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Tantra without Tears

06:30 / 24.03.04

Has anybody read Tantra without Tears by Christopher Hyatt and Jason Black?

there is an interesting bit of Magick that I really think I need some clarification on. Hyatt and Black state that masturbation can be used to cause "death of self"

What this death of self means they do not really explain (I can only think that like the rest of the book, it is a method of removing and changing metaprograms and cultural conditioning, freeing up the 'true ' self)

Anyway, they continue that if you want to lose weight, you should (if heterosexual) imagine YOURSELF as a member of the opposite sex and make yourself as attractive as possible. If your goal is to lose weight then imagine this other 'you' x amount of pounds thinner and when you have tweaked the image to make it sexually arousing.....masturbate to this image (I can imagine this is quite hard to pull off if you will excuse the pun)

Whether this takes just one session or many , it only hints at

obviously, this is similar to Sigils though if it has to be repeated, presumably the intent is not forgotten

Has anybody on here had any experience with this? If so , what else can be achieved.........in the book it is left pretty open ended and I presume there are other potential benefits (and dangers) to this practice if it was adapted for other aims

Thoughts anyone?

trouser the trouserian

04:19 / 25.03.04

I can see how this 'lose weight through wanking' technique might work. Providing you use the vigorous 'spanking the monkey' option (and not the more 'esoteric' but less physically taxing 'sticking a used biro up you're jap's eye' - Illmatic, are u reading this?), then after a while your hands will be too cramped up to pick up any items of sustenance.

Hmmn, let's see. Hyatt/Black kinda vaguely describe a technique. Then they challenge the reader by saying it's a way of 'violating programming' and finally back it up by saying that it's (a) ancient and (b) potentially dangerous.

I can't quite decide whether Hyatt is just writing complete bollocks 'cos he knows he can get away with it or if Tantra without tears is a subtle expose of how occult texts are presented.

05:44 / 25.03.04

I've wondered about that myself. Hyatt from the two books of his I have read either does not recognise his own attitude or (WHICH I AM MORE INCLINED TO BELIEVE) purposefully adopts the role of 'know all'

'Tantra' is full of him espousing how there are Magicians who don't know squat and like the sound of their own voice.....and then he tells you how he is an authority (occassionally he does admit his foibles and lack of answers)

I think he does this on purpose and to shake you up as you read the text. He is sort of saying in written form "DONT FOLLOW GURUS" then setting himself up as a guru to see if you will follow. To me it is like he is testing you throughout the book

I enjoy his writing, he is like a more no nonsense in your face RAW.

There is an underlying aggressiveness in his writing......he seems to despise his fellow man for not breaking out of our shared 'culture'
and not taking the chances he has taken

WHILST I can understand his attitude, it strikes me as strange that he is SO seemingly aggressive (it may all be an act). To hold that much aggression does not strike me as the behaviour of a man who has exorcised his own demons......it is the sort of paranoid (although in his case it was probably justified) attitude Wilhelm Reich exhibited in 'Listen Little Man'

It may just be a writing style of Hyatt's or a tool for him to get his message over but I still find it perplexing how much (seeming) resentment he holds for his fellow man.

Istill enjoyed the book. Short and a little vague in places but it is enjoyable and I will purchase more of his books when money and time allows

06:52 / 25.03.04

I not sure if I like the thought of myself being associated on a public forum wth pens up jap's eyes. Just for the record, I have never put a pen up my jap's eye in a well-known restaraunt chain and attempted to sign checks.

As for Chris Hyatt, doesn't seem to like people very much does he? Always makes me wonder about his books. I think that book has very little to do with tantra (if it wasn't obvious). By "very little" I mean, nothing at all.

10:05 / 25.03.04

I have no idea about Tantra as this is the only book I have ever read on the subject but he does at least display (whether it is real I cannot say) a dislike of his fellow man

trouser the trouserian

10:13 / 25.03.04

Hyatt once said (in a taped lecture) "To lie is human. To lie and get away with it is divine."

12:16 / 25.03.04

I've never read any of his books well Chris Hyatt so I wouldn't know how to comment on his stuff. I do tend to think that alot of books seem like constant copies of what was before said in print. But then Magick seems like a huge cottage industry of people trying to shift units and that at the end of the day people have to produce the spondooolies to support their families and that. I've known of people who ghost-write with other identities in different genres - fair play, if you can make money out of it and there seems like potential punters around the corner then whatever?! I think elitism has entered these portals before or the questions and ethics surrounding it. If someone can take on belief systems engage it and the achieve results then good luck - in this modern era I find alot of belief systems (or currents of thought) highly disposable. There I've lent in with absolutely nothing to do with the theme of the thread - ooops.

trouser the trouserian

12:26 / 25.03.04

To quote Pete Carroll: I'm sick of halfbaked ideas that pass from book to book without any intervening thought.

12:35 / 25.03.04

I agree pretty much, a lot of the New Falcon books do seem quite fomulaic presentations of the same things over and over again, ech time with a slighly new twist. The Energised Meditation stuff is in about 3 books, lots of 'em have got a sex magick section, they are a bit respun...

17:43 / 25.03.04

I feel once we adopt magick as a practice when we have done our dues reading lots, it always seems exciting to hear of newer stuff to see if we can prop our own personalised styles/systems. Unfortuneately most books just cost too much for what they aspire to. Let's face it - most stuff we can glean from downloads and pdf's. I wouldn't mind getting "Urban Voodoo" though to check it out. Not much new seems like it's getting out?! Ideally I suppose everyone should contribute to websites with their own articles & experiences - like a more groundroots level. I've never contributed to a WIki - it seems like a good metaphor to me! The last book that I bought that kicked mega ass seems like "The Book of Lies" on Disinfo, I suppose the out there pop magick/kaos current at least acts as a fresh change.

18:30 / 25.03.04

But then Magick seems like a huge cottage industry of people trying to shift units and that at the end of the day people have to produce the spondooolies to support their families and that.

I think it'd have to be a pretty fucking small family if your were trying to support it by writing books on magic. I mean small like the fucking borrowers or something.

The Knights Templar Boogie Machine

13:43 / 26.03.04

I think that out of hyatts books, this one is more accesible and readable than most, but he does over emphasise and (jack off?) over the technique mentioned by joe at the start of this thread... A really odd thing though about the book is that after 'priming' you for a tantric initiation, he presents the reader at the end of the book with a ritual that is basically a devotional exercise to crowley!
Hyatts writing is very cartoon like at times, and may well be just his way of putting things across. As was mentioned in another thread, he was once a marriage counsellor, if he is as misanthropic as he makes out to be, i can't see how he would heave held that job down for more than a day, unless the clients were prepared to be torn to psychological pieces at the cost of saving their marriage!!

14:11 / 26.03.04

I wouldn't mind getting "Urban Voodoo" though to check it out

It is one of the shittest books on the subject you could possibly hope to find. A real case of "lets spend five minutes researching something then do a book on it cos it's new falcon and people will buy it." It's about Vodou in the same way that 'tantra without tears' is about tantra. Not at all. Same old Hyatt routine, use the same material from othr books, bitch about christianity a bit, slap a 15 quid price tag on it.

15:15 / 26.03.04

I've seen other voodoo books about ha this sorta relates to another thread knocking around somewhere. I suppose New Falcon has a name to it. The only New Falcon books I've ever owned were RAW books which have musteriously recycled themselves in strange second hand bookshops.
I've went to the New Falcon website the only other book that looks good - "Monsters and Magick Sticks" I think it's called. Book on self hypnosis and accessing diffferent states. But how different from other NLP and hypnosis books could it get?!