When I agreed to speak to the Gay Buddhist Fellowship in February, I hoped for a topic which offered listeners support for their Buddhist practice. I told my teacher, Geshe Yeshe Phegey, that I'd decided to pose the question, "Do monks have sex with each other? But I knew the idea of men cut off from general society while at the same time engaged in Buddhist practice was a picture not just of monks, but of the GBF membership. What, then, could be more relevant? The vow of celibacy I had taken three years before when I was ordained allows for no sexual act wet dreams are the exception-they occur in sleep and are unwilled. Masturbation clearly breaks that vow-and monks, I learned, did it. Awake and busy every day from six in the morning until after midnight, monks would naturally be deprived of needed rest by sexual arousal.

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Badiner holds a masters degree in Buddhist studies and has been a student of Thich Nhat Hanh for over 20 years. If I want to live an enlightened life, do I need to stop having sex? Yes, you would need to stop. But only to demonstrate sufficiently to yourself that you are able to do so. Subsequently you will be acting from real choice—not habit, compulsion, or escape. It would be sex as a conscious choice. I imagine that the quality of the experience can only benefit from more consciousness and self-awareness.
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CNN Could advice from a former Buddhist monk help improve your sex life? Ian Kerner is a licensed couples therapist, writer and contributor on the topic of sex for CNN. Chat with us in Facebook Messenger.