Sexuality and the Divine
Sexuality and the Divine
Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev
Sexuality and the Divine P &
© 2006 Isha Foundation
All rights reserved. No part of this book b ook may be reproduced r eproduced in any form without the written permission of the publisher p ublisher,, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. Published by: Isha Foundation 15, Govindasamy Naidu Layout, Singanallur, Coimbatore - 641 005. India. Phone : 091 - 422 - 2319654 E-mail :
[email protected] Website : www www.ishafoundation.org .ishafoundation.org First Edition : February 2006 Second Edition : August 2006
Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev is a self-realized and profound mystic of our times. He is an embodiment of the sages of the past who served as beacons of inspiration and guidance for entire civilizations; at the same time, he is acutely aware of current realities, making him a visionary humanitarian and a prominent spiritual leader of the world today. Also an author, poet, and internationally renowned speaker, Sadhguru's wit and piercing logic provoke and widen our perception of life. As someone who belongs to no particular tradition, Sadhguru's guidance and powerful scientific methods are totally relevant to the modern individual and institutions, allowing them to cross their limitations into a higher possibility. In this regard, he has been able to touch millions of 1
people, moving them towards realizing the ultimate potential within. Sadhguru's multi-faceted personality can have a profound and enriching affect on anyone who comes across him, and yet it can also stir them into a state of confusion. Being at home in blue jeans as much as he is in a loincloth, or walking barefoot through the mighty Himalayas, or straddling a BMW motorcycle on the expressway, he shatters any preconceptions that one might have of a mystic. In the Presence of the Master series are
discourses and answers to an intricate array of questions, by disciples and seekers amidst the challenges of life. Engulfed by Sadhguru's presence, the seeker is liberated from the pain of ignorance, firmly establishing the spiritual process within.
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In the following discourse, 'Sexuality and the Divine', Sadhguru's clear insight coupled with his wit and humor creates an appealing and in depth look at sex and sexuality. Dissolving the beliefs and misconceptions of the reader, Sadhguru sheds light on the fundamentals that constitute sexuality and the Divine.
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Existence happens in two different dimensions; the non-dual oneness of the existence on one level, and the many manifestations of the dual, on the other. All the manifestations, the various types of expressions that you see as life today, are fundamentally rooted in duality because there are two, there are many. If there was one, there would have been only one. When I say two, the duality is like - light and darkness, male and female, life and death. Because the two are there, all the games are happening. If there was only one, there wouldn't be any games. There would be just existence. The many manifestations, as I said, are fundamentally rooted in duality. Once duality comes, sex comes. When I say sex, probably in most 5
people's mind - the man is thinking of a woman, the woman is thinking of a man. It's not like that. The buds are blooming, it is sex. Because what you call as sex is - the duality is trying to meet, and in the process of the duality meeting, there are also certain functions that the nature wants to fulfill like procreation and survival of that species. Always the duality is trying to meet, because what was one has manifested itself as two. Now there is a longing to become one all the time. This longing to become one finds expression in many ways. When you are young and your intelligence is hijacked by your hormones, sex will be the way; physical sex will be the way. When you become middle-aged, when your intelligence is hijacked by your emotion, then love is the way. When you transcend all this, then if you seek the same union in a much higher level of awareness, then we say it's yoga or the Divine. There are many names to it. 6
Now, these two energies, which in the human race we are calling as male and female, are constantly trying to come together. At the same time, except for this longing to be together, there is nothing in common between them. They are lovers and enemies at the same time. Constantly this is going on, because they are opposites. If they look for similarities, there is no common ground, but the attraction of the opposite is always there. What you call as opposite is always a relative thing. So, the whole process of what we are referring to as sex is just two opposites making an attempt to become one. The intention of sex is good, but the method is hopeless. Never are you going to really become one. The intention is fine - that you want to become one, but the method is quite hopeless, isn't it? Pleasure is involved, so it draws people. But oneness never really comes. So we are trying to meet in areas of emotion and 7
intellect; trying to find some common ground. We like the same things, we like the same kind of ice cream, we like the same color. Like this, people are trying to find the common ground, but actually there is no common ground. Unless you understand that there is no common ground - you just learn to enjoy the opposite and it becomes a hopeless thing. To make a simple physical act beautiful, we have invented all kinds of decorations around it. Without those decorations, most people would be unwilling to get into this physical act. A lot of people cannot simply face the basic physical act as it is, because unless it's decorated, they will feel obscene, they will feel like an animal. They will feel so basic and physical, which is the reality. In some way, we are trying to cloud our vision of reality with lots of decorations. We always add emotion to it, because without emotion it would be ugly.
