A Course in Miracles
Have you ever observed how different "mind sex", the exploration of sexual fantasies is from actually having sex. When you have sex, your mind gets blown away by the dance of yin and yang energies. When you have mind sex instead, you think this is just letting off a little steam, but this is not so. Every fantasy is a castle of the ego and you are sent on a pleasure trip that takes you away from who you truly are. While sex is of God, mind sex leads is of the ego and thus leads you away from God - it is as simple as that.
It is of little use to condemn sexual fantasies, you would be condemning yourself that way. If you meet someone attractive and if you afterwards have steamy fantasies there is little you can do about it. What you can do though, don't engage in it, just let this energy come and go and then move on with your life. But if you have spent the night watching pornography and next day you get one sexual fantasy after the other, you very much can do something about it. Stop watching pornography!
Many spiritual leaders have described our brain as a garden. Once you let weed in, it spreads fast and you have to painfully pluck it out one by one. Recent neurological discoveries very much confirm this theory. As they say, what fires together wires together. After some excessive consumption of pornography don't be surprised if your first glance goes to the breasts of your potential soul sibling. You may not really have access to her soul after a pornography orgie. Sexual addicts often report that they need to use all their willpower not to view all women as sex objects. And experts of the video game Tetris report that they see three dimensional rectangles floating in real life as well after playing the game. We see in front of us what our mind engages in all day; it is as simple as that.
Pornography, at least the stuff that is geared towards the male audience, is a classic ego device. The camera zooms into body parts and not people; most of the images display a power game that the ego loves. As you watch the graphic images you see in fact a hostile act of body parts which is hardly a symbol for wholeness much in contrast to having sex with your soul partner. Also, as every consumer of hard-core porn can tell you, the further along you go on this pleasure trip, the darker the sexual images will become. Sex addicts will also tell you that if you go down this pleasure ride long enough you will discover a strange trance. Biologically, engaging with the dark side releases chemicals in your brain that can get addictive over time. Psychological and spiritually a lot more is going on: the further you go down the mind sex road the more dirt you will throw on love. It is the demon whispering in your ear, "Go to sleep my friend - just enjoy the joy ride!"
The more you engage in these imagination, the more inclined you think that this is who you are; the more power to give to the demon, the more steps you take away from God. Experience for yourself how fear creeps in whenever you give a little finger to your demon. You can stop this nightmare; find a way to disentangle yourself from it. Shadow work is a process, it is a journey towards understanding who you truly are deep down inside. These graphic images may be beneficial to learn something about yourself, but eventually you will have to give up all forms of mind sex. Where your sexual fantasies are, true love cannot be. A spiritual path is a journey towards the light and away from darkness. When you connect with the Tao you will only experience love and all dark symbols will naturally drop by the wayside. After you have walked down the dark alley for a while, after you have understood the appeal of the symbols that you have seen, the Tao will intervene and take you in a different direction for the simple reason that every additional step would just hurt you. You will know when you are ready to drop all that and then it will not be so hard to do.
Just imagine, do you really think you will have sex the way you fantasize right now? Do you really think you will perform these acts that you see in on the internet or in pornographic movies? Just observe yourself, whenever you are doing something that deep down inside tells you that you are throwing dirt on love - you can observe for yourself that you are being infused with a strange dark energy at this moment. In fact, this strange dark feeling can actually add to the sexual excitement and is even something you can get addicted to. It is perhaps obvious to say that for a spiritual path traveler this dark energy is a step away from God. Guilt will surely come your way as the force that first entices you to engage will later beat you up over it.
Forbidden acts have a strange sexual appeal. Writes Robert J. Stoeller in Observing the Erotic Imagination: "In perversion the desire to sin is essential for being turned on." True indeed! Many sex addicts report that the very contemplation of their taboo activity puts them in a strange trance. Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam in their book A Billion Wicked Thoughts suggest that our visceral nervous system is responsible for this. We are wired to release neurological chemicals during periods of extreme stress. In the olden days we had to be on the top of our game when we needed to decide whether to run from the bear or face him. Apparently we can be addicted to these chemicals but we have to keep exposing ourselves to darker and darker sexual symbols to get the same stimulus. That is how the road to addiction looks like. Like with all ego activities, our neurological processes and biological wiring are exploited psychologically and we convince ourselves - consciously or subconsciously -that we are sinning when we engage in these taboo acts.
Don't beat yourself up over the way you are wired, the whole point of shadow work is to figure out why you respond the way you do. Traveling along the Tao is never about "good" or "bad", everything that comes your way becomes an eye-opening experience instead and this may include mind sex and pornography as well. A spiritual path is all about experiencing and understanding everything yourself. You cannot make a mistake really, all you can do is to delay your homecoming journey, but don't worry, the Tao will at every stage show you the way to the light.
It gets very hard to be on that discovery course if we don't have a partner to play and experiment with. Some people are without a significant other, while others might just be dissatisfied sexually in their relationship. When we can't express our sexual desires we are tempted with substitutes like prostitution or pornography. It is ok to be fascinated with these substitutes but you have to turn towards real life instead if you want to advance on your spiritual journey. Of course you deserve to have a significant other and of course you have the right to mind- blowing sex.
So go out and find sexual fulfillment. The Tao will cooperate with you. Sex is divine and it is beautiful if you manage to get in touch with this natural flow of life. Express this divine energy with the one you love. Whatever your soul partner is, sexual healing will just be around the corner. If occasionally you miss a beat and walk down a dark alley instead that is ok too, your soul partner will pull you right back onto the healing path. Have mind-blowing sex and observe for yourself how the ego's dark symbols fade into the background that way.
This note is part of "A Demon in the Bedroom" series. Please also look for
"Sex and Spirituality: The Dance of Yin and Yang" and
http://zeitgeistinma.blogspot.com/2013/03/sex-and-spirituality-dance-of-yin-and.html
"Sex, Love and Power"
"Sex, Love and Power"
By Christian and Su Zhen
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