Participants' Reflections on the October Tantric Awareness Retreat

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“I'm battling to find words to describe (my experience of the retreat). It certainly was one of the most amazing experiences I've had in a long time. The main reason is I broke through so many of my limiting beliefs. I feel as a result so liberated… The tenderness, gentleness, acceptance, openness and purity of our sharing made it so exquisite and safe for me to explore territories I never knew existed. As a result I feel I have a more intimate connection to the Divine and my heart has opened to loving at greater depths.”

“My mind has been opened to new possibilities. I was so blissfully blessed, and wish to continue on this journey with Tantra.”

“It was a divine and blissful sharing of simple love energy and I’m hugely grateful for the journey of the weekend and for every individual who was there that contributed in many and varied ways to make it what it was. It was a deliciously blissful time and I hope to see you all again on the next one!”

“I can’t tell you how wonderful, blissful and full of energy I feel (after the retreat). I can’t remember when last I felt like this. I am so happy without blockages, I feel like a butterfly in the air. There is a sensation on my skin… it feels like I can move mountains.”

On making love after the retreat: “(I found myself) making love slowly and just ‘allowing’ sensation and sensuality to gradually saturate my body. Once saturated; waves and ripples of blissful lightness-energy moving throughout my entire body; Smaller ripples riding upon bigger waves; Bigger waves being interspersed with calm blissful silence, then resuming again and again; going on an on; never seems to exhaust itself or getting tired of blessing me; making me giggle like a little girl and laugh like a boy riding the rollercoaster for the first time.”

Scurrying up the Mountain

On final analysis, in the turning the head back, the path suddenly looks easy and simple. Like the spot where I thought was a massive cliff overhanging where I gripped with my nails fearing for my very existence was only a small boulder. I simply had to walk up and over. Perhaps I am a little high now and lack appropriate memory, seriousness and fair judgement. Perhaps I am drunk on the beauty and all that came before can only seem small in comparison. It does not feel like an end more like a beginning. And I cannot claim what many have called awakening. I am simply in a place where I can see long distances and the vision isn’t easily interrupted.

I also know that had someone attempted to explain, as many did, this simplicity and ease I would not have and did not comprehend. I remember the agonies were some of the most beautiful part of the journey. At other places I am rolling on the floor inside my belly, as I recall myself clinging to the small boulder with the terror that this was my ultimate death.

And it has been said many times and as simply as it can be said. That what is seen external to the self is the mirror. That all the anger and the conflict and the wars and the pain and the separation are your inner space. That much of the self has been denied. There is an internal war of the many aspects attempting to regain territory with any means possible. An example of this may be when you are approaching something of juice perhaps a new lover and a thought moves through as quick as the wind spirits move through the trees. You cannot tell the direction from whence it came. And it says nay not you, you don’t have this or that and you feel yourself become small and contracted against the moment. And in that space a repressed aspect has had a victory and gained more ground. The conflict continues as you attempt to take that ground back.

It never occurs to one to perhaps make friends and recall the many aspects we refuse. It does not occur to you because as you look in the places where you have dumped these aspects you see only darkness, and badness and what some may even call evil kadevil. You see all the things that if you ever called them back no one would ever talk to you ever again ever ever. And so you rush towards the light, the light of what you know, and stay busy in what you know, and insist on it, and fight for it, and talk of beauty and light and goodness, all the while avoiding these places that hold the mystery the key to your being.

Until one day after the many journeys down the light paths, you turn forward, and say perhaps I forgot something in the places of darkness. Something vital, something that one must have to travel into the journey. And so you gather your courage and your candle, which immediately blows out as you enter and you stumble and crack against some edge that makes you bleed. Finally there is no turning back; perhaps you meet your death in these dark places; perhaps you remain forever lost wondering in the darkness but still you cannot go back.

In these places of darkness you meet the refused aspects and they have many guises. Often they are not pretty at first glance as you meet your long lost sexuality, your denied madness, your suppressed rage, your overlooked pain and the goddess so many eons refused. And I will not talk here how this place may appear, as this is your journey and cannot be shared much less repeated.

