Bren Ryder

Okay, two goals: one personal goal and one professional goal.

Coming up with only one goal for these two areas of my life was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. I knew I’d have to spend some time really thinking about what’s important. I have a ton of tasks that I want to do: make volume 2 DVD, shoots hot sexy scenes, update website, promote more effectively, lose weight, cut out junk food, socialize more, etc, etc.

But, none of those things are the number one most important thing to do. Looking at one of those tasks as my single solitary goal for my life is very unexciting. A goal must be exciting. It must be worth the effort. It must be so compelling that when I browse the internet aimlessly I’ll immediately recognize that what I’m doing isn’t getting me closer to my be-all-end-all GOAL.

Of course, even the life of a dyke pornographer can’t be that passionate and exciting all the time, but I thought about it a lot and I’ve finally come up with one personal goal and one professional goal.

The personal goal is a simple one and so simple and straight-forward that I’m not sure if it’s the right one.

PERSONAL GOAL: Pay off my debt.

I struggled with this one because I feel like I focus a bit too much on it. I’m constantly checking balances, working and reworking my debt reduction system, reading finance books and blogs, planning, planning and more planning. When really the only thing I need to do is make more money for a couple of years and it’s done. My goal for last year was also to pay off my debt. Initially, I immediately rejected it as a primary goal because I thought my obsession was a bit unhealthy. But, then I came to the conclusion that sometimes obsessions need to be cultivated. I’m such a laid back, slow-is-beautiful kind of person that I could use some more obsession in my life. Obsessing over debt and striving towards a zero balance is not exactly a sexy goal, but I’m going to use this opportunity to exercise my obsessive power until this goal is achieved.

Now, the fun part - the professional goal. I love my job and making goals for work is uber sexy. Like I mentioned before, the tasks sometimes aren’t so sexy: new graphics, find help, update accounting system, create new customer database. Therefore, none of those things are my primary goal. Those things must serve my primary goal.

PROFESSIONAL GOAL: Create Good Dyke Porn™ Manifesto.

This gets me excited. The Good Dyke Porn™ Manifesto is everything. It’s the website, the promotion, the content, words describing our mission, a book perhaps, a new DVD, a documentary film or simply brainstorm scratches on a pad of paper.

This year my goal is to create the manifesto. Maybe the next goal will be to deliver the manifesto (through promotion, selling, etc). But first, I must solidify exactly what it is I’m doing, meaning to say, the impact I’m intending to make and manifest it into media for others to understand. The vision in my business plan and goals from two years ago need to leap in front of the eyes of the world so that everyone can understand Good Dyke Porn.

This is exciting. This is about creation. Now, everything that I do from writing this blog to filming a scene or hiring a helper needs to serve this goal: to create the manifesto.

Of course, I still have to do my accounting and release media that, while in line with the manifesto, isn’t exactly the manifesto itself. But, the awesome thing about creating the manifesto is that once I have it written in a frame in my office (another creative form) then all minor or major tasks will be serving that mission statement.

This creative goal is going to take more than one form and I’m going to leave that open. I’ll know when the creative process for the manifesto is done. At that time I’ll begin to focus on a new thrilling goal.

I love this time of year. When the new year approaches I always take time to look back at the past year and make goals and plans and resolutions for the new year. I’m not too concerned about the resolutions. They consist of the usual fair - eat better, exercise more. But, it’s not my goal to follow my resolutions all year long. They’ll naturally fluctuate throughout the year and I’m perfectly happy with that.

I don’t even remember what my resolutions were last year. Probably similar health habits and work habits. Looking back at 2008, I did make a major change in my exercise habits and began going to the gym 5 times a week first thing in the morning. December has been a bit of a write-off but September to November was amazing.

Looking back at Good Dyke Porn™ there have been a lot of accomplishments.

The website was only (a)live for 6 months at the beginning of 2008. The film festival film made a nice circuit in 2007 and the film went to Australia and Paris and Israel in 2008.

*I started this blog - BrenRyder.com

*I received a Feminist Porn Award: The Golden Beaver Award for Canadian Content.

