Bruce, experimentation is a great idea. I really like the aspect of adventure, exploration and experimentation of PD. Absorbing the wisdom of others is great and all, but sometimes its just fun to strike out on your own. Thank you for your thoughtful reply.
So, some notes:
1. Celibacy or abstinance are not options.
There seem to be two camps about this. Hill seems to suggest that more sex = more sexual energy to be used for other purposes, which is also what Bruce says. Alternatively, there is the idea that less sex means more energy for other things. That's what I meant with whether the sex drive is finite or grows with use. For now I'm going to start with the belief that it grows with use (use for sexual purposes and otherwise), because it's more empowering and because the other one may become a self-fulling prophesy, as Bruce warns. This one may also be a self-fullfilling prophesy, but its one I like.
2. I want conscious control, in the sense that I can at one point say, "Ok, now I'm using this for doing my work" or "Ok, now I'm using this for what its meant for."
That is, the situation Dani described where it just sorta happens is not acceptable to me. So I'm going to start with the assumption that I can gain conscious control over it. ethereal's wonderful post is also interesting, and I'll try to find out more about that meditation. I'm woefully ignorant on the subject of chakras and the rest of that stuff.
So I might just be expecting mastery, but I also want it to be in my control, I hope I've explained that point clearly. Beginner's mind, expectation of mastery.
3. The first step is to develop awareness of my sexual energy. Being in the sexual prime of my life, and the fact that I am human and human beings tend to sense things using contrasts, my sex drive is probably like a background sound to me now. That is, I don't notice it, if I ever did. To develop this awareness, I can experiment with increasing and decreasing my sex drive (I guess by turning myself on or turning myself off) to create a contrast to make it easier for me to recognize it.
I can also notice how much I want to notice girls. Just a simple check of what I feel inside might be enough to help me gain better awareness. I think everyone has the basic awareness to say "I'm turned on/horny right now", but to what level. Probably on a simple 1-10 level.
Another one is to meditate and see if I can somehow visualize my sexual energy and see if I can manipulate it. This is (I think) similar to what ethereal posted, but its not transforming it for now, but just recogizing, understanding and playing with it.
I recall a post on conserving sexual energy here a while ago by not masturbating, which seems to use the same sort of theory that celibacy or abstinence use. I figure it like this, one can either make sure to use every piece of the pie (of sexual energy
) efficiently and be careful with itand/or one can grow the pie (the "pool" of sexual energy). The latter is my working theory for now and I'll see if it bears out to truth.
4. The awesome success image is a threefer. The first is a point where I am extremely turned on and totally focussed on whatever I'm working on. I'm using the kind of energy and courage that being full of the nice hormones gives me to accomplish my goals without getting distracted or bogged down by thoughts of sex or related. The second is that my "normal" level of sexual energy is really high but still under my control. The third is that when I want to focus on sex and sexual related stuff, I can instantly.
I'll keep thinking about this and focusing on this. This is fun. Sense of adventure and excitement by finding new territory.