However, I can say that on the other side of through you will meet wholeness and inside of that the clamouring voices fall into silence that is not a hearing but a being. And you may look with accusation at this new space but it will simply meet your accusation with a raised eyebrow; I have been here all along.

Namaste
Shima

Tantric Awareness Retreat - Impressions

A while back, Shakti and I did a workshop thing, our first residential weekend experience, with a gorgeous, brave, sincere and lively group of seekers.

We talk about "healing" in our work. This can lead some to think we're "treating" problematic conditions of mind/body/spirit, that we work with people who are "sick" to help make them well. We use this word because it's the closest our culture has to describe what we do. The older the meaning taken, the more to the origins of this word one goes, the more truthful it becomes as an expression of this school's work.

Healing: To make Whole. Not that something's unwholesome! Just that we have many aspects to what we call our mind, our ego. To a large extent, the work of Tantra is to support the integration of these divided minds.

So no one on this retreat was sick, or being treated. Sure, some got in touch with depths they didn't know they had, some got more aware of the truth, the reality of their relationships, some explored experiences that they had wanted, but repressed, and some found the strength, the capacity to support others in this work.

I drew no line, created no artificial separation of the space we met in from what's called the "real" world. We did not retreat into the "other worldly" to escape the "worldly". Yes, we were in the middle of a forest, in a beautiful meditation retreat, where cellphones don't work too well, and everyone had taken some time off from their regular routine. There's nothing "other worldly" about a couple of days away from the hubbub of life, somewhere beautiful, in nature.

There was no suggestion that people "open themselves" or stretch their willingness on account of this being a "special" place or time, no agreements of confidentiality, no keeping of secrets about the ways in which we work, what "processes" we use. This is not to say that I'm against the participants respecting each other's privacy. These were real people that we shared something real with, in the real world, and it's real to respect that in a real way!

Working with Shakti on this was a special experience indeed. Her insight, her skill with using dance and movement, allowing seekers to experience what can't be taught in words, her loving availability to work with what's required for awareness, however it looks, and her energy and skill in putting the whole logistical mission of the thing together.

My take on the experience was "I've never taken a Tantra, or any kind of group like that, anywhere along my path .. but I'd have liked to!", so, as the NLP guys say, it worked for me.

There was much appreciation expressed all round. My thanks is to all who came and played a bit of the game of life with me. In varying degrees for all of us there was fun, there was pain, there was delight, there was suffering, but most of all there was awareness and love worth calling Love. May your flowering continue...

Planning for a return to the forest is happening. Looks like October 2007 will be right. Watch the events page for it's announcement.

Maitreya: The new Guru game.

2500ish years ago, it's said Buddha predicted the next world teacher. Maitreya is said to be the name, and many look for a particular fellow to fulfill the role. There's never been a shortage of volunteers.

My take on this is that the name more describes a mode of teaching, it indicates the approach of teachers, the way of spiritual teaching 2500 years after Gautama. That he was describing a characteristic of the enlightened teacher in the future, a considerable contrast indeed to the autocratic way he, Jesus, Mohamed, Mahavira, Nanuk had to do things, even up to the days of George Gurdjieff. Maitreya means "gentle and friendly".

If there has to be "one" Maitreya, my vote's for Osho. His teaching made the transition from the authoritarian way to the gentle, friendly way. As he said, there was always something basically undignified, insulting in the Master–Disciple relationship. He really made the transition and modeled a new way of spiritual learning in the world.

I love the new "Maitreya" way. It's a delight to not have to send the beloved sannyasin to the burning ghats for three months to gain an awareness that for sure, the body will die. I just know they have or will soon be having an experience that provides that awareness. This and other archetypal steps of the path used to appear to be a matter of the Guru's control, his orders. I never have to order anything. Just, I sometimes hint for a beloved to be ready for something coming, or indicate the "old school" equivalent for what they are currently going through.