*I published the first DVD - The Best of GoodDykePorn.com Volume 1

- Canadian Distributor for the DVD - Come As You Are
- US Distributor - Babeland
- The DVD available on three VOD websites.
(all new income)

…my favorite accomplishment:
*I lived off the earning from my business for 6 months out of the year. (And learned how to live on very little.)

Besides these physical accomplishments there have been many new connections made with queer revolutionaries, new models, supportive fans, and porn allies. Not to mention the incredible new fucking sex scenes that we’ve accumulated over the past year.

Now I have a huge list of goals for the new year, but I don’t want to get too crazy about trying to do too much because look at all the incredible things that can happen in a year - and that’s just a small business summary. Looking at blogs, the one piece of advice that I found is to come up with One Personal Goal and One Business Goal. So, out of my huge list of goals for the coming year I need to figure out which ONE is most important. If I could only accomplish that ONE goal what would it be? For 2008, that goal was definitely publishing our first DVD. And we did it!

Coming up with only one goal to focus on is not as easy as it looks, but it’s a perfect strategy for lazy easily distracted people like myself.

ONE GOAL - well, two really - one personal, one business. I’ll be back with what that is as soon as I figure it out.

I am working on a porn revolution. But did you know that I’m on a spiritual journey? Celebrating female sexuality is the easy part. It fits perfectly into my path and I believe in it. Money, however, is the hardest part of my spiritual journey to get a handle on. I’ve done okay for myself - relative to a homeless person. But I struggle to achieve the kind of financial abundance that I dream about. And I’m not talking about mansions and fast cars. I’d be happy to elevate beyond starving artist. So what have I learned from all this poverty and insecurity? What wisdom can I pass on?

Let’s brainstorm: Money is important. It does great things - pays off debt, buys gifts, finances churches and history-making election campaigns. Without money charity wouldn’t exist. Without money what would we stress about? The middle-class dream is to earn more than you spend, have nice things and a big savings account for retirement and emergencies. It doesn’t seem like a lot to ask for. But, there aren’t very many people who are content with their financial situation. Which means they must be spending more than they earn, have desires for more things and/or have an insufficient amount of savings.

Money is meant to be a tool. It’s meant to get your needs fulfilled in exchange for something: your time, your expertise, your objects. Is it a tool? Or, is it oxygen? Can we live without money? No.

Okay, so if money is like oxygen, then money sustains life. That is absolutely true. Literally, we cannot live without food and water and we pay for these things (plus shelter). Figuratively speaking, money breaths life into a business, a charity organization, an artistic project, a campaign, a demonstration, to name a few. Money is life. That I believe. But I have a hard time believing that money will always be there. Why? Because it won’t. Like life itself, it can end at anytime. I feel more confident that I will live another day than I do that money will return another day. I feel more confident that I will remain healthy for years to come than I do that I will have a steady income and a healthy balance on my accounts.

Life has no guarantee. I accept that life will someday end: for me, my loved ones, and everyone. I accept it because I have no control over it. I can do my part by breathing in and out, eating right, exercising and appreciating every day that I do have. Now, apply that to money.

I can’t control the money. Not in the grand scale. If I were to ever lose my money it would be completely beyond my control. What I can do is control “diet and exercise”. Every action I take, every mistake I make, and every success I see is a learning experience. I’ve learned that when I have a friend to go with I can get to the gym every morning. I can’t control the presence of viruses, contracting illnesses or sudden accidents, but I can get to the gym when I set up my schedule in a way that works for me.

So far, with money, I’ve discovered that I can no longer borrow money. Not for business, not temporarily, not for any reason. This decision has changed my financial situation immensely. Suddenly, I have achieved an important goal: make more than I spend. I make sure that happens no matter what. Being self-employed so my income is variable, but now that I’ve vowed to never borrow ever again, I make it work everyday.

That’s what’s working for me. That’s what I’ve learned about myself. That I can control - my spending, my guidelines. What I truly want, though, is for all of my debt to be paid off and a nice huge savings account to save me from financial emergencies. And I want that as soon as possible.

Let go of the outcome.

