Live A Life ALIVE.

Hi Black Girl Tantra Fam…

I was all set to write about Black History Month and Body Awareness month. Two of my favorite things to talk about. But I am sitting here in a space of deep reflection as my friends and I mourn the physical loss of a beloved community member. His presence is already missed.

Burrel Edward Graves

August 12, 1965-January 20, 2025

I’m in appreciation of how we all came together here in Atlanta, to support the folks closest to him and how important times like these are. And most importantly, how short this current life we have to live, truly is.

Life is too short to worry about what people think, how they will see you or what they will do or say behind your back or in front of it.  Life is too short to be “right” all the time or to be “perfect”. What matters is that you lived and that you connected with others you call family, beloveds, loved ones… humanity. 

I am still living and breathing. So, while there is still life left in my body, I’m going to keep doing what brings me the most joy, and what feeds my deepest purpose and hearts desire.

 And I’m gonna keep loving on the folks who mean the world to me and let them love me back.

As a medical social worker, I have worked in the death and dying field.  I worked in both Chicago and Georgia, in adult and Children’s hospitals and in hospice. I served people with both terminal and chronic illnesses, as well as their families.

I’ve seen quite a bit. And what I have seen is that the human body is fascinating and our bodies are deeply impacted by our physical, energetic, emotional and spiritual environment. I have seen that family still comes through in the end, so even if you cannot live with them, be loving anyway. 

One thing is for sure, death is a part of life. Our lives will end someday and we will be transformed into something else (insert your belief here). I believe that our energy and spirit lives on but that is another conversation. 

Remember that the people whose lives we’ve touched are also transformed, just from having known us. That’s the way this life works. 

So before you depart this earthly plane, what will you choose to leave in your wake just by being? 

My hope is that you have the opportunity to experience life unapologetically, with joy, gratitude and compassion - like our friend, Burrel.

Find your joy, your pleasure, your love, your anger, your rage, your softness, your sweetness, your receptivity; more movement, less movement, more me-time, more time for contemplation and rest; study a skill you’ve always wanted to learn, or do an activity you’ve often dreamed of. 

Do whatever you need to do to tap into your sense of adventure and feel most alive. I don’t care if “most alive” for you is walking to the corner store, going to an amusement park, skinny dipping, or traveling to a new country and learning a new language. Release those debilitating fears so that you can be your most authentic self. Even if your authentic self loves to talk about death and dying so that people are less afraid of it. 

There truly is no time like the present. 

Don’t do it for me or for anybody else. Do it for you. Do it now.

Live a life ALIVE! 

What Is Your Rebellion?

Greetings lovers and friends!

We’re still in January and so much has happened already! Most, if not all of us, knew this was coming. It’s the destruction that must happen as a part of the world’s transformative change (Pluto in Aquarius). It is not pretty, nor easy, but it is necessary.

The destruction and dismantling that was so desperately needed may or may not look the way we had hoped, but the end result will be the same.  The question is, what side of the transformation are you willing to fight for, and how are you willing to do that?

We all have our different ways of fighting for our humanity and right to exist; and to experience the joys and pleasures of life. Often, we do this without even realizing it. We fight for ourselves. We fight for others. We protect others. We support others. There is no one way to resist and rebel, just like there is not just one way to exist in the world.

There are infinite possibilities!

One of the many ways that I’ve been resisting is by making sure you know that your body belongs to you and no one else. That you are a sovereign being who is allowed to seek and ask for your deepest desires and fantasies, and embrace your inner child and play. Reminding you that your ancestral lineage is powerful, and that your pleasure, magic, medicine, intuition, and connection to your body’s senses are your birthright. 

I keep reminding myself of this as well. I keep thinking that we always have choice, even when the choices are limited, scary or hard. No matter how hard people try to criminalize your body, you belong here and there are still so many people out here loving you and supporting your freedom and right to live!

Whether you are living above ground or underground at this pivotal point in our-story, find and center love and your pleasure. Pleasure is a radical act of resistance and self-love!