Probably the main reason I'm necessary to the path of those who work/play with me is that I can suggest practice and approach that's currently appropriate. There's a huge spiritual practice database now in the world, and teachings designed to be useful at various specific levels of awareness have gotten badly mixed up. Things that were once "inner circle secrets" for adepts only are now common knowledge among beginners and initiates. They need to be encouraged to back off a little and approach those "higher" truths appropriately. With adepts, that is advanced students, because they heard those "secrets" long ago when it was not yet appropriate to their path, it's just the other way around. They need extra encouragement to absorb those teachings at the appropriate time, when they really are ready. The "been there done that" attitude has to accommodate that maybe it wasn't appropriate then, but it's worth seeing if it's appropriate now.

Zsa Zen and Vipassana silent siting meditations are an example of this. If they are taught forcibly to a busy mind, and with a busy mind there, they can only be forced, they are at best a sedative and at worst, they create a physical and attitudinal rigidity. Taught in their appropriate timing, when other techniques have cleared the bulk of the mind-noise, silent sitting is not at all forced. One likes it then, as in the sentence "I like to breathe".

In search of a Tantra master: the becoming of a Tantrika

The wind dives over the plains dragging the reluctant wild grasses in the wake of the yawning sky. Red soils crack under noon day fire and riverbeds dream of long forgotten cool waters. These ancient lands held by the watchers and gatherers of time and form, mountains becoming and dissolving over eons of form grokking itself.

And in this place of relentless breath stands a man, savage and full, deep lines etch his living across the expanse of face and seeing, his body a meeting of life and will. Here he stands in full waiting and readiness to all movings that may bump against his way. His presence that of life diving deep and deeper still unto herself.

This waiting that stood along side the journey of the ancient mountains, this waiting that this day finds her dreamless sleep.

A woman comes, long and weary, dancing the horizon, one step in front of where eye cannot see. This woman dancing, wild and still, across expanding vastness of light and dark, dancing in her blood and in her water and in her laughter, dancing across bridges which hold breath and source of breath, dancing under oceans and over cliffs, dancing until only dancing remains.

The woman bows down to ground at the feet of the man. The wind lays down beside her and a rain opens under the sky as she closes her eyes and remembers her name.

Shima

Last year in the media - thanks, errors and apologies

We thank Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan and Longevity magazines for their generally informative articles on Tantra in 2006, and there's much appreciation indeed from those who found this school through them.

This year, it looks like there's more media attention happening and unless the interest seems outright sensationalist, we'll be playing along.

It's a tricky thing, someone without particular expertise in a field, writing an article after just a couple of hours talking to me and/or other teachers of the school. Some little things are bound to go a bit wrong. This is unavoidable, and shouldn't generally be of any harm. This will happen.

One of those magazine articles had a little slip, an incorrect and unfortunate juxtaposition of two ideas ... a very understandable misunderstanding. No one was supposed to get slapped on the dick.

The ideas were:

1) If there's a numbness, an insensitivity, a lack of feeling in the body (a symptom of deep repression and restraint) one technique which can help the restoration of sensation is to slap, with intent to sting slightly. not as a surprise, or as a shock, just to activate, to wake up the nerves, get them reporting to the brain, and get their reporting of sensation noticed. Used appropriately, this technique is quite useful. Something like what Swedes do in the sauna, switching each other with birch twigs. Tingly, even kind of nice. Definitely nice when the caress that follows the slap is really felt, sensitivity restored.

2) Immediately following ejaculation, it's common for many men to feel hyper sensitive around the head of the penis which makes continuing coition or other stimulation uncomfortable, almost painful. This is the same sensitivity a woman experiences in early stimulation of the clitoris, especially when she's young, and the tongue is a little firm. Yielding to this stimulation allows men to access an orgasm flavour that's equivalent to the clitoral orgasm of the woman. Also, if he can find this flavour of orgasm before the ejaculatory one, he becomes multi orgasmic, which is kinda nice.

It's not hard to see how these ideas got mixed. The reason nothing about this has been published before is that everyone here was laughing so much about these men catching a slap on the sensitivities to make them come to the party with another round of hot passion. None of us wanted to stop it from happening. If this is anti-social, we apologise (between chuckles).

