Looking for wisdom on semen retention

[markern]

31 minutes ago, freeform said:

 

For example a tendency for an ever expanding openness internally is recognised by most practitioners is highly beneficial.
 

However at a certain point a tight compaction and very uncomfortable squeezing is also a necessary stage of the process. But often it feels very negative, and if you’re not aware of what’s going on, you might halt the process and cut short your progress.

 

 

This sounds very interesting but I don't understand it. What kind of openness internally? That having an increasing openness with equanimity towards all aspects of your internal experience is seen as good?

What kind of contraction? Can you elaborate?

[Michael Sternbach]

Fortunately for those incurable Mantak Chia followers, there is a viable alternative to the orgasm now!

 

 

[doc benway]

Exactly how I feel when I take off the N95 at the end of the day!

😂

Airgasm!

[freeform]

1 hour ago, markern said:

Those who practice Karezza

I’m not familiar with this practice - but certainly sounds like a much healthier approach to sexual exploration.

 

The whole retention thing is very much one of those ‘it depends’ things.

 

I think it’s generally a terrible idea for young men in their teens and twenties. Even if they’re practicing internal arts. (Unless of course it’s one of those very rare full-time practitioners under a legitimate teacher’s supervision).

 

It can be very useful (and in fact necessary) at certain times for serious practitioners. 

 

Chia’s practices, whether with retention or without are either dangerous or simply useless.

 

Certain practices are harmless - like the ‘inner smile’.
 

But it’s not cultivation...

 

Its like imagining yourself walking on a beautiful sandy beach. Nice and relaxing.

 

In fact the inner smile, comes from a misunderstanding of a classic text (forget which, unfortunately) which I think described the result of the correct application of the principle of Song.

 

Much of chia’s stuff is this sort of thing. Classical text says ‘[if you practice correctly] you’ll feel a warm fluid like sensation rising up your spine’. So Chia ‘reverse engineers’ it by just imagining this sensation instead.

 

I think it’s quite clear why this is wrong - but the analogy I use is this: It’s like ‘reverse engineering’ the process of making money by imagining millions of dollars when you check your bank balance.

[moment]

Mantak Chia appeals to the lowest common denominator, while offering an appealing illusion  That is what greedy people do.

[freeform]

1 hour ago, markern said:

 

This sounds very interesting but I don't understand it. What kind of openness internally? That having an increasing openness with equanimity towards all aspects of your internal experience is seen as good?

What kind of contraction? Can you elaborate?

Sorry it’s an irrelevant description to be honest.
 

My point was that - even if you’re very sensitive to the actual movements of Qi in your body - the feeling of X might feel pleasurable and the feeling of Y might feel bad. So you go after X.
 

But if you have no causal insight into the correct process of development you would miss that Y is also useful at certain stages and might stop it thinking it’s a problem.

 

[markern]

6 minutes ago, freeform said:

I think it’s quite clear why this is wrong - but the analogy I use is this: It’s like ‘reverse engineering’ the process of making money by imagining millions of dollars when you check your bank balance.

According to the Secret that works though

[dwai]

There are natural biological processes. Why mess with them? Let them express themselves naturally. Don’t obsess with either retention or ejection. 
Lots of good advice here by @freeform @Cleansox @steve @silent thunder
 

I’ve only seen/heard/read bad stuff about Mantak chia’s practices. 

 

I have a student who was Michael winn’s student for a while. He was obsessed with these ridiculously complex mental exercises like making different colored pearls (I think they call them pills) and moving them around. 
 

My 2 cents based on my experiences and what my teachers have told me — too much mental activity is the biggest source of draining of our internal energy.
 

To not exhaust your energy, learn to still the mind, settle the mind and abide in that stillness and silence. 
 

 

 

Edited September 14, 2020 by dwai

[Cleansox]

7 hours ago, freeform said:

 

In fact the(.        ) , comes from a misunderstanding of a classic text (forget which, unfortunately) which I think described the result of the correct application of the principle (.                ) .

