Taoist's position on celibacy

[surfingbudda]

So what your guys opinions on the taoist's postion on celibacy? From what I understand taoist philosophy is based upon living balanced life. Both a life of celibacy and constant sexual activities would be on both sides if the extreme. My link, heres a link talking about taoists view and has quotes from taoists masters saying their view on how often a man should ejaculate. What all the masters have in common is that they limit ejaculation to about twice a month, and say that one should have a ratio of about one emmision per every hundred copulations, therefore these masters learn how to copulate without ejaculation and control their orgasms. What does everyone here think about this? Do you think these practices of sexual control should be more talked about in modern day taoist thought? These masters say it is vital for a man to begin looking into taoist sexual control practices by age 30 and by age 40 having learned and practice them, otherwise serious ailments will bestow upon the body. Obviously this field of practice was looked upon as very important to these taoist masters and necessary for perfect health. They also say how simply retaining from ejaculation altogether is unbalanced and will lead cause the body to build up sexual desire and climax in a wet dream or nighttime emission, which these masters say is 100 times worse for the body than a regular emission, so avoiding the issue seems to go very against the taoist philosophy of balance and control of ones life.

[Sloppy Zhang]

A lot of people have said a lot of things about celibacy. I highly suggest you go back and search through some of the old threads.

 

Not to sound too hippie-ish, but a lot of things Taoist fall under the "do things naturally" category. But "what's natural" depends on a whole lot of things. What's natural for one person might not be natural for another.

 

Rather than following something dogmatically, or rather than following something you think might be the best for you, or following something because that's what you want to be true, you should do a practice that involves listening to your body, and doing whatever practices fit your body at that time (I say it that way because that may change over time, or with other circumstances). Trying to work it all out, trying to know what's with a bunch of different systems, or something of that sort, is going to leave you incredibly focused on the issue, and, in the worst case scenario, get your mired in the very problem that you hoped to avoid.

 

Don't be afraid to do something you've never done before if it truly feels better, and don't be afraid to stop doing what you've always done if it truly feels wrong.

Edited November 10, 2010 by Sloppy Zhang

[gendao]

Not to sound too hippie-ish, but a lot of things Taoist fall under the "do things naturally" category. But "what's natural" depends on a whole lot of things. What's natural for one person might not be natural for another.

Well, the hitch here is that Taoism actually refers to your true prenatal nature...not "worldly" postnatal nature.

 

Hence, neidan basically reverses your postnatal flow to prenatal - which can then feel very unnatural at first to the n00by layman stuck in his postnatal mind.

 

Being natural is a simple concept...yet not as simple or easy as it sounds. Because you have to find your true nature first. Ay, there's the rub!

Edited November 10, 2010 by vortex

[balance.]

Well, the hitch here is that Taoism actually refers to your true prenatal nature...not "worldly" postnatal nature.

 

Hence, neidan basically reverses your postnatal flow to prenatal - which can then feel very unnatural at first to the n00by layman stuck in his postnatal mind.

 

Being natural is a simple concept...yet not as simple or easy as it sounds. Because you have to find your true nature first. Ay, there's the rub!

 

Not to stray too far from the topic at hand...

 

.... but I see this "return" as intrinsically attached to the idea of Effortlessness...

 

.. with all the habits and thought processes that we've accumulated since birth as being things that require effort and thus separate us further from that unadulterated state...

 

...Effortlessness, for me, indicates a state/frame of mind where we achieve and accomplish everything by not doing anything extra/"unnatural" ..

 

.... Yoda's great "There is no try" figures in here somewhere as well... Turn off the mind and do.

 

 

In terms of celibacy, you're absolutely right... Balance ought to be maintained. But I don't take celibacy to mean abstaining from sex, but just abstaining from ejaculation.. Also, being in a relationship doesn't do much in terms of discouraging such physical expressions... An important component here is the balancing of yin/yang that occurs between the opposing sexes that is absent from straight up masturbation... So sex, practiced intelligently does have its benefits.

