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Like all practices that move energy through the body and aura Sex magick, Tantra and Sacred Sex have the potential to shake loose memories and trauma that have remained hidden in the subconscious for years, the inability to deal with these issues is one of the major areas of blockage and frustration upon these paths.  On the other hand learning to deal with these inner ‘shadows’ can lead to some of their greatest rewards.  Arguably the best way for healthy, well balanced people to deal with these things is to face them honestly and accept that they are a part of themselves that has been repressed and to own them.  Self honesty, the ability to laugh at ourselves, a willingness to learn what these repressed energies have to teach us and taking the time to integrate new experiences before attempting to move onto the next stage are positive ways to deal with these things. It is worth remembering that these eruptions often take a symbolic form, therefore a good knowledge of myth,  and metaphor is extremely useful in deciphering their meanings.  The following books are also extremely useful and informative.‘OWNING YOUR SHADOW’.  ‘INNER WORK’.  And ‘WE’.  All 3 by Robert A. Johnson.  THE SHAMAN’S BODY by Arnold MindellMay we all Be Blissed 

Hawthorn

Are our senses in a constant state of erotic interchange with the world but due to the filtering every conditioned culture exists in, we are blocked from feeling it? In an earlier post on sexual stimulus

“the development of the sexual palate, like a wine lover develops the capacity to taste the oak matured flavour, the sexual connoisseur would perhaps train their senses to.. heighten their capacity for sensation? would it be about looking for greater nerve capability? more sensitive to the nuances in the skin?”

Or maybe it’s about filtering less of the world around us, leaving it in it’s raw state, un-allocated. Then perhaps there is development of this “sense” as another source of energy intake, different in what it nurtures than say food or water, fundamental in what it sustains such as the air in our lungs.  But again do we come back to the question of quailty? Just as bad food or air can be debilitating, so can bad sexual encounters or even the way that you taste the erotic nature of the world, though filters of low worth or not good enoughs.

Is the sexual intelligence, that each of us has the opportunity to develop, the core understanding of how to transmute the power of the erotic world around us through our current intents making manifest the vision in our hearts? The “mystery of sexual transmutation” from Napoleon Hills’ classic Think and Grow Rich perhaps is the closest I have found to the power and elegance of knowing thy sexual self as means to being in fuller relationship with ones ability to influence the world… an intelligence indeed!

I had this analogy the other day that I wanted to share. It’s about relationship.

In comparing dance to relating, one can consider a way of being with each other as being like a waltz, with one leading, usually the male, with very perscirbed steps to what happens next. There’s the beginning, the dating, the commitment, the engagement, the wedding, the honeymoon, the marriage, and on and on the steps go to live the life one is ‘directed’ to live by a culture that has very definitive meaning in the word “relationship”.

Contact improv  on the other hand is where two (or more) human beings stay very present to exactly what is really happening RIGHT NOW. The movement between leader and follower, the trust between beings to be allow the real erotic energy that can move each other into deeper and more powerful experiences. Without mandate on where this “should” go now.

That’s all… just a thought on what I would really like to experience.

I was googling ‘Spiritual Masturbation’ and I encountered a lot of sites that used this phrase as a derogatory term for various practices.  I didn’t take a lot of notice of them, because I was looking for positive associations and possibly even practices, but then I came across something that caught my eye:  Basically someone was saying that making a judgment about the value of a religious experience based on a subjective sense of enjoyment was not true worship, but a form of spiritual masturbation.  

I suppose that I shouldn’t have been surprised that ‘masturbation’ does not generally have a positive association with mainstream ideas of sacredness, after all ‘masturbation’ comes from a root which means ‘defilement by hand’.  One of the main reason we prefer to use the terms ‘Sacred’ and ‘Self pleasuring’, is to counter this linguistic bias. 

In spite of my awareness of this it still amazed me that someone would suggest that enjoyment was not a valid means of relating to a sacred experience!  I get the idea that for many people ‘worship’ is something that is ‘offered’ to an external entity and therefore their appreciation is important.  However, I have a problem with the idea that the worshipper should not also derive some pleasure from the experience as well.  I suppose that one of the defining concepts I have in relation to ‘mystical’ experiences, weather planned or spontaneous, is that which I call ‘Grace’.  I don’t doubt that there are interpretations of this word that will be at odds with mine, but I have always seen this concept as something which is by its very nature uplifting and rewarding!  

