Tetany Orgasm
by James Beard, Founder of 13 breaths and creator of the Inspiration Deck
Breathing with a partner my hands became energized and slowly began to contort and cramp up for no apparent reason. It was fascinating. I had no control over my hands as I connected my breath with each new participant in a Breathing workshop. We were connecting our breaths as we met each other for the first time on Friday night at the beginning of this weekend workshop. I unintentionally drew people’s attention with my cramped hands and my look of fascination as my arms unintentionally bent up at the elbow. The facilitator asked me to remain in one place and told the rest of the group to come to me, drawing more attention to this unusual experience I was going through. This allowed me time to truly lean into the experience. I breathed in silent synchronization with each person looking deeply into their eyes before completing the opening night of the Ecstasy Breathing Intensive.
I was more curious than anything as I greeted and breathed with each new person, smiling at them and shrugging my shoulders with an “I don’t know,” kind of look. Fascinated with the energy and internal force my hands created, genuinely painful and intense, on a physical level I mentally witnessed my loss of control of my body. At the same time, I was excited about the brand-new experience and felt that this was something significant.
Friday night our now intimate group had a promising idea of where this Weekend Intensive was going and what would be required of us. I went home at 10pm and 12 hours later I was back excited and ready with an open mind and heart. I jumped in the new adventure heart first and opened up to whatever was coming next.
Prior to the class I had been quietly studying various breathing practices to try to activate and open my chakras chasing down the mythical Kundalini release. I had held this close to my heart until that Friday night when I voiced it in one of the opening exercises. I had kept it to myself as I had been mocked, scoffed at, and attempted to be deterred by friends and family. On the rare occasion a spiritual or belief conversation started I would share the surface of what I believed. That is how I learned about that workshop back in 1992.
Friday night my cramped hands were a real sign that I was onto something. I was 30 years old and had no idea what my private “Intention’ of Awakening Kundalini was going to do, to me, my family, my entire life. No idea! “Be careful what you ask for, you just might get it.” Is a saying I completely understand now.
Saturday morning, we started at 10am and went until 10pm. I wish I could recall all the exercises we did but it was 30 years ago. I recall we did three or four breath sessions that day. We discussed our beliefs, guilt, shame, mom. dad, families, relationships and our USA culture. We dissected them all. A profound and real sense of forgiveness and gratitude filled me completely. I was all-in. I wanted it all. As we continued through the sessions, I learned
that the cramping was called Tetany. The intensity of the Tetany increased and moved from my contorted hands into my arms, legs, feet and eventually slowly worked my whole body into a gnarly, twisted knot.
I quietly continued to breathe the consciously connected beaths in between the guided sessions, during talks and breaks keeping this new energy alive. One exercise we formed a circle and joined hands. My hands immediately began to cramp like a vice crushing the hands of the participants on either side of me. “Sorry.” I said, “I have no control.” With an apologetic look on my face. They slowly slipped their fingers out of my crushing mudra of a hand and gently placed them on the outside of my hands. There was no way to deny that something was happening with me. I was truly forgiving life, my dad, my mom, and anyone or anything else I could think of, including myself. It was the most loving experience. So outside of the world I knew.
Sunday, we began at 11am and went well past midnight resulting in me arriving home at 3 o’clock in the morning. I ate very little that weekend and consciously breathed more than I ever had. I had dis-covered areas of my body to work with and relax, the middle of my pelvic floor (the perineum), energy lines running along my spine and up the front of the body, (Microcosmic Orbit in Chinese Medicine). I thought this was new original and fantastic information since it was not included in the workshop but after some research, I realized it was just new to me.
The facilitator introduced the musician that created the tracks we were listening to. He mixed brilliant pieces that would take us to a peak with our breath holds with our release accompanied by silence or soothing interludes. Late Sunday night he mixed in a Pink Floyd song that I love, Home. My heart opened even more as he built us up to the crescendo with fast and forceful breathing pushing us to our aerobic limits.
I sang the words loud, proud, and probably off key as he shouted, “Go for it James.” My body was a complete twisted tetany knot with my legs crossed over each other, my arms crisscrossed over my chest. My chin smashed down and my jaw locked. But I was still breathing passionately. The music was loud pushing us beyond our perceived limits. “Now Hold.” he shouted. I took one last big inhale through my cramped lips and held my breath in as the music went silent. I let go of the hold exhaling and remained in a knot of pain. I felt I had missed something. The goal, the purpose and I took three more full, purposeful, powerful, conscious connected breaths in the silence and held the inhale in one more time.
Everything shifted.
Time and space dissolved. I don’t know how long I laid there. In A Course In Miracles, they talk about the Holy Instant. Eastern philosophies speak of dormant energy. Science
recognizes energy dormancy in our DNA. I experienced those words in a very personal and profound way that day. Did my root chakra open and release Kundalini?
I was transformed from a knotted up cramped painful body, full of unexpressed anger, rage, shame, and guilt to a blissful vibrant innocent body like that of a child. I felt absolutely incredible.
At first, there was only white light, brilliant, loving and everywhere, and it was me. I felt the full knowledge of it staring deeply into that space. Slowly the room came into view. Through my wide-open eyes, I curiously looked at the room wondering why everything was upside down. And then ‘I’ wondered, where am I? and remembered, ‘I am in a workshop. I am known as James. I am married. I have three kids and a job.’ All the things that defined James came back and I felt my body. It took me a moment to realize my back was arched from my hips to the top of my head that was firmly planted on the floor. My arms spread out like a cross. My legs lay open and relaxed. All the pain was gone and pure bliss remained.
My body felt unbelievable as it hummed. It was so vibrant, so full of love, light, and curiosity. I wondered if I could walk through walls? I felt that light and that anything was possible. I slowly turned back into James again but without guilt, anger, shame, and fear. I was Freeeeee! Like an innocent child.
As we closed out the workshop the ego of James wanted to know what just happened? The facilitator would not make eye contact with me.
Arriving home I quietly slipped into bed with no need to sleep. I waited for my family to wake up so I could share my inner journey with them and the profound love I felt for them.
I, the now new and improved James, was joyful, which was very unusual and suspect. Normally I snuck off to work because my middle child would cling to my leg begging me to stay and it pained me every time. I was not known as a happy morning person more pissed off and grumpy that I worked for my father-in-law.
Joyful James tried to relate and tell them about his weekend experience and what had happened to him. He tried to share with them how much love he felt for them, life and himself. He was thrilled!
My two older children protectively stood behind their mother. They were looking at me with questioning faces unsure like I was a stranger in their home. My wife stood at a slight distance too, physically questioning in a skeptical posture while holding our two older children close to her side and slightly behind.
My one-year-old daughter was doing her best to get my attention. I thought she wanted a hug so I picked her up and she pushed me away. So, I put her back down as I talked to the other
three. Still demanding my attention, I squatted down to hug her on her level and again pushed me away. I felt a hug was needed and slowly realized she didn’t want a hug, she wanted to give me a hug as an equal.
As we stood toe to toe with her little head just above my knee she wrapped her arms around my knees, while squeezing my legs I heard her telepathically, “I know where you are, because I am there too.”
She was still connected to the source herself. That weekend I had jackhammered off three decades of influences and beliefs and found myself on the other side of Tetany, free in the knowledge of a spiritual truth.
That tremendous release of unconscious tension was orgasmically mind blowing, unequalled in body pleasure, leaving me in the emotional charge of unconditional love. A tetany orgasm. Who knew?
