So for the past four years I have attended a gathering that is focused around spiritual healing. The first two years I just partied my butt off and danced around the bonfires and had a good time. The last two years have become a little more serious for me, getting my reiki atunement last year and doing a sweatlodge. This year I did lots of deep meditation on my own thinking about love and what it really meant to me. A series of things happened to me when I got back home and I feel like all signs are pointing to me needing to study tantra. I have been practicing Hatha yoga on my own and doing meditations by myself, but I want more direction than just going to a yoga class for exercise. Basically I have no idea where to start. Do I just go get books and start reading about tantra? I know I’ll eventually need a guru, but when do I know that I’ll be ready for it. My understanding of most of this stuff is so small, but I feel this spiritual yearning pushing me towards this way in my life. Just a month ago I was drinking heavily and stripping, and now I have had an awakening to quit doing these things that harm. Its all just really hard to explain, I just really would like to know where to start.
You can come over to my house.
Ha.
Ok.
Joke.
Whats this tantra you speak of? Yes I’m leading you on.
Tell me.
Well for years I’ve had visions of shakti without knowing exactly what the image even meant. I’ve also had visions of the virgin mary. One day I was reading an article after I had gotten back from the festival and it was all about this woman’s journey in her life and how it had led her to yoga and eventually tantra. I felt as if I could relate to her story a lot with the pain and suffering she had been through. And then after I read the story I had remembered the visions I’d had of Shakti and the the virgin mary. I had no clue why I was thinking of these things after reading the article. So I went home and went online and discovered that tantra had to do with the female energy and that the traditional portrayal of shakti was the exact image I had a vision of years ago. Weird huh? I don’t have a complete understanding of tantra yet, I have lots of scattered facts all over the place but nothing concrete. I’ve also been reading about kundalini as well. I can’t answer this question you have asked me in completion so I don’t really feel comfortable answering. But I am so interested in gathering enough information for me to have an answer eventually!
As I see it the various hatha yoga practices in part . . . are to prepare the body and its parts . . . for eventual raising of the shakti and smooth transit to the places she can take you…
So right now I should solely be focusing on Hatha yoga?
What sort of meditation(s) were you doing? You don’t need to answer that. Deep mantra perhaps,breath or a combination or something more zen-like perhaps.
Tantric sadhan is basically sadhana of every available yoga, it may or may not include sexual, and hatha yoga is pretty big corpus.
The steps or limbs can be combined.Steady regular practice is key.
My knowledge of reiki is next to nothing.I think it’s to do with energies.
[QUOTE=Corizza;34041]So right now I should solely be focusing on Hatha yoga?[/QUOTE]
In terms of the Indian yogic systems I would be investigating:
Hatha
Raja
Bhakti
Karma
Jnana
Books, Scriptures, and Teachings . . . for good foundation.
Bhagavad Gita. The Upanishads. Autobiography of a Yogi. hatha yoga pradipika. Shiva Samhita. Yoga Sutras of Patanjali.
[B]From the Buddhist System I would look at the life of Yeshe Tsogyel[/B]
Corizza,
If you understand that tantra (magic) is basically concerned with your own spiritual survival, that it is an occult system of change which allows you to find your own soul amongst all kinds of hostile conditions and circumstances and that it is your Great Work, then that is the only tantra you should be bothering with.
I don’t know much about tantra, myself, but here is a link I saved that I believe would be a good place to start. Good luck in your journey.