Although it has multiple meanings, the word "Tantra" can be translated as "rules". Its root is"Tant", which means Tender, and also means "to weave". Hence, it directly refers to a certain quality of relationship.

   

It is a spiritual current originating in the Himalayan-Indian region. It covers a set of texts, doctrines, rituals, yogic practices and initiation methods which have penetrated most branches of Hinduism, Taoism and Buddhism. 

 

Tantra is such an ancient practice that its origin is difficult to date. However, the first written documents referring to this spiritual current are dated from the 7th century or the 5th century before Jesus Christ, varying form the sources.

 

In this discipline, the universe is considered to be founded on two opposing and complementary principles. They are symbolized by the male (Shiva) and female (Shakti) couple.

 

It is a path of total transformation of the human being, which stimulates the body and the five senses. In order to reach an awakening of consciousness, a state of plenitude, Tantra invites us to activate the masculine and feminine energies within, in order to unite them. Thus, it awakens the kundalini - sexual energy of life - located at the base of the spine, and makes it circulate especially through the seven chakras (energy centers) while healing the bodily, emotional, mental and behavioral blocks.

 

It is only very late that the West became interested in this practice, especially at the end of the 20th century, through the teachings of the spiritual master Osho.

 

Westerners have often been criticized for having kept from Tantra only ritualized sexual practices which ultimate goal is to merge into the relationship. However, it turns out that this aspect of Tantra suits us rather well since we, Westerners, live mainly through the upper body (mind and all that derives from it: intellectualization, conceptualization, mental representations, fantasies ...) while denying the importance of listening and feeling the body.

 

Tantra allows us to become fully aware of our body and of the energies and rhythm that animate it. It offers the possibility to de-demonize matter, to get out of dual visions of sexuality (libertinism versus repression, dominant versus dominated, sex versus love, etc.) by freeing oneself from mental representations (fantasies) in order to fully enter the relationship to oneself and to the other through a direct bias.

 

For men in a tantric union or a massage, this direct bias involves delaying ejaculation as much as possible in order to release all the energies accumulated by a particularly powerful orgasm.

 

But Tantra covers much wider fields than that of sexuality, and it can be experienced in a thousand and one ways. It is a state of Being. It allows us to grasp how we actually are more than our body, how the relationship is larger than what is said and seen. We understand that the pleasure of the senses is not reduced to the physical orgasm located in the sexual organs. It can be much larger, and set the whole body on fire in what is called a Tantric Orgasm.

 

Starting from the principle that we are all connected - beings, animals, plants - Tantric sharing can just as well be experienced with a partner, a tree, an energy or even the entire Universe. In order to do so, Tantra asks us to get out of our hierarchical vision of the world and social relations.

 

Tantra invites us to accept Life in its entirety in order to embrace all that is in us and around us without judgment. Thus, the knots that hinder us come undone, allowing us to deploy a quality of relationship with all that is.

 

It is, ultimately, a way to connect heaven and earth within, to spiritualize sexuality and matter or to materialize spirituality.

Tantric fusion of male and female energies

under the representation of the Hindu god Shiva and the goddess Shakti.