Sacred
Sexuality Welcome
to my Sacred Sexuality Section-Opus 2-in the 'Tao.'
This is a continuation of Opus 1 -on the History of Sacred Sexuality.
I have attempted to take my understanding of the concept of
Love and Sex to a translatable place, an articulate plateau of understanding.
Fortunately, after 3 years of searching-I found an author that translates
the intricacies of Tantra and Sacred Sexuality in ways we can understand.
Everything is Love, if only you believe!
"It is said and generally admitted that in the struggle for love
woman is almost passive; but this passivity is far from real.
It is the passivity of the magnet,
whose apparent stillness attracts iron into its vortex."
MARRO, LA PUBERTÀ
This section has a lot of information and history of Tantra.
Please take your time--bookmark this page and return often.
I promise you--if you really read and study this brief summary you
will
see Sex, Love and Relationships differently.
So Please enjoy!!
For
a companion book of study for Tantra and Sacred Sexuality,
I would highly recommend-
'Sexual Secrets' by Nik Douglas and Penny Slinger
Be
At Peace, Be Gentle and Be In Love. Om
Shanthi, Shanthi, Om LionHeart
November 2006
Tantra
An Introduction
Tantra began around 5000BC.
It is written that Tantra must be reborn age to age
and now is the time its mysteries are being revealed again.
Tantra is an ancient art form which transforms your sexual and spiritual
lives
by uniting them and it turns the sexual into the
sacred.
Tantra has been called the missing piece of the spiritual puzzle that
we are all searching for.
The Tantric exchange is a Holy one where we bless
each other physically, mentally, spiritually and energetically.
It changes the nature of your sexual exchange and brings
the spiritual aspect of love into your daily lives.
It turns lovemaking into a loving meditation.
It is the fuel of relationships that allows women to access the deep
well of their feminine essence,their
-Shakti power -
and allows men to recognise and access the healer
that lies within all men,
creating for every couple a union of sexual wholeness
woven into a tapestry of intimacy and heart connection.
It opens the way for a new level of communication and allows for deep
healing.
After a while in a relationship often neither party is getting what
they really want,
women often close down sexually and men wonder what happened and will
eventually 'stray'!
A survey study in US showed that out of 90,000 people, 64,000 women
preferred to be cuddled than have sex.
We have a 62% divorce rate which is escalating.
What is happening?
Perhaps if we learned to open our hearts and discover
the magic of sexual love we could alter the statistics!
Tantra begins by letting go of everything you thought you knew
and takes you back to the beginning of your relationship
when there was lots of energy, lots of love and lots of loving.
Tantra is lovemaking at its highest octave and it connects the passion
of the genitals with the deep love and intimacy of the heart, totally
fulfilling both partners.
Tantra teaches you how to mix passion and intimacy into a beautiful
blend of magic
which touches every level of your being - deepening your love - merging
you into oneness with your beloved, every time!
Tantra is for people who know there is 'more',
who want to discover how to combine sexuality and spirituality,
who want to be more alive in their bodies,
have more ecstasy and transform their relationship and their life.
The goal of men is to awaken the Goddess
energy in their beloved
and the goal of women is to awaken the heart energy of men so together
they become conscious lovers..
The result is more harmony in the home, the family and precessionally...
in the world.
Nik Douglas
and Penny Slinger
The History
of Sacred Sexuality-Part 2.
Tantra
(Excerpt's
from: Sacred Sexuality--A Manual for Living Bliss by: Michael Mirdad)
Tantra is arguably the oldest known art of sacred sexuality
practiced today. The true story of the origins of Tantra is obscure,
to say the least. The various versions of its origins include Tantra
as being a well-organized system from some factions of Hinduism. Others
say it came from Buddhist sects. Still others say it gradually developed
from communities within small East Indian villages.
Some people believe that Tantra evolved from the practice of yoga,
which, like Tantra, is about liberation and joining. In fact, many
of the physically challenging sexual positions of Tantric lovemaking
are actually yoga postures used for personal awakening.
Tantra is a Sanskrit word of two parts. The
prefix, tan, means “to expand, join or weave.” The latter
part, tra, means “tool.” Therefore, the definition of the
term Tantra has a two-fold meaning—“a tool to expand, liberate,
and bring together.” What is known about Tantra is that
the most common form is preserved through such writings as the Kama
Sutra (probably written around the time of Christ) and the Ananga
Ranga (a collection of erotic works from around 1100 A.D.)
The purest form of Tantra was not passed down in writing, but only
by way of initiations and personal instruction.