 

Much of chia’s stuff is this sort of thing. Classical text says ‘[if you practice correctly] you’ll feel (.              ’) . So Chia ‘reverse engineers’ it by just imagining this sensation instead.

From my view, you could insert most of the fusion practices in the (.     ) above. 

[RiverSnake]

Kamajayi mudra is a method that has stood the test of time for me. Helps sublimate sexual energy very effectively. As far as i can tell..the Hindus know what there talking about. 

 

 

 

[markern]

21 hours ago, freeform said:

I’m not familiar with this practice - but certainly sounds like a much healthier approach to sexual exploration.

 

 

It is kind of a western tantra invented by a woman in the 1800s:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coitus_reservatus

The couple who wrote the book Cupids Poisoned Arrow has done a lot to make it more known these days. They have had a site and forum at reuniting.info dedicated to Karezza but its down for maintenance and upgrades at the moment. Karezza in practice is very similar to the very simple tantra described by Diana Richardson in her tantra books. Her books are usually recommended by the reuniting people.

[markern]

This explains it quite well:

https://web.archive.org/web/20200204072939/https://www.reuniting.info/wisdom/what_is_karezza

 

And this explains how they see the difference between Chias methods and Karezza:

https://web.archive.org/web/20170128140403/http://www.reuniting.info/wisdom/neotaoism_and_karezza

[Jonas]

This is a rather serious matter. Excuse me for a long post.. but I find it a subtle and important topic worth elaborating on.

 

We are talking about transmutation of the creative / sexual energies.

 

Basically the human body is an alchemical laboratory that digests and transforms grosser matter to finer. 

 

In Indian Ayurveda they identify 7 gross / material levels - the last one being reproductive fluid (the same for men and women by the way :-):

 

* food
* chyle or digested fluids
* blood

* flesh / muscles

* fat

* bone / marrow

* reproductive fluids

Now, first of all - in order to do transmutation at all - we need to have all the seven levels more or less complete and full. That is - we need to be 

bodily healthy (a sick person cannot transmute) 
physically fit (an anemic or a person that fast cannot transmute)

 

and not 

over-train (in a damaged and tired body all energy will go to repair)
overwork (the same as previous but mental)
overindulge in the senses (food, etc - energy goes to digestion)
over-consume social media, tv etc. (energy wasted on vanity, pride, envy, anticipation, worries, etc.)
overdo the sex-thing (reproductive fluid wasted)

 

(Here is a good thread on it: https://hinduism.stackexchange.com/questions/18866/how-to-increase-ones-ojas-capacity)

 

So when the reproductive fluid is formed in a healthy manner (and charged after a certain period of calm living) it is ready to be transmuted.

 

If we want to be a bit methodological / technical there are two methods here that work in unison:

 

1. Breathing in Sushumna or spinal breathing (central channel - Governor - DU)
This comes when we are very calm and focused and our nostrils are equally open. There is a small trick / key to measure. If one of your nostrils are blocked you are not in Sushumna - you are either to the right (Pingala) or left (Ida). If both are balanced - a calm will spread - and you will breath correctly. This breathing gives rise to more Pranic / deep breathing (less ratio of air to energy) and fetal breathing (breathing almost converge / stops in a point close to the navel). It is fairly easy to self-regulate this. Just "intend / feel" how the blocked passage is opened up.

 

(here is a good primer on this technical stuff: https://www.swamij.com/kundalini-awakening-1.htm)

 

2. Combining rising chi (prana) with downward going chi (apana) by bellows breathing and locks (squeezing). Damo Mitchell calls the phase "fire breathing" since when the upper combines with lower there arises friction that will create heat.

When there is heat down there the most subtle essence of the reproductive fluids begins to steam / transmute much in the same way an alchemist distill a tender essential oil form a plant. The more spiritual and volatile part of it goes over first with a little heat.

 

Now we may ask - how is this possible since the reproductive fluids are physical? There is no such channel.. The answer is not only that it is converted to immaterial / spiritual chi. It has also to do with quantum tunneling. That is - the "ormus" part (the alchemical essence of the fluids) are the one that steams up and they can go trough physical barriers trough this process.

