Making Sense of Celibacy
An evolutionary view on human sexuality
“If you could make love every day for the rest of your life, or only once more, what would you choose?”
Human nature
Surveying planet earth, it becomes apparent there is no normal way of making love. There are countless sexual orientations and deviations from the biologically rational.
Male giraffes have sex with other males more than females, nudibranchs (sea slugs) do whatever they want, monkeys and dolphins are pleasure machines, and sea otters penetrate dead dogs, after drowning them.
Monk life
I was recently at a Buddhist monastery with monks who take 227 precepts (morality rules), many of which have to do with not emitting semen (wet dreams are OK).
Another layperson perplexed by their vows turned to me, “… celibacy is unnatural. It goes against everything that is human”
hmm. What is natural? And does celibacy go against everything that makes us human, or everything that makes us an animal? Perhaps, the ability to abstain from sex is exactly what makes us human.
Invertebrate sex
Bugs make love in ways that seem like war. Male bed bugs famously stab females with their penis, copulate with the wound, and ejaculate (traumatic insemination). Snails, which are hermaphrodites, blast mates with mucus-semen love darts (traumatic secretion transfer). Sea slugs, also hermaphrodites, sword-play with their penises, until the loser is stabbed and inseminated (penis fencing). And female arachnids, often eat their spouse (sexual cannibalism) and also their babies (filicide).
Vertebrate sex
Does having a spinal cord make sex more normal, and at the least, polite? Not really. Canines, felines, chimpanzees, and polar bears practice infanticide. Giraffes are kinky (drink their partner’s urine) and notoriously homosexual. Dolphins have their own karma sutra[D1] , and Koalas bite their mates during sex. Also, sea otters kill and rape dead (other species) animals.
Homosexuality and Masturbation
There is nothing wrong with homosexuality, it’s common through the animal queendom, but it doesn’t create babies, and is considered biologically perplexing (to some scientists). Masturbation also doesn’t create babies, and is widespread.
Scientists say homosexuality and masturbation might be practice[D2] /training for opportunities with fertile mates. I think it’s a mix, and that most sexy things are done in the name of pleasure, relief, hormone highs, experimentation, and genetic triggers.
Regarding sea otters
Actually, many sexual acts in the mammal world might be considered rape, but we must be careful not to anthropomorphize. Ultimately, genes have come up with strategies to carry on, and some techniques seem strange.
Pleasure
Just as animals feel pleasure, they also feel pain. It’s dangerous to generalize animal behavior in human terms — especially around rape and consent. Animals have a different intelligence than humans, and it’s hard to know if bed bugs, whales, and monkeys feel shame, trauma, and regret similar to humans.
Monkeys
Monkeys do everything humans do: monogamy, polygyny, polyandry, polygamy, oral sex, genital stimulation, anal stimulation, interspecies mating, affection, group sex, promiscuity, forceful sex, and myriad forms of masturbation. Some monkeys use smooth sticks as dildos. Yes. It’s all there, except voluntary celibacy.
Human sex
Humans also practice traumatic secretion transfer and penis fencing, but we also go beyond. Think BDSM (bondage, dominance and submission, sadomasochism), puke-pee-poop porn, bestiality, sex-slavery, prostitution, gang rape, and everything else money, imagination, and power can muster.
The statistics on child fetishes/abuse are especially sick, twisted, and abhorrent. We are worse than insects, sea otters, and giraffes (actually giraffes seem to have it pretty sweet).
So wait — what is normal sex?
Many people have monogamous relationships, with basic (dare I say boring) sex habits. But is that what everyone should do? No, because everyone doesn’t feel like doing that.
Maybe monogamy is one successful template (genetically and socially) among many. Our genes have gone through a multi-million year process requiring adaptation, experimentation, and a zest for creativity. For our genes to be passed on, we needed large tool-belt.
Our genes are ready to capitalize on any situation. Twist the knobs of childhood conditioning, sex education, culture, religion, early sexual experience/trauma, environmental factors, and bing-bang-boom: you have your sexual orientation. And maybe there is input from your past lives, if you believe in that.
