Psychological Underpinnings Early in the twentieth century, Freud observed that emotional-sexual conflicts originate in the “oedipal” dynamic between children and their parents. He saw that one’s sexual impulses, which are present even in early childhood (especially in relation to one’s parents), are at the root of various emotional patterns and psychological problems. But as Adi Da Samraj has noted,
Moreover,
there can be no basic emotional ease or equanimity until individuals achieve at
least a personal resolution to this conflict — first by understanding its underlying
forces and patterns. Adi Da teaches that sexual problems stem in large part from
our ambivalence toward bodily pleasure. The intense desire for pleasure, epitomized
in sex, is a primal urge in human beings, linked to the reproductive and survival
instincts of the species. Because of its immense power, it is readily exploited,
not only by the advertising and entertainment industries, but by every conceivable
means in common society. [1] At the same time, human
beings struggle with negative social messages that condemn sex as the “great evil”
or “sin”, or as the root-source of all karmic bondage — notions that have long
characterized our collective social, moral, and religious traditions, both East
and West. In Adi Da’s estimation:
For
these reasons and more, Adi Da knew that to move His devotees beyond emotional-sexual
concerns and conflicts would require an open, yet profoundly intimate process
of inspection and self-examination, free of puritanical attitudes, prudery, and
squeamishness. In His Prologue to Love
of the Two-Armed Form, written in 1978, He summarized His rationale as
follows:
The Unique Nature of Adi Da’s “Reality Consideration” Adi Da’s early students were willing participants in this consideration and all the theatre that attended it. Once it was clear that a truly open context (free of social and sexual taboos) had been established in Adi Da’s Company, they felt free to explore their sexual fascinations and interests and also to divulge their sexual concerns, problems, and obsessions. Adi Da Samraj knew all of this was necessary if the emotional-sexual ego was to be exposed and unraveled for every type of individual. Thus, His devotees explored even their most secret and outlandish desires. His consideration with them included such things as the motives (and inevitable consequences) of promiscuity, the overcoming of sexual inhibitions and “functional and stylistic limitations”, fidelity vs. infidelity, multiple relationships, homo- vs. heterosexuality, sexual abstinence and celibacy, free and unrestricted sexual association, the use of erotica, and the emotional-sexual dynamics between intimates — all of these and more were freely and openly considered. There is no doubt that to expose the intimate details and tendencies of one’s emotional-sexual life is a highly charged and intensive process — requiring a depth of trust, while challenging one to confront patterns of inhibition (or exhibitionism), emotional dependency, exploitation, self-indulgence, rejection, jealousy, betrayal, and more. In the midst of these considerations, which often continued for weeks and even months at a time, Adi Da Samraj always returned His devotees to the most fundamental questions regarding sexuality and its relation to both ordinary life and spiritual practice: What is true? What serves real self-understanding and spiritual growth? What is “the right, true, and free regenerative function” of emotional-sexual life and practice? To understand this and to responsibly adapt to its implications was the motive behind all the “sexual theatre” engaged by Adi Da Samraj and His devotees. And as these considerations became conclusive, Adi Da would summarize the findings in His written Teaching, thereby passing them on to the world for all time. Here, for example, is His “radical” conclusion regarding the egoic search for pleasure via sexual satisfaction and fulfillment:
Perhaps the greatest lesson that Adi Da Samraj conveyed to devotees (and thereby to all beings) via such considerations, is that the common “solutions” to emotional-sexual problems — whether social, moral, or psychological — are never finally conclusive or fully satisfactory in themselves. Emotional-sexual patterns and tendencies are “like oceans” in their force and influence over us. Einstein once wrote that “problems cannot be solved at the same level that created them.” Adi Da has stated this same understanding metaphorically in relation to the patterns of emotional-sexual egoity (and of human immaturity altogether): “The ‘dog’”, He says, “must be washed from head to tail”. That is, a spiritually informed life, including the bodily reception of His Divine Spiritual Transmission, is the ultimate “answer”, the way and the means beyond the untamed “dog” of emotional-sexual patterns (and even all ego-bound tendencies and illusions). Rejection, Betrayal, and Retaliation Yet devotees, like people in general, have been obsessed with emotional-sexual interests and problems. And they have been reluctant to come to such mature understanding, even when directly instructed and served by Adi Da Himself. Indeed, far from getting these fundamental lessons, many felt hurt, betrayed, and disillusioned as their sexual patterns and interests (and those of their presumed intimates) were exposed. They could not accept an even more rudimentary lesson given over and over again in the midst of such consideration with Adi Da Samraj: every act of sexuality — indeed, every emotional-sexual encounter of any kind — carries real (and far reaching) consequences. When such exchanges are devoid of “active love and steady trust”, they inevitably stimulate feelings of rejection, betrayal, and resentment. As obvious and rudimentary as this may seem, human beings seldom demonstrate such understanding and responsibility in their intimacies. Adi Da’s devotees have been no exception. As a result, some have left His Company feeling hurt, embittered, and jealous, harboring a stinging resentment toward Adi Da and others. This was inevitable. But rather than viewing this as evidence of some “wrongdoing” or “mistake” on Adi Da’s part, it in fact confirms the force of our emotional-sexual bondage and the immature sexual gaming that has always gone on in social, interpersonal, and intimate relationships. And that was its point: to reveal the otherwise hidden and “secret” script — the emotional-sexual logic at work within each of us. When social and sexual sanctions are apparently lifted, it becomes immediately clear that human beings in general (apart from higher spiritual awakening) are sexually complicated — obsessed with promiscuity, self-infatuation, emotional