who's designated to touch you, to pleasure you, to to feel you, and yet you're a woman who has a solo sex practice ⁓ a tenement of self-care. And mean it probably ⁓ says lot about him as well and your relationship. But I I think you've really spoken to so many of the common as why women mothers cannot engage in self-pleasure through the beautiful articulation of what is actually available for you as a life, as an existence, a ⁓ Presence on the planet when you do. Because most importantly, I think the biggest takeaway that you've said is you get to choose who you walk through this world what emit, what your is. for anyone who it, I want articulate it in different terms in different ways so it lands. Your contribution. Is not about what you produce. It is about who you be. And the frequency of your beingness so much more powerful than most people understand. And more importantly than that, you take it a step further and you say, and from pleasured being, you can far more than you actually ever thought you could the aliveness that you are. And doesn't mean more output. That's the disconnect from capitalism, right? Like it's not it's not about having more songs, more music, more streaming lists. It's no, it's about from the aliveness, what I is far more valuable to have even Attempted to do. And I love that you speak to the fact that I am not a woman without a to achieve something. It is now that my desires are so rooted into aliveness me versus the drudgery producing. And those two outcomes, especially as an artist, are so different. And I think you've articulated it so. ⁓ Meena: Mm. Kait Tregenza: Beautifully, that pleasure activism is not about fighting something out there. It's about almost like fighting for the person that you actually are and being she living that way. And and and being so radical and so rebellious that you live a pleasure-filled life in a in a time in history where this is now possible and has never potentially been for the last, you know, however five. thousand years or more. Like the acknowledgement ⁓ how radical it is to live as a pleasure based woman, doing desires and Just having your whole life centered around pleasure, that like it shouldn't be lost. Like if they th they if they sound like such simple words. Meena: Yeah, yeah, totally. And I I also think that like probably, I mean, even for me, like, even for me, I'm like, there's still those voices that are like, how could that be okay? Like, how is that not super self-indulgent? Like, how is that not, do you know what I mean? Like, I I just want to like name that too, because I I think what we are both trying to do is normalize this concept, like and not just normalize it, but like make it actually like the thing that people really like latch onto as like the key to the future. ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Mm-hmm. Meena: But ⁓ but there's like a real I mean there's a real gap there in terms of like what we've been taught. so the idea that not only is it okay, but actually it's like the that is gonna change the world. I mean, that's kind of my whole thing is like let's reorder the world by you know, through pleasure. and I know that's your thing too. So it's yeah, it's Kait Tregenza: So is that the answer as to why it's not self-indulgent? Because the entire axis of the world shifts into a new paradigm. And therefore if you're not doing your part, you're not being self-indulgent, you're you're you're not doing your part in we need you. Meena: Мен я. no, totally. I mean, I think it's ⁓ the ripple effect. I mean, it's like it's I have an image that I love. I don't have it right here, but anyway, just like where it's like, you know, there's a flower, there's an image of like, you know, our roots coming through, you know, from the place where we create life and like just a huge flower that's opening up in our heart center. And it's like just think about like that flower getting more open and more open, which is what we're doing as we bring pleasure in. We're opening. Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: our hearts to say, like, I can stay open. I can take on more of what the world is. I think I I think a lot of people's capacity right now is really limited. And I don't blame them because it's like what the world is doing to us. It's like we're inundated. We're like we're working our butts off and we're like, you know, we have no time for anything. You know, you add kids to the mix and it's just more for the two, you know, for the for the nuclear family to take on. there's no time and there's no capacity and there and and The world is so intense and you know, like our hearts are I j I just I feel like people's hearts are just having to kind of close to it because it's too much. so what are we doing to like open our hearts to say like no, we we continue to like we are gonna fight for this world and we it is so beautiful and so rich and there's so much to take in, there's so much to like feed ourselves with, but how do we, how do we stay? ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: How do we stay open? And then how does that ripple effect of us filling ourselves with love? Like exactly to your point, the frequency of that, like more, more of that can only make the world a better place. Like, I mean, right? Just more people walking around with a full tank and open heart. It's just, I mean, I yeah, I agree. I think it's the key to any world I want to live in. ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom. Thank you so much for letting me bask in the codes and the and the the the note that you as a musician, as a humanitarian, as a mother, as a woman, a sensual reveler. I I ⁓ so much about your handle now than I ⁓ thought. I that. before and then sitting in your presence. It's like, yeah, you're a sensual reveler. That's correct. So can people connect with you if they would like to learn more, in your, be in the glory of you? Meena: ⁓ yeah. I love that. Thank you. Yeah, I'll take that. Mm. thank you. yeah, well, I have I mean, you're interested in just like a little taste of the kind of work that I do around music and movement guiding people into their bodies, ⁓ I have a sort of 75 minute workshop that you can get on my website that's kind of like a nice little peek into the work. and my website will probably be in the in the show notes, but minabassine.com. And I'm I'm steam around something that I've been wanting to do for a long time, which is have these revolution calls. That's what I'm calling it right now, but really just a chance to gather, know, monthly to just bring whatever is up, you know, and like move move it ⁓ together in bodies. I think the idea really is around this intersection of rage and eros but like really it's just like what is up for us and how are we moving it and how are we feeling our. Kait Tregenza: Yeah. Mm. Meena: collective power together. So that's something to kind of stay tuned for if it piques your interest. and yeah, I mean I'm I'm on Instagram, Sensual Reveler. I'm also starting to really dig into to Substack a little more and and really you know, write things that feel a little bit more full bodied in terms of just what I know I'm here to say and the ways in which I want to move things. So ⁓ Kait Tregenza: Mm. Meena: yeah, many, many ways to to engage and would absolutely love to hear from any of you directly. So feel free to just reach out and can always set up a call. ⁓ Kait Tregenza: I'm so grateful to you, and I'm grateful to you for all of the work that you do single day and the presence that you be. So thank you. Thank you so much for your time here with me. But thank you at a much grander scale for being part this movement, for being who you are and heralding this and leading this and being being the kind of leader that this new world paradigm we are. all dreaming about and and you're leading it and you're being it and you're being that change. And so I ⁓ so reverently to you and I and I thank you so deeply for ⁓ of your contributions. Meena: Thank you, Kate. Thank you. I am receiving I am receiving all of your really, really beautiful, kind, kind words. And what a pleasure to be with you. And I absolutely admire you immensely and what you're doing. And we will we will be on this journey together. And yes, here's here's tomorrow. Yes. Exactly. Exactly. I hope so. Yeah. thank you so much. Kait Tregenza: Please do, it's all for you. Rebellion coals, alas.