Tantra Sessions Work
This is the most mysterious part of our teaching
work. As far as we know, our approach is unique. If there's
ever been an equivalent approach, it died out
some thousands of years back.
Mysterious, in that it's a mystery and something
of a miracle that it's possible to do what we do. Not complicated
though. Simplicity itself. For the time you're with her, the
Dakini has just one agenda…
Supporting you as best she can, as compassionately and honestly
as possible, towards your full capacity for awareness. However
that looks and whatever it takes.
Note: The agenda is not your "better adjustment"
to society, or "healing" of whatever you may view as an "illness".
To whatever extent it looks like this happens with some students,
it's purely a by-product of the work, not the centre of it.
Tantra Sessions are not in any way a "sexual
service".
Any idea that a Dakini can be paid to have sex with you is
just plain wrong, and is probably dangerous, as is anything
disrespectful of the Goddess. Also, she is available to support
your awareness, your own spiritual development. Not to substitute
for it, or to do it for you.
It may look to you like you come for a session,
as with a doctor or psychologist, but the similarity is just
due to how we arrange our time in this modern world. If you
are sincere with your interest in Tantra, it is likely you
feel some old-world resonance of approaching the Dakini's Temple
as a Devotee. Something of awe, something of wanting, and beaucoup
willingness is what's appropriate.
The spiritual path is not a smooth, well ordered
highway. There's an old Ninja tenet we're fond of:
"Don't follow a path. Go instead where there
is no path, and leave a trail."
The Teachers of this school have pioneered this
"close loving personal guidance" approach to spiritual work
as part of the trail we cut. It's huge fun, often scary, and
is recommended only for the most insistent of seekers.
This work is deeply individual, and not much
useful can be said about methods in general. Dakinis each have
a huge range of technique, which they use, guided by intuition
and informed by their experience. If they feel another teacher
in the school (or outside it) would be particularly useful
for some aspect of their student's learning, they will recommend
and refer.
Although Tantric work is often really, really
sexy, and often delightfully, heartbreakingly delicious, it's
also firmly uncompromising around issues of truth and is nonnegotiably
under the direction of the Dakini. She's OK for your experience
to be a suffering as well as blissful, as long
as it serves and supports your ego-shattering, your true freedom.
Tantric Practitioners: Dakinis And Dakas
A Dakini, the kind in human form, is roughly equivalent to
the Muse of Western stories. She inspires the male, taking
him to the full expression of himself in the world.
The student has obstacles to the expression
of his Highest Self. Releasing these pretty much always involves
revisiting the trauma that originally set the resistance in
place. This is catharsis, the intense and complete experiencing
of emotion that has long been contained, resisted, bottled
up.
This is why many stories of Muses and other forms of Dakini
picture them as willful, capricious, massively egoic, vengeful
… in a word: trouble. They use the full range of manipulative
tools and shock tactics that wives and other women have. Deliberately.
An in-school joke: What's the difference between the Goddess
and a Dakini?
Answer: You can negotiate with the Goddess.
From more modern times, legend has it that once upon
a time, Timothy
Leary met Crazy
Charlie and had just one
conversation with him. It went like this:
Tim to Charlie: WHY?
Charlie to Tim: Because
the women have all the power.
There's a lot in that little conversation.
So a Dakini is a woman. Women are powerful trouble. Sorry
female beloveds, but this really is true from the male perspective.
The male beloveds know what I mean. So what's the difference
between anywoman = trouble and Dakinis = trouble?
The difference is awareness.
Most women use their power, unconsciously,
with unconscious motivation and objectives.
The manifestations of her power, the
effect it has in the world around her is sometimes noticed,
but remains mysterious to her. She likely has
a nagging feeling that she's missing something, and is often
a good source of income for cold-readers, fortune tellers,
psychics and psychologists. They have a deep usually completely
unconscious fear of anything in life not fitting how TV tells
them things "should be". Collectively their power
is immense, even though, individually, privately, they may
have disagreements with the cultural way, they accept it's
how things are done.
