Bridger of Worlds

The Alchemy of Sacred Sexuality: Manifestation and Healing with Eastern Traditions

• Ioannis Kokkinos

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In this episode of the Bridger of Worlds podcast, host Ioannis Kokkinos explores the powerful connection between Taoist energy cultivation and Kundalini yoga philosophy, revealing how both traditions harness sexual energy for healing, manifestation, and spiritual awakening.

Ioannis guides listeners through the Taoist practice of the Microcosmic Orbit, where Jing (sexual essence) is transformed into Qi (life force energy) and then refined into Shen (spiritual consciousness). He compares this with the Kundalini path, highlighting the interplay of Shakti (feminine energy) and Shiva (masculine energy) as well as the role of the Ida, Pingala, and Sushumna nadis in energy circulation.

This conversation dives into essential themes such as:

  • Sexual energy transmutation for vitality and spiritual growth
  • The role of breathwork, awareness, and intention in energy practices
  • Sex magic and ritual boundaries for sacred embodiment
  • Healing ancestral and generational trauma through conscious practice

By weaving Taoist and Yogic wisdom, Ioannis demonstrates how these ancient practices offer modern seekers a path to deeper embodiment, expanded consciousness, and overall wellbeing. If you’re drawn to energy cultivation, masculine and feminine polarity, and the sacred use of sexual energy, this episode will inspire and guide your journey.


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Hi everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Bridger of Worlds podcast. I'm your host, Ioannis Kokkinos. Thank you so much for joining me. If you're on YouTube watching, thank you for tuning in and if you're on one of the podcast platforms, thank you for tuning in as well. So today I have, uh, quite an episode for you.

Recap of Previous Episodes

I, uh, want to elaborate on some things I touched upon in the last two episodes, so two weeks ago was spiritual boundaries as far as sacred sexuality is concerned. And last week I got more into around like the nature of sexual energy, how it can be used in ritual, and also I talked about sex magic, right?

The art of practicing manifestation through utilizing our sexual energy. 

Microcosmic Orbit in Taoist Tradition

So today I want to expand upon the microcosmic orbit of the Taoist tradition and compare it to the Kundalini yoga philosophy, which speaks very much as well to the raising of sexual energy. Now, I've talked a lot more about Kundalini yoga philosophy.

If you touch base with some of the previous episodes. But today, as far as Kundalini yoga's concerned and the microcosmic orbit, it's really about why manifestation is actually possible utilizing one's sexual energy. And of course this will be more theory, it'll be more technical.

I don't mean to get, uh, you know, school teacher on you, but it is important to know how we can also practically use this knowledge, right? We can say things like sex magic and manifesting and visualization, I guess like all these new age type of expressions. But there are in fact many doctrines and texts and teachings for thousands and thousands of years that do speak to the art of sex magic or sacred sexual manifestation, and so on and so forth. So, let's get into it. 

Practical Application of Microcosmic Orbit

I will start with basically all of the symbolism and the teachings of the microcosmic orbit. And really like how, what does this look like? What does a practice look like essentially for someone who wants to start working with their sexual energy in this manner.

After the microcosmic orbit, I will talk about Kundalini yoga philosophy and then make the comparisons as well, because they are very similar, but it's two very different cultures, two different parts of the world. But as I talked about in last week's episode, throughout all of the civilizations, the ancient civilizations really like, the main spiritual creed is divine union between the sacred masculine and the divine feminine. So we do see this in both the Taoist tradition and Kundalini yoga philosophy.

So in the microcosmic orbit, what this is, is a circuit that moves from the bottom of our spine. So basically our perineum, our genitals is the starting point.

'cause this is where as men and women, we generate sexual energy, right? It is through the gonads,

the testes for the men and the ovaries for the women. So this is called Jing. In the Taoist tradition, it is not yet Chi, which we hear about a lot. Qi Q Kong, right? QI is basically the in-between of Jing, which is raw sexual energy and Shen, which is spiritual energy. So, if one is to practice the microcosmic orbit in their day to day. All they really need to do is sit down. Create an awareness around the genital area because this is where the energy will arise from and use the back channel to circulate the energy up. Now, how does this happen? How do we circulate the energy? Now, in my experience or what has helped me the most is already knowing that that channel exists, right?