 

I'm no super-human (yet) , so I of course do slip up from time to time... but I found once I'd devoted myself to some substantial stretches of integrated retention that it was the only thing that really made sense to me... Those are the sorts of things that you need to decide for yourself after you've experienced what can result, good and bad, from dedicated, extended and wisely-practiced retention.

 

You'll also find trains of thought that follow more exactly the idea of "celibacy" and seek to move beyond all physical/mundane/humanely desire... I've heard many different reasons for this beyond the obvious that these are things, depending on how far we want to take the path, that we must let go of as they keep us planted in samsara.. But the other one that comes to mind says that stimulation and unchecked desire divert energy away from other centers in order to produce sexual fluid... I'm not at a point where this matters to me particularly, though it's good to consider.

 

It's also good to consider that there are paths that utilize sexual/ecstatic energy in the road to realization. So, my experience thus far says the only wrong paths are those that don't work for you...

 

Cast your net, sample the catch, and cast again if you don't find yourself satisfied with the offerings of a particular location...

 

Learn to listen to and trust your heart.

 

 

 

best.

 

 

 

 

balance.

Edited November 10, 2010 by balance.

[markern]

My thoughts are:

 

The techniques to achieve this often lead to problems for the practitioner. This frequently means energetic imbalances and energetic overload and it can be genital pain.

 

In hindsight it is often easy to see what people did wrong. Over the years several bums experienced in this has developed a fair share of data on what works and what does not. If you follow this advice you should be safe.

 

Is it beneficial? Absolutely! Done correctly it gives large gains in quality energy. My teacher was a celibate monk in the tibetan budhist system for four years. He says celibacy gave him a big gain in energy. Practicing dual cultivation doubled that gain.

 

Is it necessary? Absolutely not! So many people get such good progress without it and so many teachers I have respect for say it is not necessary that to me it seems clear you don`t need either celibacy or dual cultivation other than for extra help in building up juice for certain energetic practices that might be good but you don`t actually need to get enlightened. To achieve the rainbow body or become an immortal maybe you do need it but in order to get enlightened in the buddhist sense you don`t need either. I personally believe the rainbow body/physical immortality stuff, if it is indeed real, is more like a sidhi/a potentially useful thing rather than something that reflects some sort of final level of enlightenment.

 

If you look through my posts in threads concerning sexuality you will find most of the essential collective wisdom of thetaobums about retention/dual cultivation summed up including links to a couple of other useful sites and mention of useful books. THe most important aspects of doing it safe and balanced concerns laying the foundation solidly with correct non sexual practices like belly breathing etc. to proceed slowly and to learn to do it more in a yin way based on awareness, gentle guidance of the breath, subtle intent and having it happen as spontaneously and naturally as possible rather than through forceful contraction of muscles or forceful movement of energy.

 

By the way both stillness movement and KAP include methods of dual cultivation that appear to be good.

 

With regards to naturalness. I have actually read about a few people that have accidentally ended up practicing basic forms of dual cultivation without knowing about the methods. By that I mean men learning to have multiple internal valley orgasms without ejaculation and both the man and woman having valley orgasms as opposed to peak orgasms and both experiencing exchange of energy. I think if one has a high level of awareness and just listens deeply to oneself when having sex with a partner one truly loves there is a fair chance that one eventually slips into something close to this. It would usually require an awareness level that seldom come from anyyhing other than meditation and qigong or yoga but some rare people have so much of it to begin with that it can happen without it. So from that perspective I think it is a very natural practice it is just that most people are just not in tune enough with themselves to slip into it.

 

I also think that this spirtualizes sex in a truly profound way and turns sex into a valuable cultivation practice and helps spiritualize, balance and maintain the relationship in a profound way. So from a spiritual perspective I think practicing these methods is pure brilliance.

 

At reuniting.info you can read more about how this sort of sex can lead to balanced and lasting relationships. THey yap about not having orgasms but clarify int eh forum that the actually mean the tantric internal climax and the type of angelic dual cultivation Lao tzu speaks of so don`t let that confuse you.

Edited November 10, 2010 by markern