There are all kinds of interpretations and expressions of the tantric path.
The most common one I encounter is the assumption that it's all about sex. Probably orgies. Nudge nudge, wink wink.
Which, if you look at all the workshops and courses on offer, could be a fair enough assumption.
Though it's also a projection symptomatic of a culture of sexual repression and shame, which assumes, that anything to do with the body and intimacy or men and women in a room together must lead to sex!
Oh, and a woman talking openly about sex must be available and up for it.
To be honest with you, if you lay any of those assumptions on me at this point, you're likely to get an eye roll and a sigh. Because, quite frankly, I'm sick of it. It feels similar in kind to a cat call or smutty joke. Like really? Still?
Though, yes, I get that it's rooted in ignorance and absolutely endorse sex education, sexual healing and sexual empowerment.
All of which are a fundamental part of my work.
As I see it, we've all got a long way to go before the embodiment of those old patriarchal beliefs is transmuted. And the world will be a more healthy, beautiful, pleasurable and peaceful place for it.
BUT, in my experience, discovery and teaching, Tantra is about so much more than sex. And, paradoxically, the more you really get this, the better sex becomes !!!
At the other end of the scale, for example, there is the understanding - mostly amongst serious scholars, meditators and a far smaller select group of teachers, that this is a path of profound spiritual awakening.
Indeed, an authoritative translation of the Vijnana Bhairava Tantra (a key tantric text), is called "The Manual for Self-Realisation".
In the most rareified of these circles, sanskrit is parsed to the nth degree and "neo-tantra" (all that sexual stuff) is frowned upon.
Here, there can be the claim to superiority and ultimate knowing. "This is what Tantra is. And anything else is hog-wash."
The minute anyone claims to know "the" truth or stakes a claim to some kind of superiority, I'm outta there.
And yet, for me too, this IS a path of self-realisation. And the deeper and longer I journey with Tantra, the more apparent this becomes.
Which doesn't mean I now want to retire to a nunnery. LOL !
Oh No!. My own path is devoted to awakening right here with what is. Including the full and juicy integration of my sensuality.
As my tagline says: Bringing Tantra to Life.
I stepped onto this path after ending a sexless marriage and desperately wanting answers and healing.
It exploded my ideas of pleasure, orgasmicness, womanhood and relating. And set me on a path of continual revelation.
It even catalysed a total career change. (I wasn't born wanting to be a Tantra teacher ya know!)
And as I taught and sought over the years, my understanding and experience grew ever more fine.
Until I really did understand what one of my teachers meant, when he said that all of life is a great making love.
Only this time, not as one speaking from a sex-fixated standpoint, but from the humble, embodied recognition of a spiritual truth.
So you see, my own experience has taught me, that we start where we start and usually the start is closer towards the "it's all about sex" end of the spectrum.
Though Tantra will also call to and benefit those spiritual seekers so attached to their transcendence, that they are by-passing like troopers and failing to integrate all that light into the material and every-day.
Ultimately, nothing and no-one is wrong.
It's all just a choice and a resonance. We go where we are called. Where the feeling is "right".
If my flavour of Tantra feels right for you or you want to taste it, come and join me at one or both of my monthly online tantric practice groups: the mixed Tantric Temple or the women-only RAPTURE Study Group.
Sessions are scheduled 12 months in advance, so you can pre-book session by session or save and book for the year.
NB. The next Tantric Temple is on Wednesday, April 20th, 7-9pm GMT, and the next RAPTURE Study Group is on Wednesday, April 27th, 7-9pm GMT.