When life is the outcome, how do you let go? As a person who may be struggling with a terminal illness you know the intense difficulty in letting go of the outcome: staying alive. It seems like everyday all of us are fearing the death of abundance. So much so that it’s actually stifling our growth. Just like a highly stressed and angry person is stifling their own life and health. When we worry about money it’s like we’re worrying about death.

I never worry about having too much money. It’s always the opposite. So, to worry about losing money is like worrying about death. I choose not to worry about death, so it’s time to make a change in my thinking about money. If I’m worrying about money, then I’m worrying about death. And since I believe that whatever we focus on comes into being then I would never focus on death. Thus, it doesn’t make any sense to focus on the potential financial shortfall. In fact, it’s standing in my way of truly living, truly experiencing abundance.

A lot of us have a hard time with money. Financial experts are experiencing huge abundance to try to help us overcome our fears around money. We’ve mostly been taught that money is either good or evil. But it is neither. Or is it both?

Money is money. Life is life. Death is death. Money is life and money is death - metaphorically speaking, of course. When we worry about money, then we’re focusing on money as death. But, when we appreciate money and believe in the power of money, then we are focusing on money as life. Which is “better”? Life, of course. It’s easy for us spiritualists to believe in life and appreciate it, but now we need to translate that faith into our money. Money is an integral part of life and needs to be held up as important as life because it is life.

Until our society completely changes our system of exchange (not likely to ever happen), then money will be our currency of life. I am a healthy woman and I appreciate that. I live a good life and I appreciate that. Because of the society I grew up in I have a hard time believing that I deserve money as much as I deserve flexible limbs and a strong heart. That has to change. Money is life. And what I choose to do with it will change the world. As I change, then the world will change with me.

Ever since I can remember I’ve been lazy - or at least that’s what I was told. And maybe that’s why I embrace the lazy label so readily - because there’s been more than one loved one who’s mentioned it. Sometimes I try really hard to overcome this obstacle, this being lazy. If only I could stop being so lazy then I’d be able to accomplish so much. I’d make more money, my house would be cleaner, I’d be more knowledgeable, I’d eat better, I’d be healthier. Wow, life would be so much better if only I wasn’t lazy.
(Photo by Howdy, I’m H. Michael Karshis)

Bullshit. I’m all for personal development and GSD (Getting Shit Done), but sometimes you just have to let that go. I don’t know if I really am lazy or if I’m just addicted to boring activities. Everybody procrastinates, but it always gets done… eventually. Besides, I’m so gifted at taking pleasure in doing nothing. How can that be bad?

I don’t know if I’ll ever be a millionaire. By the time I’m old that’s going to have to be a bare minimum when it comes to real estate and retirement funds. I’m used to living in poverty - typical starving artist. Maybe if I worked harder then I’d make more money. Maybe if I make more money I’ll be happier. Happier? Is that even possible? I’m delighted by the simple prospect of spending hours doing absolutely nothing. So, how could the words “lazy” and “millionaire” be put side-by-side?

I’m willing to explore the possibility that things can happen in a way that’s completely contrary to what we’re led to believe. When I was young I was let to believe that the “lesbian lifestyle” was going to be a hard life: people wouldn’t treat me right, society wouldn’t accept my partnerships as legitimate, and I would never have a real family. I think overcoming those self-limiting beliefs is the reason why queers are a bit behind on careers and relationships - rather than the other theory that we need to overcome society’s oppression.

What if I can be who I am AND have a healthy and successful life? What if I can have enough money, be healthy and fit, have a good relationship AND be lazy. Maybe this character trait that people refer to as being lazy is actually something wonderful. Being a lesbian has turned out to be completely different from what I was led to believe. It turns out that being gay is actually better than being straight.

I’m going to start believing that being lazy is the superior way to live your life. The key here is to eliminate any sign of guilt when I’m being lazy. I can’t be guilty for following a path to happiness. That would be like having internalized lazybonesiphobia. It can only slow me down. Well, you know, slow me down more.

I vow to be lazy, to never feel guilty about it and to ultimately achieve my wildest dreams.