So perhaps we should be happy knowing there is no normal when it comes to sexual behavior. We have gene-based hormone responses for a whole range of situations, these hormones are often pleasurable, and we build narratives around the experiences to justify our behavior and continue attaining pleasure (avoiding pain).
Sorry if you don’t think you are a hormone-robot, but you mostly are.
*Note
This is evolutionary theory, and not meant to justify abhorrent/hurtful behavior. These perspectives are a basis for where sexual impulses originate, and general food for thought. Please forgive me if this is triggering or inaccurate. I take full responsibility for these words. I am not an evolutionary biologist, nor a sexual sociologist, nor a celibate monk. I’m a white, male human with feelings, ideas, and inspiration to better understand myself.
Celibacy
Kaiwelo: alone lib(h)s: living[D3]
Animals abstain from sex temporarily to conserve energy, waiting for ideal conditions/mating season, but only rare cases (cloning stick insects) see no sexual reproduction.
Humans are different. Abstaining is our superpower. We can choose to eat or fast, sleep or stay vigil, leave or stay, marry or live alone, sex or not sex. Many choose celibacy, and not just Jesus, Joan of Arc, [D4] Mother Teresa, Isaac Newton, Immanuel Kant, the Buddha (after renunciation), the pope (after ordination), and Nikola Tesla. But why?
“If you could make love every day for the rest of your life, or only once more, what would you choose?” Seriously, what would you choose? Please answer in the comments.
I asked my university peers. Almost always: “yes!” to everyday-sex. When people said “only once more”, my ears perked. Why?
1. You have time to do other things.
And perhaps, better things. Not that sex isn’t good, it has health benefits, builds trust, and makes babies. But it also creates trauma, consumes the mind, and creates insatiable/problematic desires. So healthy sex should be differentiated from unhealthy sex.
Sex can be the closest thing to a spiritual experience we ever have. It surely feels like communion. Some religious traditions use sex as a means to elevated mental states. But, I think we should ask ourselves seriously if our sex life is a spiritual practice, or just pleasure-seeking.
If we are in a relationship and make love every day (is this even possible/sustainable?), and each session is an average of 30 minutes (60 minutes/day for two people). That’s a cumulative 365 hours a year.
What about the time we dedicate to thinking about sex, watching pornography, or chasing sex (going on dates, scrolling tinder/FB, bar-hopping, clubbing, texting, scheming, courting, and playing Bingo)? As animals with genes bent on spawning brood, we are subconsciously, and consciously wired to prowl, calculate the fertility of potential mates, obsess over our crush, and undertake elaborate courtship rituals. This is a lot of time we could have been doing selfless and wholesome projects.
This sounds crude, but next time you’re at a university campus, shopping mall, or Instagraming, observe. And yes, scrolling and bar-hopping might have other benefits (communication, networking, friendship building, having “fun”, economic effects, etc.), but if our root intention is sex, than perhaps everything else is superficial.
2. Living blamelessly.
Sexual abuse incidents throughout human history is massive. Sexual Violence [D5] (SV) rates worldwide for women are 36% (90%+ in many developing countries). SV for men by other men is around 29% [D6] (though these incidents are drastically underreported). Most of these incidents are by family members. For refugees of war, SV rates are around 99%.
There is honor to restore. We all have mothers and sisters and people. To live blamelessly and boycott this cycle of trauma holds value.
I don’t mean no sex for anyone. Complete celibacy must be natural and takes time. But men, we must do our research and try harder — to be better. Do it for all the women who suffered from your ancestors, friends, and perhaps you. But mostly do it for you.
Effects of Sexual Violence (SV) on mental health (for the perpetrator)
The first person you harm when committing sexual abuse, is yourself. Only once one generates tremendous agitation (passion/jealousy/lust/ego) in the mind, can one harm someone else. And this defilement of the mind has deep roots and deep effects on your life. After committing sexual misconduct it will be harder to sleep at night. Or perhaps you go to jail. Or lose a relationship. Or who knows. Never will anyone feel peaceful after harming another.
