Sex, Drugs and Ritual
I'm sick.
I'm sick because I had too much.
Yep, an espresso AND a coke... 5 hours ago.
I don't do caffene. Not out of any malice towards it, or wierd hippy health reasons, but simply because I respect it as a powerful stimulant which is legal and redily available. So by keeping off the stuff, when I do need it, it will be effective. Sometimes I forget how much of a lightweight I am (like, when I'm nodding off in my chair with 4 hours of work to go) and get too much, but for the most part, I use it only when needed, and it's usefull for that. This is my issue with candy tripping in general, be it alcohal, pot, or other drugs. I don't do this out of habit, I do it with intent, and by allowing myself to become acustomed to it, I reduce that effect.
Now, how aplicable is this to sex and ritual?
With sex at least, I don't think anyone can deny that, as with any other physical activity, our bodies become acustomed to it. No one will ever experience an orgasm like their first. They may learn to come close with proper technique and a skilled partner who has come to know them over time, but there is a certain something that will never be achieved again. that all consuming death in ecstacy.
On the flip side, very few things are more akward and clumsy than your first time in the sac. With time and patience, and intent, you can learn about your partner, and your experience together can reach new heights as you learn about each other and yourself in a wholistic fashion. That being said, know one another, and then take a break, and see if the time away does not make the return all that much more powerfull. Once again, there is something to be said for abstinance, if only for a time, and with specific intent.
And now what is left?
Ritual.
Reciently I was at a suspension. It was private and went well enough. it's almost become routine there. People were talking and laughing while hooks were being thrown, and then there was smoking and discussion while the rigging was done, and aftercare was done with people who knew the routine so well, they bairly paused their conversation to handle it. I have nothing against this for other people. It just doesn't work for me. Now, ritual, like sex gets better as you take your time to learn to understand it and yourself. However, like sex, the instant you allow it to become "routine" then, once again, for me and me alone, you might as well stop. What is the point? For me it's focus, it's coming into a mindset, and being there.
For 3 years I was at a dojo 6 days a week, hours each day, and at no point did it ever become routine. Despite other peoples opinions of my sifu, and things he may have done later, after I was no longer with the dojo, at least while I was there, he provided an environment which for me, at the time, was not routine, despite regularity. it was every time a sacred experience, a world apart from my daily life, and in which I became a different person, a skilled worker, improving myself.
Can you do drugs regularly without them becoming routine? I don't believe so. I believe there is a physilological reaction that builds up an imunity and they CAN NOT be as effective every time.
Can you have sex regularly without it becoming routine? While your body will not react the same way as it would given abstinance, I do believe regular sex can still be a sacred event, but if only on a physical level, it can not be as powerfull as if you abstain.
and then there's ritual.
Drugs are a physical substance. Anything you do around them is not the drug, and hence the drug itself requires a physical reaction. Physicaly repition takes away from effect.
Sex is both physical and emotional. While the physical effect is diminshed, this is in many ways compensated for by the learned skill, and of course there is the strong emotional connection (I would hope anyway) which allows for a sacred event every time if both people are willing, but will never be the same on the physical level with and without abstanance.
And then, as I said, there is ritual. Ritual is an outward sign of inner work. As the body learns the ritual, it flows smoother and the mind is free to do it's real work. The mind becomes better, not worse with repition, and repition reenforces rather than breaks down a reaction. So the more you do something, the more you will experience similar results. To aproach something as routine, will make it at points in the future MORE routine, however, to aproach time and time again, the same act as sacred, as divine, will set the precident to make a powerful experience.
Now, some ritual such as suspension has a very strong physical element to it, and for those, the above points on the bodies ability to make something routine must be minded, however, I believe that the majority of a rituals routine nature is strictly the fault and responsibility of those involved, to keep their minds in check and to establish for themselves the experience they wish to have, and manifest it.
I am going to work on this, starting today.
-- James
I'm sick because I had too much.
Yep, an espresso AND a coke... 5 hours ago.
I don't do caffene. Not out of any malice towards it, or wierd hippy health reasons, but simply because I respect it as a powerful stimulant which is legal and redily available. So by keeping off the stuff, when I do need it, it will be effective. Sometimes I forget how much of a lightweight I am (like, when I'm nodding off in my chair with 4 hours of work to go) and get too much, but for the most part, I use it only when needed, and it's usefull for that. This is my issue with candy tripping in general, be it alcohal, pot, or other drugs. I don't do this out of habit, I do it with intent, and by allowing myself to become acustomed to it, I reduce that effect.
Now, how aplicable is this to sex and ritual?
With sex at least, I don't think anyone can deny that, as with any other physical activity, our bodies become acustomed to it. No one will ever experience an orgasm like their first. They may learn to come close with proper technique and a skilled partner who has come to know them over time, but there is a certain something that will never be achieved again. that all consuming death in ecstacy.
On the flip side, very few things are more akward and clumsy than your first time in the sac. With time and patience, and intent, you can learn about your partner, and your experience together can reach new heights as you learn about each other and yourself in a wholistic fashion. That being said, know one another, and then take a break, and see if the time away does not make the return all that much more powerfull. Once again, there is something to be said for abstinance, if only for a time, and with specific intent.
And now what is left?
Ritual.
Reciently I was at a suspension. It was private and went well enough. it's almost become routine there. People were talking and laughing while hooks were being thrown, and then there was smoking and discussion while the rigging was done, and aftercare was done with people who knew the routine so well, they bairly paused their conversation to handle it. I have nothing against this for other people. It just doesn't work for me. Now, ritual, like sex gets better as you take your time to learn to understand it and yourself. However, like sex, the instant you allow it to become "routine" then, once again, for me and me alone, you might as well stop. What is the point? For me it's focus, it's coming into a mindset, and being there.
For 3 years I was at a dojo 6 days a week, hours each day, and at no point did it ever become routine. Despite other peoples opinions of my sifu, and things he may have done later, after I was no longer with the dojo, at least while I was there, he provided an environment which for me, at the time, was not routine, despite regularity. it was every time a sacred experience, a world apart from my daily life, and in which I became a different person, a skilled worker, improving myself.
Can you do drugs regularly without them becoming routine? I don't believe so. I believe there is a physilological reaction that builds up an imunity and they CAN NOT be as effective every time.
Can you have sex regularly without it becoming routine? While your body will not react the same way as it would given abstinance, I do believe regular sex can still be a sacred event, but if only on a physical level, it can not be as powerfull as if you abstain.
and then there's ritual.
Drugs are a physical substance. Anything you do around them is not the drug, and hence the drug itself requires a physical reaction. Physicaly repition takes away from effect.
Sex is both physical and emotional. While the physical effect is diminshed, this is in many ways compensated for by the learned skill, and of course there is the strong emotional connection (I would hope anyway) which allows for a sacred event every time if both people are willing, but will never be the same on the physical level with and without abstanance.
And then, as I said, there is ritual. Ritual is an outward sign of inner work. As the body learns the ritual, it flows smoother and the mind is free to do it's real work. The mind becomes better, not worse with repition, and repition reenforces rather than breaks down a reaction. So the more you do something, the more you will experience similar results. To aproach something as routine, will make it at points in the future MORE routine, however, to aproach time and time again, the same act as sacred, as divine, will set the precident to make a powerful experience.
Now, some ritual such as suspension has a very strong physical element to it, and for those, the above points on the bodies ability to make something routine must be minded, however, I believe that the majority of a rituals routine nature is strictly the fault and responsibility of those involved, to keep their minds in check and to establish for themselves the experience they wish to have, and manifest it.
I am going to work on this, starting today.
-- James