I still remember my first sober dance. The anxiety and awkwardness I felt as I walked into the studio space without the liquid courage I’d come to rely on. The vulnerability of having nowhere to hide. No drink in hand, no darkened club corners, no chemical buffer between me and my feelings.
And yet, two and a half hours later, I was drenched in sweat, a huge smile spread across my face and my body was humming with an aliveness that surpassed any high I’d ever experienced clubbing (and trust me, I’ve experienced some real highs clubbing!)
It was eight years ago when I first discovered 5Rhythms and Ecstatic Dance. And it’s no exaggeration to say they completely changed, and perhaps even saved, my life.
Breaking the cycle
For over a decade, my weekends followed the same script: pre-drinks, a couple of clubs, an afterparty, an abundance of drugs and a string of hookups. Week in, week out.
Dating meant apps and fleeting, unfulfilling hook-ups that rarely lasted more than half an hour. I was constantly surrounded by people, yet increasingly isolated.
“It’s just the gay lifestyle,” I’d tell myself. “It’s what we do… it’s all we have.”
Don’t get me wrong, there was a lot I loved about it at the time. I was obsessed with music, I loved dancing, I adored my friends and the highs were ecstatic.
But it couldn’t carry on forever. Ten years was more than enough.As I edged into my thirties, I realised the coping mechanisms I’d leaned on were becoming a big problem. What began as weekend fun had grown into full on dependence. Chemicals for confidence and sex for validation.
My ADHD, once masked with alcohol, cigarettes and substances, now left me overstimulated, dysregulated and struggling with intense bouts of depression, paralysis and sex addiction.
One day, at a particularly low point, I found myself teary-eyed in a café in Limehouse. I could barely think in a straight line, let alone figure out how to change my life.
“Gary?!” a voice called out over the clink of coffee cups. It was an old friend. I poured my heart out to her and she told me about a conscious dance event called 5Rhythms that was happening next weekend.
As it happened, she was in that very café for a meeting about it with the team. I booked my ticket instantly, and the very next week, I stepped into a bright white studio for my first session. I’ve never looked back.
Finding freedom through movement
That first dance was utterly transformative. As soon as the beat dropped, my body moved before my mind could protest. For the first time in ages, the noise in my head went quiet, replaced by pure sensation and creative instinct.
As someone with ADHD, this was nothing short of revolutionary. Conscious dance offered me everything I’d been searching for elsewhere – more presence, physical release and the sweet, liberating feeling of being completely lost and alive in the moment. Had I actually found a way to do dance with amazing music without all the mess that came with it?
I moved through euphoria, grief, joy and wild freedom. There were moments of stillness, then explosive expression. But unlike my old habits, I left feeling energised, not drained. Connected, not alone. Alive, not hungover.
As I became a regular at 5Rhythms, Ecstatic Dance and Movement Medicine, I discovered new way to experience the joy and delight that was inside me. I’d found a way to let it out.
I formed friendships based on honesty, shared joy and connection. I’d found what one dance friend called “soul family.” Some of my old party friends have even come over to the light side too!
Coming home to my body
One of the biggest shifts was in my relationship with my body. Like many gay men, I’d spent years seeing my body as an object. Something to attract, to perform with, to win approval. I also never felt good enough in my skin. I always felt too skinny, too this, too that, too… something or other.
Conscious dance turned that inside out. I began to feel my body from within, to move from primal sensation, from emotion and from my truth. My body started to feel like a home again. I started to feel beautiful in my own unique way. I once said to a friend, “I used to dance like everyone was watching. Now I dance like nobody is, even when they are.”
Gabrielle Roth, creator of 5 Rhythms says:
“When you truly surrender to your own rhythm, you look so cool, so mysterious, so seductive, the way you deep down really want to look but don’t trust that you do”.
Creating what I needed
But I couldn’t help noticing: I was often one of very few gay men in the room. The question kept echoing: “Why don’t more gay men know about this? Why aren’t we here too?”
And that’s how Pleasure Medicine was born – my love letter to the conscious dance spaces that transformed me and to the gay community I hold so dear. Pleasure Medicine is a space where GBTQ men can dance freely, connect deeply and be sensual without it needing to become sexual. A space where we can explore intimacy without pressure, without performance, without apps, without booze and without drugs.
Pleasure Medicine is all about kindness, care, safety, respect and love. It’s about brotherhood and real community.
The medicine we need
What started as a chance encounter in a café has become my life’s work and calling. Every time I open the doors to a Pleasure Medicine event and watch the men arrive – some nervous, some sober for years, some just curious – I feel such tenderness, pride and love for my fellow brothers. Because I know what’s waiting for them on the other side of this journey. More love, more connection and more self-worth.
We don’t need to escape our bodies to feel free.
We just need spaces that invite us back into them – joyfully, gently and together.
Sober dancing changed my life, and it can enhance yours too.
Gary is an award-winning music maker and performer, conscious DJ, writer and creator of Pleasure Medicine, a bi-weekly Ecstatic Dance for gay men that involves sensual connection and conscious dance in Hackney, East London. With over a decade of experience as a therapist, and currently training as a Somatic Embodied Sexologist, Gary is devoted to helping GBTQ men unlock their pleasure centres, soften shame and rediscover joy, intimacy and sensuality through embodied dance and celebratory sexuality.
The next Pleasure Medicine event is on 19 April, 12pm – 2:30pm 2025, at Green Space Studios, 127a Elderfield Road, London E5 0AY United Kingdom
