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Hey, so before we start this episode, I do want to give you a heads up that we will be talking about some adult subjects. So if you have any people in your life that you're listening to this podcast with, or you yourself are somebody that feels like you don't want to hear about some very personal subjects, then you might want to listen to one of the other episodes or put on a different podcast. You've been warned.

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Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct, I undertake to cultivate responsibility and learn ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals, couples, families, and society. I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without love and long-term commitment. To preserve the happiness of myself and others, I am determined to respect my commitments

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and the commitments of others. I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to prevent couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct. That's out of Thich Nhat Hanh's 5 mindfulness trainings.

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I want to welcome you to the Imperfect Buddhist, where we discuss mindfulness and incorporating Zen principles into modern life. My name is Matthew Hawk Mahoney, and today's episode is titled Buddhism and Masturbation.

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Bye!

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First, I want to say thank you so much for joining me on this path together as we learn about and share experiences of incorporating mindfulness, Buddhist or Zen teachings into our modern lives. Thanks for choosing this podcast out of all the other Buddhist podcasts and mindfulness podcasts that are out there. It really means a lot.

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Understanding Buddhism, Zen, and Sexuality. Anybody familiar with Zen or Buddhism will be familiar with the concept of mindfulness, which is the teaching that one can train themselves to place their awareness in the present moment and through this awareness one can come into contact with truth or the way things are with the Dharma.

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If you were to look at old school Buddhism, old school Buddhist teachings, the Dhammapada, a lot of these teachings seem to be aimed at monks, people living in a community where practice was at the forefront of their life day in, day out, when they would eat, there was a ceremony, a practice that they would do, when they would sweep the floor, when they would meditate, when they would sleep, all these things were regimented and they were not allowed to.

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have any type of sexual relations with other people in the organization or outside the organization, strictly forbidden. And in some Buddhist teachings, it was taught that sexuality or sex lust were a defilement of the mind, that they led to endless suffering and rebirth and negative karma.

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self-pleasure. Sure, some people within monasteries or even lay practitioners view sexuality or sex in the same way that it's a defilement and a distraction from the path of liberation. But then in modern times you also have the Thich Nhat Hanh flavor, which I read that at the beginning there that it's not saying that there's anything inherently wrong with sexuality. It's as natural as eating. However, just like with eating,

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they recommend a mindful approach, being present, being aware in sexual activity, being present and aware with whom you have sexual relations with, what are the impacts, what is the karma related to these sexual relations.

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Zen Buddhism has an emphasis on direct experience and awakening through the present moment. Through our meditative practices, whether that's zazen, walking meditation, which is known as kinnhin, or other different various awareness training techniques like oriochi, which is a ceremony, a formal way of eating that's there to cultivate awareness. The core aim is this direct experience.

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of reality in Zen. And so it's never really been a contradiction in my mind when it comes to base sexuality, meaning not using porn to stimulate the mind or live in some type of fantasy and not projecting a bunch of lust on men or women or people around you if you are present in that sexual act. It's a consenting person, of course.

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and you can be present and mindful and not lose yourself in some type of daydreaming or projection, then it could become a mindfulness practice. There was a time where I thought, okay, my sexuality or masturbation, self-pleasure, sex, are not in alignment with the teachings of Zen Buddhism or these awareness trainings. But then I also adopted this other viewpoint where I said, okay, maybe I can treat it as a mindfulness training.

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So that said, where am I at with it now? There was a time for the last couple years that I really didn't put much thought into my use of porn, when or how often I masturbated or had sex or lusted. There was not much emphasis or awareness around those things until I started thinking within the last couple weeks about that. About...

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Where does my practice begin and where does it end when it comes to my own sexuality? And what is healthy? What is in alignment with the path to awakening as I see it? And it's been a challenge. It's been this last week. I've really put an emphasis on it as I've been preparing to talk about this on this episode. I've asked myself, can I not use porn? Can I not fictionalize or...

