your back relax and move slowly downwards. Begin with your shoulders, then release your back, hips and buttocks, so you return to the corpse pose.
Release
Bring up your knees, keeping the soles of your feet resting flat on the floor and the small of your back snuggling into the floor. Place your hands, palms down, over your heart area, and focus on breathing into your heart. Let your arms fully relax, with your elbows resting on the floor. Your fingertips should touch each other.
The butterfly
The butterfly describes the action of your bent knees, which move together and apart like butterfly wings. This exercise opens your pelvis to sexual energy.
Open your knees to each side as you breathe in, taking the breath all the way down to your pelvis. Exhale, and relax into the posture with a feeling of surrender.
Take another breath in and, as you exhale, press your feet together and down into the floor in order to bring your knees back to the upright position. If this is at all uncomfortable for your back or hips, support each thigh with cushions.
When you have familiarized yourself with this ‘out-in’ movement of your legs, switch your attention back to the rise and fall of your abdomen with your breath.
Surrender
The posture of surrender focuses your attention on the movement of sexual energy by drawing your breath in and out through your genitals.
Lie on your back, with your arms out to the side and your palms facing upwards. Let your knees drop to the floor on either side, placing the soles of both feet together. If you are not very flexible, don’t bend your knees quite so much, but leave the soles of your feet together. As you inhale, imagine that you are drawing in energy through your genitals and the base of your spine; in your mind’s eye, see it climbing up your spine and resting at the crown of your head as you finish inhaling. As you exhale, visualize that your breath drops back down to your genitals and streams out through them.
To finish
Repeat the corpse pose, and relax for at least five minutes.
Get a head start: meditation
Most meditation practices start with paying attention to your breath. Breath is the source of our vitality; it is how we live. In Sanskrit, the word for ‘breath’ means ‘spirit’. Breathing deeply also stimulates your unique energy-body, the internal, subtle energy that is stimulated through Tantric practice.
The best posture to meditate in is ‘easy pose’, which helps to keep your back upright while sitting for long periods. Sit with your feet crossed at the level of the calves so that each foot is under the opposite knee.
How to breathe
This breath meditation helps relax your body, and bring your mind to the present – it is this quality of presence that makes sex ecstatic, when you focus on sensation and feel the exchange of love between you and your partner. By practising breath meditation, you can let energy radiate from your breath and animate your body; when you make love, you can feel intensely in the moment.
Sit with your legs crossed loosely in easy pose, with one leg in front of the other. Sense your relaxed body. Summon up a sense of wonder at the miracle of being alive. Breathe fully, right down into your abdomen. This expands your lung capacity, and slows down the rate of your breathing.
Pause for a moment or two before you inhale, and before exhaling. Then lengthen the holding-in stage of your breath, as well as the exhalation, so that you inhale for a count of one, hold for four, and exhale for two.
Pay attention to each out-breath and fully relax on each one. Let go. The in-breath will take care of itself.
When you have mastered this technique, you can use it in all the meditations in this book. You can progress your practice by focusing your inner eye on visualization to encourage the natural movement of energy through your body.
Get centred
Grounding, or centring yourself is a basic technique that deepens your sense of being; it helps you to feel connected and complete. When you are with your partner you can be self-contained, but also open to share your energy; in Tantra, this is a building block for intimacy. Grounding is also recommended as a relaxation technique after dynamic freestyle dancing; learn how to move from a state of high energy into this blissful, centring meditation.
Stand with your feet hip-distance apart and your knees slightly bent, with your back straight. This helps align your spine so that energy can move through your body more easily.
Close your eyes and focus your attention on your breathing. Be aware of your inhalation and exhalation, without trying to control it. Observe it for a few minutes. You will probably notice that your breathing calms down and becomes longer and more even just by paying attention to it.
Inhale, and imagine that your breath is travelling down to the base of your spine, right to your tailbone. As you exhale, imagine it moving back up your spine to exit through your lungs.
Imagine that you are a new tree growing roots. Visualize these conduits of energy reaching deep down into the earth. As you breathe in and out, your roots are expanding, growing, reaching through the layers of earth. With each out-breath, let your roots penetrate even deeper as if they are striving to touch the centre of the earth. This symbolizes your connection to the earth as a source of energy. Feel this vital energy pouring into you through your roots.
As you continue to breathe, draw this nurturing source of life and energy up your spine so that it can permeate your body. Keep breathing and drawing this energy up through the soles of your feet, creating a sense of solidity and groundedness.
Then draw that energy up into your pelvis and torso and into your lungs and chest, allowing your lungs to expand fully.
Breathe in, drawing that energy into the centre of your chest, in the area of your heart. Feel your heart expand with your breath, and fill with energy for life and love.
Fill your head with energy. Imagine that you are growing branches of energy that touch the sky from the crown of your head. Feel these vital conduits reach into space, the realm of the infinite and of the spirit.
Feel a sense of infinite possibility. Mentally bring down this sense of expansion and spaciousness through the branches in the sky and into the crown at the top of your head. Then bring this sensation into your chest; let your heart feel soothed. Imagine the spaciousness of the heavens mingling with the grounding energy of the earth in your heart. See your heart as the centre of convergence whose roots connect with the earth, and whose branches connect with heaven. You are a bridge between the two.
Ground yourself in nature
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