Love is Letting Go of Fear
“Love is Letting Go of Fear” was a book I read in the seventies by Gerald Jampolsky. This philosophy was guiding my every decision in life, long before I read his book. Here was the thing. I was afraid of being forced back into another womb and having to do the process all over again. However, I could not let fear dictate my behavior. Sure, I remembered what it was like to die and to take birth again and that alone was enough to scare the shit out of Hercules, however, letting fear dictate my behavior would be a sucky, horrible way to live and you can’t truly be yourself if you’re trying to be somebody else, right?
In spite of knowing what was going to happen to me, I could not fully surrender to simply loving God and giving up material desires. Neither could I let these patriarchal leaders control my behavior with fear. Like everyone in this world, my biggest desire was for love and sex. I started masturbating with my next door neighbor early in life, maybe at the age of 10, I’m not sure. From the very first time, I experienced an amazing orgasm and knew I had found the most incredible feeling in the world. I masturbated everywhere, on every hard surface where I could rub myself and with any tool or vegetable I could find. My neighbor first turned me on by ‘playing doctor’ with me where she took some plastic toy tools and played around with me until I was dripping wet and arching my back in ecstasy. I could barely contain my scream as she finally rubbed me into a frenzied passion of thrusting, heavy breathing and wet squirting. Masturbation became the thing I wanted to do most in the world! My lust was overwhelming me and it was My secret. I experienced something amazing and it was making my youth much more interesting and worthwhile.
By the time I was 20, I was married, a virgin but craving, and as time went on I realized I was craving more sex than my poor husband could give! One job I worked at in my twenties was as a Leasing Agent for a property management company. There, I met a fellow employee that told me she had sex with her boyfriend two to three times a day. I was only getting it two or three times a week. I was incredibly jealous! “How did you find a guy like that?” “He’s Latino,” she said. Well, I didn’t know any Latinos, but I sure wished I had one. And later in life I did, finally! And yes, he did live up to the reputation! Thank God! I found my sex buddy! And he loved me!
But this was long after Rusty. While living in the ashram, I restrained my sex desire because (I was supposed to have sex only for children) and, yes, I was really stupid at the time or either I was absorbed in devotional service to my guru and Krishna and the thought of sex was in the background of my mind. For years I gave up sex, only having an occasional rendezvous with my husband. I also gave up meat, with good reason. I became a vegetarian before ever meeting the devotees. We followed four regulative principles, 1) no illicit sex, whatever that means, 2) no meat, 3) no gambling and 4) no intoxication. Intoxication was not a big deal for me. I smoked pot and did LSD and drank lots of booze, but they were never my priority, as they were actually part of the reason I joined the ashram, feeling them to be just not enough to satisfy my soul. Mostly drugs and alcohol were something to divert my attention from being bored. So giving up drinking was easy. I could take it or leave it. Another regulation required for living in a temple and taking initiation was to give up gambling. Well, I was too cheap to ever gamble in the first place. I never wanted to give away the money I worked for and I never won anything in my life.
So those were the four regulative principles one followed to become an initiate. I followed them with not much problem, only a little.
But as time went on, the fear of going again to the womb would not stop me from fulfilling my desire for the pleasures of the flesh. If I gave up sex, even though I was desiring it immensely, out of fear of taking birth again, it would have made me miserable. Who the hell wants to live a life full of misery? I certainly didn’t! I wanted sex and I finally told myself, fuck it if I have to come back again, over and over and over again to yet one more womb or tomb, for that matter, I’m going to get laid!
So I figured my success in this lifetime would probably not be happening. I was definitely going to have as much sex as I could possibly get. Fear was not gonna stop me.
I began to realize, fear would not allow you to have love, as well. Fear is the actual barrier repelling the courage to get love. It will stop you from exploring the depths of your soul. It will stop you from getting out of a bad situation. It will stop you from associating with the type of people who can help you move forward to reach your goal. It will stop you from learning. It will stop you from loving yourself. It will stop you from saying no when no is the only solution to a peaceful situation. And as I found out many years later, it will stop you from reaching the highest goal of Raganuga Bhakti or love and devotion with extreme attachment to the Supreme! So after around three and one half years, Fear did not stop me from leaving!
I don’t belong here!