How exactly is that done?
I'm not looking to change my loner ways but there are other areas of my life where the same principal could be applied...
One of the anomalous things about modern society and the Abrahamic-European societies from which it developed is that there's hardly any explicit, direct knowledge about this type of thing. And, probably for related reasons, there's a general utter lack of ability to interpret pertinent writings from cultures where there was such direct knowledge. If we were to view the vast trans-personal dynamics in which humans partake as living processes-- spanning hundreds of years, perhaps-- it's like the societal-body in which we are cells lacks some basic capacity for awareness. It's as thought our culture itself has something like Autism; we don't have direct access to a basic experience that was essential to humans before us and apart from us, and we very rarely even recognise that we're missing it.
I've been researching this for some time, and it relates to such diverse phenomena as the degraded and overly-specified nature of current male body-concepts (reduction of sexuality to the sexual organs and sex-as-a-means-to-orgasm), the way in which sexual experience is commonly divided into various intensional categories of acts instead of continuous extensional descriptions (that might sound strange, but Chinese and Indian writers from pre-colonial eras definitely didn't understand sex in a way comparable to how we do), and the devaluation of personal, experiential physical understanding.
Neidan (Taoist Inernal Alchemy), old Indian and Chinese sex-books, the training given to the concubines and Emperors of old Imperial China, the various yogic traditions and countless other examples: these were about direct bodily knowledge and the manipulation of our psyhological-physological configurations with the intention of producing specific states of being. People are generally inclined to reject them out of hand nowadays, but there was real technical understanding there of a kind we don't even approach. I'm a Transhumanist at heart, but the potential for the exploration and enhancement of embodied experience-- without technological augmentation*-- is great.
*Of the kinds currently suggested and considered the likely ways in which we'll progress.
Specifics, though: it's a gradual process. It's like learning a lost language. Learning to listen to the signals of your own body and to construct new physical orientations upon the basis of what you learn from such. But it's immediately rewarding and ultimately worth whatever you put into it.
First, I'd recommend Feldenkrais lessons. Quebodeaux's
posture with a purpose is the best recorded course I've found, but occasional in-person lessons with a practitioner are important. Feldenkrais' books are informative, but probably unnecessary for your purposes.
As you use Feldenkrais more and more, you get an intuitive sense for how to alter your bodily experience. It becomes apparent that all experience, and what we call our 'personality', is bodily. That the modification of the rhythms and patterns of movement and sensation is a modification of our entire self. Exploring sexuality and habits of sex and masturbation independently, upon that basis, would likely be the most beneficial way of going about things. Here's what I did, though:
I cycled between different physical configurations, logging my experiences each day, for months. There were 4 basic orientations: non-masturbation without use of the Feldenkrais method, non-masturbation with use of the Feldenkrais method, non-regulation without use of the Feldenkrais method, and non-regulation with use of the Feldenkrais method. During the weeks when I was using the method, I also attempted to exercise a certain willpower and direction in my daily behavior; during the weeks when I wasn't, I didn't. I alternated between these four, spending a minimum of one week (and a maximum of 1 month) at a time in each configuration. I explored as much as I could and attempted to avoid any will-to-beleive or wish-to-have-found-an-answer as far as possible. I think the whole thing lasted for 4 months or so.
By the end of it, I knew, as clearly as I know the difference between night and day, that the combination of non-masturbation and willed-directed activity resulted in an inexhaustible energy and outward-directedness while its opposite, non-regulation and no direction to activity, resulted in the breakdown of any kind of ability to willfully exert myself and a progressive degradation of bodily awareness. I found out a lot more about myself and how the rhythms of my physiology function, but that's not relevant to anybody else.
The essential thing to this orientation is the complete breakdown of any association between sexual urge and masturbation. If you're fighting with yourself, it will likely do more harm than good. It's a clear sign that whatever you're doing isn't working naturally. Best to listen to your body when that happens, and change course.
I've gone quite some way beyond that, now: the more attention you pay, the more specific the modifications you can make become. How you direct that energy, how much flexibility of experience you have within any particular configuration, and how able you are to break the conditions of that orientation without undermining it all change. If you have some source of activity which you naturally engage in to express yourself-- like compulsive writing or contemplative thought or art, for example-- I'd expect that that's what will increase in intensify first.
I don't know for certain if my results apply to anybody else (and doubt that they apply to any women). But I do strongly suspect that similar exploration will result in similar discoveries, and a similar understanding of how to directly-- without the mediation of abstractions or conceptual divisions-- manipulate one's own physiological-kineshetic orientation in such a way as to break-down static or inhibited patterns of experience.
So... er... best of luck. I don't expect anybody to do this. But... the possibility's there. Personality is bodily. Best of luck along the way, if you happen to choose to walk it. If not, best of luck along whatever other way you choose to walk.
I know this is the type of thing that lots of people will find ridiculous, or laugh at, or find embarrassing... but, frankly, I don't care. They can kindly impale themselves upon their own limitation and historical short-sightedness.
...or so would say Freud)
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