Tantra on Huffington Post

(I just wrote this as a comment to an an article/post on The Huffington Post, about Tantra. It was too long so I am posting it here in its entirety.)

Lots of comments to this post. Some object to a connection between sex & spirituality, others are concerned that the teachings presented here (in the Huffington Post article) aren't pure Tantra. At the end of the day, or the year, or the lifetime, what matters most is that we have loved. Even the Dalai Lama has said that life is about experiencing happiness. If we can find ways to bring more love and happiness into relationships by drawing on some principles of ancient wisdom, so much the better for all of us.

Oddly, the spiritual training most pertinent to my leading Intimacy Retreats for couples is twelve years of dedicated, daily training in Aikido. Yes, a martial art, and yes, Aikido is indeed more about spiritual awakening than about fighting. And no, Aikido is not about sex. (It’s a martial art, not a marital art!) One thing I learned in Aikido is that when my partner (not considered an "opponent").. . when my partner in Aikido extends energy toward me, I can blend with that energy, I can enter into such a connection with that partner, that, literally, for that moment, we become intimately part of something larger. Through a process of centering, I encounter a larger sense of being that encompasses us both. This is also experienced with my husband, not on an Aikido mat, but in our more physically intimate bedroom time together. This feeling is what most people would call spiritual. Many today call it tantric sex.

Ten years ago, when we created a modified Qigong practice that we call “Tantra Tai Chi,” I had some reservations at first to using the name. But as the years have passed, and restaurants and bands also use the name Tantra, I have become more accepting of its use in the public vernacular.

I’m a certified instructor a moving exercise originated by a westerner only 40 years ago. He named it T’ai Chi Chih®. When I began teaching, I was warned by a teacher from a more ancient lineage that this could be dangerous. Since one of the places I taught was the Manhattan AIDS project, I had to laugh. Dangerous?

I have huge respect for those who delve deeply into powerful spiritual traditions. Yet perhaps it is in the light-hearted yet meaningful sharing of principles from those ancient traditions, that their value is further increased and maintained.

Practices taught at weekend workshops do not generally lead to rigorous and lengthy training. On the other hand, they encourage a lifetime of continued - and enjoyable - practice. The merging of meditation and sexual pleasure, the ongoing activation and expression of love and intimate presence, these are the rewards that even a watered-down and maybe slightly skewed teaching of Tantra can provide us with.

Happiness is contagious and I hope we all catch it.