 Another way that I am rebelling, is that I am purposefully and consciously turning my love inward and feeding it back to myself. It took me a while to find the love I had for me. It was always there, but it was turned outward for so many to receive and I sacrificed myself too often. Now that my love for me has grown deeper, my love for others is also richer. It is so nourishing, nurturing and brings with it a certain joy and brightness, and a new level of self-intimacy.

Living in my happy, fat, black, queer, non-binary femme body is an act of resistance and rebellion. And this body dares to experience and facilitate love, sensuality, and pleasure.

What is your rebellion?

What does your resistance look like?

What’s New for Black Girl Tantra in 2025?!

Before we begin, our hearts, protection spells and prayers go out to all of the beings impacted by the fires in California, and to all of the beings impacted by the great challenges around the world right now.

I’m starting 2025 off with collaborations.  I’ve been invited to join the faculty at the body electric school, my birthplace of erotic embodiment practices. My journey with them began in 2012 after I ended a significant, long-term relationship. It was a beautiful way to come back to myself and ignite my erotic power. Little did I know it would help me find my true passion.

I have always been a bridge builder between people and communities, since I can remember. I’d love for you to wish me well, and to wish us all well as we navigate the cultural challenges of today and as we remember the beauty that love can bring. Humans are going to need one another now more than ever and perhaps our humanity will be restored during this big cosmic stretch and transformational time of Pluto in Aquarius for the next 18 years.  The ultimate lesson may be for us to deeply understand that we are all in this together. 

Since re-joining the Body Electric School and joining the Urban Tantra community last year, I am finding myself booked and busy with many juicy collaborations. However, I am also making sure that I find balance and have time for my rest and rejuvenation. So, if you have been wanting to collaborate with Black Girl Tantra, I welcome these connections. Since this year is already full, free to email me if you would like to collaborate on something in 2026.

Save the date: September 18th-21st

I will be co-facilitating a celebrating the Body Erotic Workshop in Maine in September 2025.

Register here: 

I had a wonderful conversation on the Erotic Liberation Podcast with Craig Cullinane in December.

Content Warning

The podcast touches on sensitive topics including childhood sexual abuse.

Also be on the lookout for a BIPOC class this year.

And a Black Girl Tantra Workshop.

Taking my time, slow and steady, enjoying this pace.  

No matter our individual and collective struggles, we have the power to choose how we are going to live in our own bodies and live our lives even if our external choices become limited. Because as always, the personal is political.  

Nikki Giovanni, poet, activist, educator (June 7, 1943-December 9, 2024) spoke to all types of love, from self-love, to black love to universal love. She is our cultural ancestor now and her legacy of love and activism lives on. 

To add to that, I speak to the activation of love that comes from the passion and drive of our life force energy. Eros, or erotic energy is in all of us and it takes us to other dimensions. The more we harness our Eros, the more we have the power to creatively rebel in ways that transform our relationships and our society. This is how we become erotic revolutionaries!   

That’s the power of sexual freedom and erotic embodiment. The power to change ourselves and transform the world!

 

Who’s in?

The Holiday Season Is Here!

Around the world, many winter celebrations occur, and this can mean socializing with community, chosen family and/or relatives. My family has always celebrated Kwanzaa since I was a baby. Kwanzaa is a Pan-African holiday created by Dr. Maulana Karanga, an African American activist, to unite people of African Descent across the diaspora. It begins the day after Christmas, in which there are 7 principles that we celebrate over 7 days and the last day culminates on New Year’s Day (known as Imani-Faith).

Each year during my youth, the Kwanzaa celebrations were complete with African dancing, food, and vendors in large community events, or lighting the red, black, and green candles and seeing the cornucopia full of fruit at at-home celebrations with the unity cup and mat. The festivities made me feel close to my heritage, my family, and my community. The West African dances I used to perform as a child still live in my body in a beautiful way.

At home, my mother would give a Unity gift, a gift for all of us five children to share as a family, and we never missed, nor did we even know, about Christmas.