Over at the Good Dyke Porn blog I explore this question a bit. It was inspired by the forum topic by the same name.

Read the article.

Read and participate in the forum - it’s free.

*

The amazing video-on-demand collection of porn that caters to women, HotMoviesForHer.com, has done it again. They’ve recently created a category for “dyke porn”. If you read my recent post, “What Box Are You In” you’ll know that the category dyke porn is one that is close to my heart.  Of course, the fact that I run a website called, “Good Dyke Porn” might safely imply my enthusiasm for the creation and recognition of a specific genre called dyke porn.

The strange thing is that most people seem to know what dyke porn is and they know that it’s different from “lesbian porn” or “all-girl porn” (I’m sorry, that label is just disturbing, women only please). But, when you go looking for dyke porn on any kind of porn directory it simply does not exist.

Which is why I’m so excited about HotMoviesForHer.com starting the ball rolling by creating their dyke porn label. And, if you go to the “Main Theater” or “Lesbian Theater” (not Hetero or Queer) and click on “Categories” in the left sidebar, you’ll find us right under “for women->lesbian->dyke porn”. Currently, I’m #1. Woohoo!

Dream: Be a leader in dyke porn. Check!

I am living my dream by making my life and my business all about creating dyke porn that women love. When I first created the name, “Good Dyke Porn™” for the outlet of creating this porn I thought I was going to hear a few comments like, “nice try, porn yes, good no” or “an attempt at something good, but…”

I think most of us women who are following dreams and making things happen tend to have an imposter syndrome and sometimes doubt our worthiness of compliments or praise or even certain leadership roles. Since this is a job like anything else there are days that are easier than others and sometimes I have days where I feel discouraged, like I’m spinning my wheels or work feels pointless.

To combat those days I’ve compiled a document that I refer to whenever I need some encouragement. It’s a file that has quotes from reviews and emails from people who have incredibly wonderful things to say.

I’m so grateful to receive such comments. Not only do I actually get to create “my” work, but people actually love it! What more could I ask for? Below is a sample of the comments that I get to look at whenever I want to. They aren’t credited. For a look at a complete review check out some recent glowing reviews by:

Essin’Em: “Bren Ryder has really done both the adult and queer communities justice with Good Dyke Porn. and
Scarlet Lotus Sexgeek: “I think Good Dyke Porn is an amazing site full of wonderful videos enjoyable to everyone even remotely queer (and in my world that’s just about everyone)..”

This is a small sample of my inspirational list of compliments:
(Ain’t life grand?)

• I never get turned on by porn (the usual made by a man for a man porn) but your production is great and I was turned on.
• My butch boi and I had an interesting night afterwards *cheers to you*.
• I am happy to be a straight man discovering all this amazing dyke porn. The stuff I watched of yours has this real and earnestness about it. I’ve never seen anything like it in porn I’ve consumed.
• I have to say I’m a major fan of Good Dyke Porn, and yours was definitely the hottest of all the screenings!  I enjoyed the panel talk afterwards, too, everyone raised some really interesting points.
• I just wanted to say thanks for making such delicious feminist porn, that reflects a colourful spectrum of sexualities, all of which are hot in their own way.  You’ve obviously worked really hard to do what you do, and I think everyone benefits from your work.  It’s amazing.
• Congratulations on creating the best, most authentic site on the web.
• I just want to say that your site is absolutely amazing . . . from what I can see of preview videos and just your general attitude, I can already tell it’s wonderful.
• I love sights like yours, that have a unique personal vision…please keep up the good work.
• Good to finally see some decent porn on the web.
• just saw your site for the first time and have to say it looks awesome.
• I appreciate your art!! Brave. And incredibly sexy I might add…
• Good for you.
• Just thought I’d drop you a line to say congrats on your site. It’s VERY nice :0)
• Thanks for your work!
• I believe you offer lesbians a valuable product, and I admire your ambition, your skills, and your ability to convince attractive women to have sex on film for public consumption.
• Just for the record, I think what you do is awesome

Keep sending me encouraging messages. I appreciate every single one of them.

Photo by Daylight.

