Science

My first degree was in Physics and I have always retained a scientific interest particularly in the bridge between conventional science and alternative views.   As a therapist I am well aware of the human tendency to believe what we would like to believe rather then what has been established. The scientific method of slow testing and systematic observation has great value (and also some limitations) and the alternative healing world has too much sheer rubbish in it, where people believe what they want to believe (or sell!) So I loved this piece of research;  (Abstract at ;http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18637995 ) which demonstrates that trained observers can tell with over 80% accuracy from the way a woman walks if she is able to orgasm from vaginal sex rather than clitoral stimulation. The abstract says, "a gait that comprises fluidity, energy, sensuality, freedom, and absence of both flaccid and locked muscles"  indicates an ability to experience deeper vaginal orgasms because the lower back and pelvis are freer for energy to move in. Obvious really but nice when it comes from science. It is also true that for a number of women when they get more aroused then they tend to tense their lower back and thigh muscles - as well as their neck and jaw. So book a good tantric massage now ( www.shivoham.asia) to learn to really let orgasmic energy flow freely in your body! 

Bits and Pieces

We have had the Royal Wedding where the bride was in white and the groom, dressed like a toy soldier was all in red. A strange reversal of the traditional tantric colours where Shakti is usually associated with hot red, kundalini energy and Shiva with the cool white energy of awareness.  It seems strange to me to connect the celebration of a relationship with military power but the bottom line is always that the state will use whatever force it has to survive. They could have asked us to organise a tantric wedding instead!

Equinox

Last night was the Spring Equinox, the equal balance of day and night. We did a short fire ritual at sunset as the very full moon rose with the havan kund, the inverted copper pyramid with a fire of cow dung, ghee and small sticks.

We chanted 108 times the Maha Mrityunjaya Mantra; Om, Tryambhakam Yajamahe, Sugandhim Pushtivardhanam Urvarukamiva  Bandhanan  Mrityor  Mukshiya  Maamritat, Swaha! and with each "Swaha"  offered some rice to the flames. A precise translation is;  Om. The three-eyed one / we worship. The fragrant / sustainer of this world. Like a cucumber / from its stem. From death / liberate / not from immortality.

In this mantra, Shiva is addressed as the three-eyed one. The deeper meaning of the term “Shiva”, that which is auspicious and benevolent. Shiva is not merely a specific deity among other deities, but is Absolute Consciousness or Godhead. The third eye is the eye of wisdom, which stands for spiritual vision and knowledge beyond the duality of past and future, knower and knowledge, subject and object. The third eye is not only associated with spiritual realization and meditative vision, but also stands for Shiva’s power to destroy evil. In Hindu mythology, Shiva is known to destroy evil with a mere glance from this third eye, especially when his righteous anger is aroused.

We didn't do another chant to Shakti as if to balance things up. Western tantra seems to have made Shiva and Shakti into a modern egalitarian couple (traditionally it was more likely to be Shiva and Parvarti). There is no easy equal symmetry here. At the deepest level Shiva and Shakti are One - like the wave and the ocean or water and wetness. Above that Shiva is absolute consciousness and therefore the base on which the whole world is created through Shakti. Enjoy Spring and the blossoming of all that is created, grown, and reborn.

What it is All About!

There is only emptiness – vast spaciousness like the infinite blue sky or like the deepest silence beyond all sound.

There is no “me” – all I perceive is not me; thoughts, feelings, sensations, images which are apparently inside me; and  phenomena, things, apparently in a place called the world which "I" observe. In reality, on my shoulders is just a blazing empty space; not separate from the vast spaciousness of all.

There is no "I" or "me" to be healed,  improved, or become enlightened. Enlightenment is not an experience – it is the demolition of all concepts; all that we think we are.  There is no path to truth – it just is; here and now.

Resting easily in the natural state, emptiness arises readily and is luminously clear. There is no perceiver of this emptiness. Not being separate from this empty, loose and natural space allows the experience of the inseparability of emptiness and the phenomena that arise in the emptiness; thoughts, feelings, insights, perceptions, experiences. All experiences and phenomena are empty and are not different to, or separate from emptiness they are like two sides of a coin. This emptiness is not an absence but a fullness, a spaciousness that contains all. The world is not an illusion; it is the viewer who is the illusion.

