Pride as a Spiritual Practice

When June rolls around, our feeds flood with rainbow flags, parade routes and party invitations. Don’t get me wrong, I love the spectacle, the solidarity, the unapologetic visibility. And I have a deep reverence and respect for the fight that our ancestors gave for our freedom. But somewhere between the glitter cannons and corporate floats, I started wondering:

What if Pride could be more than just a weekend? What if it became a spiritual practice through the year and the rest of our lives?

This year, I’m thinking about Pride differently. Yes, it’s political, it always will be. Our very existence remains an act of resistance in many corners of the world. But it’s also deeply personal, intimately physical and surprisingly spiritual. It’s about the Pride we take in our bodies, our minds, our hearts, our trauma healing, our community and our connection to something greater than ourselves.

The Body Knows 

Growing up LGBTQ+, for most of us, often meant learning to disconnect from our bodies. We’re taught early that our desires are wrong, our expressions too much, our very presence a problem to be solved.

Many of us spent years, decades even, living from the neck up, treating our bodies like inconvenient vessels rather than the sacred homes they truly are. No wonder so many gay men end up in spirals of alcohol and drugs abuse, sex addiction and suffering with loneliness, anxiety and depression. Then comes Pride and we slap on the glitter, stick on a smile and parade the streets as if everything is just fine.

Pride, at its core, is about coming home to ourselves completely. It’s about reclaiming the fullness of who we are, not just our gay selves, but our full physical and spiritual selves – in my free weekly news letter The Pleasure Portal, I send all kinds of inspiration, practices and teachings around gay embodiment, healing and transformation, so hop in and join me if you feel the call!

Queer Healing

LGBTQ+ bodies have unique needs, experiences and wisdom. In London especially, we are starting to see wellness practitioners, workshops and spaces that understand how healing happens differently for queer people. We have different shame, different forms of chronic stress from being in a minority, unique armour we’ve built against a world that wasn’t built for us.

Pride can be a spiritual practice in the sense of connecting to something larger than our individual struggles. When we gather in Pride spaces, whether that’s a march, a party or a quiet moment of self-reflection, we’re tapping into generations of queer ancestors who fought for our right to exist openly.

There’s something sacred about that connection and about recognising that we’re part of a lineage of resistance, creativity and fierce love. Our joy becomes a form of prayer. And our visibility becomes an offering to those who come after us.

Making Pride Personal

So how do we bring this expanded vision of Pride into our actual lives? How do we move beyond Instagram posts and performative celebration. How do we turn Pride into an embodied practice?

Here are four ways to celebrate Pride throughout the rest of the year, and your life, that honour the fullness of who you are:

1. Pleasure Medicine

Pleasure isn’t frivolous, a luxury or something you need to work hard to earn. It’s not something you deserve for behaving well. It’s medicine. Pleasure is baked into the fabric of our existence and the universe. Why does fruit taste sweet? Why is nature beautiful? Why does sex feel so good?

This approach recognises that our capacity for joy, sensuality, and yes, erotic pleasure, is directly connected to our overall wellbeing. Pleasure is healing on so many levels. When we learn to receive pleasure without shame, we’re healing generations of conditioning that told us we were too much, not enough, dangerous even.

One place you can start to heal you relationship to being gay and other queer men is at Pleasure Medicine my twice monthly sensuality workshop and Ecstatic Dance for gay men. It’s about sensuality, connection and joy, created specifically for gay, bi, queer and trans men in London who want something different from the usual scene.

This is for every body type, age, background and story. It’s a space where gay men can connect away from bars, clubs, apps and substances using embodied movement, sensuality and conscious dance instead.

A conscious dance is substance-free, sensitive and soulful space where men connect through music and a shared desire for more pleasure. No dance experience is needed. Just a willingness to explore joy, vulnerability, intimacy and celebratory sensuality together.

Where: Prana Voice, 4a Tuscany Wharf, N1
When: Every 2nd Saturday
How much: £20/£15

2. Gay Wellness

Gay Wellness is a revolutionary online directory connecting gay men with massage therapists, healers and wellness practitioners who understand the unique landscape of queer healing. Whether you’re dealing with physical pain, emotional overwhelm, stress or just want to experience touch and therapy that’s both healing and affirming, having practitioners who ‘get it’ can make all the difference.

