Spirituality Articles

Volume II

What Does It Mean to Live a Fully Embodied Spiritual Life?
by Jorge N. Ferrer, Ph.D.

"The frequent inhibition of the primary dimensions of the person—somatic, instinctive, sexual, and certain aspects of the emotional—may have been necessary at certain historical junctures to allow the emergence and maturation of the values of the human heart and consciousness. More specifically, this inhibition may have been essential to avoid the reabsorption of a still relatively weak emerging self-consciousness and its values into the stronger presence that a more instinctively driven energy once had in human collectivities. In the context of religious praxis, this may be connected to the widespread consideration of certain human qualities as being spiritually more “correct” or wholesome than others; for instance, equanimity over intense passions, transcendence over sensuous embodiment, chastity or strictly regulated sexual practice over open-ended sensual exploration, and so forth. What may characterize our present moment, however, is the possibility of reconnecting all these human potentials in an integrated way. In other words, having developed self-reflective consciousness and the subtle dimensions of the heart, it may be the moment to reappropriate and integrate the more primary and instinctive dimensions of human nature into a fully embodied spiritual life."

From Foucalt's Ars Erotica to the Next Wave of Inwardly

Inspired Yoga and "Trantric Sex"
by Stuart Sovatsky, Ph.D.

"Numerous spiritual teachers are calling Now-consciousness the “ultimate enlightenment” based in “the giving up of all seeking” and finding Wholeness right here, right Now. Yet, this fully-attentive, being “present,” unchanging or “always in the Now” awareness seems to fits the ars erotica definition of pratyahara or dharana or, possibly some glimmers of dhyana—de-sticking one’s “bare attention” from inner and outer objects, worries or thoughts for longer and longer periods of time; and santosha, acceptance of pain and pleasure equally—but not the long-esteemed, nirbija samadhi that involves complete energetic maturation or, literally, “full exhaustion” (nir- ) of bija, “the seed- forces-of-incarnation.” For, Awakening to Presence is just the beginning of ars erotica maturations that deepen the physical and energetic complexity of one’s awakening within the hormones and neurotransmitters (the elixirs) of the body."