Tantra Yoga: What's Sex Got To Do With It? - Part 4: Funky Sex and Multiple Orgasms

(Continued from The Catch: Tantra’s Sex Appeal and the Need for a Guru)

 

A branch of Tantrics, known as the Left Hand Path, supported, encouraged and condoned the use of sexual rituals as a means to cultivate spiritual enlightenment, whereas the majority of Tantrics, known as the Right Hand Path, frowned upon such, casting out the beliefs of the other group as erroneous, even dangerous. The Right Hand Path instead promoted celibacy as a means to mastery over desire and wanting, in order to merge with the Divine while in form.

 

Saying Tantra is about sex is like saying that Muslims are about terrorism. Nothing could be further than the truth. The vast majority of Muslims are a faith-loving, good people who promote wise and compassionate action. An extreme sect promotes the use of terrorism. The same could be said for Christianity and Buddhism and other world religions, where small sects seem to paint a general picture over the tendency of that belief system. Perhaps because we lack cultural and spiritual maturity as a people, we allow the flavour of one grape to affect the entire batch of wine.

 

I have always had a natural connection to the unseen realms, ever since I was a child. As such, my yoga and meditation practices and studies naturally and organically flowered into a relationship with the realm of the energetic. Fueled by the desire to understand what was naturally occurring within me in my yoga practice, I uncovered references in the Tantric texts to contextualize what I intuitively knew and what I was physically and energetically experiencing.

 

It has been in some sense a personal interest of mine to support a deeper understanding of Tantra through my musical works and performances, and through my yoga teaching method called YEM: Yoga as Energy Medicine. YEM naturally finds home in the Tantric traditions, since this Hatha Yoga practice emphasizes the alchemical power of breath and its relationship to the flow of life-force energy throughout body/being in order to create a body/being that consciously co-creates with the divine.

 

So I say to the New York Times article, “Come on! Really?” Surely we have evolved into a people that can hold the notion of potential paradox so that that a few does not colour the whole. A few Tantrics were keen on sexual rituals, whereas the majority stressed the rituals’ deviance from the spiritual path and warned of their self-deluding tendencies. But I guess if we elect presidents and leaders who are overly ready to press the button on war with alarming reactivity to fight terrorism, we must not be quite ready to see that a few does not make the whole. We may need more time to mature.

 

Until then, Tantra will be seen as being about funky sex and multiple orgasms, Hatha Yoga will come from a sex cult and yoga studios will be full of those who seek beautiful bums instead of spiritual alchemy. I used to own a yoga studio in Montreal, then one in Toronto. But my music career become too demanding so instead I offer YEM workshops as I tour my music and shows. I used to also teach Tantric workshops, but tired of having to continually explain that Tantra was not about orgies and how to master blissful sexual climaxes. Thanks to John Friend and the recent sex scandals, here is another opportunity to help clarify the beautiful and powerful roots of Hatha Yoga and Tantra, illustrating what it is, and what it is not. Thank you, John.

 

I believe that sex has a place in the spiritual arena and by no means, though my personal practice lies most naturally in the Right Hand Tantric field, do I dismiss it. But just like Tantra and yoga are easily misunderstood, so too do I feel that the spiritual power of sex is largely misunderstood and misdirected. Sexual power is after all the very force that creates life! So what are we creating with it, beyond new babies? Whatever consciousness we bring to sexual acts will be amplified through it. But this is for the topic of another blog.

 

Until next time, practice fierce discernment and courageously follow your deepest joy.

Jai Ma,

Parvati

 

Yoga Scandals, Light Chasers and Shadow Boxers - Part 2: The Light of the Satguru

(Continued from Duality and Denial)

The ancient Sanskrit word "guru" comes from two root words "gu" (darkness) and "ru" (removal of such). The classical Hindu text called the Guru Gita refers to the meaning of the word "guru" as being the one who leads us from the darkness of ignorance to the true light of pure consciousness. How easy it is for our limited ego-mind to project a wish for such liberation upon a human being who is not fully realized, and as such, cannot support our spiritual journey through its perils and promises. Because of our projections, we end up disappointed, feeling misled, coming to believe that the word "guru" refers to one who abuses power or behaves scandalously.