So there's no expectation that the media attention is always going to express things as we'd like them to. Also, we won't be falling all over ourselves to correct every little misunderstanding. Basically, we hope those that need us will find us and get some right ideas, and if a few dicks get slapped along the way, well, that's just what's called collateral damage these days.

Sorry guys.

Tantra School Audio - interviewing each other

The tantraschool.co.za site construction is going well.

This site has audio clips of school members and friends interviewing each other about their experiences, learning and teaching, posted as .mp3 files which you can download, or just listen to.

It's still under construction, no video there yet, or our links page. Work progresses on both.

What's posted there will, I sincerely hope, be of use to seekers. We're keeping the interviews mostly close and personal. Of course, some of these interviews get very, very personal indeed, and so go into our own archives, or get deleted if they are too personal for even that.

My intent with all my writing and public talking on tantra is to support awareness in my beloved fellow beings. I see it as helpful, of use, to make this information publicly available because around 2% (my guess) or so of people have the capacity, the capability of working with tantra. To reach these, it's unavoidable that the other 98% will have access to what I say.

This is why I don't make my websites look like XXX porn sites, and I don't make a big deal of enhanced/extended orgasm or the other "yummies" of the path. Not that the path isn't yummy beyond belief, just it also requires depth, sincerity, and a burning thirst for the true, the real. Hence, it's really not for everyone. Also, I'd prefer that our (horribly expensive) web hosting bandwidth allowances not be used up by porn-hunters.

There's a lot of what we have to say that's more appropriate for the ears of people a bit attuned to this work, so not everything we record will be openly accessible on the site. For example, you can hear parts 1 and 2 of Jacqueline interviewing Shakti, but not part 3.

The next major project at tantraschool.co.za will therefore be a members only password protected area where we can, so to speak, really let our hair down.

Cunt - much appreciated. Thanks be to Inga

A student recently recommended I read "Cunt", Inga Muscio's "a declaration of independence" ISBN 1-58005-015-8

I was a leetle resistant, as I generally am in the situation of adding to my "keeping up with the culture" reading list, but the fellow insisted that there was a freshness to it, some qualitative difference from the feminist and post feminist stuff I've long ago absorbed. I agreed, and he filched it from a Dakini's library.

I finished it last night, and found it indeed a fresh expression, a deep awareness is expressed, and though much has been said before, it's a really worthwhile incitement to women in the (there now is only one) culture.

I highly recommend it to males and females alike.

The title is direct - cunt - and is a worthy attempt to reclaim this word's original usage. It derives from the Kund, the revered source of life energy in the woman's body. Source of the word Kundalini. A fine, respectul-of-the-goddess word that has been demonised, given an overlayer of association with "badness" over time, because it was too powerful a word to remove or replace from human language.

When women can say "cunt" with pride, and men can say it with respect, we'll have come a long way indeed.

Namasté

Rahaysa

TV is bad.

In a news group recently, I got into a discussion about TV. This has nothing to do with tantra really, except the obvious fact that TV is bad for tantra.

My attitude to TV comes from my own experience and an experiment, some 12ish years back.

I experimented - on my children (who I've always said needed traumas, neglect and such to bitch about to their therapists later in life, thus rationalising my conscience into submission).

I remember being out with them, and, feeling magnaminious, giving them the choice of takeaways to go with the video (probably something educational like South Park, Life of Brian, ) They answered in unison "KFC".

Puzzled by this (they were agreeing? What was happening to my strategy of divide and rule..) I paid attention to what they did that evening for a change, noted that the fried bits of something didn't get finished, not much delight in their eating. But the TOY! - there was a plastic injection moulded aeroplane. Small. Ugly. But they were in love with the things.

I recalled the KFC ad, with a magnificent aeroplane flying out of the bucket and zooming impressively around at a kid's party,and the delight, the adoration of this wonder on the little faces. What the PUA's call "social proof" deluxe.

