1 NOMENCLATURE

Throughout this manual, I will use the word "lingam" for penis and "yoni" for vulva or vagina. These are eastern words that roughly mean wand of light and sacred temple respectively. Not that "penis" and "vulva" aren't perfectly good words. Both come from Latin. Penis is from the same root as pendulum and peninsula, and suggests something that hangs. Vulva means a covering or sack (and in my opinion has an especially sexy sound to it). Unfortunately, the Latin words sound clinical. It is not the fault of the words, but the fault of western attitudes toward the body parts -- attitudes that produce vulgar and demeaning words like cock, prick, pussy, and cunt (incidentally, "cunt" is also from Latin). Because the emotions attached to such words are negative, we assume that a nonnegative word for a sex organ must be devoid of emotion.

The eastern words carry with them a sense of respect for our bodies and remind us to look at them as sacred. Every part of your body is exquisitely made, and your lingam or yoni is privileged to be your body's entry and exit point for the passing of sexual energy. I had the good fortune once to tour an exhibit of Bhuddist religious art. Many of the paintings and sculptures showed human sex organs rendered unabashedly and in the most sensuous and glorious ways (unlike, for example, classical Greek sculpture in which the male organs are diminished and the female effaced of their detail). Although I know little about Bhuddist culture, it was clear that these people have found that spirituality and sexuality are sister emotions, and that the appendages for experiencing one find employment in the other. When we begin to think of our flesh in this way rather than as the soiled currency of sexual commerce, we take a step toward spiritual sex a step beyond just plain fucking, sucking, and jerking off.

I will often be representing a person's urine stream as his or her spring, or fountain. Just as rainwater that falls on a mountain and bubbles forth from a spring at the mountain's foot carries with it some of the essence of the mountain, so does the water that passes through us. That is because, not only does it come from deep within our bodies, it comes from every part of the body. Urine is filtered from blood, and is a part of our blood only a short time before it passes from our loins. Blood flows to all points inside us, including whatever the secret places in which our spirits reside. Urine is what's left after our blood has nurtured our sacred selves. It contains the sweat of our souls. And I don't think it was a coincidence or a divine joke that The Creator chose to connect our lingams and yonis with our personal fountains.