[Written in 2006.]
People argue that conscious celibacy in the service of the path toward enlightenment would lead our species to extinction, but in their denial they completely miss the point – and get it backwards. It is our unconsciousness which is leading us to extinction, and as the coming decades pass this will become only more obvious.
The way things are heading with our species on our planet, it is becoming increasingly irresponsible for people to have children. Hopefully this will not be so in the future, but it is the truth is now. Some are waking up to this reality and are consciously changing their ways. Some are being woken up to this reality and are being forced to change their ways. And the rest are going through their lives blissfully asleep – and will soon be rudely awakened to this reality.
There is no need to become depressed and bury one’s head in the sand. There are things the individual can do. The basic way is to become personally enlightened. Once that is accomplished everything else falls naturally into line.
Here is a short list of ways to speed up your path to enlightenment:
- Stop using drugs.
- Stop drinking alcohol.
- Stop smoking cigarettes.
- Stop having sex.
- Do not masturbate.
- Discontinue other addictive behaviors.
- Eat a healthy, reasonable diet.
- Take a reasonable amount of exercise.
- Set aside time for a good night’s sleep each night.
- Do not reproduce.
- Be single.
- Study your personal history.
- Keep a journal in which you honestly express yourself.
- Write down your dreams at night and study them – and analyze them – carefully in the morning.
- Study your motives.
- Simplify your life to the extreme.
- Take distance from your family of origin.
- Take distance from people who do not follow the things on this list
If you can follow this list, chances are it will add a great degree of stress to your life – perhaps too much to handle at any given time – but it will certainly provoke some degree of healing reaction.
While being single can’t we connect with our inner-self and ask ‘how it want to have sex or be pleasured’ and let feel the outcome of it in the body freely. Is it not more like developing capacity for heart-orgasm than mere genital-excitation. Does not even have to ejaculate when there is freedom to be in the pleasure (without frustratingly having to finish it quickly or hide out of fear of being caught by parents 🙂 )
There is a person named Joseph Kramer (a massage therapist) who says that we do not give time to enjoy pleasure but out of some frustration or laziness we leak it out quickly and the feedback mechanism repeats.
I’ve been doing all these things except 13 and 17.
13. I have a hard time keeping a physical journal. I’ve done online in the past and I know it helped me. Because of personal reasons I’m thinking about keeping it online again in a way I won’t lose it if I lose access to my account as it’s happened before.
17. As soon as I get fully vaccinated I’ll do that.
My idea was to do a solo travel around Latin America but due to the pandemic it became impossible and I had to go back to living with my parents who caused and still causes a lot of stress in my life. I got know your channel and this blog only yesterday and I’m loving it.
One shouldn’t live by rules. I found that going towards my desires, not judging them, is what grew me. It’s kinda new agey but I discovered it on my own. It’s the guilty and shame that is ultimately the problem. You have to be past the trauma recovery though. You have to go thru the grieving phase to then come to a still mind. Then its just letting go of judgements, rules, expectations, and let life take you where it will. It’s more of letting go then doing anything or living under any set of rules. Maybe making love with a wife in a small cottage is happiness/destiny (such things aren’t the source of happiness but the final path in our lives journey). By allowing and being open, you will find happiness. But as soon as you have rules and start judging then the mind contracts and you go back into the thinking closed state rather than feeling your way thru life (which you can do after grieving and healing). There are.a lot of law of attraction people that say similiar stuff but they bypassed the pain and suffering and grieving stage of healing so they are just dissociating. But if you do it in the right order, the openness in being is radical. I no longer do all the addictive behaviors but I didn’t lift a finger to stop them or resist against them. I even indulged them after grieving stage and at some point they left me. All other modalities are about resisting this, being minimalist, not dong this or that, following some mantra, yada yada. Yet I’m more in love with life and others around me than ever before and it was completely the opposite of what others would expect. life is gentle for I am in the flow of it. I feel instensly yet I don’t get triggered like I used to so the feeling are good. I cry at movies, I mourn with others, my heart breaks when loved ones suffer…. yet its not the heaviness of the past- I can just sit in a park and feel everything so vividly and joyous. Like all creation is a symphony. what a ride. love you bro.