The next day, I surveyed (in Honeydew, there was still room for that) my lands. I noted the tree squatter-shack I'd built. Still ugly. The 7m bungee swing from it hanging, limply. The block and tackle lift, without break or any safety device, with which a little one could lift a big one all the way to the top if they had a goodly attention span, and persistence. The small, yet horrifyingly fast kid-size little motorbike (look, darling - it's so cute! Think how they'll look riding that) 2 acres of garden, 3 acres of wild land, 1/2 acres of roof, big trees, a ride-on lawnmower that could wheelie, horses available two plots away, two dogs, five cats, peacocks that weren't ours, and kept getting eaten by the dogs. Even the cats providing entertainment by trying to take out peacocks. Ticks, all sorts of insects. Nature. Even a perennial stream goddamit. I noticed two children, clean children, unscarred, unbruised. No laughter, no tears. At 5pm. Watching TV.

So I experimented. Changed a factor in the situation, just to see.

I climbed on to the roof, disconnected the aerial, and informed the beloved children that TV would no longer work, we would just do videos. They didn't like it. Tried to petition the mother and all. I stood firm. Windmills don't scare me.

Not three months later, they were sharing complaints about the latest thing the kids at school were into. There was this toy.. a lump of plastic (the island) for which they were collecting various other bits of plastic that made up it's (on TV, no doubt Star Wars grade) defences. I offered to get them one, get the next takeaways there if they liked, but no. My son then 6, 7ish said "but dad, it's just crap". The daughter agreed. I said "that's why we don't have TV".

I'd be embarrassed if I had to admit that I'd noticed I'd bought into some of the TV nonsense myself. I don't have to, so I won't.

From my own experience, I deduce that

1 TV is bad.

2 Occasional, relevant viewing is not practical in a household with children unless there's a strong military-style (don't spare the rod, and trust they're too stupid to cut your throat while you sleep) discipline in place.

3 TV is insidious. Watch a scheduled something... and there's some mind numbingly stupid story of people behaving as greedily, with personalities as deep as politicians'. The story will remind the wife of her second cousin's friend's new sex slave who had exactly the same issues, except... and she'll tell you all about it.. just like I'm telling you here, long winded and all. If you want to turn the TV off, you then "don't empathise". (giaconda)

4. Tv is bad. Good people don't watch TV. Repetition works, I hope..

5. TV is bad. It leads to premature ejaculation, cancer, rickets, polio, substance abuse and AIDS. In that order.

6. TV is bad. It leads to finding yourself or your descendants in a conscript army, or marked for the attention of said army.

7. TV is bad. Love is good. You are good. Loving yourself is good. Better than TV if you do it right. If you get good at that, you can try loving someone else too. This is what people did before TV. TV is bad.

8. I hope that makes things clear. Surely it couldn't be said that often and not be true. TV is bad.


Rahasya

PS:

As my token of empathy with your suffering, your endurance, having skimmed or hopped to here, I didn't use the "copy paste" function once. Typed out "TV is bad" each time, keystroke by keystroke. At this time of night. TV is bad.

Sex and God

What is the relationship between sex and God? How can we talk about sacredness and sex in the same sentence?

These are questions that I felt in the room during a men and women's evening I held in the last month. In a beautiful, soulful exploration of their unconscious patterning, participants came up with memories such as:

I was raised to believe that my dingelong would fall off if my 'did that' to it. And the idea of S-E-X. Baddd. Very sinful. Not part of the Christian way of life. Unless of course it is done
a) in wedlock
b) under the covers
c) in the dark
d) quick and
e) only to make babies, not for pleasure.

In time, more liberal notions started to allow for some pleasure, provided all the other conditions are met.

The difficulty, really, is not with Christianity, but with dogmatism that stems from the need to find security in tribal beliefs (and judgments). One man who has been struggling with this dilemma told me that he is left in the dark around the sexual, since Christ it 'so clearly asexual' in his portrayal in the Bible.

Later, in our conversation, we explored another possibility: The possibility that Christ was in fact a revolutionary, not an institutional man who wanted conforming; the possibility that Christ stood for radical truth, in the body, in total presence, and with full embracing of the sacredness of embodied life. What opening to bliss that brings! How it sings into the spirit of Christ (and Mary Magdalene!)