The Kama Sutra was written by a noble man who
saw life as consisting of dharma (spiritual substance), artha (financial
substance), and kama (sensual substance). Kama is said to be “the
enjoyment of appropriate objects by the five senses…assisted
by the mind, together with the soul.” Although Tantra might appear
to be an art of sexual pleasuring and the Kama Sutra a manual of sexual
positions, the real goal of kama is to cultivate love and reverence
for the person with whom the Tantric pleasure.
Although most spiritual disciplines insist on evolving into higher
states of consciousness by controlling or denying the senses and lower
states of consciousness, Tantra teaches that
you cannot experience complete personal and spiritual liberation while
restricting a part of your being. Tantra is a profound form of active
meditation that expands consciousness using the senses to take you
beyond the realm of the senses. It teaches that sacred sexuality is
a way of deepening intimacy and expanding consciousness, a way to
achieve freedom from limitations and to join with the Divine.
Observing a Tantric experience, you might assume you are simply witnessing
“great sex.” But if you could see
the experience clairvoyantly, you would witness an amazing dance of
energy and color, not unlike a fireworks display. Furthermore,
if you could see into the hearts and souls of the participants, you
would observe a consecrated joining of loving intent.
Valerie Brooks, author of Tantric Awakening, summarizes the stages
of the Tantric lovemaking experience
as follows:
1. Physical: total concentration on the physical
pleasure in the moment.
2. Emotional: immersion in loving thoughts and worship of your partner’s
divinity.
3. Spiritual: feeling yourself and your partner as a single unit that
is connected to Spirit, or God(dess).
Just as some of the world’s greatest spiritual teachers have
said that Heaven cannot be accurately described in words, the
essence of Tantra cannot be captured in either oral or written words.
To truly understand Tantra, it has to be experienced.
In addition to cosmic, mystical experiences,
Tantric masters are also interested in having deeply personal experiences
with other people and the world in which they live. When a deep interconnection
is established, the formerly perceived space between any two people
or objects becomes filled with the light of Spirit. This spiritual
presence activates and excites the etheric energy within and between
the two, joining them as one. That which was contracted and separate
is now free to expand and unite. This is Tantra!
True Tantra is a spiritual path and is practiced with an air of sacredness.
Since Tantra is practiced as a spiritual ceremony, as with all forms
of spiritual worship, there is an acknowledging
and honoring (worshiping) of a Divine Being. However, in
Tantra, this deity is reflected and honored in your partner, rather
than in an intellectual concept or vague image. Therefore,
Tantra is not an abstract form of spiritual practice, but a practical
one, wherein the experience with the Divine
is brought down to the very realm of the senses.
Of course, this is not to say that the tantrika
(practitioner of Tantra) cannot choose to practice other forms
of spirituality and worship. It’s just that Tantra challenges
lovers to see the Divine Presence of God(dess) in and through each
other.
Tantra has two distinct paths of training, a
left-hand path (vama-marga) and a right-hand path (dakshina-marga).
The left-hand path practices a more literal
form of Tantra that usually involves intercourse. The right-hand path,
on the other hand, practices a symbolic form of Tantra that views
intercourse as an allegory.
The left-hand path of Tantra practices the maithuna
ritual known as “The Five Makaras.” During an evening gathering,
several practitioners join to partake of the five symbols of pleasure,
which are madya (wine), matsya (fish), mamsa (meat), mudra (parched
grain), and maithuna (sacred sex).
In Tantric writings, a woman’s sexual and
spiritual energies are often referred to as shakti. In Hindu
traditions the goddess Shakti represents the
female principle or energy. Although the female force, or shakti,
exists in both women and men, women are seen as the “guardians”
of the shakti energy. According to ancient Tantric writings, the power
of the shakti is limitless. Once awakened, this spiritual, energetic,
and sexual force can be channeled creatively.
Upon awakening, Shakti rises up the spine to meet Shiva, her male
counterpart. Together their merged energies create an alchemical fusion
of bliss. Thus in Tantra, the coupling of a man and woman serves to
represent this greater, universal creative process, as
the intercourse between a couple simulates the creation dance of Shakti
and Shiva.
Tantra is not to be confused with other arts
of sacred sexuality, including Taoist
sexual practices. Tantra (from India)
and Taoism (from China) are similar, but are also quite different.
Both involve balancing the male and female energies.
