Book about Celibacy : Way to Peace, Power and Long Life

This is a book by Swami Narayanananda that writes in great detail about Brachacharya or Celibacy.
it is very rare, but worth finding.

 

I would like to quote a paragraph from the spiritual autobiography "Game of Consciousness" by Swami Muktananda:

“I had seen the world, people of all kinds and in all walks of life, I had seen everyone from the king to the man on the street and also what happened to them in the end. All kinds of people came to my guru in Ganeshpuri because a saint belongs to everyone. There were business people, rich people, great artists, famous movie stars, singers, speakers and high government officials. They all had some problem they wanted to talk about. And no matter what else they had, there was one thing they all lacked - a healthy body. They said, “I have everything I want, but my heart is not healthy.

My sense organs are weak. Doctors don't allow me to travel or eat a full meal. "" My stomach hurts terribly. I've spent thousands of rupees on it in England and America, but the disease is still there. "" I've got everything, but I can't digest anything. I can not sleep. I have already spent two hundred thousand rupees on treatments.

One has a sick ear, the other a sick eye. Each brought grief and suffering to my guru. Everyone brought their worries and needs to him. Everyone was kind of poor, everyone was missing something, and they wept heartbreakingly. One was rich, but his health was poor. Another was healthy, but he had no money. A third was uneducated, poor in knowledge. A fourth was ugly, poor in beauty. One had no husband, the other no wife, and the third had no son. So everyone who came brought their own poverty with them and talked about their miserable situation.
I listened to everything quietly and wondered what I could learn from all of these people and what benefits I could get from them. To tell the truth, my situation was just like hers - poor in self-awareness and realization. I looked closely at them, they were pale, restless, sick, or rich, but not satisfied.
They had no strength or energy, just new diseases.
I realized that the cause of all this was the waste of sexual fluids, sensuality and, above all, an irregular way of life. "


One more thing I want to remind you about: expulsion of feces is far better than discharge of seminal fluid. This is not just for sādhus, renunciants, and celibates, because they have no relationship with the world anyway. It is for worldly people. You should live in the world and be happy. Husbands and wives should look upon each other as gods and love each other very much. You should preserve your seminal fluid, which is your radiance, as you save money, watching every penny. Never forget that a radiant human being can be formed from one drop of semen. Remember the value of the radiance of that one drop. If you lose it, all the best powders and creams and rouges and lipsticks will not brighten your skin. The radiance of the sexual fluid is the vehicle of Chiti Shakti. Consciousness is, as it were, bought with it. It is the means for activating Kundalini and the highest means of making samādhi stable. Look carefully and see the condition of the man who has wasted his sexual fluid.

I thought you all might find this interesting. Earlier in the book, Muktananda also describes visiting his guru, Baba Nityananda, and seeing all the people who visit asking for Nityananda's blessing. Muktananda observes that the one thing these troubled people have in common is their carelessness with sexual energy.


One more thing I want to remind you about: expulsion of feces is far better than discharge of seminal fluid. This is not just for sādhus, renunciants, and celibates, because they have no relationship with the world anyway. It is for worldly people. You should live in the world and be happy. Husbands and wives should look upon each other as gods and love each other very much. You should preserve your seminal fluid, which is your radiance, as you save money, watching every penny. Never forget that a radiant human being can be formed from one drop of semen. Remember the value of the radiance of that one drop. If you lose it, all the best powders and creams and rouges and lipsticks will not brighten your skin. The radiance of the sexual fluid is the vehicle of Chiti Shakti. Consciousness is, as it were, bought with it. It is the means for activating Kundalini and the highest means of making samādhi stable. Look carefully and see the condition of the man who has wasted his sexual fluid.

I thought you all might find this interesting. Earlier in the book, Muktananda also describes visiting his guru, Baba Nityananda, and seeing all the people who visit asking for Nityananda's blessing. Muktananda observes that the one thing these troubled people have in common is their carelessness with sexual energy.

 

The vital energy or prajna in a person basically exists in three states:

1. Normal or subtle state: In the normal state, vital energy is spread over the entire body (in blood, bones, muscle, nerves, etc.) giving us energy to indulge in various day to day activities. Pranic energy in this state is integral with the entire body in a state of harmony and union. The body is fully geared and the life force is available to perform action efficiently. Based on the kind of activity we indulge in, life force flows to that particular part to perform the action. For example when an athlete gears up to run a marathon, his life force focuses into his leg muscles. When a boxer is in the ring, his life force centers around his arm muscles, when a chess player in midst of a game, his life force is concentrated in his brain and so on.