Because in the beginning I was putting like a lot of effort. I felt like I was thinking about it too much, but something that can help you may serve you that has served me is already knowing that that circuit exists and we basically just need to attune to that circuit that is already naturally occurring because the energy naturally does want to move up. It's just we've been conditioned or we've not learned or been taught that this energy can move up, right? So I talked about last week how the energy, the sexual energy if it stays in the bottom centers, can become very much about misuse and abuse of power, right? The shadow, the ego, all that, uh, a lower expression of sexuality, which is basically what we see as far as sexual trauma's concerned and everything I talked about, but if we start to learn and practice, really utilize the sexual energy as a source of fuel and vitality, then we can totally and completely transform our lives, including our health, including how we can manifest, including our energy levels and so on and so forth. So back to Jing. So by breath and awareness, awareness is number one basically with everything, right? To be aware that this energy is moving up through the back channel. So we want to envision the energy moving up the spine through breath, awareness. And then basically in the Taoist tradition, the kidneys also play a very vital role because the kidneys is where the adrenal glands are and the kidneys play a very vital role in our sexual energy function and production.

They regulate our hormones, including sex hormones. So our kidneys need to be in a healthy state and healthy function, and one thing we can do to render them healthy is actually to send sexual energy there so that the sexual energy nourishes the organs. This is a key component of the microcosmic orbit, is that sexual energy can be used not only to gain higher spiritual awareness, but to actually nourish organs, to nourish the inner body.

According to the teachings, we can nourish our heart with sexual energy. We can nourish our kidneys, we can nourish our liver, and so on and so forth, because sexual energy is creative energy. So once we start moving up the kidneys and like let's say to the heart area, Jing, which is no longer raw sexual force becomes qi, QI is what moves through the meridians of the body.

I n Chinese medicine, the meridians are the foundational component to really healing, right? Acupressure and acupuncture works with the meridians of the bodies. These are energetic pathways that exist within the human body according to Chinese medicine. So this is Qi that circulates through these meridians. So again, we see how vital sexual energy is because it is Jing that makes Qi.

Right. So if we don't have Jing, we don't have qi, but QI is not the final destination, quote unquote. We need to also transform Qi into Shen, which is spiritual energy. Now all this happens as the energy moves up, and in Taoist alchemy, this is also symbolized by the dragon, which is the masculine energy.

So as energy moves up acting as the masculine polarity, the dragon, it actually pierces and penetrates any blockages and congestion that our body and meridians and energy channels may have, right? That is the nature of masculine energy, is to pierce, penetrate, create space, and this is symbolized by the dragon in the Taoist alchemy tradition.

Now, once we move up to the head, we want to circulate the energy. Now if you are familiar with Kundalini yoga philosophy, it's not so much about circulating with Kundalini yoga, but really just about raising the serpent. But I will get into that a little bit later on. I just wanted to add this parentheses, because it is a very crucial part of the microcosmic orbit is basically to learn how to circulate the energy, because once we get to the head, the top of the head, we want to move the energy back down. We could store the energy into our belly, or we can bring the energy back down to our sex organs, and this creates a loop. So basically what happens is because Jing is transforming into Q and Qi is transforming into Shen. We do gain higher spiritual awareness because we start to open up our spiritual centers, which is basically our third eye and crown chakra.

Now, the Taoist tradition doesn't talk about chakras. This is very much Kundalini yoga philosophy. But even though there are no chakras, there are glands, right? The chakras are actually related to the seven main glands we have in our body, and because in the Taoist tradition, it's very much about using the sexual energy to nourish the body. That very well includes our glands. So obviously as we move up and we hit the pituitary and pineal glands with Shen or spiritual energy. This is how we can activate our higher mind, our higher self, and really expand open into universal consciousness. But it is very crucial within the Taoist tradition to not stay up there. We want to circulate the energy back down, and this is what we call manifestation. So, when we are raising energy up, this is the energy of liberation.

When we are anchoring energy down, or when we are bringing energy down into the physical or bottom, we are, actually, that's what manifesting is.

And Kundalini yoga also talks about this, but before I get there, I just want to mention that when we are bringing the energy down in the microcosmic orbit, this is related to the feminine polarity, right? So before I talked about the masculine raising up the spine and like piercing and penetrating through everything.