Somewhat more aware are women who use their power unconsciously,
with unconscious motivation but
for conscious
objectives These
are the women-warriors. Attila the Hens. Maggie Thatcher,
St.
Jean d' arc, Boudica, Poolan
Devi Condoleeza Rice and less obviously
Jane Fonda and Oprah. They have a cause, a battle to fight,
and they often do so magnificently. They feel compelled,
driven to their battles but aren't in touch
with the source of their motivation or aware of their real
enemy. With just this degree of awareness, however, some
of them really manage to rock the world!
More aware still are the modern Hetaeras who
use their power still unconsciously,
but with conscious motivation for conscious
objectives. Women who don't accept cultural restrictions.
They either cover up carefully like Glen Close in Dangerous
Liaisons (at amazon or kalahari),
circumventing the strictures of the Women's Union, or ignoring
the hatred of their less evolved sisters, they pay the cultural
taboos less than lip service. They often have
influence in the arts and politics. Lola
Montez, Lilly
St. Cyr, Marilyn Monroe, Madonna. Appreciated,
even worshipped (often in secrecy) by men as the closest
representatives of the Goddess they know.
Spiritually evolved, and greatly aware,
a Dakini has one purpose – your spiritual advancement,
from wherever you are to wherever you can go.
She is operating consciously with Love and all the leverage
that affords her, to pry apart defences, smash ego and put
Truth where it can't be ignored – that you might wake
up to your purpose, your flowering. She's an emissary of Life,
tempting you to really Living, to experiencing the real fruits
of your existence.
A Dakini can be loved, adored, worshipped… that's
essential… but she can never be owned. No artist, no
poet could expect his Muse to be permanently available, or
in any way exclusive, to him. They do what they do, live as
they live so that they may serve existence in this way. Any
restriction on their freedom, their flowering, is a restriction
on their usefulness to existence. Another way to express this
is to say that they are already married – to The
Divine.
Dakas in this school, in sessions, work strictly to
the directions of a Dakini when a female student (or another
Dakini, or prospective Dakini) of theirs can benefit from something
that particular Daka is practiced in. Very sensitive work indeed,
and not often required. No, we're not hiring, please, guys,
we're not even reading your applications anymore. Stoppit!
Dakinis and Dakas are those who know, at their deepest level,
that this is their calling, their vocation. The commitment
required is not "great" or "huge", it's
total. Every aspect of being is involved. To work effectively
with Tantra, an impeccable mind, a healthy body, an open heart
and a significant degree of spiritual awareness are required.
So, for Dakinis, diet, exercise, meditation and some form
of energy work are important. Dakinis work on themselves, their
bodies and minds using Yoga, Tai-Chi, and practicing various
arts along with lots of silent sitting meditation.
The Buddha's injunction to practice "right livelihood" is
also important. Being involved in a business that profits from
or causes damage to the earth is not compatible with tantric
practice. Neither is being involved with any enterprise that
derogates the Goddess, or any aspect of the Divine Feminine.
These are not "rules", they are simply facts. Keeping
the heart open and loving is essential to working with sacred
sexuality. The heart can't be open when you're doing that which
offends it.
The judgments of the surrounding culture also have to be
faced. Many people focus on the sexual aspects of the work
and reckon that "Dakini" is synonymous with "whore".
Mainstream religions have done an effective job of convincing
people that sex is inherently sinful, and this judgment has
infected even non-semitic religions.
So a Tantrika, Dakini or Daka, has to face the same cultural
judgment as a sex worker. She has to make a living from her
healing work, or supplement it with something compatible with
her ethics/aesthetics. Maintaining her body, mind and spirit
is a full time job, whether she has one client a month, or
a dozen. Her lovers (outside of her healing work) are limited
to those who have transcended jealousy, or willingly take on
that journey. It really is a miracle that there are people
in the world that are willing and able to do this work. It's
not surprising that they are rare. Appreciate them.
