THE ARCANE ARCHIVE
	a cache of usenet and other text files pertaining to occult, mystical, and spiritual subjects.

From cat@luckymojo.com  Thu Sep  3 22:04:35 1998
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Message-ID: <35EF8441.2B1A@luckymojo.com>
Date: Thu, 03 Sep 1998 22:10:09 -0800
From: catherine yronwode 
Organization: Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
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CC: tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com
Subject: Re: Celibacy and prostate problems
References: <6smedo$mvp$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com> 
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> 
> alstrup@my-dejanews.com writes:
> 
> > I recently decided to become celibate as my interest in spirituality 
> > has grown stronger than the interest in sex. 

Frankly, i don;t follow you there...it seems to me that it would be just
as logical to say that you have decided to race model cars as your
interest in spirituality has grown stronger than your interest in sex.
Or that you have decided to become celibate because your interest in
model car racing has grown stronger than one's interest in sex. Your
hidden premise -- that celibacy enhances spirituality and both oppose
sex -- is not a common denominator among practitioners, advocates, and
teachers of the many forms of sex-worship, sex-magic, and sex-mysticism.
As a theory, it makes about as much sense to me as the hidden premises
in my two exemplary statements, respectively that model car racing
enhances spirituality and that model car racing enhances celibacy. 

> > The primary reason for 
> > going celibate is that I experience a great increase of primary 
> > vitality on all levels of mind and body, almost to a state of 
> > euphoria. 

This is quite differeent than claiming, as you did above, that a lack of
sex interest fuels your spiritual practice of celibacy!

> > I have been using some tibetan yoga exercises described in Peter 
> > Kelder's book "Fountain of Youth". One of the rites in this book is 
> > meant to be used occasionally when there is a need to transform 
> > accumulated sexual energy in the lower chakras and lift it upwards.

Note the key word "occasionally.".

>  I have direct experience that this particular exercise
> > removes the sexual desire on both a physical and mental level and 
> > transform the energy into a higher form of energy. 

Please define "higher" -- i rarely understand what people mean by that,
so i like to get further explanations. Do you mean "toward the crown
chakra"? "More spiritual"? 

> > However, after a few weeks with no
> > ejaculations, problems arises with my prostate gland. 
> > [...]

to which joshua geller replied:
> 
> It's a really good idea to know what you are doing *before* you try
> something like this.

A good point, Josh -- but where do you suggest he go for information? 

Basically, folks who are following a sex-mystical path are not going to
find much medical or biological work to support or disprove ancient or
even recent claims. On the one hand the aspirant sees hundreds --
thousands! -- of years of literature supporting a certain course of
action that seems counterintuitive  (abstinence from ejaculation,
urine-drinking, suppression of menses, etc.) but is said to produce
great spiritual benefits. On the other hand looms a body of
copuntervailing "conventional wisdom" ("it's bad for you!"). Even
medical "authories who come down against a counter-intuitive practice
don;t back up their statements with long-term studies on the biomedical
effects of these practices. 

So what is the aspirant to do? Who will he or she trust? 

And for how LONG? That is -- if bypassing orgasms results in great
spiritual or emotional benefit when one does it three times in one
night, will the benefits increase or at least remain constant when one
does it six times in one night? Six times each morning and night for
three days? Once a day for ten lunar months? What did the author cited
mean by "occasionally"? 

And if one person makes a detailed accounting of his or her own
practices and the effects they have produced, both spiritually and
biomedically, will that accounting prove true for all other humans?
Other humans of the same gender? Other humans of similar genetic
make-up? 

We're all shooting in the dark, here, Josh! That's why this forum has
proven so useful to many readers over the years. If i take time to give
an account of my own body, it MAY help someone with similar genetic and
gender-determined functionality. Or, perhaps, the fact that i have
outlined at least an approach to how i THINK about these things may
help. 

But telling someone to do their homework before embarking on a
counterintuitive path like ejaculation avoidance is not fsir: What may
have worked for a man with a low sex-drive (one who as a teen
masturbated or ejaculated via wet dreams once a month) and thereafter
have been recounted as dogma by his followers for centuries will
probably not work for a man with a high sex drive (one who as a teen
masturbated several times a day or ejaculated via wet dreams twice a
week or more). 

Never underestimate the lack of REAL DATA available in this field ...
and never underestimate the amount of variability in human physiology. 

catherine yronwode

Sacred Sex: http://www.luckymojo.com/sacredsex.html