Great-Bliss-Tantric-Sex-and-the-Path-to-Inner-Awakening

He uses literally his “nectar finger,” the ring finger of his left hand, to draw a maṇḍala circle
around her yoni. The practices in this verse are easier to perform if the woman has shaved her
pubic area, an ancient Indian custom. The ring finger symbolizes the female essence. Using the
left fingers is a way of intentionally inverting the Indian cultural principle that the left side is
impure and the right side is pure to see all appearances as pure, and honoring the female
principle symbolized by the left side.
The male practitioner first draws the maṇḍala of a circle, counter-clockwise, the direction of
feminine power. He then draws a double triangle within the circle on the female practitioner’s
yoni. Draw the downward triangle first, then the upward triangle. The double triangle is
visualized as a three-dimensional tetrahedron.
The Sanskrit verses call for saffron (kuṃkuma) and red sandalwood (candana) for marking the
body. Turmeric (haldi) is an inexpensive substitute for saffron, and red wine (madya) mixed with
flour, especially for this exercise, is a much safer substitute for red sandalwood.
Verse 34: The seed syllables are visualized within the circle, resting on top of it, equally spaced
from each other. Because the practice derives from the Yoginī Tantras, the seed syllables are
arranged counter-clockwise, and face the male practitioner. The mantra blesses her yoni.
Verse 35: The pleasure-sound sīt is an onomatopoeic hissing sound of pleasure, common in
India. It is used here to finish the round of mantra recitation.
Generating the Four Immeasurables – Brahma Vihara
Verse 36a: The Four Immeasurables, love (maitri), compassion (karuṇa), joy (mudita) and
equanimity (upekṣa), are from the Common Vehicle, and reciting them sets the emotions in good
qualities.
The Emptiness Mantra – Śūnyatā Mantra
Verse 36b: The Emptiness Mantra clears your mind of discursive thoughts, and creates an open
space for pristine awareness to dawn within you. When you recite the Emptiness Mantra, you are
not dissolving the world into nothing, nor are you purifying any thing. You are dissolving your
conceptual stains of subject and object that prevent you from seeing reality clearly. All objects
that appear to you are perceived as empty of self-nature from the view of emptiness, and
eventually perceived as forms of primordial awareness arising from the Clear Light.
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