It wasn’t until my mother married my stepfather, who celebrated the secular aspects of Christmas, that we started celebrating both Christmas and Kwanzaa. Christmas in our house was fun, and I enjoyed decorating the Christmas tree and getting my own presents as a kid, then celebrating the unity aspects of Kwanzaa the next day. However, when I became an adult, Christmas became stressful with the emphasis on shopping and spending loads of money on gifts for everyone I loved, to only come out broke and in debt. I started noticing how much stress it brought for me and how competitive and individualistic the holiday became, so I stopped celebrating the material gift-giving aspect. My favorite thing about Christmas is the lights and the Christmas movies that highlight meaning, togetherness, joy, peace, faith, and magic!

These days, as an eclectic pagan or a spiritual anarchist, I celebrate in all ways that bring meaning to me. I celebrate what speaks to my deeper love and desire for connection, unity, faith and my connection to the earth, humanity, and divinity. For me, that’s Winter Solstice, Kwanzaa, and Christmas without presents - but with presence.

As we rest in winter, or celebrate the holidays, trust that your body, mind and spirit will tell you what you need to do in each moment. Whether it is to stay home and rest fully and abundantly, or whether it is to spend quality time with chosen family or relatives, or both, you get to decide and make a conscious choice to choose what will bring you the most pleasure this holiday season. You may choose to spend only a short time with family, and the rest of your time enjoying alone time.

Whatever it is, make a conscious choice and honor your personal boundaries, so that you can be in embodied consent with yourself.

With winter here, I celebrate the Winter Solstice. Others celebrate Christmas, Chanukah, and Kwanzaa. Whichever you observe, enjoy :)

My Rediscovery

Hello good people,

I had the opportunity to attend a neo-tantra retreat in September and I can't believe it’s already December! Since the retreat, I have felt so rejuvenated and exhilarated, that I jumped right into collaborations and being my erotically extroverted self!

Then I hit a wall this week, where my body told me to come down off my energetic high and listen to my higher self. But how amazing and luxurious that high was! This enabled me to make some important changes in my life, write about my experience and share it with all of you.

So let's get into it. In September, I was invited by Barbara Carrellas, Author of Urban Tantra, to participate in her Urban Tantra professional retreat, and offer my moaning practice to the group.

If you joined my email list after the Pleasure-Filled vs Pain-Filled Moans newsletter, and the Moaning Through the Chakras newsletter see my blog entry here. 

I had such an ecstatic, heart-centered and connected experience with my own body and curious play with others. After almost 10 years of being away from the erotically embodied community, due to co-parenting and caregiving, I had all but thought that the ecstatic part of me was gone. Because my work is my life and vice versa, I have still been teaching erotic embodiment, spirituality and Tantra to my clients and slowly building my Black Girl Tantra community, mostly online and some in-person.

Before Barbara contacted me, I believed that my Tantric Shaman program needed to be put on hold indefinitely; that I didn’t have it in me to do another one; that maybe it just wasn’t "who I am" anymore. However, attending this retreat for my own healing and pleasure while also getting to share my Black Girl Tantra moaning practice with the group, inspired me; and helped me remember who I am.

I got to re-experience what it was like to be touched lovingly, without an agenda. How it felt to breathe more fully and connect with subtle touch and orgasmic intuition, using the breath and presence. I was reunited with the importance of intimacy and the sacredness of play! And I got to do it with other black women in the room. Meaning I wasn't the only one this time! In the past, I was often the only fat, the only black, the only queer...etc. etc. But this time there were other queers, other people of size, other black bodies, and other people in my age group in the room and I got to experience beautiful platonic-intimacy with them. This is what I do this work for! Bridge building. Connection. Community!

I also noticed how my relationship to pleasure has changed as I’ve gotten older. I discovered how being my present slower, calmer self at 52, is just as important as my past, wild and care-free self in my 20's and 30's. I am older, a bit wiser, more rooted in my body, and with a new erotic complexity that is prismatically, multi-dimensional. I know myself more deeply. My erotic embodiment practices, my spirituality, my wife, friends and family help me through these tough times that I believe most, if not all of us, are experiencing.

