Words by JJ Croucher
Design by Yosef Phelan

The four-or-five-hour workshop is set to a discordant soundscape; while we meditate, the instructor tinkers with some Tibetan singing bowls; when it's time for breathwork, we huff ourselves red to janky EDM; I think the "testicular massage" is set to a lo-fi remix of Redbone by Childish Gambino. We are silent for the undressing ceremony. 

There are about fifteen of us in the room, sitting on meditation bolsters in a half-moon curve. We are in a humid loftspace in East London at a "tantra" workshop for GBTQIA+ men; I'd stumbled across it on Eventbrite, the advert promising an evening of "energetic transmission" for men who want to increase their so-called "erotic intelligence".

The FAQ I'd read beforehand did little to dispel the practice's ambiguity: Tantra – I'd seen the word bandied around on leaflets at the temples and mindfulness centres I'd frequented; I'd seen it on the side of pink-lit Soho parlours too. Now I was staring down a forked path; the description of the fifty-quid workshop was littered with potential euphemisms – ‘held environment’ – ‘energetic transmission’ – ‘group coherence’

Nothing risqué has yet happened – we've meditated a lot and I feel as though I've just spent an hour dozing on a sunbed. There's little that feels ceremonial about the offhand undressing that follows though; the instructor tells us to turn our backs and I face a stack of idle yoga mats, presumably used to watching over more-modest yummy mummies. In true New Age fashion, the power rests with the self – the instructor tells us that we can now take off as much or as little clothing as we like. I want him to tell me what most people do, preferably with ratios; his open-ended dress code feels like the 'smart-casual' of the safe space.

The thirty seconds we have to get our kit off contain a battle of paranoias: I weigh up the risks of a nervous erection and appearing prudish; I worry that I misheard him and that I might find myself the only one starkers, in a cruel scene of Bridget Jones anatomy. Though I see a snatch of my neighbour's bobbing penis, I can't bring myself to go all the way: I  take The Middle Path: my thighs rattling around in my boxers – I look like a teenager as I await our instructor's direction.

"I weigh up the risks of a nervous erection and appearing prudish; I worry that I misheard him and that I might find myself the only one starkers, in a cruel scene of Bridget Jones anatomy"