Introductory note: this essay began as a private posting to a man who said
he wanted some straight instructions on tantra. He was not religious and
was not interested in Hinduism, so he worried that tantra might require
him to convert to some religion or other. He also wanted to know if
studying tantra meant that he would have to "suppress" his orgasms, which
he said did not sound like fun. He said that he had been trying to
"suppress" his orgasms and wasn't having much success.
I am posting this material here because i have seen a number of requests
for information on tantra in this newsgroup. The following comprises all
the basic advice on tantric techniques i was given or can pass along. I am
not a teacher of the subject. For what it's worth, here is my story:
I am a 47 year old woman who first read about tantric sex in 1962. It was
not until 1975 that i met someone who wanted to try it. He had read about
it, too; neither of us had a teacher. It worked for us! That's all i can
say. It worked! It didn't make us life-partners and it didn't turn either
of us into swinging singles, either. We did not join a religious cult. It
did take us to spiritual vistas of sexual beauty and unity.
In 1977 a long-time friend of mine told me he wanted to try it with me. We
had never made love before, so we discussed the subject for about half an
hour and then we did it. Again, a spiritual experience was found to grow
>from this humblest of biological acts. Although this man and i have rarely
seen each other since and i have not (yet) found another man who would try
it with me, that experience changed my life, for i knew then that all of
the religious mumbo-jumbo i had read about tantra was just a bunch of
socio-cultural veneer laid over a basic biological-spiritual truth.
What that truth is has been obliquely approached by research John C. Lilly
did on monkeys in the 1950s (before he got into dolphin brain research).
As documented in his book, "The Center of the Cyclone," he found that
there are four points in the mid-brain, arranged in a row, that control
the sexual response of (male) monkeys. He used males because their sexual
responses (tumescence, ejaculation, etc.) were easier to see and thus to
quantify than the responses of female monkeys -- but the mechanism is the
same in both sexes.
The first neural point in the series regulated arousal (erection). The
second point regulated muscular contraction (ejaculation). The third point
regulated the orgasm itself (sensation of sexual culmination). The fourth
point he called the "master switch," for when it was stimulated, it
entrained the three previously-mentioned centers, causing the monkey to
experience erection, ejaculation, and orgasm in the usual predictable
order.
The discovery of these four neural points in the brain indicates that
through conscious and learned control, one can separate orgasm, or
erection, or ejaculation from the other responses.
We all have experienced this disassociation of the entrainment center at
one time or another (not always under our conscious volition) as when, for
instance, we achieve tumescence but not orgasm, or have an 'involuntary"
ejaculation, or have an "unsatisfying" orgasm in which the contractions
are truncated in duration. What tantra teaches is how to control these
things so that one can experience orgasm without contraction, thus
prolonging it beyond the biologically-regulated constraint imposed by the
amount of time it takes to complete the 8-25 contractions you would
normally have.
So -- in strictly biological terms -- the practice of tantra becomes
somewhat akin to the practice of biofeedback training. It is sort of like
learning to wiggle your ears -- it's something you have to work at,
because the volitional control of the musculature involved is not part of
our usual training in life.
Where does the experience of spirituality come from? That, i have come to
believe, is part of our neurological hard-wiring. Human beings seem to be
naturally equipped to experience the metaphysical world. Many ages-old
techniques for perceiving the realm of spirit make use of repetition (of
hymns, prayers, chants, dances) while engaging in single-minded
attentiveness to cosmic forces. Tantra provides both repetition and
attentiveness. It is not the only way to achieve spiritual bliss, as its
religious practitioners assert, but it is one way, and that is good enough
for me.
Okay; first thing, you have to notice what your orgasm reflex is. Just
observe it a few times (ten or more times) and pay attention to how it
works. (You might want to do this while masturbating, as it could prove
distracting to a partner.) Especially, notice that there is a brief
moment at the onset of orgasm when you are consciously aware that it is
about to occur but it has not yet become inevitable. That's where you will
later spend your time.
In the typical orgasm (both male and female) there are 8 to 25 muscular
contractions (women may have more than men; how many you have will vary at
times). Get to know how many contractions you experience. (For instance,
my usual number is 18-20; it's never fewer, but sometimes more, and that
has not changed in 30 years).
Now, rather than "suppressing" an orgasm, try to let one or two
contractions happen and then relax. If you can learn to let one or two
waves of orgasmic contractions occur and then relax (by breathing and
being attentive, NOT by trying to think of something else to "distract"
yourself), then you can learn to repeat this over and over again. Imagine
yourself at the edge of a breaking wave of pleasure, not plunging over the
edge.
You can practice this with a partner or while masturbating. It's easier
with a partner, because he or she can hold you at the wave-edge, gently
changing position and thus slowing you from going into the stage of
involuntary pelvic thrusts you have been trying to "suppress."
While you are learning to ride the wave-edge, take turns with your
partner. As one of you rides the wave of bliss, the other acts as a
"lookout," keeping the wave-rider from falling into the undertow of
orgasm-when the wave-rider reaches saturation and relaxes, you trade
roles. During the course of one sexual encounter, you may trade roles
often. You may also rest (in a semi-detumescent state), and begin again
later if you like. When you and your partner become attuned to one
another, you will no longer think about who is riding the edge and who is
guiding; the roles will blend and mesh and you will both simply "be"
there. That is basically the "secret teaching" of tantra.
