As a youth, did you ever furtively sneak into a sex shop when no one was looking and lustily flip through all the “dirty” books, nervously laughing? Chances are that you were very concerned that no one around you watched you or saw you come and go. If you got away with it, you felt deliciously naughty!
It is amazing that sex education is still repressed in many parts of America and even forbidden in many schools. Very few churches and houses of worship are willing to deal with it.
Even parents are reluctant to talk about “the birds and their bees” as the chances are their own parents never did. More and more, youth rely on the media, which, thanks to the Internet, provide erotic and sexual material in abundance.
Sensationalized Tantra
Since the 1960’s and 1970’s, Tantra has become increasingly familiar in the West, often with one or another prominent guru being scandalized with a conspicuous affair.
Osho was one of the most brilliant gurus to ever tread the North American continent. However, his open endorsement of Tantra made rumors abound in his Oregon Ashram, Rajneeshpuram, until he was practically driven out.
Numerous films have come out over the years depicting Tantra and Hindu erotica. People are entertained and amused by the possibilities of a group sex orgy, or a sacred Hindu temple with statues on the outside engaging in scandalous postures in a frank celebration of sex.
Men have recently initiated relationships to find a girl friend as a sex partner to engage in slow sex, ostensibly to achieve enlightenment. To put together the Tantric trappings, including flowers, incense, soft lights and haunting music, legitimizes it in a way that might not otherwise be possible.
Yet even today, I find men coming from India who just laugh about Tantra, and consider it utter nonsense and a thin excuse to take advantage of a young lady. The irony is that it is a once great tradition within South Asia that spilt all over East Asia, deeply influencing other spiritual traditions, even Shinto in Japan.
The True Meaning of Tantra
Tantra actually refers to weaving together diverse strands, and alludes to techniques to induce altered states that might lead to enlightenment.
It actually represents a technology of consciousness that embraces everyone and everything as a possible vehicle of transformation. It is closely related to devotion to the Hindu god, Shiva, and his consort, Shakti.
Shiva is the supreme embodiment of pure consciousness in that tradition, and Shakti of divine energy.
Tantra is also the focal point of the Third Turning of the Wheel in Buddhism. Dr. Robert Thurman mentioned how Buddhism moved from Theravada, “the tradition of the Elders,” to Mahayana, “the Great Vehicle,” to Vajrayana, “the Diamond path,” which is characterized by Tantra.
Dr. Thurman emphasized how Buddhism grew vastly over a thousand years. Initially, Theravada was esoteric and required a guru and monasticism to practice.
Enlightenment was highly improbable to achieve, even after a lifetime of effort. Within five hundred years, around the time of Christ, the Mahayana tradition emerged of wisdom and compassion.
One put off the final realization indefinitely to enlighten others. Within another 500 years, an entire society, such as Tibet, was wholly devoted to the idea of creating an enlightened civilization that might awaken everyone in a single lifetime.
Out of the last tradition, elaborate rituals and practices developed, including having vegetarians eat meat, monks visit cremation grounds; disciples drink alcohol, or engage in sacred sex under the supervision of their guru.
However, this has been overplayed in the public imagination. More typical of Tantra was the use of chanting and mudras (hand movements), yantras and mandalas.
Tantra also influenced the Kundalini yoga tradition where you raise “the coiled serpent” up through the seven chakras out through the top, or crown chakra, where you experience the ONE with no more differentiation.
The key is to work with energy, all kinds of energy, to raise your consciousness.
Sacred Sexuality
Is there a profound truth behind Tantric sex? Most certainly “Yes.” If you think about the interplay of men and women, you will find four stages in the spectrum of love. Each stage is a form of love, but every succeeding stage is a more mature form.
We start with a natural liking for one another, which can be true of boys and girls very early on, in nursery, kindergarten or elementary school. You learn to appreciate one another, despite any anatomical difference and have fun together. You feel relatively at home with your partner and feel a sense of companionship.
We then move in puberty to a sexual awakening, which can be rather embarrassing. Orgasm is intensely appealing, although usually achieved alone. It is the most intense, pleasurable feeling imaginable. There is a certain delay, and then suddenly it comes. As you feel strong physical attraction, you become shy with the same young lady with whom you felt most comfortable as a boy. Even holding hands and going for a walk, let alone the first kiss, seems immensely appealing.
At some point, a powerful feeling of romantic love emerges. Suddenly, this young lady is the most gorgeous woman and important person in all the world to you. You utterly relish her beauty and are thrilled whenever she gives you any attention. You think about her day and night, but find it very awkward to express your true feelings when around her. Perhaps a rose and a poem or two will cover your self-consciousness. You are in love partly because you are both sexually attracted to her AND you deeply like her.
Finally, if you are ultimately blessed, you learn the meaning of true love. You care more about her than yourself. You are preoccupied with making her truly happy, no matter how inconvenient it might be to you. You take greater joy in her wins than in your own. If you grow in this love, you will eventually come to the point where your love outflows to all the world. You begin to love people you have just met for being the way that they are. You move to the point where they are as much YOU as your own body, personality and mind.
Ultimate Tantra
Tantra is finally a dance of pure being and consciousness. Your energy has been heightened to an ultra-high-frequency, such that you see and experience God everywhere. You are others, and they are you.
You, as you knew yourself, are no longer, and yet, paradoxically, you are far more yourself than every imagined possible. As some gurus have pointed out, sexual intercourse, per se, has no more meaning to you, because your body, your skin, your entire being are all orgasmic.
The highest expression is the realization of Shiva and Shakti coming together in an eternal dance. “I am you, and you are me. I create you, creating me, creating you, creating me…forever and ever.” Interbeing is the passport to the supreme realization of God or Supreme Being. The entire Tantric tradition points the way.
As a first step on the path, just focus on enjoying every moment for what it offers you, a gift from God for your celebration of pure being. You can greet it with gratitude, and enjoy the beauty of every caress of the wind and scent of the blossoms.
Life doesn’t have to always go your way for you to have a grand time. Just open your heart. Sense. Feel. Flow with it. Re-charge from it. Come alive again!
And yet I wish but for the thing I have:
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite.
Tantra: Is It a Cheap Excuse For Sex? appeared first on http://consciousowl.com.
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