 

So when that happen you can gently gently "lead" it up from the "perineum" trough the coccyx and up the spine as you feel the current.

 

When it come up to the brain you can continue to circle it down again - and then up - etc., so a circulation is preformed - it is sometimes referred to as "refining the honey". 

 

I would also argue that you can leave it just by itself. Since when the brain - that is cooler - receives the steam - it will condense.

 

Now you have it in the brain as "Ojas" - as the Ayurvedists calls it. From here on it is relatively safely stored. If you dont trasmute it up to this stage it will become old and will leave your body sooner or later (like apples that are not picked off the tree in right time and made juice of).

 

Then our Pineal gland will filter it and convert it to a kind of soma-substance called "Amrit" or "Nectar". It is called so since it is a condensation of the Ojas into a rather thick, oily, cool and sweet substance. 

 

When the brain or the whole cerebrospinal fluid are saturated with this substance it begin to drop down and you can feel it in the mouth. I can attest it tastes sweet - like a sweet thickish flower-nectar. And what more: it feels nice - like being bathed in an elixir of youth that makes you really strong in body, mind and speech.

 

(You will know when you have some of this. Depression is gone. Magical things will happen since this substance is intelligence and healing itself and close to the most perfect rejuvenative medicine for body and mind.)

 

Note that before it condenses you might fell a little dizzy or like there is a cloud of energy - there actually is. But when it condenses to concentrated Ojas it will instead refill and invigorate your brain to youthful conditions (if you're older) or more towards genius if you are young.

 

Now to your question. The fire-process can also be "stimulated" in a non-attachment way. But that is a secondary process. If you are young and have saved the energy that process should be spontaneous for example in nighttime when you naturally will produce much of this. It will linger on un-transmuted during the day. If you don't transmute it (don't care for breathwork and meditation anymore) and it is produced it will linger on and fall down your legs and it will just be troublesome. You can feel the warm current. It needs to be refined.

 

At the same time you work on the "upper part" - that is the 3 upper chakras - the shien / light and cultivate that. It will ameliorate with the stored Ojas in the brain and the alchemy continues.

 

An interesting thing is that I have studied and experimented with outer alchemy (for 3 years or so) and it is striking to notice how much inner and outer alhemcy have in common..

 

The Ojas - also the Soma - nectar - is something you can distill or concentrate out of a good source of water (that is - natural water or rain-water - or best dew-water).. It is the "ormus"-part of water. Ormus is a special state of matter - known to the ancient alchemists as the "seedform" and "rediscovered" by David Hudson in the 1990'ies. It is basically atoms that are freed from their bonds with other atoms - that is free from crystalline structures and having their electrons bound up in cooper pairs - dancing together by quantum resonance - and forming super-conducting Bose-Einstein-Condensates at room temperature. This new state matter can have properties like quantum tunneling, levitation, disappearance or reappearance, sympathetic resonance with substances far apart, etc., etc. Basically the air is full of it. That is part of the energetic prana or chi.

 

I experimented wit making ormus the usual way with dead sea salt and potassium hydroxide - but instead of taking distilled water as the modern receipts say - I felt that that would try ormus-water instead. Lo and behold - the substance - after one-two months of low temperature digestion (something that in my view is essential that is also left out in the modern recipes) at summertime on my upper floor - it actually tasted like sweet violets - and really induced my energy. So I concluded this outer experiment was in certain parallel with the inner alchemy of soma-drops.

Interesting.. at least to me :-) By the way: in my view everything about practical alchemy (WeiDan in Daoist terms) is more or less true. The elixir that rejuvenates, the transmutation of metals, etc., and it can all be explained by incorporating quantum mechanics and also understand that everything is modifications from the same source - consciousness and can be brought back to that. (consciousness->energy->matter->energy->consciousness).