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See, sex is a natural thing. Sexuality is invented by you. Do you understand? Sex is a natural thing. It's physical, it's there in the body, but sexuality is something that you invented, you created. It's psychological. There is no such thing as sexuality, it is something created by you. Today, this is sweeping the modern world. It is no more healthy, in so many ways it has become sick. Because if sex is in the body, it's fine, it's beautiful. The moment it enters your mind, it becomes a perversion. It has no business with your mind; it has something to do with your body. If it's in the body, it will just fall into its natural place where it belongs. It is a small aspect of you, but today it has become a huge aspect; it has just become life itself. If you look at the modern societies now, I would say probably 90% of human energy is being spent either on pursuing sex or avoiding sex; whichever way. (Laughs) Yes or no? Whichever 9
way, it has become a huge aspect. But it is just a small thing; if you look at a man and a woman, physiologically, it is just a small difference. This simple physical process, we are trying to make it into so many things which it is not. It is just nature's trick to reproduce; because if this attraction was not there, you wouldn't reproduce. The species would end right now. But now, we have made such a distinction between men and women, as if they are two separate species. No other creature on the planet has this kind of problem with their sex as man has, isn't it? When they have it in their body, they have it; otherwise they are free from it. But with humans, it is on their mind all the time, endlessly. One big reason why this has happened is - somewhere in the past, especially in the West, it is not so much in the East - your religions went about denying a simple physical process to such an extent, they even had to make it 10
so ugly that they could not accept the simple biology of a human being. See, religion means liberation, isn't it? Yes? Religion means freedom. How can there be liberation, how can there be freedom when you cannot even accept the biology of a human being? They could not even accept the simple biology of a human being, so instead of looking beyond the limitations of the biological process, we tried to deny the biological process. We went about saying, if somebody is holy, if somebody is really sacred he cannot be born out of it. He is born without it. Now, once you do not accept the simple biological processes, that is where the bondage begins. That is where, in so many ways, once you could not accept the simple biological differences between a man and a woman and what happens, that is where the whole exploitation of the woman started. If we had no problem with the biology, then 11
we would not make a distinction between who is who. Everybody would be known for what they are worth, isn't it? Now whether somebody was born to a virgin or a prostitute, what's your problem? What the man is worth is all that matters, isn't it? So whether somebody is a man or a woman, what's your problem? What that person is worth, that's all that should matter to you. Only because you could not accept the simple biological processes, that's where the distinction, that's where all the exploitation started. And unfortunately, these few religions always denied the simple biology of life. You don't have to make the biology sacred, nor do you have to make it filthy. It is simply there, it is life. It is through that, which you exist. It is neither filthy, nor is it sacred, it's just life. If you know how to live it without decorating it or without making it ugly, it has a beauty of its own. 12
Now, the biological process which you are referring to as sex, fundamentally, it is reproductive. But if there was no sexual difference, if there was no sexual attraction between man and woman, I want you to know this, by now men would have killed all the women on the planet. Not one would have existed. They would be extinct by now. Only because there is a deep need, he has kept her alive. The physical strength of the man gives him the power to physically destroy the woman. If he had no need, he would have destroyed her long ago. Yes or no? Definitely it would have happened. See, anything that is physically weaker than him, he has gone about destroying, isn't it? The same would have happened to the woman, only because there is a need, the survival has happened. Now this need between the sexes, this need between the two biological entities of the same species is fine as a survival process; but if you are 13
seeking anything beyond survival, it will never be enough. Even people who are into this process, or even though this process is active in people in different levels, without the decorations of emotion they would not be willing to go through it. Now, unfortunately, in the Western countries it has happened this way, if you utter the word relationship, they simply think it has to be sex-based. Yes? Nothing else is a relationship. Some sex-based relationship is the only relationship. This is unfortunate. This has happened because your identification with the body has become so strong. As you get more and more identified with the body, sex or sexuality becomes more and more important. As you become less and less identified with the body, you will see, the sex recedes. You see in your own societies, somebody becomes very intellectually active, he becomes 14
identified with his intellectual process. Do you see the need for sex recedes in that man? Somebody who is physically identified with his body, in him the needs are very heavy. It's always so. Where you are identified, it is through that, that everything functions in you. So, in any relationship, sex-based relationship, if you discover one day that actually in the other person there is no emotion, it is simply physical, suddenly you feel that you are being used. Yes? After all it is sex, it is physical. That's all it can be, but without the decorations of emotion, you will feel that it's not good enough, it's an abuse. In sex-based relationships, what is usually passing off as love is just a mutual benefit scheme. You give me this, I will give you that. If you don't give me that, I won't give you this. It's like this - one day Shankaran Pillai went to the park. Shankaran Pillai means, it's a common name in India. He went to the park; there on one of the stone benches, 15
