Tantra

The fundamental vision of Tantra is that the human body is the home and means and actual process of worship, rather than any religious authority figure or institution, scripture, building or holy place of pilgrimage—or any externality. The whole human being is the multidimensional vehicle and domain and function of celebrating and realizing (embodying) the divine. Enlightenment is whole-bodily awakeness in unqualified mutuality with all that appears, now-ever.

Not merely "May the Force be with you," but "The Force IS you!"

In the Tantric view, we are each a cosmic totality. Because the human body is the true realm of worship, then sex (of course!) is also divine and amazingly powerful. Yet sex is not the primary focus of the Tantric wisdom tradition, whether in its Shaivite or Buddhist or Taoist any other of its authentic incarnations. Rather than an obsession or exclusive focus on sexuality, the guiding principle and practice of Tantra is awakened awareness of and identification with energy—the indestructible and inexhaustible life-force. Not merely, “May the Force be with you,” but rather, “The Force IS you! May you realize and actualize the Deathless Energy of Life.”

The way of Tantra is to live large—to LIVE the view that you are Consciousness-Energy (Chitshakti) that incorporates and animates a wonderful physical body within the vastness of your irreducibly spiritual identity. You are truly MORE than the body and MORE than sexual. At the same time, you are not less than the body or less than sexual. Tantra fosters no negative attitudes against the body and sex as do most other religious teachings. Rather, the body (including sex and birth and all changes and death) is the very process or action of dynamic divine worship and enlightenment. Reality shines as all the worlds; it is Bright as your own life, if you will but breathe and receive, release and smile.

Enlightenment of the whole body and world (which truly are one indivisible system) rather than escape from the body and world; release from the independent, encapsulated ego into the fullness of love, rather than recoil into isolation as an interior self—such completeness and flow is the ideal of Tantra.