Remember. You are safe.

On letting it in and letting it go

Do without doing and everything gets done. This phrase entered my mind today, a reference to the Taoist concept of Wu-Wei. The idea is that when you are in touch with the Tao, which is the informing principle of nature, (or the natural order of the universe), and you allow yourself to become an instrument of it, rather than resisting what is present and acting according to your own selfish desires, everything happens without you… doing it. 

It can be a bit confusing to wrap yourself around this notion at first because there is a necessary awareness of, or at least openness to the Tao itself, that lives beneath the possibility of experiencing the truth of Wu-Wei. 

My own relationship with the Tao is akin to many people’s experiences of God. Not the Judeo-Christian man-in-the-sky-who-we-must-fear, god. The God that is experience experiencing itself. When I talk about God I am referring to this relationship. This attunement. This communion. This attention to the natural order of things. This awareness that I am an instrument of God or the Universe. That I am a vessel. A hollow bamboo. A receiver and a transmitter. A channel of recognition and sensation that I am not in control of, that is not right or wrong, and that need not - cannot - be justified or classified or defined. 

In the words of Lao Tzu from the Tao Te Ching:

“The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao; the name that can be named is not the eternal name. The nameless is the origin of Heaven and Earth; the named is the mother of all things.”

To experience this, I must, layer by layer, surrender my identity and all the beliefs and expectations and stories that go along with it to arrive at the recognition that I Am. Period. I Am, and I remember, and I forget, and I am reminded again, and that seems to be the natural order of things. Just ask Alan Watts. “Now you see me, now you don’t” is how he often described the nature of God’s game. 

There is a necessary recognition that we, humans, don’t know anything, until we experience. And even then, it is just a temporary recognition, apt to change at any moment. Any way the wind blows. So it follows: to experience what is, we must stop resisting what is arising in the present. In other words: be here now. I know you’ve heard that. But do you live it?

We tend to walk around with ideas about how things should be, right? Most of us have a plan and we think if we just execute the steps we lay out, we *should* arrive at the destination we expect to. And sure, that happens sometimes, often by force (high-powered vibrator day after day, anyone?), maybe by luck. But that is not Wu-Wei, and in essence, it is directly opposing the natural order of the universe. Throwing the balance off, so to speak. 

You can think of this in terms of yin and yang. The feminine and masculine, the receptive and the penetrative, the dark and the light. We need both, in balance, just as nature (which we are) needs balance to thrive and continue to produce its bounty. It needs and produces different nutrients on different days. It needs different seasons, different climates, different elevations, different minerals, different plants, different animals. Nature is a balance of all things. And with infinite variables constantly in motion, the only way to come into balance is to become aware of what is necessary now. Nature operates in patterns, generally, and still, it is unpredictable. Still, we cannot know it is going to rain until it is raining. The clouds can look full and grey and still need another day until they pour. I think Karen from Mean Girls was the perfect demonstration of what a weather forecaster is really doing. Noticing, “Oh! I'm wet. Must be raining.”

Can we agree on that? Yes?

Let’s proceed, then, 

What does this have to do with pleasure? Everything. 

In Taoism, a self pleasure practice is referred to as self cultivation. In essence, it is the practice of cultivating a self that is free to experience what is present. Cultivating a serenity, a blissfulness, an openness to what is arising as the natural order of things. It is a practice of non-judgement. Of self mastery. Of not acting upon the emotional impulses that might habitually arise. Of harnessing the strength and willingness to pay close attention to what is moving through the body, and following that sense with precision. Which, if followed through, can lead to orgasm. It is also a way to circulate and cultivate healing life force energy.

Of course, this way of present to the demands of the moment would be a lot easier if we weren’t all so damn conditioned to believe that “pleasure” means one specific thing, or that pleasure is forbidden, or can only be experienced in certain environments with certain conditions and certain people and certain times, and etc, etc etc. I could go on forever. Anyway. That’s why we practice. To notice the conditions and through our awareness, free ourselves from them.

Now that we’re talking about orgasms, you might be wondering… “but if come - if I get what I wanted - isn’t that enough?” Well, sure, it could be. But then maybe it isn’t. I don’t know. You have to ask yourself that question.

Maybe you find yourself continually seeking for more of something because the first go round just wasn’t quite enough. Maybe, because you forced your way there through a series of predetermined steps, you missed everything that could’ve made the experience satisfying beyond the realm of pleasure as a means to an end. Do you see where I’m going?

Yes, it’s nice to have a big fat screaming orgasm, and sometimes  taking the well-trodden road gets you there just the way you like it. Yet other times, there’s a different journey to take. One that could be more useful. More enlightening. One that could illuminate for you something you might not have otherwise found. Which, if you’ve been reading, you might have noticed is something that happens for me quite often in my own practice.

It’s about the journey, not the destination. And before you get on my ass (pun intended)… yes, have goals, but don’t make them the end-all-be-all. Have goals, and use them as jumping off points. PAY ATTENTION to what’s happening, and you might find your path veers differently than you anticipated. You might find yourself, eventually, at the destination you sought for, but perhaps the path will be much more winding than you ever could’ve thought. 

When it comes to sex, solo or partnered, this is especially true.

Here’s a little story about balance.