Sexual abstinence for or against

[therootbeersprite]

It really matters what your intention is with abstinence from anything. For example, Jews abstain from eating pork or shrimp as part of their Covenant with G*d. What would be your purpose for abstaining from sex? This isn't a rhetorical question to tell you to disregard the idea, just an emphasis for you to understand for yourself why you are making the choice that you do, and to act with intention.

I also want to point out that abstaining from sex can divorce you from being in unison with the world around you. For many people, sex is just a natural part of being human. Sex can help you to connect with your humanity, and/or your animality. Again, this isn't meant to sway you one way or another, only to offer some perspective. Maybe you want to divorce yourself from the world around you, maybe you want to connect with it - Both can be paths of or towards spirituality.

 

[MorganBlack]

At least for the diabolist grimoires like the GV., sexual abstinence and other preparations are not about morals. These rituals include a journey to the underworld. You're entering the place of death, not life. Sexual abstinence, fasting, turning inward and away from worldly distractions, and quieting the passions make you more "dead" so you can pass into that world more easily. You might get mistaken for another one of the dead and avoid detection from some of the worser things that also live there. Not fun. Appropriate also here is shamanic emphasis on invisibility when traveling to the underworld . Other rituals that are mythically more life-centric? For them, I'd say go sow some oats ahead of time. Or maybe adopt a puppy or kitten, be joyfu, full of life (hell, do that all the time, good stuff!). Ramp up, not down.

 

[White Wizard of the West]

I’ve personally had powerful magical experiences when intentional abstintense. I feel it concentrated my energy (which I was then able to direct). Like others said, I am not picking a team or side. There is a time and place for everything. As with fasting, sexual abstinence has its place for a time. For myself, just as I wouldn’t always be in a state of fasting from food, I’m not always in a state of intentional abstinence. All things come and go in cycles, fasting and abstinence included. I am interested if others who have practiced intentional abstinence (and had success), find it is more powerful during certain phases of the moon, seasons, or times in life? My last episode of great power and insight whiile practicing intentional sexual abstinence was from a time in the fall season to a few weeks after the winter solstice.

 

[freed-mana]

Wanted to chime in to say a few things I have learned:

• Sex magic is more about the astral than the physical
• Abstinence gives the kidneys more spiritual power
• Kundalini sex exists but it requires absence of karmic entanglement, which is difficult to achieve without complete trust
• Abstinence owing to shame is not true abstinence -- it is simply a manifestation of unboundaried behavior

 

[HoldAll]

I can't help but wonder if it's purely a guy thing when chastity is more about personal power like in this thread or here than the sensual delight of sex in general. Women seem to be more energised after sex, not deflated like men. Taoism appears to be paranoid about the loss of semen and recommends retention but what about female fluids? The old grimoires were all written for men and I presume also the Taoist manuals, and I'd be really curious about how women think about sexual abstinence.

 

[Morell]

I can't help but wonder if it's purely a guy thing when chastity is more about personal power like in this thread or here than the sensual delight of sex in general. Women seem to be more energised after sex, not deflated like men. Taoism appears to be paranoid about the loss of semen and recommends retention but what about female fluids? The old grimoires were all written for men and I presume also the Taoist manuals, and I'd be really curious about how women think about sexual abstinence.

Interesting question.

You said yourself that men are really hardwired for sex, while women far less so. They are the ones after sex to carry the baby and are then expected to raise it. In a way that is insanely greater loss of energy and time than of semen.

So actually they are way more focused on sexual abstinence. Needless to say, the society expects them to do that and in history if they weren't, they were murdered for being impure. (while their lovers just punished) Consider how hard the tradition is on Muslim women. In some way it used to be like that everywhere. Magic tomes for men were in an ironic way making man to catch up with strict discipline demanded of women.