insecurity, lust, self-pleasure, manipulation of others, and deceit. When their own expectations are frustrated or denied, they are fully capable of anger, rejection, betrayal, and every kind of spiteful, even violent, retaliation. (One means that Adi Da used to enable devotees to confront these patterns in themselves was to have each of them write a comprehensive history of their emotional-sexual lives and then to openly consider the details and egoic patterns it revealed with others. This was followed by practical disciplines that require a counter-egoic force of intention and action relative to what has been revealed and understood.) The Call To Be Love While the exchanges between Adi Da Samraj and His devotees uncovered every kind of limitation on emotion, sexuality, love, and self-understanding, they were primarily an intensive investigation of the dynamics of love itself, and a calling to what is beyond and greater than all forms of ordinary human expression. Adi Da’s constant urging was that devotees understand and transform the core patterns of their egoic lives. Among the enduring outcomes of His emotional-sexual Work with them is His fundamental Wisdom-Message and universal calling for love and self-transcendence in all relationships:
The Paradox Of Compassion: A Traditional Account In my own thirty-plus years as a formal devotee of Adi Da Samraj, I have seen Him engaged in every conceivable Teaching mode. By this I mean that I have seen Him radiate a Spiritual Presence of ineffable peace and sublimity, and I have also seen Him animate a ferocity and outrage that have shaken me to my core and stimulated every fearful and violent reaction in my being. I have participated in considerations with Adi Da relative to my own emotional-sexual patterning. In the course of these, I have often been offended, embarrassed, confounded, outraged, and more. In retrospect, however, I have come to see that Adi Da always employed the precise combination of instruction, criticism, discipline, and humor that have granted me a greater self-understanding — and also a greater ease and freedom in life. I have also seen Him Working openly with others relative to emotional-sexual intimacy and every kind of ordinary human concern. But whether fierce and outrageous or silent and serene, it is clear to me that He has always Worked to serve the human well-being and spiritual awakening of His devotees — and never anything else. That said, I can well appreciate that Adi Da’s interactions with others, including those no longer associated with the formal gathering of His devotees, have often been unsettling. It is virtually guaranteed that individuals will suffer difficulties, offenses, even apparent abuses, when approaching any true Master for spiritual instruction and liberation. We need not look only at the history of Adi Da’s Work to confirm this. The various Guru-traditions, ancient and modern, provide a vast body of supporting evidence. But that is not the whole of the story. The traditional accounts of interactions between Gurus and their devotees affirm the extraordinary compassion and “skillful means” underlying a Master’s (often paradoxical) work with them. As Adi Da writes:
A famous traditional example underscores this assertion: In the recorded account of the Tibetan yogi, Jetsun Milarepa, the story is told of his harrowing discipleship under Guru Marpa, whom he approached for initiatory instruction in the “secret teachings”. As a qualification for receiving them, he was repeatedly ordered by Marpa to build (and then raze) numerous stupas (or temple-houses). Working tirelessly, with extraordinary faith and tenacity, Milarepa built and then tore down numerous stupas at his Guru’s behest, carrying each stone from place to place on his increasingly sore back. Marpa’s demands seemed entirely ill-considered and capricious, while Marpa himself appeared indifferent to the trials and ordeals endured by his disciple. He pretended only outrage at Milarepa’s requests for the secret teachings. Here is a telling example of their strained dynamic (which Milarepa recounts with a touch of humor):
When the house was yet one-third finished, Marpa told Milarepa to tear it down, denying that he had ordered its construction in the first place, while insisting that its triangular design was inauspicious — “like a sorcerer’s temple”. The saga of Marpa’s contradictory commands continued, as he worked to purify Milarepa of past deeds and prepare him for spiritual initiation. When at last Milarepa summoned the courage to approach Marpa for this initiation, the latter responded:
Milarepa indicates that he well understood the penance he was enduring at Marpa’s feigned caprice. (Milarepa was reportedly a black magician in his early life, causing much devastation in the course of avenging the wrongful treatment of his family.) Nevertheless, his faith and endurance were tested beyond his capacities, so that he broke down on several occasions and even left Marpa for a short time, only to return with an even greater determination to receive the secret teachings. At long last Marpa granted his disciple’s fervent request. Overjoyed, Milarepa applied Marpa’s instructions with unflinching dedication and to the point of profound spiritual awakening. For the remainder of his life he sang hymns of praise and gratitude to his beloved Guru:
However much mythology is attached to this account, it vividly conveys the often strained ordeal of discipleship under a true Master. But it also shows that beneath Marpa’s facade of outrage lay a great depth of compassion for his beloved disciple. As we have seen, in the Reality-Way of Adidam, the initial trial to be endured has more to do with ego-transcendence in the domain of “money, food, and sex” than with physical endurance — although a similar disposition of faith and fortitude is required of Adi Da’s devotees, if they are to mature in the Way. Milarepa was of a time and culture more inclined to asceticism than ours, but the confrontation with egoity in the foundation stages of practice in the Reality-Way of Adidam can be as trying an ordeal — if devotees insist on making it so. Regardless of how any one might otherwise have it, a responsive, intelligent (albeit non-puritanical and non-moralistic) adaptation to “a right, regenerative, and lawful pattern of living” is necessary to prepare one for spiritual awakening in Adi Da’s Company. Remarkably, there is something difficult and demanding for everyone in the “right-life” disciplines that Adi Da enjoins devotees to embrace. And this is why “money, food, and sex” have been a principal theatre of His foundationary Work with individuals.
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