GoodDykePorn.com has been online for over one year now, but the filming first began two years ago this month and the business preparations started the summer before that. Once I became completely engulfed in the business of porn, including creating a business plan, seeking investors and making it all come together, I was faced with an irrefutable fact - I am fucking LAZY.

The days that I dedicated to working the business went something like this: spend the morning planning and writing lists about all the tasks that I need to do in the afternoon and evening, then decide to do it tomorrow. I am the queen of to-do lists. I have an intense understanding of what I need to be doing. I love to plan things out. It’s the doing that’s the hard part.

So, once my passion for creating Good Dyke Porn met my lazy ass procrastinator I decided to google, "how to be more self-disciplined". That’s when I found StevePavlina.com - an interesting, incredibly successful, personal development blog. The subject matter is very diverse: self-discipline, finding your life’s purpose, habit forming, subjective reality, raw food diets, astral projection, law of attraction and much more. I started with self-discipline and became drawn to articles about love and living with purpose and these things led me to learn more about love and spirituality in general.

It’s been an interesting journey of self-discovery that’s included Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer, ZenHabits.net, Suze Orman, The Secret, Eckhart Tolle, and many other trendy personal development gurus. The journey to provide the world with Good Dyke Porn suddenly became a journey to my ideal self. Recently I began writing a non-porn spiritual development blog so I could write about what I’ve learned and be totally open about all the best flakey bits of myself. I was writing a post about the subject of career when I realized, "This is a diversion from my career. My voice needs to be true to me and BrenRyder.com is the place for that voice."

Steve Pavlina, this unusually success blogger, published a book recently. The contents of the book aren’t a duplication of the blog at all and I found it to be incredibly insightful (I highly recommend it) . After exploring his idea of the principles of life, he goes into the practical application of these things in the second half of the books. The subjects are divided up into six categories: Habits, Career, Money, Health, Relationships, and Spirituality.

I’ve been exploring these subjects in my writing and thinking and I’d like to share some of that with you through this blog. BrenRyder.com is meant to be a place where I share my progress in making my porn business work and my own progress in "figuring it all out". It’s about time I start truly sharing.

Photo by Javiercit0.

As a pornographer of dyke content you’d think that I would experience my fair share of drama. In general, however, my life is fairly drama-free. Well, you can’t avoid it completely. Some people who enter your orbit are a bit more high strung than others. But, like Oprah says, you can’t control what happens, but you can control how you react to it.

Looking back there have been a few dramatic moments over the life of GoodDykePorn.com. There’s been break-ups right before shooting a scene, a back-outs because of jealous girlfriends and most recently a canceled scene that upset one person much more than another.

Sometimes people get mad and start acting kinda freaky, but, I don’t see that as being dyke drama exactly. I think what would have turned the situation into drama would have been an extreme reaction from me. I know that in some of my intimate relationships I’ve gotten mad because they were mad, but when it’s a creative acquaintance who’s freaking out, it doesn’t bother me. I don’t have to react adversely and as much as I’d like to help them to not be so mad I simply cannot take responsibility for their emotions. When someone calls my phone multiple times in only a few minutes then it’s obvious that they have difficulties handling an emotional situation. Perhaps there’s something I can say to help and perhaps there isn’t. My policy is to be as clear and straight-forward as possible, but frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.

Sometimes I proudly proclaim that I live a drama-free life. Although, I wonder if that’s simply an expression of my cold cold heart. People can act really messed up because of past damage or current mental health issues or rock hard patterns. But, I don’t really care. It’s sad. I can see that. I look at a young woman fly off the handle and I feel sad. Similar to the way that I look a starving child in an impoverished nation on the news. It’s sad. But, I refuse to take it on. I refuse get angry.

I’ve always felt this way. I’ve always wondered why people get so worked up about all the bad things in the world. I’ve always thought that action is a much better way to respond. The biggest flaw in that philosophy is that I rarely act. I see horrible things, hear about all the bad news and choose not to get upset over it AND I choose not to do anything about it. Is that apathy? I’ve heard that anger can induce action. I’m not so sure I buy that. I find people who get really angry and affected by the drama around them fancy themselves to be non-apathetic, thus, better. I question that.