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fantasize in my mind when I masturbate. Can I masturbate less? This is maybe TMI, but this is something that needs to be talked about. I think that a lot of people are ashamed to talk about it. It's not normalized in a lot of spiritual communities. And I think that there is, in our current culture and society, I think that there's like this sex positive culture, which can have a lot of benefits.

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There's a lot of room for interpretation when we talk about like, all sex is good. Embrace your sexuality. That can leave a lot of room for like, what is healthy? What is good for my mind? What will lead me on a path to awareness towards awakening if that's the path that I'm endeavoring to walk down? This last week, I've kind of put some question marks around those questions.

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When I got that sexual urge, when I have that feeling, it's kind of like being hungry. You can sense it, you can feel it, and there's a desire and a need there. I've experimented with this idea of being present while I did my masturbatory practices and tried to bring my awareness to the sensations that were present. To be quite frank with you, it was pretty unenjoyable. There wasn't a whole lot

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pleasant about it other than the physical sensations that I created without any type of imagination or fantasy in my mind. Not holding those images in mind or fantasies and just really being present with the act of jerking off. There wasn't a whole lot that was really exciting about it. This experiment left me with a lot of insight. Wow, how much of...

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this pleasure that I'm getting, how much of it is what they call in Buddhism attachment, fantasy, and illusion? How much of this pleasure I'm deriving is it from some type of imaginary fulfillment of a fantasy I have in my mind? Since doing that, I've had less desire to masturbate.

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Through our normal meditative practices, like sitting or walking meditation, we cultivate our ability to hold things without judgment. And in this case, I was holding the thing. Wow. We developed that compassion to hold things without judgment. And while I was holding my thing, I was also holding the desires of my mind with compassion and holding it with an element of letting go. Our

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Culture promotes the idea of these strong sexual attachments and normalizing, in a sense, really strong lust. It's used in ads to sell things. We're using sexuality and sexual desire to sell things, as the saying goes, sex sells.

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It's good that we are developing a sex positive culture. We're not shaming people for their sexuality, whether that's gay, trans, straight, non-binary, or not interested in sex at all.

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Catholic Church or other organized religions where sex is prohibited, where sexuality is closeted, and we've seen the horrific things that can happen when someone is in complete denial of their own sexuality, of their own sexual needs and desires. It does seem like in environments where sexuality is swept under the rug, not talked about, act like it doesn't exist, or where it's said that it's just evil, some really terrible sad things happen.

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Some of the negative effects of mindless masturbation. Don't you like that? That just rolls off the tongue. Mindless masturbation. I've noticed when I use porn, there's a sense of shame and it's interesting, like I won't be very aware while I'm using it and fantasizing and doing the act, but afterwards I noticed there's like kind of this feeling of being grossed out and be like, ugh, what did I just do?

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shame can come from a lot of places. Porn use and mindless masturbation can have some negative effects. There is the movement of nofap which is about no masturbation essentially and that it has all these benefits of boosting productivity, creativity, self-confidence. Some books mention the negative effects of masturbation on creativity. Think and Grow Rich where he talks about a controlled sexual

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a huge asset to success that some of the greatest and richest people, greatest creators, channeled and harnessed their sexuality for things other than sexual acts and channeled those into creative works and business. So some people would say that an effect of porn would be a lack of ambition, a lack of genius creativity. And I don't know if that's fact, but that's what some people say.

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using porn or sexual fantasizing in one's mind is that we can strengthen this pathway of sexualizing individuals. Looking at someone like a piece of meat, that it does strengthen that pathway. Say I've been in a period of really engaging with porn and sexual fantasy and masturbation for a period of time and I get into a conversation with a woman that I find attractive. There is a

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tendency to zoom in on that sexual aspect and maybe the chasing of that. We're strengthening that way of looking at the world, of looking at certain people. And in doing so, we step away from the direct experience that Zen Buddhism champions. Because instead of being present with a person listening, maybe in that moment we are aware of some type of sexual desire,

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What that person's saying. The content of what that person's saying. The ideas, the feelings, our own feelings. The sound of the car is going by outside the coffee house as we talk to this person.