Existence has also given me the rare gift recently of seeing what happens when a denial of sexual awareness goes with extreme religious dogmatism. I encountered two people, both of whom have suffered from sexual abuse in their earlier years and have suppressed this memory, and both of whom are fundamentalist Christians. The result for both of them has been full-on or near scizophrenia. The fracture, extreme denial and resistance to their experience has resulted in both of them literally splitting off into different personalities or seemingly being possessed by 'demons'. This psychological profile may be a greater potential for some people, but it is so clear to me that a suppression of sexual memories and experience linked to fear-driven religious dogma is the perfect recipe for dis-integration.

I feel such compassion for these two struggling people. And I am grateful to them for the gift of their message. Look for yourself whether somewhere inside you those two realities - God and Sex - don't sit so well together. And if you can find that discomfort, explore why.

June Tantra Evening - and "premature" ejaculation

The tantra evening in Jo'burg last night was an interesting one for me. We had a couple of absolute beginners, Dakini Wendy, a sessions-client of hers, and a "fan" of these talks.

Every one of these talks (I haven't kept an accurate count, but it's around the 12 or so now) has been significantly different, because they are mostly driven by the questions people bring. Also, I often refer questions to the Dakinis, as they have really good answers. Last night we discussed (or, more accurately, I lectured) the tendency to quick ejaculation in males, recovering sensitivity and a few tricks for gaining aawareness in sex. We also did a couple of old breathing/pcb exercises.

What I said about the cause of premature ejaculation:
Males have this erection thing, which tends to be rather obvious, and isn't generally socially acceptable. Also there's generally judgement about masturbation (which I prefer to call "loving yourself") which leads to a need for hurry in order to avoid discovery and humiliation. This applies in the "average" home, and more so in boarding schools.

This leads to a habit few males get to avoid - and I didn't get to avoid it on my journey - hurried, necessarily rough masturbation. This triggers a prostate/ejaculatory orgasm mainly from the lingam (penis) getting slammed, hit, into the prostate gland, which is at the lingam's root.

The result of this is that most males have ejaculation before they are aroused... the main symptom of male arousal is the clear highly lubricant fluid produced by the Cowper's gland, not erection. Erection can be there just because there's a fullness to the bladder, and an occasional fading of erection during sex isn't a sign of a lack of arousal. A common view of the Cowper's gland function is that it is just to neutralise the acid of residual urine, making the urethra safe for the sperm. Even some renowned sexologists believe it's a "component" of ejaculate, and it's commonly called "pre-cum" by many.

There's a neurological and physiological equivalence in men and women. Like the woman's lubrication, the Cowper's gland fluid is present fairly early in arousal, and it's only the male's hurry and (obsessive) focus on ejaculation as the "goal" that gives rise to the idea that it generally appears only shortly before "orgasm" - often confused with "ejaculation" - they aren't always the same.

The male has the neurological possibility the woman has of "clitoral" orgasm, via stimulation of the glans (crash-helmet), the very thin-skinned head of the lingam. The experience men often have, of being very sensitive after ejaculation, is just the start of the "clitoral" response. Like a young woman having her first oral sex experience, he can be scared by the intensity of sensation, and, like the young woman, with a bit of encouragement, he can "tough it out" for a bit.. at which point things tend suddenly to become realy nice. This thing of the sensitivity arising in the man only AFTER ejaculation is just a symptom of his lack of arousal. Arousal is only beginning... and the ejaculation's already happened.

A male who can relax deeply into sex, drop the woodpecker thrusting, and take long enough with "foreplay" (A word I'm not fond of, because it perpetuates the idea of sex being a linear progression to a result) particularly oral sex, or gentle, sensitive penetration can experience this "clitoral" orgasm, and later continue, having an ejaculation a while later, or not. A woman who regards her partner's ejaculation as "premature" can help herself a lot if she realises that a man will typically "last" in coition for as long as the "foreplay" took as long as he's encouraged to not tense his bum and go into woodpecker mode.