Sometimes, while learning these techniques, the lookout partner becomes
suffused with a feeling of personal power, knowing that he or she can
cause the wave-riding partner to have an orgasm, simply by making a slight
gesture at the point when the wave-rider is letting go and relaxing. This
experience of power should not be devalued. It is profoundly moving to
realize that someone has given his or her sexuality into your control and
it is a pleasure of high magnitude to watch the process of your partner's
orgasm unfold -- but once you understand your power in the situation,
don't force your partner over the edge, for mistrust may develop, and the
partner who is continually forced into orgasm may lose the fine
proprioceptive senses he or she should be developing. Occasionally, when
one partner is sexually needy (for instance, a woman during the ovulation
portion of her menstrual cycle), the gift of release into orgasm may be
offered and accepted, but be prepared for the offer to be refused, too.
Remember, at all times your goal should be to share equally in the
experience, not to second-guess what you think your partner wants.
One recommended minimum length of time to spend exchanging off-and-on
waves between partners is twenty minutes. It is believed by many who have
practiced and studied this, including myself, that although less than
forty minutes will be pleasant, it will not produce the sought-after
spiritual experience. Remember, this time is shared between the two of
you; typically, that does not even mean exactly ten minutes each at the
edge-point, for it may take you a few seconds or a minute to get back to
that place of wave-riding after you have had your turn being the lookout
for your partner. As your experience increases, you may find that you can
switch from lookout to wave-rider in less than a handful of seconds; when
that happens, you have only to be careful that you do not become
over-confident and "forget" to relax when your training tells you it is
time to relax.
If, by reason of forgetfulness or over-excitement, either partner is drawn
inexorably into orgasm, neither party should be alarmed, angry, or
distressed. For one thing, if you have been very close to the edge for a
long time and you see your partner slipping over, it's a simple matter to
dive in and join the orgasmic experience. Or, if you prefer, you can
watch, content in viewing from the vantage point of calm contemplation. It
has been my experience that when one partner "fails" to maintain the
wave-riding technique, he or she usually half-apologizes and is forgiven
with tender kisses; there is no sense of disappointment or resentment,
because both partners know that the supply of pleasure is not meted out
stingily and that balance will be restored in due time.
If you get good at these techniques and enjoy them, you may find that you
will have achieved the "satisfaction" of an orgasm (that is, your sex
drive will be temporarily sated) after twenty or thirty minutes and you
will not necessarily want an orgasm. On the other hand, you may find that
the moment you both decide you are sated and that neither of you wants an
orgasm, you both do, RIGHT NOW, and you may finish the sex act rather
tumultuously.
In non-religious tantra there is no premium placed on avoidance of the
orgasm -- that is, there is no theorizing about a man's kundalini energy
shooting up from his testicles into his brain and being sucked back down
and "wasted" if he ejaculates -- so choosing to have or not have orgasms
may depend on your personalities, the time of month (for a woman), how the
two of you feel about the benefits of "pure" (non-orgasmic) tantra, and
how much each of you enjoy the sheer physical workout of the push toward
orgasm.
Now, here's the great part: these techniques are not simply a recipe for
great sex. Believe it now or not, you WILL have spiritual feelings while
doing this. It is these spiritual feelings that have formed the basis for
several sexually-oriented religions and magic cults.
Traditional tantric practices -- eating the five sacred foods, raising
kundalini energy through your chakras, seeing the blue light, and so forth
-- are of use to you only insofar as you accept the allegorical,
religious, alchemical, or symbolic premises that underlie them.
If you perceive the heart-chakra as nothing more than the location of a
muscle-pump, it would be meaningless for you to visualize kundalini energy
in your heart. But something will happen in your heart, nonetheless, and
you will find a name for it.
If you think that the god Shiva and the goddess Durga are remote and
obscure from your daily experience or cultural conditioning, it would be a
waste of your time to learn their names or their iconographic and gestural
attributes. But nameless or named, sitting lotus-fashion or not, you and
your partner will enter a realm of divinity, so be prepared, for tantra
will take you there.
To allow spiritual feelings to evolve without embedding them in a
religious context, try looking into your partner's eyes, thinking about
the universality of sexual congress among all species, and then extending
your awareness out beyond the pair of you to the world and to the cosmos.
You may find yourself in what is called by some "the magnetic ocean," a
sensation that you are partaking of a universal, ongoing sexual experience
that is life itself. If you have no partner, the best way to do these
things is to "invoke" a partner. In Thibetan tantric practice this
imaginary lover is called a tulpa. Do not imagine that your tulpa is doing
whatever it is that you consider "hot" or "sexy;" imagine that your tulpa
and you are doing what i described above.
If you are in a committed relationship and become interested in tantra,
you should be cautious in bringing the subject up with your partner. Your
partner may take your interest as evidence that you are disinterested in
"normal" sex or may feel you are disparaging his or her sexuality as not
"good enough" for you. Your partner may think it is "unromantic" to
discuss biologically-based spirituality or that sexual activity requiring
a bit of practice is less "spontaneous" than untutored sexual activity. Be
prepared to deal with these concerns patiently.
I am willing to answer short questions by e-mail but prefer to do so
within the newsgroup. I am neither embarrassed by the subject matter nor
am i in search of virtual sex.
catherine yronwode
Venus Conjunct Mars
Solitary Confinement
Outer Circle of Purgatory
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