I witnessed adults of various ages enjoy erotic practices, some for the very first time, and how beautiful and divine that awakening was! The erotic is expansive, vast, with infinite options that is hard to imagine until we practice it, feel it!

Nothing compares to the exhilaration and joy of being in my own body awareness and experiencing my own pleasure. The feeling of being asked what I want and given the spaciousness to feel into my answer fully, and doing the same for others. It is an intimacy and a mutual respect that is so sacred, so divine, and so necessary for my soul.

It reminded me of how important it is to connect on emotional and energetic levels, not just the physical. We miss so much when our only focus is on the physical. There is so much more to be experienced in the unseen world of our senses. There’s so much information for us to notice and play with.

 This retreat rescued me from a stuck place. It helped me tap into my courage and self-confidence once again. It reminded me of why I do this sacred intimacy work, and how being a Tantric Shaman and Sexual Freedom Coach is my calling. It helped me to realize why it’s so important to have community and skilled facilitators who can hold space for it all. My goal is not only to help adults see their own erotic power, but to train BIPOC facilitators in these skills and practices. I believe that we can change the world, and the ways that we see and treat one another, through the universal expression of love.

So, my challenge to you, my dear friends, is to open up to more conscious explorations with touch, outside of the romantic realm, and invite in fuller breaths, stillness, play, joy, erotic movement and sensual creativity. This will help you focus on your inner energetic world as much as your physical world. This retreat reminded me of the power of my calling as a Sexual Freedom Coach and the sacredness of play, touch, and intimacy.

And…

It is never too late to find yourself in the fullness of your sensual-self and your magic again. 🪄✨💫

It's National Boundaries Awareness Day!

In my body-positive work, exploring erotic embodiment practices with Black women, queer, non-binary, trans, and BIPOC folx of many sizes and abilities, boundaries are essential.

In fact, they are a natural part of our daily communication and human connection. We literally do this anytime we discuss even seemingly simple things like: where we are going to meet, when we are going to meet, if we are still coming and when/if we will meet again.

Boundaries are sexy!

Who doesn’t love a good communicator?! Communication and Boundaries are sexy! Boundaries is ongoing communication as we explore the possibilities of what could be, and come to an agreement on what will happen and what is happening in the moment. The agreement part, is known as consent, and it is never just one conversation, nor is it all verbal. The door must always be open to changes and amendments as our bodies receive more input and discover new feelings and sensations that may be in conflict with what we originally thought we wanted. So flexibility is a must.

Besides our verbal boundaries, body language, facial expressions, tone of voice, our energy, even our pheromones, all are a part of embodied boundaries that we express with one another. It is especially so when we are including platonic or sexual touch and connection in that interaction.

AUTHENTIC CONNECTION

Boundaries help us create more authentic connection with one another as we state what we are available to do, receive, give or take, from friends, family, work community or partners. And this can be about anything at all!

The more we begin to understand that boundaries are a way of letting others know what we need, want and desire, as well as what our limits are, the less we feel afraid or ashamed of having them and expressing them. This can be even harder for people who have experienced trauma, and those of us who were conditioned as women and femmes.

Expectations and Attachment

What is not often talked about, is that having expectations, and an attachment to getting what we want can get in the way of a healthy conversation about our needs and desires. We live in a culture that is all about instant gratification, competition and winning. So often times we may actually feel like we are losing if we don’t get exactly what we want, in the way that we want it, when we want it. Which can lead to coercion, shaming, bullying, abuse and even assault, especially when there is a power differential.

Unfortunately this is what many of us have experienced in childhood, as well as adulthood. So it can be difficult to notice when someone is being authentic and not going to war with us, or secretly plotting to harm us.

This is why it is important to develop our sense of inner safety and knowing by learning what feels good to us and trusting our instincts through therapy, erotic embodiment practices, meditation, spirituality and more. Then we can trust ourselves to become more vulnerable with the right people. This takes strong inner courage, looking at old habits, and learning our body’s wisdom to practice being in our authentic consent, as well as accepting the authentic boundaries of others.

