You’re doing your Yoga. You meditate. You try to use your ‘giraffe’ ears to listen well. You won’t say anything un-PC (politically incorrect) for fear your twisted sense of humor won’t be understood. One of the most intriguing concepts to come forward in many a year is the idea of using sex and intimacy as a consciousness raiser! We Westerner’s love ideas like this. We eat them up (no pun intended).

But the point is: Anything you do in life is a potential Consciousness Raiser! ANYTHING. Be it sex, meditation, communication, yoga, Buddhism, gardening, coaching the kid’s soccer team, washing the dishes, running three miles, going to work everyday – it is all pure potential for consciousness.

Everyday you encounter multiple incidents in your life where you have choices in how you respond to outside stimuli. You are then faced with looking inside for the ‘moral’ or ‘acceptable’ action or response. How practiced are you at ‘seeing’ each of these times and making much more informed or conscious decisions about how you will respond? Does it do any good to produce a ‘little white lie’ right now to protect this person? Can I hide my vulnerability and just say something that isn’t personal? Can I fake an orgasm again because I don’t want to face a situation I don’t have control over? Shall I tell my boss about what I really think about the project I’m involved in or just let it go, again?

Watch and witness yourself next time you admire someone or something or when you are moved by a simple act or a child’s curiosity. What is happening inside of you? What did you first notice? Did something stir in your tummy? Did your heart give a flutter or skip a beat? What happened? Practice being ‘The Witness’ to your life experiences more often. Get better and better at it so you can keep moving that point of awareness further toward the source of the awareness. It is the never-ending, soft, vulnerable study of our self that is the key to personal growth.

The body is that exquisite, physical self that inspires, frustrates, lures, repels and often leaves us in awe of it’s power. We watch it grow, change and evolve. It becomes a metaphor for our inner process, reflecting how we feel, perceive the world and, consequently, frame our lives.

In sacred sexuality, our physical body becomes the vehicle for transformation of our interior selves. The process is reversed. By expressing our sensual, sexual, erotic nature through our physical body we begin to learn how to reframe our interior reaches or inner selves. As an athlete or Yogi knows, the transformation to the “inner smile” that occurs when our bodies are at their peak; the dynamic, interior feeling, is a synthesis of endorphin release and sheer physical well being that transforms our mental and emotional states to more nearly a bliss state. As we begin to feel that state more often we begin to have access to it simply by thinking about exercising and being very active. This is a feedback system that can be developed over time. It can serve us very well if we learn to utilize it in our lives.

This same principle, when taken into the erotic, sexual part of our lives, becomes a powerful pathway to inner transformation. For many of us, our sexuality exposes us to un-traveled territory that holds old wounds and hurts. This is why the ancient tantrics believed purification could occur through accessing our sexual natures and playing out our sexuality to it’s fullest. It brings to the surface both the sweet, fully nurturing aspects of our nature and the less-than-perfect material that is driven by hurt and fear. When we work on our sexuality consciously with ourselves and/or a partner we peal away the layers that hold us back from being empowered, ecstatic, fully alive human beings. It requires being vulnerable, open, aware, trusting and playful. If we allow ourselves to open, both to ourselves and others that we love and trust, we uncover the shadows that keep us from loving wholeheartedly. This is why Tantra, Sacred Sexuality and conscious relationship is so powerful - to be carried to the edge and gently back, time and time again, creates life in a whole new light.