proy wrote:I just find it odd that the genders are strictly separated with no account taken of an individuals sexual orientation. After all, what is the use of preventing contact between brothers and sisters when, given the statistics, some people in Gyan must be gay or lesbian.
I agree. It is part of the nonsensical half made presumptions, like only using your right hand to take " holy sweeties " from the senior etc. They might tell you to stick out your right hand only, what they don' tell you is that you are meant to use your left hand only to touch your dirty bits and do dirty things. And what about left handed people?
[Oh, they just need to do more Yoga and they will be cured next birth. Needless to say everyone in the Golden Age is right handed and as one old BK told us, the deities don't poo because they and their diet of flowers and fruits is so perfect they don't eat enough to do so. Actually, that BK thought the deities did not have bits at all ... but that was non-standard bit of knowledge ].
And extrapolating from your point, I think it would be interesting to discuss whether sexual orientation changes through the practise of Raja Yoga.
If you accept the "female soul in male body" concept, which I think is a little weak an argument, or that homosexuality is a spiritual disease / imbalance, as some fundamentalist groups do, does being a practising BK "cure" you of homosexuality?
Of course, there is a difference between Raja Yoga and other religions in that there is no thought of going off to have "normal" sexual relationships in this life and Raja Yoga practises the thought that we are neither male nor female but equal souls.
The one ex-queer BK that did come out to me recounted the emergence of heterosexual desires which they were really surprised by. But one could argue that it was just that they were just over-sexed or sexually imbalanced in the first place and suffering from the results of the sublimation of desires.
My experience is that if you bite the bullet, rather than the pillow, stop sex and just get on with the BK lifestyle, actually the sexual instincts and desires quieten down fairly quickly, 3 or 4 months. And that was when I was in my early 20s. It must be a lot easier for BKs post-children or in their middle to late ages.
I remember someone stating that there had been a thread on masturbation I think on the Australian BK forum and that someone was defending it as not being sex but that is all wrong. No way does it fit in with a celibate lifestyle.
I think that most sex is merely driven by sanskars and if you create or empower sanskars to do it, the urge becomes much stronger. To recreate that sanskar, you have to stop and make new ones. What I think that BKs lack is a discussion of this, the effects of it, how to manage those effects and side-effects. Ever other deep spiritual tradition seems to.