The Beauty Beneath the Taboo

If you’ve followed my work for any length of time, you’ve probably heard me say a few things over and over again:

The erotic mind is not rational. It is not politically correct.

The erotic mind doesn't care about your social comfort.

You cannot control or negotiate with what turns you on.

You can only get curious about why.

You’ve also heard me say that fantasies are rarely literal. They're symbolic. They're emotional storytelling devices. They are often the nervous system’s attempt to get a need met in the only language it knows how to speak: through sensation, intensity, power, and connection.

Recently, someone trusted me with a fantasy they’ve carried their entire life. He gave me explicit permission to share this for educational purposes, with full anonymity.

Here is what he shared.

When he was five years old, his mother took her own life. He has carried profound grief and confusion around that loss. For as long as he can remember, he's had recurring fantasies in which his mother teaches him everything he needed to learn about intimacy, connection, and his body. In these fantasies, she guides him. She initiates him. She shows him what love and closeness feel like.

And as the fantasy progresses, he becomes stronger. More powerful. He expresses anger toward her. Sometimes that anger is intense. Sometimes it becomes violent. In the fantasy, he is no longer the helpless child who was abandoned by tragedy. He is powerful. He chooses. He reclaims.

On the surface, I understand why this would make many people squirm.

Incestuous themes are one of the deepest cultural taboos we have. Add in death and violence, and most people’s instinct is to recoil.

But when I listened to him, I didn’t see perversion.

I saw grief.

I saw a five-year-old boy who lost the person biologically wired to teach him about safety, attachment, love, and embodiment.

I saw a child who never got initiation into intimacy in a healthy, attuned way.

I saw anger that never had a safe place to land.

And I saw a psyche that — brilliantly, creatively — built a symbolic story where that child could finally receive what he didn’t get.

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What I Saw in the Fantasy

I saw resolution.

The longing to be taught. To be guided. To be shown how to connect. When a parent dies early, especially in a traumatic way, there are developmental needs that never get met. The body remembers that absence.

Fantasy can become a space where the nervous system says, “Let me rewrite this. Let me give myself the closeness I missed.”

I also saw reclamation.

In real life, he had no control. His mother was gone. The decision wasn't his. The loss was absolute.

In fantasy, he has agency.

He chooses. He grows stronger. He expresses rage. He's no longer small and powerless.

The nervous system doesn't just crave pleasure. It craves agency. It wants power where there was none.

And sometimes, it uses erotic charge as the vehicle.

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Compassion and Boundaries Can Coexist

Understanding a fantasy does not mean endorsing harmful behavior.

Let me be clear about that.

There's a vast difference between symbolic fantasy and real-world action. This man isn't seeking to harm anyone. His fantasy exists entirely in the realm of imagination. It harms no one.

What it does do is give his inner child relief.

It gives his psyche a place to metabolize grief, longing, and anger in a contained way.

And honestly? That makes me happy.

Not because the taboo is thrilling. But because the human nervous system is astonishingly creative in how it tries to heal.

Shame would only freeze this part of him. Shame would push it underground, where it would become heavier and more isolating.

Compassion allows it to be explored safely.

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Be Curious, Not Judgmental

This is something I say all the time: be curious, not judgmental.

When someone shares a vulnerable fantasy with you, especially one that feels socially unacceptable, your disgust might be loud. But what if instead of recoiling, you asked:

What is this trying to resolve?

Where did this person lose agency?

What unmet need is encoded here?

Most fantasies aren't about the literal scenario. They're about power. Or safety. Or longing. Or grief. Or initiation. Or control.

When we approach fantasy with curiosity instead of condemnation, we create space for integration.

And integration is healing.

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Celebrating the Psyche’s Creativity

I am not celebrating incest. I am celebrating the resilience of the human mind.

I am celebrating a psyche that refused to let a five-year-old’s grief remain frozen.

I am celebrating the fact that this man found a way (however taboo the imagery) to experience connection, strength, and agency in a story where he once had none.

That is not perversion.

That is a nervous system trying to survive.

And if we want people to heal, we have to make space for the shadow without shaming it.

Be curious.

Be compassionate.

Hold boundaries.

And remember... the erotic mind speaks in symbols.

Sometimes the fantasies that scare us the most are the ones trying hardest to heal us.