a pretty woman was sitting. He also went and settled down on the same bench. After a few minutes, he moved closer. She moved a little away. Again he moved closer. She moved a little away. Again he moved closer, she moved a little away. Now she is at the end of the bench. The only choice she has is, either she has to get up and go, or she has to do something else. Again he moved closer, now she pushed him away. Shankaran Pillai waited for a few minutes. It was evening, sun was setting. You know when the sun is setting, the twilight, those are the times you can say things and make people believe it. When the sun is up there, nobody is going to believe you. So, Shankaran Pillai went down on his knees and told her, 'I love you. I love you like I have never loved anybody in my life.' The woman is always a fool for love; she melted. Nature took over, things happened. Then it is becoming 7:45, he got up in 16
a hurry and he said, 'I need to go, I need to go.' 'What, you are going? You said you loved me.' In her understanding, the moment he utters the words I love you, they have become one. He said, 'No, no I need to go, my wife will be waiting. 8:00 is dinner time at home.' So I love you is a mantra. It's like 'Open Sesame', you know? You know that story, Ali Baba? So I love you is a mantra to open up things for you. Without it, things don't open. With the opposite sex, in sex-based relationships, without I love you, what you want won't happen. (Laughs) When a person transcends the limitations of his duality, when the struggle of the duality is gone in him, only then the divine manifests itself. What you are referring to as the divine, it is a much abused word, I know, but what you are referring to as the divine, if there is something divine, where should it be, or where can it be? 17
I just want to help you to look at things, you know, I am not propounding any theory or philosophy. I know so many philosophies are being propounded just to support people's sexuality. I don't see why you need a philosophy to have sex, it's just biology. You don't need a philosophy, isn't it? But people are always propounding philosophies to have sex. (Laughs) So no philosophy, I want you to look at it. Don't make a theory out of it. First thing, you make something which is so simple and basic into right and wrong. Then you want to find a philosophy to subvert the wrong and still have it. (Laughs) It's unnecessary, all these complications. If you just see the simplicity of what it is, it will become a simple part of your life. If you make it complex, it becomes an unnecessarily large part of your life, you know? Now, if there is divine, where can it be? If there is something that you can refer to as the divine, it has to be everywhere. If it is 18
just within you or just within me, or just in my temple and just in your temple, it's no good, isn't it? If there is something that you can refer to as divine, it has to be everywhere. If something is everywhere, what faculty do you have to know it? What faculty do you have to experience something which is everywhere? Right now, the only faculties of experience within you are the five senses. The five sense organs cannot experience anything if there is no perspective, or if there is no comparison. See, only because there is darkness, you know what is light. If there was no darkness, you wouldn't know what is light, isn't it? This is the way your eyes are made. Only because there is silence, now you know what sound is. Otherwise, your ears wouldn't be able to perceive. Your sense organs always perceive everything in comparison; always in bits and pieces. They do not perceive anything in its totality, always they perceive just 19
one side of everything, please see. Is it so? Right now, if I show you my palm, if you see this side, you cannot see the other side. If you see this, you cannot see that. This is how your eyes are made, isn't it? Once there was a philosopher fish. What, a fish, a philosopher? Yes. Is there anybody who is not a philosopher? Everybody has a philosophy for whatever they are doing, isn't it? If you want, you just go to the drunkard on the street and ask him, 'Why are you drinking like this?' He has a solid philosophy as to why he is drinking. Yes or no? You stop a thief and ask him, 'Why are you a thief?' He has got a solid philosophy as to why he is a thief. You go and ask a sex-maniac why he is like that; he's got a solid philosophy too. For whatever nonsense that anybody is doing, they have the support of a philosophy of their own. Without a philosophy, you cannot continue to do stupid things all your life. Your intelligence will not allow you to do it. If you 20
have a philosophy, you can go on doing the same thing every day, not thinking about anything. Especially if you get God's stamp on your philosophy, you don't have to turn back and look, you can just go on doing the same stupid things endlessly. Yes or no? The moment you get God's stamp on your philosophy you are through, you don't have to use your intelligence anymore. You don't have to wonder what nonsense you are doing with your life. You are just clear. Do you see the clarity on such people's faces? This is so with anybody. It doesn't matter which religion, which nonsense you belong to. The moment you get God's stamp on what you believe in, that's it. You don't have to apply your intelligence and see what are you doing with life, you can just go on. So, even a fish - a philosopher. One day this philosopher fish is in great misery, sitting in one 21