Dear Daniel,
As its now been over 13 years since you wrote this essay, are there any parts of it that you have changed views on?
Love and Light
Jane
Hi Jane,
Hmm, I just read over the list and I still feel pretty much the same way, that doing the 18 things on that list will speed up the healing path — but also that it might be a little too intense to handle if someone just did all those things all at once, especially if they weren’t previously doing a lot of them… But overall I see the potential healing value in all the items there. However, I realize my essay is short and not so nuanced, so it can make it seem like I think that doing those 18 things is the only way to live a “proper” life — and I don’t feel that way. I’m not that rigid…instead, I was just sharing ideas. all the best, Daniel
The main thing is presence. The ability to be still and conscious without thinking. At first it is foreign. Not having a direct experience of it, it seems difficult and almost futile because people are weakened and addicted to thinking. After awhile the peace and presence and spaciousness dawns. With that glimpse the passion for more of it grows. So if you can be still long enough for the mud to settle things will clear up. With enough practice one will achieve. Too many rituals, rules or preconditions are simple manifestations of the mind tripping you up. It’s about not following thoughts but returning to presence. That is the basic practice. To become part of the consciousness beyond thinking. To stop misidentifying with anything but the pure consciousness of self. Nothing needs to be done first before being enlightened. No need to add a lot of superstition to it. It is the quiescing of the mind that allows for the clarity of enlightenment.
Have you’ve been enlightened?
in some ways, yes, Thomas, but in others not. I still have a lot of work yet to do…unresolved traumas…. daniel
I understand, I’m in the beginning of my journey.May you be blessed on your journey to the light.LOVE TO YOU
I just ran across this… I think having children can be one of the fastest routes to enlightenment. They show you all the places you are not yet free, and at the same time you see their freedom. They require your presence… if you are able at all to be truly present with yourself. Talk about a mirror!
hmm……then where are all the enlightened parents? i mostly just see quite the opposite…and lots of them.
If married people try to guilt-trip me I say ‘for lazy people they will have to make kids to look at hard things in life’ others do not have to do that crime 🙂
(Not about you)
hi daniel
i love most of ur essay, but i don’t understand some of them, for example, enlightement. what is the meaning “enlightement” exactly? and what is correlation enlightement with be single, having sex and reproduce? this is like buddha doctrine.
Most of these make sense, but I don’t understand why masturbating is a problem? I’ve always thought it was a healthy, self-loving activity. Sometimes I feel guilty about it, but I thought that was just a remnant of a religious upbringing. Maybe it is in fact my intuition telling me it’s wrong, but I would like to be able to explain why.
hi dorothy — well…….maybe it’s not all bad!! i think, though, that it can definitely and easy carry a lot of our unresolved traumas and fantasies, but that doesn’t mean that not masturbating is necessarily the answer……..because that can just be repressing and dissociating…. i think the answer either way is to keep healing traumas…..somehow!!!
sending greetings,
daniel
I know this is an old comment, but I’d like to add something here.
Masturbating alone is generally not a problem. However, be careful with pornography. Masturbating with pornography can become an addiction and that’s a big problem. And even if it doesn’t become an addiction, I wouldn’t recommend pornography anyway, since most of the time it just waste your time and take your energy for something that’s not productive. For science on how porn is bad: https://yourbrainonporn.com/
Our inability to enjoy pleasure which leads to bad sex and frustrated ejaculation etc can be from some sort of parental guilt trip like ‘how can I enjoy this while my parents suffocates pleasureless sick life’ and they sure hate their children enjoying pleasure too. Just like certain moms hate their child (man) being close to other women.
So giving oneself time to enjoy the pleasure must be healing than mere quick frustration release.
IMO
All well, except for the analyzing of dreams. DO NOT ANALYSE. Just let things be the way they are.
And for the whole “stop using addictive drugs” thing: Not necessary. As you make progress on the path you will automatically lose interest in these things. In fact, just concentrating on your craving for those things will already drop much of their attractiveness.