The tantric formulation of this is that everything is Shiva; universal consciousness. If we don’t have this as the root realisation then we either embark on a futile game of self-improvement;  trying to  become more spiritual or more whole; or we chase phenomena such as more powerful experiences, bigger orgasms, greater realisations.  All experiences and phenomena are empty and the experiencer, being not distinct from this spacious emptiness is also empty. Phenomena of all sorts are the manifestation of Shakti - the dynamic, creative power of the universe. Therefore if we only see and worship Shakti then we are tying ourselves into the manifest world. If we are rooted in the realisation that everything is consciousness (“I am Shiva”) then we can experience Oneness; the inseparability of form and emptiness, energy and consciousness Shakti and Shiva beyond all dualities. This is true advaita tantra. 

Deeply realising this either as a gradual dawning or as a sudden awakening puts much of what happens in tantra workshops into a different perspective. 

Flowers of Emptiness

I have just come back from two weeks in Goa, India. It is a beautiful, warm simple life there; probably much like the Mediterranean fifty years ago before big hotels and package holidays started.  In all the many hours I spent sitting in cafes meeting many, many Europeans I only met one person who was there for their annual holiday for three weeks. Every other person I met was there for many weeks or months or sometimes years (with excursions out of the country to renew their visas). Some were "finding themselves"; some had hopelessly lost themselves; some had probably smoked far too much dope; some had put in many hours of meditation or yoga or spent years in spiritual practice, some just travelled and travelled. Some were in their early 20's others in their 60's.

I wondered what the hard-working Goan  fishermen made of these westerners practising their poi on the beach or drumming at sunset. It is hard not to judge. Spiritual growth requires awareness and relaxation into being; but paradoxically is forged in the activities of life. If we have not cultivated awareness then relaxation and lack of challenge usually leads to dullness and sleepiness. All spiritual teachers are trying to get us to wake up!

 I was reminded of Kahil Gibran's words in The Prophet that work is love made visible and that we work to keep pace with the world. Everyone's path is very mysterious ; usually to themselves and invariably to anyone else. The most powerful yoga is kriya yoga and "kriya" means action!

Barotse

I am back from two weeks in Western Zambia with many memories. Strongest is the sculptured groups of black mat skin. The women with silent wide eyed children; the large group of girls, some carrying younger children and small boys. There were a few young men, usually near the edge of the group. Most of the men were in the fields. It was as if they were posed for a photo of beauty, dignity, with an air of welcome; unperturbed by the differences which bothered me so much.  We arrived in a gleaming white Toyota with plastic chrome; four white middle aged or elderly men and a couple of local people.  They had very little in some villages; no cattle or goats or chickens,  just huts and a diet of maize and cassava. They found some chairs and we sat in the shade of the tree on the poor sandy soil. Nearby was the hand pump; the subject of our visit.

I notice how in the West poverty is shameful and differences awkward. They seemed at ease with this and peaceful, open, welcoming; shaking hands at every opportunity. No one could envy their suffering, their very basic existence and there is certainly nothing ennobling in poverty. But they can more easily attain a natural relaxed state in a world of few distractions and little pressure beyond the daily tasks of survival.  No mobile phone signals reach here yet; no satellite dishes, no internet; (but not for long I fear).

We came to see how they were managing with the new well made after they had accepted out demand that they construct and use pit latrines and wash their hands. A small imposition on them which can save the lives and the sight of their children, nearly half of whom will otherwise be struck by simple illnesses.

I hope there is some way that their lives can be improved without being spoilt. That the usual development doesn't lead to an exodus of the young from rural life to live in the sprawling cities where  half the world's population now live. I don't know what would make that possible but at least basic sanitation and water make health a real prospect.

Polyamory

So many songs are written about love. Here in the West we have a religious tradition of Christianity - a religion  based on love (though some pretty unloving things have been done in its name!); and in tantra we often see the heart chakra as the centre of the body and the transformer and gateway from the three lower - but not lesser chakras to the three higher ones. The heart is the centre of love. So it seems a bit strange that little attention is given to how and where love flows in our lives. Who do you love? How do you love? What are the limits of love?

 I am not going to answer these questions but Dr. Deborah Taj Anapol, after training as a clinical psychologist has spent most of the last thirty years, trying to understand this in her own and others lives. Her first book Love without Limits was published nearly twenty years ago. She has written about the Seven Laws of Love and has now just published Polyamory in the 2st Century. Summarising this and giving many examples of the lives of those, who from choice or necessity have lived in a different way. Her website www.lovewithoutlimits.com  has some excellent articles on it. She has been staying at my house and is a lovely person who runs great workshops. 
Imagine a world where our hurt and pain about love wasn't running us and where we didn't operate as if love was in short supply!