Thursday's Tantra: The Three Basics

Greenwoman returns soon!!! I can't wait until she shares what adventures she can with us upon her return. In the meantime, I am continuing her request to do some Thursday's Tantra posts. I've been enjoying them, so may continue the tradition. Perhaps we can get a whole slew of people writing about Tantra on Thursdays and have an unofficial webring or something.

There are three exercises that I always teach as the basis for any Tantric work. They are Deep Belly Breathing, the PC Pump and the Pelvic Tilt. It's best to learn each independently first so they are second nature. After that, you learn to combine the three.

The Breath

It's always best to start with the breath. You would be amazed at how difficult it can be to breathe correctly. Some people cannot feel their bodies. If you are one of these people don't give up, just keep trying and with practice you will get it. You want to really concentrate on taking a slow full breath in. Expand your belly, give room for your lungs to expand fully. Then when you want to exhale, just relax. Again, this may sound easy, but if you experience difficulty in isolating your belly and getting it to go out on the inhale lie down on the floor on your back. Put your hands on your stomach or a book or something so your awareness has somewhere to concentrate the sensation on.

When I coach, I always suggest starting any practice slowly so that you actually end up doing it. For most people an hour commitment every day just seems too difficult so they never begin. But if you start with three or four minutes a day, just lying in your bed before getting up, breathing deeply and consciously, you might actually keep doing it for more than two days. Then the more you do it, the more desire you have to remember to breathe this way. As time goes by you might want to more of it in the morning because it feels so good. You might even start to think of it in the middle of the day and check in on your body to see if you are breathing deeply or not.

People often wonder why I suggest learning this and stress it so much- it's because there is nothing on the planet that brings us into our bodies and brings us more present to the now than the breath. It's life and increases life force in our bodies, opening up orgasmic channels that help kundalini to flow.

The PC Pump

Women have been taught about this, the Kegel or PC (pubococcygeus) muscle, and how to exercise it for childbirth for years. We have been told that it reduces the incidence of incontinence that can develop with age. What isn't communicated, however is the importance of this exercise for men. Studies have shown that doing this exercise reduces prostate problems in men.For both sexes, this exercise enhances your sexual experience. For men it is the basic exercise for learning ejaculatory control and for beginning to learn to be multi orgasmic.

For women, it helps bring on orgasm and enhances your sexual experience, too. If you are a heterosexual woman, you can really enhance both of your and your partner's experience by learning to milk his vajra (Tantric word for penis. Another is lingham) with your muscles... it feels great to him and wonderful for you.

Some people have a hard time finding the muscle, but it can be easily learned. You just use the same muscles that you contract to stop the flow of urine. If you have any question as to what that feels like or which muscles you are supposed to be using, then practice the next time you pee. When you tighten the right muscle the flow of urine stops. You can start and stop numerous times to integrate the feeling. Then just replicate that feeling when not urinating, going back to checking when you are, just to make sure you have the right muscles. Many people think they are doing the right ones when they are really just contracting their lower stomach muscles. It's really a good thing to check.

Once you get the basic feeling down, you can play with the the PC Pump in a variety of ways: try tightening lots of times really fast. Then tighten it slowly or alternate fast and slow.Try doing it R...E.....A....L...L..Y slowly, hold, then slowly release.Tighten it to about a third of the way, then again tighter, then again. Then go down in increments.For women, when you reach the bottom, bulge that muscle out like you are pushing a baby out. This is one exercise to begin to ready your body for ejaculation, ladies.

For the women: you can stick you finger inside yoni as you do the exercises to understand the feelings and to give yourself a sort of visual or more integrated kinesthetic knowing of your body. This can be especially helpful when learning milking.

The Pelvic Tilt:

When first learning this one, I have found that the easiest way to feel the sensation is to lie down on your back with knees bent, feet flat on the ground. Take your fingers and feel the area right above cheeks of your butt. Most people have a bit of an indentation on either side of the top of a triangle bone called the sacrum. The bone then continues down into a point about five to six inches or so. This is where you focus.

Usually when lying down in this position, there is a natural curve to the back, with this triangle,or sacrum, slightly arched, leaving a space right above it between your back and the floor. To get the motion down, tighten your thighs a bit and flatten only that sacrum part of your lower butt/back to the floor. Don't round your whole back, just that part moves. Now press it under a bit more, arching the pubic bone up and tilting it at an angle. Then release and arch it the other way slightly exaggerating the space between the back and the floor. Again...this does not involve the whole back, just that sacrum area.

Try it a few times, then when you feel comfortable, do it rhythmically to a very slow beat, arching first one way then the other. Once feel you have the sensation of what it is supposed to feel like with the added pressure of the floor, you can then sit a zafu (or other pillow) on the floor or on a chair with no arms. Sit up straight on the edge of the chair, spread your legs and begin the motion in that position. Again..all movement is just in that lower part of the body- only movement below the waist should be going on. You can imagine that your pelvis is on a fulcrum moving back and forth while the rest of the body sits still.

Once you have this down, you can practice it in a variety of positions, always focusing on isolating that very lowest part of your body. Eventually you will feel so at ease with this, the Breath and the PC Pump exercises that you will be able to combine them for enhanced meditation practice, increasing orgasmic energy flow throughout the body, controlling sexual orgasmic release and grounding. I'll talk about that some other day in another post.

Images:

Diaphragmatic Breathing image from here

Pubococcygeous Muscle from here

Pelvic Tilt from here