Theos-Talk Archives (August 2007 Message tt00000)

"What has sexual or breathing exercises to do with the spiritual 
awakening? To me, it would be a universal joke if after all the soul 
could be liberated in such an artificial way."

"When all the motions of the body have become perfectly rythmical the 
body has, as it were, become a gigantic battery of will."

Those who practice prolonged aerobic activity know that during this 
activity body automatically tends to acquire the most rational 
consumption of energy and that this tendency expresses itself in the 
attunement of all bodily functions with the rhythmical breathing. 
This actually means that it tends to acquire its most natural way of 
functioning which we have distorted or artificialized with our 
unnatural way of living.

What is actually breathing? What are its higher aspects? What or who 
controls it? 

The Secret Doctrine - "The Beginnings of Sentient Life" - says that 
it is the breath of Lha (Spirit) which gives Life to the Seven - 
Dragons of Wisdom. 

Therefore, in my view, breathing is expression of our inner 
Intelligence in our sentient life.  We can attune ourselves (or 
better our bodies) with this Intelligence if we acquire a natural, 
rhythmic, circular way of breathing (without any special exercises), 
when inhale and exhale become uniform movement. If we can achieve 
this movement without interference (or with exclusion) of mind then 
we can enter in the state of Ever-becoming - "eternal, ceaseless 
Motion" - in which the creative powers of our Intelligence can 
express themselves. With the will of our Intelligence we can for the 
time being experience, for instance, respectfulness - not just 
feeling it but actually becoming respectfulness. 

As regard to the sex, there are, in my opinion, no better words to 
express the position of sentient experience in our life as those in 
the M. Collins' book, Through the Gates of Gold:

"The man who chooses the way of effort, and refuses to allow the 
sleep of indolence to dull his soul, finds in his pleasures a new and 
finer joy each time he tastes them, - a something subtle and remote 
which removes them more and more from the state in which mere 
sensuousness is all; this subtle essence is that elixir of life which 
makes man immortal. He who tastes it and who will not drink unless it 
is in the cup finds life enlarge and the world grow great before his 
eager eyes. He recognizes the soul within the woman he loves, and 
passion becomes peace; he sees within his thought the finer qualities 
of spiritual truth, which is beyond the action of our mental 
machinery, and then instead of entering on the treadmill of 
intellectualisms he rests on the broad back of the eagle of intuition 
and soars into the fine air where the great poets found their 
insight; he sees within his own power of sensation, of pleasure in 
fresh air and sunshine, in food and wine, in motion and rest, the 
possibilities of the subtle man, the thing which dies not either with 
the body or the brain. The pleasures of art, of music, of light and 
loveliness, - within these forms, which men repeat till they find 
only the forms, he sees the glory of the Gates of Gold, and passes 
through to find the new life beyond which intoxicates and 
strengthens, as the keen mountain air intoxicates and strengthens, by 
its very vigor. But if he has been pouring, drop by drop, more and 
more of the elixir of life into his cup, he is strong enough to 
breathe this intense air and to live upon it. Then if he die or if he 
live in physical form, alike he goes on and finds new and finer joys, 
more perfect and satisfying experiences, with every breath he draws 
in and gives out."

Warmest regards,
Anton