A valuable article from Deva Charu. Much of what she says is what I’ve found to be true in so many ways:

As the things that used to titillate me and turn me on dissolve, I find myself asking what is it to be ‘turned on’ when it does not come from my brain?

It seems to me that most of the things that are sexually exciting to us as human beings fall under one of the following categories:

1. forbidden in some way eg. making love in public

2. inaccessible, unrequited eg. lusting after someones spouse

3. ‘bad’, unethical, just plain ‘wrong’ eg. sleeping with someones spouse, a teacher, co-worker

4. shameful eg. longing for some sordid sexual act

5. punish-able eg. (see ‘bad’, unethical)

6. somehow involving control eg. a feeling ‘if I am sexy enough to win this persons attention, I have ‘won’ control over them

For some(most) of us, we have been raised so isolated from sex and sexuality that we are turned on by anything sexual because to us it somehow falls into one of these categories.

And yet, when we find ourselves in loving, committed relationships, these elements are generally not a part of it, or if they are, the novelty wears off after a while and we are left with a person we love, who loves us and…???  How in the world do you get turned on within such freedom and love?

I always had a feeling that most of the time when I felt ‘titillated’ it came from my brain…being a meditator I imagined that as I let go of listening to what my mind was telling me, and little by little found my way back to the wisdom of my body, that all of these turn-ons would go away and I would begin to discover what is ‘authentic sexuality’.

I believe that I have had moments of this.  The first of which occurred for me in India at the Osho commune.  Each evening we would do a 3 hour meditation which involved dancing, listening to a lecture, speaking gibberish (making sounds), and resting silently…whenever I would participate in this meditation I would feel my heart open, and with it, my vagina.  I would often leave the meditation hall feeling a slippery wetness dripping down my legs…I felt very alive, and none of it came from stimulating my brain or what I had come to believe was sexy.  It was simply a bodily response.

I have also felt this several times within my relationship, moments when I have felt so loved, and allowed myself to receive that love…as my heart would open, my vagina would open in a completely genuine, alive delicious way.

…and, of course, one of the main things that drew me to Tantra, and that keeps me consistently dedicated to this practice is that in Tantra I have often felt the sweet, authentic, connected opening that I so long for.

Several times in my life, including right now, I have felt a wall come up, or a switch has been flipped ‘off’.  The things that once turned me on no longer do and I feel strange and slightly less than human.

Although I regularly practice opening my heart and my body, it seems that the door to my authentic sexuality does not yet know how to stay open consistently and I find myself in an uncomfortable numbness.  Or perhaps it is that as I am opening more and more and journeying deeper into unknown territory inside of me, I am gradually uncovering walled-off areas that I had been able to avoid when I was more disconnected.  Perhaps there was a more comfortable layer of behavior that has been burned away by the meditation and I am sitting with parts of myself that I had been safely avoiding.

My intuition says that something beautiful is happening for me, that I am meeting a new side of myself and as I allow myself to feel what is happening in my body, I will begin to discover a new level of authenticity…perhaps make new ground-breaking discoveries about what is available between man and woman.  Perhaps touch the depths of myself on a new level and learn to experience even more of life, even more of lovemaking, even more intimacy.

In the meantime, I am having trouble letting go and allowing.  I feel confused, frustrated and wrong for experiencing this.  I feel a responsibility to satisfy my partner, I feel a pressure from within to ‘hurry up and get through this’ so that I can again feel alive the way that I once did.

I am afraid of the unknown.  Afraid of what comes after this point.

The point beyond excitement into a discovery of essential arousal.

in love,

Charu