Giving up power is uncomfortable
Greetings, RH-ers. Tony Cuseo here.
As many of you know, Radical Honesty as a methodology and as a community, is changing. Or at least we’re trying to.
This call for change has come as a result of a petition drafted by a group of Radical Honesty Trainers and Trainer Candidates who are advocating for a greater focus on consent and sensitivity in workshops.
Personally, the petition has me examining quite intensely how I show up as a facilitator. So much so, that about a month ago I wrote an internal email to the RH Trainers and Trainer Candidates about how I want to show up in workshops — a declaration, of sorts.
In that email, I told a story about when I was getting certified as a Sexological Bodyworker that I want to share with you now...
In order to be certified, I had to complete a series of assignments, ranging from research on sexually transmitted disease, to learning genital anatomy, to more intimate practices, like “masturbation coaching.”
For one of my final assignments, I needed to complete for certification was giving an erotic massage to a person with a vulva. I posted in a variety of Facebook groups asking for a volunteer for this practice and eventually received a message from a woman who said she was willing.
A few days later, she invited me to her home. I showed up on her front porch and rang the doorbell. After a brief greeting, she let me into her house where I took a few minutes to explain the exercise and to make it clear that what we were going to do, if she chose to do it, was for her.
“You should not be enduring anything during this process,” I said. “I do not want you to put up with something because you think it might hurt my feelings if you tell me it’s not what you want. Don’t perform or pretend that something feels good if it doesn’t. This is for you and only you.”
I then asked if she still felt open to the practice. She said yes. A few minutes later, she led me to her bedroom where I gave her an erotic massage, checking in periodically to ask what felt good, asking if she wanted more or less pressure, or for me to move faster or slower, etc.
At the end of the session during a debrief, I asked how the experience was for her. “At the beginning, you said that this was for me and I could really feel that,” she said, with her eyes a bit teary. “Something about the way you touched me…there weren’t any tentacles. You felt pure.” I find my own eyes a bit teary now as I relay this story to you. I think of her statement at the end of our session as some of the most meaningful words ever spoken to me.
This commitment to being of service — to putting the participants first — this is how I want to show up when I facilitate a workshop. And, to go a step further, I think this is my responsibility as a leader. Of course I am human and taking care of my basic needs is important. If I don’t do that, I probably can’t maintain a mindset of service. But my role at a workshop first and foremost, is to serve the group, not myself.
To borrow from Dr. Betty Martin, it means that I hold my boundaries but forego my preferences. And, it means giving up some of my power and control as a workshop leader and giving it to the participants themselves instead.
Last weekend, Mak and I held a workshop in New York and experimented with implementing some of the principles set forth in the petition, just to see what would happen.
Firstly, we did away with the agreement that asks participants, upfront, to accept our coaching. Instead, we opted for ongoing consent. Whenever Mak or I had the impulse to support someone, we asked if they were open to being coached and waited for them to say yes or no — with perhaps two exceptions when we flat-out forgot to ask (old habits die hard…).
We also did away with the agreement that proposes participants remain in the room and stay until the completion of each exercise. For the most part, people stayed in the room and did the exercises anyway, but we did have people get up and leave the room, or go to the bathroom during sessions far more often than in any workshop I’d led previously.
I felt good about our choices. I imagine allowing people more agency and flexibility throughout the weekend made a difference in the tone of the workshop. We encountered less resistance from people in the group because they had less to resist, so to speak. That’s the good news.
The less-good, or more challenging news, is that it turns out that giving up power can be uncomfortable. Mak and I both remarked, whilst cringing and making faces, that there were times when we missed assuming people would do whatever we asked them to do, simply because we coached them to do it, dammit! “And what the hell’s up with these people standing and leaving the room all the time?!” we lamented.
Over the course of the weekend, I had the chance to put my money where my mouth is. I’ve paid lip service to the idea of giving up control. Now I have experienced what it’s like to do so and I can tell you, it ain’t as easy as I had hoped.
At several points during our three days together, participants expressed displeasure with me and/or Mak about the workshop and how we were running it. And for a moment my mind thought, “But wait! We’re giving you so much leniency. We are trying so hard to serve you. How can you still be disappointed with us?…”
To be a bit dramatic, at times it felt like giving up control meant we gave away the good stuff (people doing what we wanted, when and how we wanted it) while holding onto the shitty stuff (people being unhappy with us over how we were leading).
Even still, I felt proud of what we were doing. And, to be fair, there were some times we did make mistakes. In fact, my proudest moment over the weekend was acknowledging when I felt I had done a rather poor job of coaching two participants during some processing.
I didn’t listen to either of them well enough and instead, I got rigid and set in my ways, thinking I knew what they both needed, pursuing a way of coaching that didn’t serve them. Once I had made a royal mess, I turned to the two of them and essentially said, “Look, I think I done fucked up here, and I’m sorry. I wish I had listened to you and trusted you more.”
It’s worth noting that I don’t particularly like admitting my mistakes. It feels uncomfortable for me to do so. And, I think that’s the whole point here.
There’s a growing number of us in the Radical Honesty community who want to see a fundamental change in how we lead. If we are committed to seeing that change through, we will need a willingness to be with discomfort. The discomfort of giving up power and control, and taking on new ways of being and leading that will likely feel disturbing only because we aren’t practiced in doing them. I’m curious to see if we’re up for the task.
Speaking of, Mak and I will be leading another weekend workshop in New York from November 17th to 19th. If you’d like to come and experience this new form of facilitation that we’re working on, come join us. I hope to see you there.
Love,
Tony
Tony Cuseo is a Radical Honesty Trainer Candidate who co-leads workshops and practice groups. He also holds certifications in Embodied Counseling and Sexological Bodywork. Tony is passionate about creating art, music, and love.
Upcoming Workshops Co-led by Tony: