Welcome to Getting Curious, I'm Jonathan Vaness, and every week,

I sit down for a 40-minute conversation with a brilliant expert to learn all about something

that makes me curious. On today's episode, I'm joined by the writer, editor, activist,

and social justice facilitator, Adrian Marie Brown, where I ask her,

are we imagining a better future into existence as we speak?

Welcome to Getting Curious, this is Jonathan Vaness, I'm so excited to welcome our guest this week.

We need her, we need her work, we are so excited to welcome Adrian Marie Brown,

who is the author of Pleasure Activism, the politics of feeling good, and emergent strategy,

shaping change and changing worlds. You also host a couple podcasts which we're going to get into

a little later, but on this podcast, we always ask a question, and this is one of this,

that we need to ask, which is, what future can we imagine into existence? And I think

you're an integral person to ask, so welcome Adrian Marie Brown, how are you?

Thank you so much, Jonathan Vaness, for having me on your show, it's a pleasure,

pleasure, pleasure to get to talk with you about all these things. And yes, I love this as an

opening question for me, because my work is all rooted in the legacy of the prophet Octavia Butler,

and I think all about the future, and both the dystopian and utopian and all the things. And

in terms of the future, we can imagine into existence. I don't think there's anything off limits,

I think that we can imagine a future into existence in which each of us gets to have easy access to

all the pleasure that is our birthright, that we all get to have easy access to belonging.

And I consider myself a scholar of belonging, I'm always thinking, how do we get in right

relationship with each other? How do we get back into a relationship of belonging to this planet

that is our home that wants to nourish and feed us and care for us and gives us total abundance,

...