Open and authentic conversations where we all get to express our needs and limitations, increases safety, trust, respect, love and compassion. Even if we don’t get exactly what we want.

The biggest gifts that come from authentic boundaries and conscious consent conversations and interactions, is deeper intimacy, connection, integrity, and aliveness.

And that leaves more room for play, fun, love and laughter!

Questions to Ponder

Have you taken the brave steps needed to be aware of your needs wants and desires and share your secrets with others you care about and want more intimacy with?

How often do you respect others needs, desires and limits, but not your own? Or vice versa?

As you start becoming more aware of your boundaries on a daily basis, outside of sexual activity, what feelings arise in you as you begin expressing what you need?

How often do you set loving limits, with loved ones?

If this is meaningful to you, share with others.

CHECK OUT OUR SOCIALS…

Your Erotic Starship Energy Blueprint

Your Erotic

Starship Energy

Today we’re going to discuss your Erotic Starship Energy. “Erotic” energy is your life force energy, which makes you feel alive! Your “starship” is how you travel from one experience to another as you learn to navigate the world around you, and is your unique blueprint.

Release Shame and judgment

As we’ve previously discussed, your moans can connect you to your body’s feelings and sensations and help you stay in your body, in the present moment. More expansively, learning about your erotic starship energy can help you understand the bigger picture of your desires and how you tend to go after them. It answers the question, “Why do I think, feel and do things that way?” Not from a place of judgment or shame but from a place of deeper self-awareness, consciousness, curiosity and connection.

Increase Intimacy

I teach and encourage my beloved community to study the elements, planets and energies that makes up their erotic starship in order to assist them in owning and naming their desires in their intimate relationships. It’s one of the ways I’ve come to understand and embrace myself. I don’t teach anything I don’t also practice.

Studying these naturally erotic parts of ourselves often brings clarity and a deeper level of self-intimacy, partner-intimacy and community-intimacy.

Beyond the Gender Binary

Discovering your erotic starship energy blueprint, may help you find that….

regardless of your sex, gender, sexual orientation and the roles society defines for you, you may learn that you’re a fiery person (masculine/active energy) who communicates like water (feminine/introspective energy), with an earthy (feminine/intuitive) erotic love language, and an airy (masculine/extroverted) way of getting your needs met. All of these energies lie within each of us.

This awareness is multi-layered and can help you make sense of how your needs, desires and actions play out in your relationships, how you resolve inner conflicts and how to accept your human contradictions.

Some aspects of your erotic starship energy may be hidden (feminine energy), while other parts of you may stand out (masculine energy)! This may mean that it takes more time and intimacy for people to truly get to know you, because of how your unique energy flows.

It may also help you embrace yourself with the knowledge that there is no need to waste your time with anyone who isn’t going to enjoy taking their precious time getting to know all of you.

This clarity can open up your world

exponentially!

We are a part of nature

There are many ways to talk about our erotic energy and desires. But how often do we really get to discuss the way that the natural world, above and below us, influences our humanity, our spirituality and our sexuality all at the same time? Aren’t we a part of nature after all?

To learn more about your unique erotic starship energy, regardless of what system of astrology you use, schedule an Erotic Starship Reading and Upliftment Session today.

Black Girl Tantra’s services, workshops, retreats and trainings are creative, practical, immersive and beyond this world transformational for ALL BODIES!

Email maisha@blackgirltantra.com about speaking engagements appearances, writing an erotic activist piece, or finding your erotic energy!

MOANING THROUGH THE CHAKRAS

 The 7 Major Energy Centers

Believe it or not, it is possible to intentionally direct your moans toward each of the 7 major energy centers (chakras) of your body, to alleviate your bod from feeling stiff and rigid to feeling supple, flexible and agile again. If you’re feeling restricted, confined, or stuck in your relationships, chances are you’re feeling that way in your chakras, your mind and your body all at the same time.

Moaning is really multi-dimensional when you think about it, just like us!