 

A Satguru, however ("sat" in Sanskrit meaning true), refers to a fully awakened master. The Guru Gita says that a true guru is one who is neither bound by his senses nor limited by form, as "gu" refers to "beyond the qualities" and "ru" to "devoid of form". Anyone who truly seeks true guidance on the spiritual path must be sure that the person in whom they place their trust in is indeed a fully awakened master. We are taught through sacred texts that those who are fully realized are those who love all beings equally and see all beings equally. In the case of the vast majority of us, we easily fall short of those very crucial qualifications. These qualities are indeed very rare.

 

Though I would love to see fully realized masters fill up every football stadium across the globe, those beings are not drawn to the limelight for its own sake, but quietly live their lives in humble service to humanity wherever they may be and in whatever way they may best serve. Crowds may draw, but that is not their motive. I am so grateful to realized masters like Amma and the Dalai Lama who do happen to draw very large crowds, and are also willing to give private audience to their devotees. Luckily, as well, we live in an age where football stadiums are filled with conscious bands like U2, who are able to awaken the notion of possibility, hope, social responsibility and love in audience members so that they may taste the ambrosia of eternal spiritual truths that exist beyond temporal luminosity. That is certainly why, as a dedicated yoga teacher and musician, I create music, tour and perform to share the joy of being alive.

 

We must ask ourselves, if a realized master were to shine his or her full, radiant light, would we find it too bright? The light of a realized master is not one that eclipses our shadow, but that sheds light onto the totality of who we are, so that we must learn to embrace our entire being, including our darker, uncomfortable and painful places. Can you imagine being invited to a football stadium not for a shiny, entertaining pastime, but to be in the light of truth so that we may integrate our shadow? Ticket sales would be abysmal. We want to believe in our sugar-coated superstars so that our pain, for a moment, falls away.

 

If we are true aspiring yogis, we will see ourselves in the journalists who cannot allow themselves to believe in the eternal light because they are so attached to their pain. We too have that tendency, active or not. We can then have compassion for those who write cynical articles and put down light seekers because their cynicism is simply the other side of the light seeker's coin - both naive and in denial. The cynics have sunk into their shadows, while the light seekers levitate above theirs.

 

Though I am saddened by these reporters' cynicism and lack of understanding of yoga's exquisite beauty, I understand that we are, after all, in Kali Yuga, a time of profound ignorance and darkness. But in the face of this, I see opportunity. I hold in the light of my heart that those reporters and those who are the subject of scandals may believe in their own inner beauty and human potential, which clearly they have forgotten. The reporters have chosen to doubt their own light by dismissing the eternal light that can be shared even by flawed and finite teachers. The teachers may have bought into the sparkle of fool's gold while conveniently forgetting to notice the mud with which it came. It is easy to get stuck judging the shape and size of the window dressing, forgetting that what is essential is the wisdom that comes through the window.

 

Any good yoga teacher will know that they are not the doers, but a humble vehicle for an ancient, brilliant and wise-beyond-words message of love and interconnection that comes through them - but is not about them. The message of yoga is about a profound intelligence that exists within all things, through all things, all the time. It inspires hope and compassion as we meet the fullness of our lives with true courage - the good, the bad and the ugly… all of it. We all make mistakes. We are all flawed, finite beings. We are also infinite, divine beings of eternal light. As yogis, we need to stay within the apparent "union of opposites" in order to be true yogic aspirants, so that we may eventually embrace both the light and the dark and transcend duality to become "Yoga", that is, the eternal light of pure consciousness that is our true nature.

Yoga Scandals, Light Chasers and Shadow Boxers - Part 1: Duality and Denial

Hello friends,

 

This week I feel the need to express some thoughts about recent press regarding scandals in the yoga community, in particular, regarding John Friend. The details of the scandals are not important to me, but the general reaction to them in the press more so. We are all flawed and beautiful as we walk this Earth together.