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So I want to come back to this idea of treating masturbation or sexuality as a mindfulness practice. Instead of pushing it away, acting like it doesn't exist, or fully indulging and completely losing our awareness, dissolving our awareness in fantasy, porn, these other ways that we delude ourselves, can we bring an element of mindfulness?

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The other day when I was employing this idea of being present, I tried to come back to my Hara, which I know a lot of this stuff sounds very hippie, but essentially it's bringing your awareness to a space right below your navel. There is a point of energy there. My mind started to want to fantasize and I was doing this self-pleasure exercise. I came back to my Hara. It really pulled back the energy of this fantasizing and brought me back to the moment.

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When it comes to shared sexual experiences, this can go a long way because when I am in my head fantasizing, I'm projecting this fantasy and my own sexuality onto this being in front of me. And when I'm doing that, I'm not directly experiencing that being in front of me. I am projecting my own fantasies and illusions. But I've made an effort to be mindful.

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when I'm kissing my wife to be present in that moment. All these other sensations wake up in me and it's much more pleasurable when it's a shared experience. The juxtaposition is that self-pleasure when it's just you by yourself and you bring a lot of mindfulness. I didn't find it as exciting, but when I had that shared experience with my wife where I'm present, it was less exciting in the sense that my mind wasn't so excited and I wasn't fulfilling some type of fantasy in my mind.

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but it was much more wholesome and enjoyable and fulfilling to be present with her in the act of sex. People say that everything in our society is driven by sex, by this one act. Like we earn a lot of money so that we can attract a mate, we stockpile resources so that when we find a mate and have sex, we can care for children.

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we dress in a certain way or present ourselves in a certain way to make ourselves more attractive to a potential sexual partner. And so if all this is leading up to this, we might as well enjoy it. We might as well be present while it's happening to see what all the fuss is about. So we can become mindful of the touch of our partner as they run their fingers down our arm or our back or as we touch them, as we feel their skin on our fingers, as we kiss them. We can become...

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aware of all these physical sensations on our skin and our nerve endings and focusing in on all the sensations that arise in that present moment, we might start to discover that underneath this buzz of sexual stimulation in our mind, I'm talking about this fantasy in our mind, that maybe there is a sense of connection, there's a sense of oneness and a closer connection of well-being happening.

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I'm not a master though when it comes to mindfulness or having some type of deep spirituality in my sex life or self-pleasure. And I don't know what the answer is here. Maybe the old teachers and abbots at the temples in Japan are right. Maybe there is not a whole lot of room for sexuality or sexual desire on this spiritual path. I can't see that being the truth as sex is a huge part of who we are.

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sexuality and sex are so a part of what makes us human. There is a path for incorporating our sexuality into our spiritual lives and that there is a middle path as they talk about in Buddhism, that we don't go too far in either direction and end up falling in the ditch. One ditch being self-denial and acting like

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We don't have a sexuality. And then the other ditch being unhinged sense, pleasure, desire. I want to encourage you also to reflect on your own porn usage, your own sexuality, your own sex life, and see where does your mindfulness, your present moment awareness go during those acts. Try some of these practices and see if you can bring some awareness into your sex life.

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Thank you so much for tuning in and being present with me through this sticky situation. Oh God, the dad jokes. It's not an easy subject to talk about, but I'm really glad we got to talk through it a little bit. If we wanna spread this community further and get the word out there, hitting the like button would really help me reach more people. And if you could share your thoughts and experiences along the path by hitting

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the feedback button leaving a hopefully you'll leave a five star review after this you may leave a one star review because it freaked you out but i would love for you to share your own personal journey and experiences along the path leave some feedback for the podcast in your favorite app and consider subscribing to the podcast i would love to stay in contact with you and i would love to stay in community with you so you can get fresh updates when i put out new episodes

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I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week, wherever you are, and here is to you, mindful masturbation. Take care.

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