How difficult or easy it is for your moan to emerge and where it originates in your body, can provide you with important insights.

The level of ease or difficulty you have with your moan, can indicate what interventions might be needed to help you move out of a mentally, physically, emotionally, sexually or spiritually stuck place. It is absolutely possible to realign your chakra’s through the powerful act of conscious moaning!

self-healing and community-healing

You can realign your energy centers on your own, or you can find a practitioner who has years of insights, wisdom and practice with energy, healing and sound vibrations to help you begin or support you (shameless plug) ;-).

Finding your moan helps you get to know yourself, your energy, and your body better, from the inside out. Not only is moaning a great tool for self-healing and self-pleasuring but it’s also a powerful tool for our collective healing! Many African diasporic communities around the world collectively moan to process grief and other emotions as a collective. Your community may already do this in ways that you may not even realize.

An example of how moaning through the chakras can work for you...

Let’s say that you are having difficulty expressing your pleasure, your needs, desires, or actual moans when being intimate with your partner. Maybe you are self-conscious about making sounds, or you don’t think that moaning is appropriate for someone who looks like you. If you keep your voice silent even when you are experiencing pleasure this may have a deeper meaning for you than you may realize - it could even lead back to past social conditioning or even physical or emotional trauma.

For example, some people feel that being stoic makes you present in a certain way to people, perhaps this means you appear “strong” and “impenetrable” sexy and desirable even - you’ve heard the term, “the strong silent type”. However, this silence can also leave a person closed off from their partners during intimacy, in ways that they might not even realize. If you find that this does impact your self-intimacy and partnered-intimacy in ways that you do not desire, this may be both a throat issue as well as a solar plexus one.

THROAT CHAKRA

Self-censoring and not allowing certain pleasurable energy in, can be a throat chakra issue. Stifling your moan, may stifle your breath, your voice and your ability to let erotic energy into your body or may prevent old, stale energy from leaving. Stagnant energy in the throat can look like frequent sore throats, teeth issues, gum issues, feeling like a lump is in the throat. If closing off your moan or voice during pleasure or pain, is ultimately about a desire to maintain a “strong” appearance, or a wall of protection, this can likely be a throat issue accompanied by a solar plexus issue.

SOLAR PLEXUS

The Solar Plexus, the area just above our belly button deals with our relationship with dominance and submission, power and control. Solar plexus blocks may look like, digestion issues, reflux, slow bowels, IBS, constipation, diarrhea, gas and bloating, low energy.  Another solar plexus block can present as an inability to project your voice far enough for others to hear you well, or feel confident in your words, especially when it really counts. Or just the opposite, you may experience a lot of anger, rage and frustration. And of course there is always the both/and, meaning may experience it ALL which really can stir up your nervous system.

WHY MOANING IS SO IMPORTANT

From my own experience as an evolving, multi-dimensional human who has experienced complex trauma and silenced her voice, I’ve learned that stifling your own voice can impact your relationship with yourself and others whom you want to be more intimate and communicative with - be they family, friends, lovers, partners, co-workers, spouses or community.

As an erotic healing practitioner who has gained lots of insights working with folks over the decades, I’ve seen how silencing yourself can stop you from experiencing the full breadth of sensations and emotions that your body is capable of knowing.

Something new, different and liberating happens when you consciously access your moan, IN ALL OF IT’S FORMS, WITHin in the deep recesses of your wise and magical body.

TIME FOR CLASS!

Moaning Through The Chakras CLASS Thursday June 13 at 7:00 pm - 8:00 pm (Eastern Daylight time)

To put moaning through the chakras into practice, join me for a 60 minute zoom class Thursday June 13 at 7:00 pm (Eastern Daylight time), where we will have fun finding our pleasurable moans and locating which energy centers we are activating in our bodies!

Black Girl Tantra’s services, workshops, retreats and trainings are creative, practical, immersive and beyond this world transformational for ALL BODIES!

Click the link above to talk with Maisha about speaking, writing an erotic activist piece, or finding your erotic moan!