The third precept in Buddhism is no sexual misconduct. For monks it means complete celibacy, for average people it means no sexual behavior that harms another person (or yourself) — mentally or physically. So: (1) Only consensual sex. (2) No sex outside of agreed relationships. (3) No sex with dependents (students, employees, etc.). (4) No rampant indulgence that creates mental or social instability. Sounds OK, right?
In short, be peaceful and mindful in your sex life. I’m not sure where pornography fits into this, it wasn’t invented at the time of the Buddha. So you’ll have to make your own call if you’re hooked on it. I would say from my own experience that pornography has devastating effects on the mind.
To take this vow of no sexual misconduct, is a powerful and profound action that reverberates through society. You can make a contract with yourself and sign it.
3. Mental clarity.
If you are celibate and you meet a new person, you can go straight to supporting them, rather than calculating the odds of rubbing genitals. We often fumble with each other’s hearts because we want to be more-than-friends.
Thinking about sex agitates the mind. Between the ages of 15–35, it can be borderline debilitating, especially when paired with other cultural pressures pecking at our mental wellbeing.
One Thai forest monk is quoted: “… sexual passion is the most destabilizing and consuming human emotion.”
By learning to focus the mind on one object, the mind naturally becomes calmer, and creates a habit to come back to the present moment — the breath.
4. Wisdom — Vipassana.
In the practice of Vipassana, meditators are trained to observe physical sensations in the body equanimously. When emotions (including passion) arise in the mind, they manifest as sensations in the body. By observing these body feelings without reacting, and being aware of their changing nature, the associated craving or aversion to such sensations (and the associated emotion) is weakened. This changes the habit pattern of the mind at the root level.
A meditator weakens unwholesome mental states through repeated non-judgmental observation. Sexual craving inevitably arises while meditating, no matter how powerful and crafty lust is when it arises, you can tell yourself: this too shall pass — no sensation is permanent. Passion is a normal, universal emotion that agitates the minds of millions. I have the option right now not to indulge in it; I will observe objectively. Be brave.
So celibacy doesn’t create wisdom, meditation does.
Slowly, slowly
Over time a good meditator and ethical human may naturally incline towards celibacy, especially as we get older and the evolutionary urge diminishes. This process should not be forced. Sexual behavior should not be suppressed and not overly expressed. There must be a middle path with proper understanding of: (1) What lust is and how it creates suffering in the mind, and in society, (2) the cause of lust (hormones and conditioning) and its roots (evolution and reproduction), (3) that it is possible to diminish the negative aspects of lust through meditation, and (4) the path and technique to eradicate it (morality, concentration training, and Vipassana meditation).
Intentionally diminishing passion through meditation and a code of ethics is different than just not-having-sex. [D10]
Goenkaji, a modern teacher of Vipassana Meditation says that couples who are both good meditators might naturally come to the point of celibacy. He also says that when passion does arise in a relationship, just observe it and watch it as objectively as possible.
What is true love and support, and can it exist without sexual passion?
I want to be clear: I am not advocating sexual suppression or justifying overt sexual expression. I’m suggesting self-exploration, reflection on biology, and tuning our moral compass might offer perspective and perhaps, even joy.
Good luck on your journey. Be brave. Keep searching for the truth.
References:
[D1](https://www.science.org/content/article/everything-you-always-wanted-know-about-dolphin-sex-were-afraid-ask),
[D2]See book of humans
[D3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celibacy
[D4]https://www.elitedaily.com/life/famous-successful-virgins/1347908
[D5]https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-020-09926-5
[D6]https://internationalcap.org/abuse-neglect-info/statistics/
[D7]https://encyclopediaofbuddhism.org/wiki/Mental_factors#Fourteen_unwholesome_mental_factors
[D8]https://encyclopediaofbuddhism.org/wiki/Mental_factors#Fourteen_unwholesome_mental_factors
[D9]https://www.dhammawiki.com/index.php/9_Jhanas
[D10]https://www.quora.com/How-is-it-to-live-the-life-of-celibacy
