You Will Not Be Punished for Your Desire
What Is Your Element X?
Today I strategize from the bathtub with the guidance of Alice Coltrane’s Transcendence and develop my vision and values during forest bathing sessions because in a world crafted around my Element X, this is just what we do here. N.K. Jemisin describes “Element X” as a creative device that powers speculative fiction’s most popular books, films, and TV series. She frames it as a, ““What if...” question that establishes some foundational oddity. This premise binds the narrative together, defining what is possible in a story and shaping what can (and does) happen”1. I have developed a practice of designing my life through the framework of worldbuilding where my Element X is the commitment to embodying my deepest desire as a transdisciplinary artist. In 2023 America, a queer black woman building a life around exploring the erotic possibilities inside of poetry and ecosystem collaboration is the “foundational oddity” binding my narrative together.
What is your Element X? That vision of what daily life could (and should) look and feel like. A vision attracting you with magnetic terror and lighting you up with an energetic sense of possibility. “I will not be punished for my desire” is an affirmation that baptized me during a meditation session as I began to embody the world I was building. A world where I gave myself permission to live out the multitudes boiling in my body — thrashing with desire to be released. That sacred, transcendent place where I was practicing software engineering, poetry, painting, ceramics, teaching, researching, gardening, fashion designing, self portraiture and braiding all at the same time. This affirmation gave me permission to leave my perceived zone of safety and enter a world of my own making instead.
Healing from years of childhood trauma, where pleasure meant threat of punishment and desire meant danger. My Element X beckoned, “What if your desire became more powerful than your fear?”
What if your desire became more powerful than your fear?
What if your desire became more powerful than your fear?
What if…your desire became more powerful than your fear?
What do we build from inside the belief that we will not be punished for our desire? I entered the liquid realm of my desire and found a world wet with want, then found a story, then found a school, then found a life I could bear. A life of sowing and gathering, writing and researching, forest bathing and drawing, teaching and performing, coding and poetry — A life I once believed was too pleasurable to be possible. Elemental and limitless. Too unknown to be touched, too unknown to remain untouched. I had no blueprint. It was a foundational oddity. It was impossible in this world, so I built another one and named it after an ancient bald cypress tree rooted in the American South and an adinkra symbol. My last name is Cotton and my middle name is Zaire, born as an elastic bridge, what else I was supposed to do?
You see, when the stories of safety start to feel too small you’re left with no choice. I don’t want you to think I was courageous enough to choose this at first. I left my comfort zone kicking and screaming. How dare this world sell me a story of safety then make it too small to breathe inside of? Toni Cade Bambara said our job is to make revolution irresistible, but there is one step before that. We must believe we are worthy of touching the irresistible, sacred enough to only accept what feels irresistible. My Element X felt too irresistible to continue to deny myself of it. What is your Element X? That vision leaving you wet with want, attracting you with magnetic terror, a reality only made possible through revolution, a world you must build in the meantime.
With desire,
Ayana
N.K. Jemisin teaches “Fantasy and Science Fiction Writing” published by Masterclass. Learn more about the concept of Element X by viewing the class sample and checking out the instructor guide.