Gay Wellness prides itself on its professionalism and clarity when it comes to its practitioners. Unlike other gay massage websites that focus on sex and can often just be glorified escort websites, Gay Wellness carefully selects its therapists and coaches based on mutual consent, transparency quality and professional behaviour. Over on the website you’ll find massage therapists, energy healers, coaches, nutrition coaches, life coaches, psychotherapists and more.

When: 24/7 . How much: Various.

3. Prana Voice

Prana Voice is the new place in East London for everything connected to Holistic Well-Being; therapies, classes, workshops, sound healings, yoga and healing music all under the same roof.

This new healing centre is the love child of Antonello Brunetti. He has been practicing as a healer since 2014 motivated by the desire to play his part in bringing more light, love and understanding to people’s lives.

With longstanding experience in facilitating people’s healing processes, Antonello has put together a team of therapists and teachers under the same roof, to offer an incredible support network whilst creating a vibrant community.

When: 24/7 . How much: Various

4. Tantra For GBTQ Men

Tantra for gay men has been growing in popularity over the last years. Are you ready to embark on a transformative journey into the depths of Tantric Embodiment? This is where ancient wisdom meets contemporary somatic practices to awaken your most authentic self and empower you in spaces of intimacy and connection.

Led by an experienced practitioner, Michael Peck, in a safe and nurturing environment, this work invites you to explore the subtle energies within your body, mind, and spirit for healing and personal transformation.

Whether you’re looking to build confidence in the bedroom, heal from past sexual trauma, manage anxiety around sex and relationships or deal with sexual dysfunctions such as premature ejaculation, maintaining erections, or achieving whole body orgasms, this work offers a space for deepening your connection to yourself and others, cultivating presence, and awakening the inherent wisdom of your body.

Pride: A True Revolution

Pride started as a riot, but it’s evolved into something more complex. It’s resistance and celebration, grief and joy, individual healing and collective liberation.

When we take care of ourselves holistically, body, mind and spirit, we’re not being selfish. We’re ensuring that we have the strength and clarity to keep fighting for the world we want to see. We can only create that if we are strong in mind, body, heart, soul and spirit, not just individually, by collectively.

This Pride, what if we celebrated not just how far we’ve come, but how far we can go?

What if we honoured not just our right to exist, but our right to thrive?

What if we made Pride not just a season, but a practice of radical self-love that lasts all year long and the rest of our lives?

What if the most revolutionary act wasn’t marching in the streets for one day of the year, but learning to heal and transform that which holds us back from our full, most alive, vibrant and radiant powerful selves.

Happy Pride, beautiful humans. May this month be a gateway to deeper joy, wilder self-acceptance and the kind of love that changes everything!

About Gary

Gary is a therapist, embodiment facilitator, somatic erotic bodyworker, award-winning music maker, conscious DJ and writer. He’s the creator of Pleasure Medicine, a bi-weekly sensuality workshop and ecstatic dance for gay men in London that blends conscious movement with intimate, embodied connection.

With over a decade of experience as a therapist, Gary is devoted to helping gay men unlock their pleasure centers, soften shame and rediscover joy, intimacy and sensuality through dance, touch and celebratory sexuality.

He is a guest columnist for queer culture magazines and writes personal essays, opinion pieces and cultural reflections—always from the perspective of being in the waters with the reader, trying to work it all out together.

Connect with Gary:

• Book your ‘Pleasure Medicine’ ticket here: www.pleasuremedicine.co.uk
  
• Join ‘The Pleasure Portal’, weekly conscious self-pleasure practices, sexy soul notes, soundtracks and general spiritual gay stuff going on in your inbox:
  www.pleasuremedicine.co.uk/pleasure-portal
  
• Touch Me Workshop, a guided intimacy, sensual touch and massage workshop for gay men:
  www.pleasuremedicine.co.uk/touch-me