2. Gross or semen state: When man is under sexual excitement, his life force or prajna is withdrawn from every part of the body and focused into the sex center. Life energy which was earlier in a subtle state of amalgamation with his blood, flesh, etc., in the normal state, separates from those regions to a large extent and flows to his sex center. This sends a signal for his testes to produce sperm. The prostate gland gets ready with the prostatic fluid. The Cowpers glands ready up the bulbo-urethral fluid [preseminal fluid]. Man is now fully geared up to engage in the sex act. Almost all his vital energy, except the basic energy required for his vital organs to function, has now come down to the sex center. Energy is in a sate of wait to propel semen out of his system. Note how sexually aggressive a person becomes when he is fully aroused in the sex plane. This is further to all his prajna being in a state of sexual focus; in this state man cannot efficiently indulge in any other activity other than the sexual act. Ask a fully aroused man to play a game of chess … he might not even remember the movements! Semen in this state is the linear, gross representation of his prajna or vital energy in liquid form. Energy which was earlier in electricity-like form has now become physical, embodied in liquid semen.

In a man who constantly resides in the sex plane, his prajna is mostly in this gross semen form. This is the reason such people cannot effectively carry out any other form of work. The nature of gross semen is expellation. Its sole purpose is to reach outside to aid reproduction. This is called the ejaculatory mode. It cannot perform any other function in this state. If not let out immediately, it will flow out in a wet dream.

Once in the ejaculatory mode, semen can never be fully reconverted back to pranic energy. The sexual glands have already secreted various physical secretions to manufacture gross semen. All these processes are not fully reversible even through transmutation and meditation. There are severe limitations. A considerable volume of vital energy will flow out, immaterial of meditation or celibacy, once it has reached this final gross form due to sexual duress.

3. Very subtle or ojas state: When a yogi leads a life of true celibacy, conserving all his vital energy and transcending it from its normal state to a highly concentrated, very subtle state through techniques such as meditation, asana, prajnayama etc., his prajna becomes very subtle in nature. Its intensity increases to a great extent. It is akin to gross water being heated and converted to superheated-gaseous steam in a distillation plant. Vital energy now has enormous potential energy. It rises up like steam does and reaches his ajna chakra or the point between his eyebrows. This is called ojas state. [ojas = radiant life energy] The full power of this state is said to come to a brahmachari on reaching 12 years of true celibacy, without wastage of even a single drop of semen. His pranic energy is now totally sublimated. It gives him the ability to enter the metaphysical word/astral planes. He can get astral visions, knowledge of creation, god, etc. Advanced urdhvareta yogis get powers such as trikala gnyana or knowledge of the past, present and future. Many ancient sages in this state had ashta siddhis or eight superhuman powers like levitation (ability to fly), astral travel, ability to make the body microscopic or macroscopic, bhuta vidya or the power to converse with wild animals and win their obedience, listening to sounds many miles away (doorashravana), power of sight ranging to hundreds of miles (dooradristi) and many more

I will give a detailed description of all the siddhis for the information of celibates in another answer sheet. Most importantly, the yogi gets vision of God and is blessed with self-realization. This is the highest state.

Celibates should understand what exactly sublimation is all about. Urdhvareta kriya in reality is not conversion of gross semen into ojas. It is conversion of subtle/normal prajna into ojas, by preventing the formation of gross semen. If you continuously indulge in sexual activity that brings down prajna from its normal state to a lower gross/semen state, sublimation becomes difficult and roundabout. It must again be brought back to its normal state and then taken to the very subtle/ojas state.

The answer to what happens in a man at the start of celibacy lies in this fact. At the start of celibacy when man shuns sex stimuli, his prajna or vital energy comfortably rests in the normal/subtle state. Earlier it was being brought down to form semen. Now that need has been removed. The body stops production of earlier quantities of semen. Initial stages of celibacy do not really involve re-absorption. Most volume of semen in gross form at the start of celibacy actually flows out. It is due to lack of further production by which energy levels go up. This is exactly why for celibacy to bear fruit say beyond three months or so, sublimation into ojas is necessary. Until this time the body is actually not in a state of re-absorption. It is only in a state of non-production and in a state of harmonization of existing prajna at the subtle state. Further to this, production of gross semen goes on reducing and formation of more and more prajna goes on increasing (provided the celibacy is true and genuine).

So when we say sublimation of semen into higher forms, it is really sublimation of prajna in normal state into ojas state. For prajna to reach normal state, man should desist from sexual excitement thereby prevent formation of gross/semen state. In an urdhvareta yogi, this is fully achieved. His body does not produce gross semen at all. The vital energy required to sustain his body and intellect are fed from that part of his prajna. The rest is fully converted to ojas.

Dhananjay on Sublimating

 

i don't think it always has to be yoga ... we in the west also have strong spiritual directions. no less than india. it is important that we ascend. And one day we will all get on the right track. And anything that helps us is welcome.