I hear that peace is the way. I rarely see people practicing that method of change, however. Maybe that’s because the angry people get all the attention. Maybe that’s because “getting angry” has been held up in such high regard by people who claim to be changing the world for the better.

This world is complicated. A lot of people are very hurt and some of them are going to spread their hurt through anger. I wish them well. I will not take it on. I will not embrace their pain. And, until the day I choose to do something that will change the world that contributed to their pain, then I will not care.

If you like porn then chances are you’ve gone to a free porn site, like Pornotube or Xtube to watch some free clips of people fucking. I have because it’s my job and because I like to watch people having sex. However, at the enter page of these sites and many other VOD sites you are given two choices of the type of content you want to see: Straight or Gay.  Some sites give you the option to choose both, but what if your choice is Neither?

As time goes on and I watch more and more porn, including man/woman cock action and man/man cock action, I’m realizing that I don’t really like watching cock.  I am a dyke afterall so it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. I want to see dyke porn.  I want to see silicone cocks, smooth bodies, breasts, curves, muscles, WOMEN. As most of you know the most common female porn is “lesbian” porn. This is NOT the same as “dyke” porn. Most likely the women are straight or maybe bi, but it doesn’t even matter what their sexuality is because the content is essentially the same: conventionally beautiful feminine women acting like their having sex, but paying more attention to the “watcher” than to each other.  But, here’s the funny part.  If I want to watch “lesbian” porn I need to click on the category STRAIGHT. How did lesbian porn ever get the label, straight?

That’s not a difficult question to answer. Lesbian porn has and is created for straight men. Okay, I can accept that. But if lesbian porn is considered “straight” then the porn that I create should not be in that category. I make dyke porn. The scenes feature women (mostly) who are fucking other women (mostly). There is nothing straight about it.  Even when we shot a scene between a man and a woman it was the queerest piece of work we’d done to date.

So, does the categorization apply to WHO is watching it? Not likely, I don’t think transsexuals are the predominant viewers of “tranny porn” or mothers watching “milf porn”. Categories describe the content.  Lesbian porn does not describe the content of what we are creating at GoodDykePorn.com.  What does? What box can we put this content into?

Dykes are notorious for fighting to break down labels and embrace the fluidity of sexual and gender identity. But we need a label to identify ourselves and the sexually graphic images we create or else other people will do it for us. And as it stands the category we’re being put into is STRAIGHT. That is so wrong.

But what about the women that don’t identify as dyke or even female? How do they fit in to the dyke category? I’m of the opinion that the category “dyke” includes more than just self-identified dyke women. It also includes transguys, femme dykes, butch lesbians, queers, bisexuals and many other varieties.

Queer porn is the other up and coming category for the type of porn that is being made these days. Sites like Crash Pad Series and No Fauxxx identify as queer porn and of course, Buck Angel (although, he identifies specifically as FtM porn).  Perhaps instead of having a main category as STRAIGHT with a sub-category LESBIAN, we can have a main category QUEER with subcategories of FtM, DYKE, GAY (google queer porn and you’ll find mostly gay porn sites), and many other people and sexual preferences that don’t fit into “straight” or “gay”. The funny thing is that Good Dyke Porn™ doesn’t seem to be queer enough to fit into the Queer category at HotMoviesForHer. In this context queer only applies to transsexual/transgender porn.

I want to see the DYKE category because this is a category that is female-centric. The content does include transgender guys and even a bio-guy, but when you’re looking for women then you know you’re going to find them in dyke porn. The beauty of female-centric anything is that it’s highly inclusive. There will always be a variety of sexual and gender varieties in dyke porn, but first and foremost you will find dykes. Come on people, dykes are huge segment of society. We are women who love other women and we exist in every corner of this planet. At times we fluidly shift our gender identity and always love and embrace our community’s choices, but we need to claim our place in this world.  We need an address so you can find us. We need to fill the box with content that we actually enjoy watching.  Give that box a name.

Call my box DYKE!