What Tantra calls the dance of Shakti and Shiva, Taoists call the
balancing of yin and yang. Both systems have a goal of total
physical and spiritual union. Tantra and Taoism
are each an ancient form of sacred sexuality. Also, in both
traditions, sexuality is practiced in a spiritual context.
Nevertheless, the differences are very distinct.
For example, Tantra uses more ceremony and ritual, while Taoism is
more scientific and focuses on the body, its meridians, and energy
systems. Tantra is an art, while Taoist sexology is a science. In
Tantra there is less emphasis on “controlling orgasms” by
“constricting specific muscles.” Instead, in the art of
Tantra there is emphasis on relaxing into the orgasmic sensations,
rather than tensing in any form. On the other hand, in the Taoist
sexual systems, control and muscle constriction are at the very heart
of the techniques and principles. Tantrikas may not agree with all
Taoist concepts of ejaculation control. Taoists have developed their
principles of sexuality into a science that has worked for thousands
of years. Taoist masters, who are commonly known to live in vibrant
health for well over a hundred years, attribute their semi-immortality
to their sexual practices of ejaculation control and in-jaculation.
Because of the differences between Tantric and Taoist sexual practices,
most practitioners of any ancient system of sexuality follow only
one of these two paths. Few practitioners have learned to reconcile,
synthesize, and integrate the two. Nevertheless,
the key to successfully practicing sacred sexuality is to use both
techniques at precisely the right moment. (The
Spiritual Gardener-LH)
Many
Blessings On Your Journey
Om
Shanthi, Shanthi, Om LionHeart
Frequently
Asked Questions
Q. What is Tantra?
A. Tantra is such
a vast subject that it's fascinating and awe-inspiring. It includes
so much that it can be very confusing to the beginning student. Tantra
is an art, a science, a way of life that is honest and courageous.
It includes and faces squarely our sexual energy, this awesome force
that some religions fear and want to suppress. It can be used to help
us reach our highest potential of pleasure, and union with the divine.
However, Tantra is not a religion. Tantra
does not require anyone to follow any dogmas. Rather, it encourages
us to discover through our own experience our true creative potential
for pleasure, and our ability to connect with all the elements that
surround us, and the spirit that we all share.
To achieve this, it offers a series of exercises in breathing, tone
vibrations, use of certain muscles, and concentration on certain symbols
representing the energy centers of the body. This helps us clear blocks
interfering with the movement of energy, and guides us into altered
states. There we can transcend our everyday self-identification, and
we can get a glimpse of our true reality. That includes the body,
and is also beyond the body. It's a state of
great expansion and orgasmic pleasure that goes way beyond the short-lived
ejaculatory orgasm that many are accustomed to.
Q. How does tantric sex deepen the love between couples?
A. The tantric couple makes a commitment
to keep their love fresh by scheduling time for long love sessions
at least once a week. The beginning of every relationship is easy.
Everything is new and exciting, and chemistry is carrying us through:
We see only what is good about our lover. For some of us, however,
after a couple of years when we seem to know everything about each
other, and we have made love in all imaginable positions and in every
room in the house, boredom might start to creep in unless we go deeper
into the realms of the emotions, the psyche, and the spirit. Setting
time aside to play together is the best way to discover new things
about each other, which makes the relationship exciting again.
Another way to keep the relationship passionate is to commit to a
short time of physical connection, even if only ten minutes, at least
once a day. Here the intention is just to express the nurturing and
caring for each other without having a goal of actually "having
sex." The woman is especially grateful for that. It is important
to nurture each other, especially when we might start to close our
hearts and become numb after repeated disagreements that seem impossible
to resolve. After the ten-minute physical nurturing connection, it
is often easier to come to a loving solution and restore the good
feelings. The body remembers how good it feels to be in harmony and
sexually excited.
Q. Why is communication so important
(vital) in Tantra?
A. Many of us believe that we are great
lovers, and that we can read our lover's mind about what he or she
likes in sex. As tantric practitioners, however, we discover the nuances
of pleasure that we miss when we are only goal-oriented, and develop
the humility to ask. The person asked sometimes has to overcome his
or her shyness or embarrassment in explaining what is most pleasurable.
Some people are so afraid to ask for what they want that they don't
allow themselves even to become aware of how their needs are not being
fulfilled. Lots of patience and gentle coaxing can help the receiving
lover become aware and express his or her needs, and slowly open up
to more pleasure.
When we communicate fully and with great honesty, the results are
wonderful. Usually our partners love giving us what we want. Giving
us pleasure increases their pleasure. Asking for what we want (and
receiving it) increases our trust in each other, and therefore our
closeness and love.