 

(If you feel you have interest to study this - very good books are: The way of the Crucible - Robert Bartlett, Real Alchemy - Robert Bartlett, The Elixir of Immortality: A Modern-Day Alchemist’s Discovery of the Philosopher’s Stone Robert E. Cox. Also https://ormus.tesla3.com/science-behind/)

 

About Mantak Chia I am VERY sure he is authentic in the way he studied with Daoist masters - and were taught the right processes. It is just that he is a bit light on it in his books - giving the impression that it is something you can go at very quickly. He is sometimes also not so ordered and updates his methods now and then and I notice that they have removed his book "Taoist secrets of Love".. But that being said - he has tons of knowledge and I have got some good info from him. 

 

However the method (maybe more related to men) where you are close to 100% and you stop by force and force it up.. it is really not good. It is a violence on the body since the prostate gland is ready to execute. This mode or "readiness" of the organs don't slow down so quick. It can be swollen enlarged for longer periods. In the end you can attract diseases.. So its best to stop with that anyhow.

 

Damo Mitchell is clear about that a prerequisite for inner alchemy to happen is first of all removing a certain amount of your "body armour" - that is your blockages and stored emotional charges. Secondly it is saving up - as I wrote in beginning of this answer - "the 100 day virgin period". Thirdly it is a sequential application of inner breathing exercises that is to be followed very precisely. Then it could work and you may have real experiences and awakening what is called "kundalini". 

 

I also think - as previous poster said about Karezza - that it will work as long as there is true love and mutual intent to rise spiritually.

But to just force it up - well - it can bring up wrong energies that is too coarse and it could lead to blockages and pain, fatigue and weakness. "Poisoned fire entering the heart".

 

I have for a period experiencing this.. it was a period I should have rested but I tried to force such practices against my intuition - and I really felt like garbage circulating in my system.. 

Edited November 23, 2020 by Jonas

[Maddie]

I was reluctant to chime in as the Chia/Semen retention topic gets discussed A LOT on here, but with that being said and having tried Chia's system in the past all it did for me was to turn me into a sex craved maniac. I read the books, and tried it for years. Once I got into Acupuncture school I learned it was a really bad idea.

 

Personally I think its because the stimulation builds up testosterone but with out the usual loss that ejaculation results in. So it just builds up to very high levels, i.e. extreme Yang excess in relation to Yin.

Edited November 25, 2020 by dmattwads

[freeform]

4 hours ago, dmattwads said:

all it did for me was to turn me into a sex craved maniac

Which, funnily enough, is one of the main signs of Jing dispersion and turbidity - precisely the opposite of what we’re aiming for in these arts 

Edited November 25, 2020 by freeform

[Maddie]

2 hours ago, freeform said:

Which, funnily enough, is one of the main signs of Jing dispersion and turbidity - precisely the opposite of what we’re aiming for in these arts 

Yes I was struck by the irony as well.

[Cleansox]

You forgot to turn on the quantum process, that's why you got the negative results. 

[Maddie]

2 hours ago, Cleansox said:

You forgot to turn on the quantum process, that's why you got the negative results. 

 

What does that mean?

[Nintendao]

Quantum processing helps the extra energy disperse back into the false vacuum of empty space. It might used to be called contemplation of the void. It's an innate capability of all sentient beings, as it is important for sustaining all of life as we know it. Because of the slight imbalance of matter to antimatter required for the visible universe to exist, spacetime has to keep expanding at an ever increasing rate in order for matter to stay slightly outrunning inevitable annihilation. This of course creates pockets of lower density, that need to be filled back in to prevent the whole thing collapsing. Normally this is not a problem, as the subtle energy of consciousness itself is sufficient to fill the immeasurably tiny cracks. That's why people tend to think too much these days, because space has gotten too big. In order to survive this situation, humans are evolving the ability to channel their own reproductive force into a denser form of consciousness that will be able to fill the voids much faster. It's still relatively early in the process, and can cause people to go insane when they haphazardly discover how to force the mechanism.

[freeform]

38 minutes ago, Nintendao said:

Quantum processing[...]

 

Oh - I thought @Cleansox was having a joke... but maybe not!

[Cleansox]

I was, and will continue with that joke until someone shows that quantum theory is relevant within this specific context. 

