Some of the most sexually repressed individuals I have ever met have been Christianized people of color…
For some time now, I’ve been posting on Tantric and Taoist sexual/ spiritual practice. Using sex as a path for spiritual awakening is not for everyone. Many Westerners, socially conditioned by the sum of thousands of years of anti-sex propaganda, are at a loss when confronted with the notion that sex could be about anything other than physical pleasure, or that it should even have a place in a “spiritual” discussion. In order to elevate sex beyond the ego, beyond the conditioned habits, takes a conscious and sustained effort. At a basic level, we are hard-wired for pleasure. As humans, we are pleasure addicts, conditioned to contract it down into a small and egocentric agenda. In order to shift this circuitry takes time and commitment.
While there are many paths leading to awakening, sex is one of the most effective because it works through the body, as the bridge between spirit and matter, between our inner and outer life. If you learn how to use sex (instead of the other way around), you will have access to one of the most direct routes to spiritual realization and embodiment.
Margot Anand was one of the first Westerners to explore this sexual territory:
You begin to open up a channel to allow the orgasmic energy to move through your body, beyond the orgasmic explosion of release to an implosive orgasm of expansion of consciousness. You move from the genital orgasm to the belly, to the heart… You don’t fall in love anymore, you arise in love… When you have an orgasm of the heart, an orgasm of surrender, where you become the other and the other becomes you, it’s a tremendous heart-opening. When you have an orgasm of the third eye, you are in total spaciousness and total peace with each other. This is a wonderful art… you have to devote a lot of time to this.
Practices
While the following practices are very simple and easy to learn, they are also extremely powerful and need to be practiced precisely. I offer the following only as a very brief overview. If you feel attracted to redirecting sexual energy in this way, you will definitely need instructions that are more specific. In my personal opinion, I would go further and say that eventually you will need a teacher.
For a Man
The first step for a man is to open his body to allow energy to flow more easily. You can do this through yoga, with qi gong, or just by stretching and opening the whole body.
The next step is to begin to arouse and recirculate sexual energy. It is best to start this alone, before you practice with a partner. Begin with self stimulation until you begin to feel the first waves of sexual energy, and then use breath and intention to draw that energy up through the spine and through the rest of the body. Once you become accustomed to practicing in this way, you can send the sexual energy up the spine, over the top of the head and down the front of the body again.
Your penis will go through waves of being very charged with energy, as though you were close to ejaculating. As you move the energy with the breath, there will be less energetic focus on your penis. Each time you move the sexual energy, your penis becomes less charged with sexual energy, and the rest of the body becomes more energized.
Keep practicing until you can stay aroused without ejaculating for at least twenty minutes. Then you are ready to practice with your partner.
For a Woman
For the woman, the core of the practice is to open the heart, to use the heart energy to open the sexual energy, and then share that energetic alchemy with your partner.
Although the genitals will become fully aroused, the practice doesn’t involve direct stimulation, but rather the circulation of the energy from the heart downward.
First, massage your breasts in order to stimulate and open the heart center. When you begin to feel a warming and concentration of energy in the heart, use the breath to practice drawing energy up from the ovaries to the heart. As this continues, feel the energy in the lower part of the body being drawn up into the heart and flowing out of the heart, particularly from the breast, as a blessing and a prayer.
As you continue drawing energy up into your chest and out through the breasts, feel for your friends, your family. Expand your attention, feeling the whole world, the births, the joys, the wars, the pain -- all of it. Like a prayer, a meditation, you are giving yourself. It is as though you were saying with your body, with your breath, with your relaxation, “I am here, I am giving myself to you, to all of you.” Once the heart is awakened with the flame of loving compassion, let it flow downward and awaken the vagina, draw it all up into your heart, and keep pouring it out as if it were a river of blessing. Feel as big as the universe and beyond, just give everything away through your body.
There are practices for partners to do together, but I won’t post that here.
The whole practice is about balance. The reason why these practices were always guarded in secrecy was because of their potential to create power.
A good place starting place for men is Mantak Chia’s and Douglas Abrams Arava’s The Multiorgasmic Man. In addition, Chia’s Healing Love through the Tao (written with his wife) is good basic text for women. Chia also offers trainings throughout the world as well as tapes and DVDs. I personally stand by his teachings, having read his books, taken some of his courses, and having applied his teachings in my life. Margot Anand has written several good books that offer guidance in how to enter into sex with a deeper sacredness.
Finally, I will personally vouch for all of David Deida’s works. His Finding God through Sex was a revelation for me and has been a huge influence on my spiritual path. Before Deida, my spirituality was missing a coherent approach to sex. I have to say that he was a major influence in my way of thinking and spiritual path. I have attended several of his workshops and recommend him highly.
Love,
Eddie
PS: Sex is good for you!