I see no reason why the sacred should not be pleasurable, in fact most of my most profound sacred experiences have been characterised by a powerful sense of  pleasure and bliss.  I am certainly not the only person to have felt this way.  Many mystics  have spoken of their spiritual raptures in distinctly (though not necessarily overt) erotic terms.  This is not to say that there are not trials and ordeals upon the path of sacred exploration, obviously there are.  However, some might say that transmuting such ordeals into  rapture and bliss is at the very heart of the mystical experience. 

Oh well as someone who promotes the idea of ‘self pleasuring’ as a sacred practice I suppose I really am a ‘Spiritual Wanker’!   

May we all Be Blissed 

Hawthorn

It’s old news (unless you haven’t heard it yet) but economic researchers have conducted surveys which have convinced them that  Sex is better than Money for Happiness.  They say that increasing sexual intercourse from once a month to once a week can generate the same level of happiness as earning and extra $50,000 US per year!  I’m not sure how they managed to quantify happiness, but there you go.  Personally I would have thought that the quality of intimate relationships was more important than the quantity.  I’d rather cuddle someone I love than have sex with someone I don’t!They didn’t say how much self pleasuring was worth!

May we all Be Blissed Hawthorn

I picked up a document that has been on my desk for a year, called “Sexual Integrity”
it connects to quite a powerful intent, and yet, imho, still missing the point.

This led me on to a woman’s view of sexual education that I found interesting, even with her Christian undertones, and yet, still missing the point. She’s right, having 10 year olds putting condoms on banana’s is not effective. But building a culture that sees sexual experience as normal, healthy and honest, that could be the answer to all the fear mongering that goes on.

“A comparison of the US and The Netherlands is a good example. The US has one of the highest teenage pregnancy/AIDS/STDs rates in the world, while The Netherlands has around the lowest. The difference: in The Netherlands sex isn’t a dirty word. It’s simply a natural part of life; often used to strengthen relationships, more often used for fun and sometimes even used to procreate.” Posted[in the comments end of page 2] by Josh, Monday, 7 March 2005 9:44:45 PM

I could taste the “abstinence” education just underneath the lashings of concern. Honestly, we can see what the US has failed to do, and I for one would like to try on the Netherlands approach, PLEASE!

One of the core areas that most don’t/wont perhaps comprehend is the sexuality of young people. The book “The story of V” page 320 speaks of an ultrasound done at 32 weeks with 20 minutes of recording a girl fetus self pleasuring. This illustrates that the sexual nature of a human being begins in utero. WOW, that seems hard to comprehend but it’s real. So perhaps because we are not sound in our sexual energy, we can’t even contemplate the sexual nature of our young people.

Now, just for those that have made the jump from the exploration of the sexual nature of our young people to pedophile, let me assure you, that to me, a young persons exploration can and should be sovereign, a power unto themselves. Safe, in that it has NOTHING to do with anyone else, and everything to do with a human being unfolding their understanding of themselves. To my mind the pedophile is one that exploits this incredibly vunerable time in a young persons life, they are sick and need help, but the fear of them can no longer be an excuse as to not face the sexual nature of young people.

Here is where I think the sexual education could address. Honest discussion with young people, age appropriate, (which would perhaps be best directed by the questions that young people have) about whats happening in their bodies. Real opportunity to understand these incredible forces that are unleashing in their minds, hearts and very real expressions in their bodies.

At some stage in our (hopefully near) future, we need to find the sound (as in whole) sexual nature so as to model this for the young people in our lives. If we, as the adults that are informing young people to what being adult is all about, cannot face our own sexuality as a force unto ourselves then what hope have they got to navigate this turbulent time.

Otherwise, I’m just going to have to move to The Netherlands.

I was thinking about ways in which explore the idea of erotic community  as a spiritual idea when I  remembered something I had written a while ago. 

I wonder what it would be like to be in sacred space with people who know how to raise energy and share it, with the only restraint being that which contributes to raising the energy higher and higher. Then BE ‘in’ that state – allowing it – until the energy feels unbearable and yet bear it we do, until we are able to expand our capacity for that energy, so that we may continue raising it, again and again and again until we are all madly intoxicated on the divinely ecstatic passion of magick and love – raised and consumed, but not consummated; so that even as we feed our desire we yearn for more! Surrendering to our rapture we expand, deepen and intensify it again and again and again until our ego selves shatter in an ecstasis of Dyonisian abandon!!!! Surely it is possible to do this safely, respectfully and consensually?

May we all be Blissed

Hawthorn

I was talking with a buddy today about orgasms, as you do when you’re me, (note to men: women will talk) anyhow, the conversation was about her new lover and how, now that she has a man in her life that is more than willing, in fact enjoying, the exploration of sexual encounter, she seems to be not finding her orgasm the way she use to. We spoke about the pathways she used to use to orgasm just not being the ones she uses any more, mostly because she used to have to hurry up and grab it when she could and now that her lover is so responsive, she’s finding that they are coming (embrace the pun) from somewhere else.

