I created this space, removed from the notion that the “muse” is me.

My journey to the sacral expressive person on the interwebs was, indeed, a spiritual one filled with inner child healing and heavy-ass shadow work. For the last ten years, the narratives surrounding my self-esteem and self-worth impressed upon me by others, and soon ingrained in my psyche, began to crumble. I could no longer hide in the shadows of imposter syndrome and insecurities or play passively knowing it’s not my natural makeup. Deflecting and deflating when I needed to advocate for myself. Living in fear of being too loud or boisterous because it was “unbecoming.” I let people make me feel as if I wasn’t good enough or enough at all. 

This is when I understood what it meant to be the muse.

I was destined to see my life as a continuous case study filled with hypotheses, insights, and optimizations. Testing methodologies and adjusting as I go. It was written for my lived experience to manifest as shared data and transform it into reference text shared with the community. The ebbs and flows of my life became the essential ingredient of The Muse’s Lab.  

But trust, this part of my human experience isn’t easy.

As a Jersey girl with southern roots, I reconciled heavily with being loud and yielding to the respectability politics of my church-going elders. Twas a long road to recognize and accept my voice, and it began in the shadows of writing erotica under the pen name—L.T. Robinson. Four books later, I chose to live in my truth as my name—ShaVaughn Elle. Reclaiming my voice and connecting it to my spiritual and sensual DNA led me to reclaim heaux, and make it part of my lexicon. In my world, heaux is an archetypal expression that persons within the feminine spectrum operate in daily. Reclaiming and reframing these heaux tales evolved as a way to assert sovereignty over my sexual identity and experience.

This is important when viewing yourself as a conduit who sends and receives—in equity. 

Thus, my identity as the heauxly aunty is an outward expression of being a spiritual heaux who embraces the spectrum of her sexuality and spirituality as mutually inclusive identities. Rashida Webb Miller tells us that the erotic is holy (2019), and because of this, the naming of oneself as spiritual, erotic, sensual, and heauxly/holy is a testament to the breadth of our divinity as “the muse.”

I talk heavily about the importance of naming yourself here.

To “muse” myself is to draw inspiration from my experiences and daily interactions. To hold space for residual moments of awareness, while manifesting each moment with the words that eke from my tongue. Choosing to broaden my spiritual lens and adjust my mindset to see and uncover the nuances of Spirit in every facet of life is an act of resistance. Even in the hardest of times, my spiritual practice became a way to soothe, grieve, and rekindle the relationship with my body after visceral and traumatic experiences.

To integrate the spiritual and sexual aspects of myself has been my most challenging journey, but one that’s become my most fulfilling. Reaching back into my ancestral notes, choosing to be a generational starter, communing with other feminine spectrum persons, and learning from their lived experiences is most rewarding. As someone who had to reconcile transitioning from a two-parent to a single-parent home, the desire to feel whole and fulfilled is one I’ve pursued for as long as I can remember. As I ascend, so do the ones who choose to walk this path—though it is not for the faint of heart.

As the muse, I can create and shape my reality to ensure it always serves my highest good and my favorite self. And this isn’t the end, per se. Other ways for being and becoming the muse may enter my atmosphere and push me to evolve into another iteration along with this platform. However, while I continue to unlock the cheat codes, those who are ready can gain access to this knowledge and wisdom for their betterment pursuing spiritual pleasure and scholarship.