When that happens, I will incorporate it in my belief structure. 

 

I have ample space for that, between "shit I can explain", "shit I have a theory for", and "mysterious shit". 

 

If it was relevant, as in changing states of substances and transporting the result where no physiological transport routes can be found, there should be no stagnation and no turbidity, since the post heaven jing manifested as semen would return to its primordial state and not become "leakage" in the traditional meaning. Wasn't that implied above, or am I just mean spirited? 

(I am just mean, right 👹) 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2020 by Cleansox
Added stuff

[Nintendao]

Good point. The quantum stuff is not going to be much use after a certain point. Refusing to eat a meal that's already been cooked is not a viable way to conserve food!

 

[Limahong]

On 9/12/2020 at 4:07 PM, TaoistNoodle said:

I was very excited to figure out how to send the energy up the spine and preserve my jing.

 

Hi TaoistNoodle,

 

You write well and with much clarity.

You have the potential to self cultivate your needs.

 

Throw away whatever books, videos... and take an inner path.

 

Do you know yourself?

 

 

 

Be kind and gentle to yourself.

Take one step at a time.

You surely can...

 

 

- Anand

 

[Maddie]

4 hours ago, Nintendao said:

Quantum processing helps the extra energy disperse back into the false vacuum of empty space. It might used to be called contemplation of the void. It's an innate capability of all sentient beings, as it is important for sustaining all of life as we know it. Because of the slight imbalance of matter to antimatter required for the visible universe to exist, spacetime has to keep expanding at an ever increasing rate in order for matter to stay slightly outrunning inevitable annihilation. This of course creates pockets of lower density, that need to be filled back in to prevent the whole thing collapsing. Normally this is not a problem, as the subtle energy of consciousness itself is sufficient to fill the immeasurably tiny cracks. That's why people tend to think too much these days, because space has gotten too big. In order to survive this situation, humans are evolving the ability to channel their own reproductive force into a denser form of consciousness that will be able to fill the voids much faster. It's still relatively early in the process, and can cause people to go insane when they haphazardly discover how to force the mechanism.

 

And how does one do this?

[Jonas]

On 11/25/2020 at 7:32 PM, dmattwads said:

I was reluctant to chime in as the Chia/Semen retention topic gets discussed A LOT on here, but with that being said and having tried Chia's system in the past all it did for me was to turn me into a sex craved maniac. I read the books, and tried it for years. Once I got into Acupuncture school I learned it was a really bad idea.

 

Personally I think its because the stimulation builds up testosterone but with out the usual loss that ejaculation results in. So it just builds up to very high levels, i.e. extreme Yang excess in relation to Yin.

 

It's ok.  I can relate to this. I had a periods where my Jing built up. I was feeling uncomfortable and hot and was probably quite "deranged". Like gasoline filled over without an engine consuming it.

 

I think transmutation first happens when you go deeper into stillness over longer periods. It happens from the "void" so to say. This would be the "Yin"-part of it all. After such longer meditations the Jing is really converted to chi and then to Shien / Ojas / Spiritual energy. But this is just descriptions / models that more or less approximate reality. All I can say is that you feel stronger and more robust, get a deeper voice, have less illness and have a a general radiance. For me those practices is about higher quality of life.

 

Also worth mentioning, the first month or so of daily meditations the general built up darkness and obstructions in the body seems to slowly loosen up and one may think nothing is happening, it is just uncomfortable and painful. But after a longer period light begins to be felt and you feel more and more of the positive effects. It's like big black blocks that are slowly melted and loosened and converted to pure chi. Then comes a point where you might feel more like energy / spiritual than material.

 

The theories of internal alchemy talks about Kan and Li. The fire of awareness (mind / heart) enter the kidney waters and the chi starts to sublimate. If you just meditate without the "Kan"-foundation (that is a supply of Jing) it can lead to lightheadedness and general weakness. So both sides are dependent on eachother. (In classical Daoism they are referred to as Nature and Life).

 

Weather or not testosterone is lessened by this I cannot say but you feel strong, balanced and have more vitality.