The Tantric path with its diverse ways and practices, developed long ago in several cultures, is emerging from a lengthy dormant period and now promises to flourish again. A new Tantra is being created, blending ancient and modern healing and transformational skills. The current flow of history is ripe for Tantra – why?

The nature of the modern industrialized civilization now dominating the world is separation. With all its focus on material possessions and the intense preoccupation with ‘getting,’ a deeply essential human/spiritual need has been denied – the need to connect, to create a union. The desire to share has been sublimated to the desire called greed, the urge to have and control more power and possessions than others.

Getting (as distinguished from receiving) usually precludes giving, and in doing so disavows the honoring of Spirit, in others, and in self. Getting without giving is the outward expression of the inner imbalance of push without yield, assertion/aggression/control without surrender/flow/receptivity. It is the yang without the yin. Getting is about trying to dominate the world without opening the heart. The energy only flows one way, and thus separation is created and maintained.

Separation, extreme as it has become, has begun to arouse in us all the deep desire to be connected with others. Separation is maintained by a thinking aspect of the mind called the ego, whose primary motivating energy comes from “fear thoughts,” – fears and thoughts of lack – ultimately lack love, for self and others.Thus separation can be said to have two components: An energetic pattern in which the open flow of energy and sensation is blocked, incomplete, or unidirectional, and secondly, a mental state that displaces love with thoughts and feelings of lack and fear.

In a culture such as our modern Western materialistic society, people are conditioned to be unaware of their energy or unskillful in commanding it, thus habitually blocking its natural flow. Energetically they live cut off from others and from aspects of themselves. Likewise, most people are trained to run their lives from their fear-based ego thinking, accepting a misconception that separation and absence of intimacy with others is the human condition and to be expected. The pain of this pervasive separation has begun to arouse widespread interest in understanding and healing this “dysfunction.”

Tantra offers relief from the components of separation on both accounts. The classic partner energy meditation found in the major Tantric traditions, as well as the practices for individuals, effectively serves to train awareness and command of the natural energetic flows both within each person and between people. Given awareness and command, anyone with Tantric skill can reclaim the natural experience of union and connection.

The meditations also serve to quiet the thinking mind and with it the fears and fear thoughts that maintain and justify separation, offering instead moments of relief and inner peace. From the place of peace, openness to others is possible and through the Tantric practices, openness can lead to connection and even to the blissful experience of union. Indeed a popular definition of the Tantra is, “to connect, to unite,” to make a deep connection, to create unity or union is the healing of separation.

Creating an experience of union, a sense of connectedness with others is a natural human desire. This desire seems to be especially strong in our culture where separation is so widespread and pervasive and where a natural, healthy style of physical contact and sexual relations has been so distorted. Again, I suspect that this may be a primary underlying impetus behind the resurgence of Tantra in the western world where the overwhelming emphasis on materialism has heightened this separation between people.

Another significant underlying cause of separation lies in the internalized fears that have been conditioned in us regarding closeness, intimacy, giving and receiving touch, conditional vs. unconditional love, freedom to be and express ourselves, safety, and privacy.

These conditioned fears are typical of the interpersonal and intrapersonal dynamics found in dysfunctional families and co-dependent relationships. A dysfunctional family system is based upon separation from the true self and from loving others, instilling in its members both longing for and a fear of intimacy.

Where there is little or inconsistent safety within a system for each person to openly, easily, and naturally express and receive love, touch, and affection, what is learned and practiced instead is defensiveness and/or aggressive compensating (hostility, blaming, etc.); what is felt and often repressed is frustration, anger, hurt, sadness, fear, shame, and guilt.

Both repression and “acting out” of such feelings tend to create distancing, the separation between people, and loss of natural passion and sensuality. Children who grow up in such a family system usually miss the important training in how to naturally make loving intimate contact with others.

They are deprived of education and understanding of how to be open and vulnerable, how to reveal their fears and feelings, how to be present without feeling self-conscious, how to listen empathically to another, how to offer compassion, how to give and really receive affection and touch and how to feel and enjoy the sensual passion.

Being deprived of such training in natural intimacy is in itself a kind of wounding and it carries with it a deep desire for healing. If in addition to this developmental lack there is also a history of childhood abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, etc.), then the mixed feelings about intimacy (the fear of, yet longing for), will be even more intensified. This condition is far from uncommon. In every Tantra workshop, we find a number of participants who are wounded from childhood and are often confused about how to attract, create, and experience intimacy.

They are drawn to Tantra by their desire for healing this wounding, yet initially, their experience of the power of Tantra can be overwhelming and even terrifying. To merge with others so quickly and deeply can bring up deep fears for those who learned in childhood that intimate contact was wrong, unsafe, or not to be trusted. For those who barely maintained a sense of themselves while surviving in a dysfunctional and abusive family system, the experience of letting go of themselves and merging through Tantra can be almost life-threatening. Yet they are drawn to it somehow for their healing and recovery.

Perhaps this brings up the meta-question, “Is Tantra appropriate for people who are significantly involved in their recovery journey?” I believe that Tantra can offer value here if the training is presented carefully and sensitively with ample safe, loving, professional support. Survivors of sexual molestation and incest are especially in need of extraordinary safety and trust in order to deeply heal.

They require the presence and adjunct assistance of skilled, experienced, tantrically oriented therapists who are familiar with their process and who can help them heal and integrate the often intense reactions and memories that can arise with the sense of loss of self that comes with merging tantrically. I am convinced that Tantra teachers do a great disservice to these people if they gloss over or redirect their reactions, fears, and pain.

Such approaches are extremely disempowering and are yet another violation of self-esteem for those who are trying to recover their identity and their right to have and express their feelings and emotions, regardless of how inappropriate or appropriate they may seem to others, especially those in positions of authority. Directives such as, “Just keep bringing your awareness up to your third eye,” or “Just keep circulating the energy,” or “Continue to look deeply into your beloved’s eyes and breathe deeply,” may likely be interpreted as messages to over-ride one’s feelings – that once again “my feelings don’t count.”

Thus I have come to recognize that the most wounded ones require different care than the majority of people who are drawn to Tantra to enhance their passion and to integrate their sexuality and spirituality. Most participants bring a somewhat healthy sense of themselves and their ability to relate to others, and in discovering a familiarity with Tantra, they are enthusiastic about enhanced experiences of merging.

Yet for everyone, and certainly, for those who come seeking healing, I have developed and included in the workshops additional training in “healthy boundaries” as a part of what I call “the pulse of autonomy and merging.” I am convinced that people need and benefit from both Tantra/intimacy skills for merging, as well as skills for returning to and firmly establishing and owning autonomy.

The development of subtle awareness of boundaries helps us tune into and honor our own sacred space and to know where I end and you begin. From there we each can choose “to merge or not to merge,” and how much, and for how long. There seems to be a great safety in knowing that we can return from our connections with others to a “home” experience of self-awareness and self-love.

The ancient Tantric emphasis on solo (individual) practices offers wisdom that supports this idea. Ancient Tantric teachers understood that using regular Tantric practices to cultivate a healthy, enlightened sense of self (and of Self) appears to enhance one’s ability to merge deeply and appropriately with others. The healing of separation with self lends to the healing of separation with others, thus opening the possibility of Tantric union.