 

"Yoga and "scandal" seem to walk hand-in-hand these days. It's a "union of opposites" that's growing more comfortable with time." - Stewart Lawrence, Huffington Post

 

It saddens me to see a beautiful life art-form and science-of-life misunderstood and misinterpreted. But I guess that is what we humans tend to do. If we are a people that can crucify a holy man, we can also easily throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater.

 

Scandals in the yoga scene are nothing new. We could cite here pages of stories depicted in ancient yogic texts such as the Mahabharata and Ramayana that illustrate the twisted acts of human folly while on a spiritual path. Yet the media, spearheaded by journalists that are clearly not impartial reporters doing thorough research, seems to proudly point fingers at seeming rot at the root of the sacred, while conveniently ignoring the fact that scandals are created by imperfect humans, not the eternal divine.

 

Human ignorance is as old as man. When we lift up humans to the realm of gods, they are bound to fall. We do it to our movie stars. We do it to our politicians. We do it to our spouses and friends. And we do it to our yoga teachers and leaders. If we make someone an angel, they will eventually become a devil. If we lift them up, the force of gravity will make sure that they will come back to Earth so that we make peace with shadows.

 

As the Nazarene once counselled, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." We all cast shadows. There is not one person on the planet whose darker side does not dot the Earth in some way under the light of the sun and the moon. The higher up we grow from the ground, the deeper the shadow we leave behind, the more humility we must have to embrace the dark, and the more likely our ego will try to go awry if left unchecked.

 

We live in a word of duality and opposites. We can see from nature, that what goes up also comes down; that if there is night, there is also day; hot counters cold; that which opens can also close; that which resists can also flow. Why then are people so surprised to find that those in the limelight have darker sides just as we do? Why do we hold such high hopes for people to only have light and be without dark?

 

It does not matter if a person promises eternal life, attests to be the best yogi ever or preaches the way of the holy. If they are not a fully realized master, they will cast a shadow. Whether or not they are in touch with it or in denial about it, it is there. And it is up to us to use our discernment to see only part of the picture, or look deeper to see more fully.

 

At our core, unless we are fully enlightened, we all are uncomfortable in some way with our shadow. There are parts of ourselves that we do not like, and certainly that we do not want others to see. When we are presented with the possibility that we may avoid doing the work in our own dirty basements by following a shiny leader on a path to the promised land without turmoil, we sign on the dotted line and project perfection on a limited individual in an imperfect world. We are bound to be disappointed. Disillusionment is just the collapse of illusions that we needed to humbly see beyond in order to evolve. Disillusionment is an act of Grace.

 

From an early age, our culture teaches us to believe in saints and saviours that will take away all our sins. We are persuaded that our sinfulness will be cured by another's super powers that will magically remove them, while we lie back and avoid our responsibility for our own evolution. Like yearning children, we hungrily want to believe that some mystical big mummy or daddy will dissolve our pain and do our uncomfortable work for us. But we are not little children living in lack, but adult children of the divine who are fully supported to do our very important inner work and take responsibility for the shadows that we - no one else - cast and leave behind us. Yet we distract ourselves from our pain as we look to others for escape. We amplify their light, so that it may, for a while, free us from the darkness we fear.

 

I do believe that there are real Buddhas on the planet, true realized masters who have fully integrated their own shadow and live in the oneness of absolute, eternal love. But the light of pure consciousness is not a conditional light like that of day and night. The light we cultivate to embody in the practice of yoga is not about luminosity to outshine the dark, but about the ultimate dissolve of the ego's need for duality into the eternal substratum that is the essential underpinning of all of creation. We are limited humans with limited words, so we call that substratum "light". How can a finite word in a dual world ever capture the perfection of such a force? That is where mystical poets like Rumi take the floor.

 

Continues tomorrow with "The Light of the Satguru"