This conversation prompted me to post about a part of being human that I just find fascinating. Sexual stimulus! what turns on one can be an instant turn off for another. Where and how do we individually create these pathways to being “turned on”. We found ourselves discussing the books we used to read that had descriptions of sexual encounters when we were young. Those stolen moments of reading and re-reading something that seemed to make our bodies respond. We both found our fathers collections of “sex to sexty”   and remembered fondly the exploration of these, quite funny, quite explicit artwork.

As a person grows, and experience many different types or styles of stimulus I guess that different pathways are built. Well, ask and you shall receive! I just googled, sexual stimulus pathways and found that link. So, there you go, built by repetition! the more that the brain says, “yes I know this,” the more it translates into “yes I like this”… no wonder all sorts of “fetishes” get built over time.  Which would then translate to being able to consciously being able to re-build them, would it not??

For me, this is an area that I wish to explore from many angles. Can the pathways in the body that normally access an orgasm change? well obviously they do, over time and situation, but what level of conscious actions can we take to change them? perhaps this is already a huge field that I just haven’t found yet…  For me I call it the sexual landscape, the development of the sexual palate, like a wine lover develops the capacity to taste the oak matured flavour, the sexual connoisseur would perhaps train their senses to.. heighten their capacity for sensation? would it be about looking for greater nerve capability? more sensitive to the nuances in the skin?  Perhaps it’s about being able to read your lover, or all lovers? being able to note their breath changes, their little cues for on or off?

This is but the tip of the iceberg! mmmm so much fun to be had!

ENJOY your world, tis what it’s for!

I love the idea of self pleasuring adventures.  The possibilities that occur to me when I think about it are almost overwhelming, so much so that I can hardly sort them out into a sensible stream of thought.  Obviously there is the financial incentive that is associated with promoting and selling our Self Pleasuring Adventure mp3’s , but there is so much more as well. I believe that a healthy relationship with our bodies, our senses and our desires is absolutely essential to physical, mental and spiritual well being.  

Erotic Earth is a way of inviting people to experience that perception for themselves, of testing, exploring and having fun, and hopefully finding enrichment in the process. Erotic Earth is also about community – virtual and physical – places where like-minded people can get together to share ideas, insights, thoughts, energy, action, love and magick.  It’s about respect and autonomy, for others and for ourselves. 

We start off small: Inviting people to explore the sacredness of  Self Pleasuring Adventures, sharing ideas and feedback through this forum, and finding and linking to other pleasure positive and sacred erotic groups such as The New School of Erotic Touch, Pleasure Activism Australia, and The Pleasure Project.  After that who knows?  Maybe one day we will see physical temples and retreats where knowledgeable and passionate people can teach and share their visions, and much, much more. 

Then there is the exploration of our sacred erotic potential – “What do I like, what do I dislike, what does this tell me about myself, what do I do with that information?”  There are questions of potential “What can I do with this stuff?  Does it affect the real world, what about sex magick, is it real?”  These ideas and so many more await our exploration. 

May we all be Blissed

Hawthorn

Our venture here in Erotic Earth has only just begun. I hope that I can translate the passion I have for the freedom to explore these realms of sexual sovereignty that our culture truly could use. That’s the tricky bit though, wanting to make an offering to a world that I am just not sure will be able to understand. Walking that thin line between invitation and dare.

There is an investment that one will need to make to actually see where these Self Pleasuring Adventures will take you. Perhaps they begin with the lights off and the eyes shut, progressing to the eyes open with the light low… then maybe one day in front of a mirror, sinking deep into your own eyes as you would a lovers. That’s what I hope for these journey’s that one can take them deeper and deeper into one’s own sexual experience.

I recently read of a woman, Marie Stopes, a woman before her time? or expressing the needs of many because they were her needs too? (she was probably the first woman to publish the thought that women could/should enjoy sex too!) I’ve traveled out in the edges of our culture, always searching for a true and authentic life that reflected the intensity that I feel. When I look to that which we call porn, or other version of sexual stimulus, I can only see a surface dwelling existence, not a deeply satisfying experience.  I want to share the places that I go, in the depths of the forest, or the frenzy around the fire in rite.

Are we ready for the next level of the sexual frontier? I think we are, and moments like these, of beautiful agony , illustrate that there is a definite desire to open to more of the intimate reality of skin, breath, heart and…. (the list is quite endless)

With love, Katherine Cunningham.

ENJOY your world, tis what it’s for!

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