corner and thinking badly. I see that a lot of people here are into thinking, endless thinking. It's all flying around here, the thoughts. (Laughs) So, this fish is into deep thinking and misery. Another fish came by and asked, 'Oh, philosopher, why are you so miserable? What has happened to you?' He said, 'Oh, no, I am in deep trouble.' 'What is the trouble?' He said, 'Wherever I go; people are talking about the ocean. I wanted to see this ocean, so I went in every which way I could go, but I don't see the ocean. Where is it? Everybody is talking about it.' Now the problem is, he is in the ocean, he is part of the ocean; he is ocean in so many ways. But, no way to perceive it. If you are outside, you could see it, this is the ocean, this is not. But when you are in it, you don't know. Right now the same situation is with the divine. When there is something to compare it to OK, this is divine, this is something else; you could 22
recognize. But now if the divine, as you said, if the divine is everywhere, how will you recognize it? How will you experience it? Because the only way you can experience life right now is through the five sense organs. Yes? Is it so? So that which is everywhere, how to experience that? How to know that? Within the limitations of the five sense organs, there is no possibility. Seeking the divine is not something that you have to start as a project now. From the moment of your birth, the seeking is happening, but unconsciously. It is just that the choice that you have is either you can seek it unconsciously, or you can seek it consciously. If you seek it unconsciously, we can call it sex. One expression of unconscious seeking of the divine is called sex. One expression of it. If it becomes a conscious expression, if your seeking finds a conscious expression, then we call it a spiritual process. Generally, if it is looked at as 23
a science, then we say it's yoga. I know probably in your mind, yoga means twisting your body this way or that way. No, the word yoga means to become one. That's what love means, that's what sex means. Whether you are seeking it physically, or emotionally, or truly seeking oneness beyond all these limitations - if you're seeking it beyond all the limitations of your body, emotion and thought, then we call it yoga. If you are seeking it with the physical body, physical bodies will always remain two, no matter what you do. Yes? All kinds of weird things people are trying to do in the name of sex because somewhere they want to find some unity, but it won't happen. A few moments of fake unity will come and then people fall apart. It is bound to happen, isn't it? Physical entities can never become one. It doesn't matter how much they try. Unless you transcend the physical, there is no question of oneness. 24
Now, 'I don't want any oneness, I am just seeking pleasure.' That is also OK, but it is just that, you will see, it is not enough. I am not saying there is anything wrong with it; it is just that this human being will not be satisfied with it. It wants something more. Isn't it so? Just the physical pleasure is not enough. It wants something more. What is that something more? Something more than what this little person has become. Physical body means a bondage because in this vast existence this little body is a separate entity. If you are identified only with this little body, then there is a sense of insecurity, there is a sense of feeling lost. I would say at least 60% of the sex in the world is happening out of insecurity and nothing else. Not out of love. Not out of anything else. Not even pleasure, it is out of insecurity. Two bodies coming together feels a little secure for at least a few moments.
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Do you see in most relationships - most sexbased relationships are made because otherwise people are lost by themselves? Isn't it so? By themselves they are totally lost. They don't know how to be by themselves. It is not for love, it is not for joy, just because there is some sense of security in two bodies coming together. One thing I see is, for example, here on the streets, with all this affluence, with all the comfort that has come to the Western societies compared to other parts of the world, you see so much more insecurity on people's faces than anywhere else in the world. This is the reality. If you have not traveled around, this is actually the reality. Here on the streets of a metropolis like Paris, you see so much more insecurity on people's faces than a beggar on the street in the Eastern countries; it is so. This has happened simply because slowly the cultures took on too much of physical identity, they got too much identified with their own physical body. The more 26
and more you get identified with your physical body, the more and more insecure you become, because this body is never safe, next moment anything could happen to it, isn't it? Once your identification is limited to the physical body, then insecurity is the natural way, and the need for sex will increase dramatically when people are insecure. Now, seeking a spiritual process does not mean going to the temple, it does not mean believing what your father said, it does not mean believing what your priest said, it does not mean believing what your book said - whatever the so-called sacred books of the world. It simply means that you are seeking tools to go beyond the limitations of the five sense perceptions and experience something more than the physical. That's what a spiritual process means.
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Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev's tireless efforts towards bringing human well-being to all serve as the inspiration behind Isha Foundation's activities. Set up as a non-profit, non-political, and non-religious organization, the Foundation does not promote any particular ideology, religion, or race, but transmits inner sciences of well-being to multitudes of people across the world. In addition, it has also pioneered several projects of immense social value. Isha Foundation functions through over 150 centers worldwide. It is enabled by thousands of active volunteers from Asia, Middle East, Europe, and the U.S., whose dedication, compassion, and spirit serve as an example of an inspired humanity.
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