Women of course, have things the other way around. The clitoral orgasm tends to be much more available, easier to reach than the ejaculatory G-spot flavour. An intensely erect lingam isn't the best for this. After arousal's been there a while, there's a natural tendency for it to soften slightly, which helps it stroke the G-spot particularly in women-above-facing positions.

The next Tantra evening in Johannesburg will be on 16 July. Go to http://www.sacredsex.co.za/rahasyatalk.html or click the "Tantra" link on the right to find out more.


-- Love, however it looks --

Rahasya

Blogging begins.. introducing my school and teaching.

Since I made this blog thingy, I've been mainly concentrating on my sites http://meditate.co.za and http://sacredsex.co.za. This has taken up most of my available time. So it's just been sitting here, not even gathering cyber-dust in the form of comments.

I'll be posting regularly from now on, with news of my tantra school, sometimes comments on the work we do, but without risking the confidentiality of school members and healing sessions clients.

We do work that doesn't happen much in the world - in fact, I don't know of an equivalent practice, teaching, anywhere.

Most teachers in the area of Tantra teach as a method of deepening their own work (If you would really learn a thing, teach it - Buddha). And it makes them really worthwhile teachers. This is why the best teachers of most therapies are themselves in the process of learning what they teach.

I've had a 20-year journey with Tantra, Osho's sannyasins, groups, workshops and meditation. Through that time, the idea of me teaching never ocurred to me. It's only the last few years, after my having completed the path, that I've been (gradually, as encouraged by those I work with) teaching.

It is strange for a man to be teaching tantra. It's usually, archetypically, womens' work. Historically the males involved have been mainly "fronting" for the woman's teaching when society requires. Even most of the historic "greats" like Saraha had an Arrowsmith Woman who's teachings they furthered, or made accessible.

My place in teaching is mainly to encourage woman to their teaching... being an encouragement and support. It's these women that have the capacity to free men from their illusions, particularly around sex, and they need the encouragement now on account of the world having been rather unfriendly to women with an authentic spirituality for the last couple of thousand years.

Some of the teachers I've worked with are nervous about what I do. Mostly, they are themselves struggling with what limitations, restrictions to impose on their work. How to keep the traditional "therapist" position of neutrality, non involvement. To me, with my current understanding, this is silly. This attitude doesn't make for totality, and it perpetuates a problem Osho highlighted with Tantric practice - that there's a tendency to be remote, cold, unloving. Of course, it's only on account of my own movement, my transcendence of my own sexuality that I feel I can work with Tantra, and support others. There's no way past teachers of mine (who of course saw me during my own seeking - which didn't generally look too pretty) can know that I'm "done" without encountering me in person. Even then, the "who I was then" is likely to give them trouble when looking at "who I am now".

Tantra is an "extreme" path. Although almost everyone can benefit from developing a more natural, less repressed sexuality, Tantra in it's higher, meditational practices is really for those who have an insistence on (and potential for) awakening to their enlightenment in their current incarnation.

At present there's two Dakinis (female tantra practicioners) and a Daka (the male version) in Cape Town, one Dakini, one Daka-in-training and me in Johannesburg. We've done IMHO magnificent work. Time and time again, I see "instantaneous" healing of deeply entrenched repressions and sexual traumas. The kind of "breakthroughs" that happen in around 5 years' conventional therapy - - for us, that's what happens in a "just average" session.

We're not here for those of just purient interest. We are screening more and more intensively as time goes on, as we get better known.

Our clientelle are pretty much unanimously overjoyed at our work. I don't put up testimonials and such at my website because I think it's tacky. I've been in marketing and web design long enough to know how few testimonials were unsolicited, how few have any truth in them at all.

The people we most like to work with (and the only people we should work with, really) are seekers. Those who had some significant freedom in their first 6 years, who don't automatically buy into "what everyone knows" and have done significant enquiry into themselves, that have a good awareness of their mind's trickiness, and a willingness to go beyond it's limitations.

Rahasya



-- Love, however it looks --

beginning blogging 12 April 2005

This is a first post, testing the thing.

Hello World?