In the front channel when we circulate the energy back down. This is also symbolized by the Phoenix. The phoenix is the energy that cools everything down, whereas the dragon actually expands and heats everything up, but we cannot only remain in that heat, right? Sexual energy is very fiery. It's very charged.

It's very arousing. We do need to cool down that energy and we want to in a sense dissipate that arousal because we cannot remain in a state of arousal, even though we are practicing sexual alchemy and using our energy to transmute and to manifest, and so on and so forth. So that's like the microcosmic orbit in a nutshell.

We do have the masculine, we have the feminine, the dragon, the phoenix. We have energy going up. We have energy going down. It is a circular motion. And really, all this needs is quiet time, breath, awareness, and knowing that this circuit or this loop is already there, we just basically need to attune to that loop with our mind and intention.

Kundalini Yoga Philosophy

So now let's move on to Kundalini yoga philosophy and as I already said, I have talked more about Kundalini yoga philosophy throughout my episodes, but I do want to focus on manifestation and liberation today because essentially that's what sex magic is, and sexual healing. So at the Root Chakra, right, this is where the serpent is located, and here we are to raise the energy upward. Now, it's interesting because in the Taoist tradition, this is the masculine current, right? The dragon that rises. But in Kundalini yoga philosophy, this is Shakti, which is the feminine sexual force that rises because Shakti's the dance, right?

So the Hindus perceive this dance of life, the shift, the change and the cycles as feminine energy, the feminine polarity, and all this exists of course within the context of sexuality because sex is a dance and it is about bringing two different entities together. It is about the cycles of up and down and alternating waves of energy, right? So all this is feminine. This is Shakti. So, in the teachings, this would be known as the current of liberation because what happens is we have, let's say, very dense energy within our bottom centers. We can call this matter because it's dense, it's heavy, and we want to liberate this energy.

This is what Shakti  meant to do is reunite with Shiva up here in the crown. In order to experience Nirvana in order to experience oneness and cosmic consciousness, right? So all this matter is lightening up, is being liberated as it's being raised. 

Manifestation and Liberation in Kundalini Yoga

And then up here, once she meets Shiva, this is where like we experience, you know, transcendence and God consciousness, but there is a current of manifestation that also exists in Kundalini yoga philosophy, and this is where we need to bring the energy down. So when we are manifesting, right, we are actually anchoring consciousness, energy, spirit, and bring it into form.

That's what manifesting is. So it very much makes sense that energy comes up in order to come down so that it can become matter. Basically, we are to release old matter. So that it becomes energy and then energy becomes new matter. This is the art of manifestation and also healing really, right?

When we are wanting to manifest something, it has something to do with our healing. So all of the old matter, all the old dense energy that we are to liberate. It is very much connected to the energy and into the matter that we want to will and bring into existence because in order for new manifestations to happen, we have to create space.

So there are a lot of people that are wanting to just manifest, right? They want to whatever, wills, whatever, into existence, but they're not actually creating space for those manifestations. And this is where healing comes into the picture. Because we do need to create space.

We need to release, we need to surrender, we need to let go, and that is the empty space, quote unquote, that we create in order for the new manifestations to occur. And all this is a part of Kundalini yoga philosophy. So Shakti's, the feminine force, Shiva's the masculine force, which is like cosmic consciousness that holds space for the dance of Shakti to occur.

And once they unite, this basically signifies heaven on earth, heaven being cosmic consciousness and earth being the material experience.

And then another component of masculine and feminine energetics within Kundalini yoga philosophy is Pingala and Ida. These are two nadis, energetic pathways that move around the spine, which is the central Nadi, otherwise known as Sushumna. So it is within these pathways where basically Kundalini energy raises and through the Pingala and the Ida, we can move the energy up and down along with Sushumna. So Pingala, which is the masculine, governs the right side of the body. And Ida, the feminine governs the left side of the body. Also Pingala is related to the sympathetic nervous system, and IDA is related to the parasympathetic nervous system. So in the tantric teachings, the masculine is seen as the solar channel, the one that heats up and the one that opens and expands. And then Ida is the cooling channel or the lunar channel, which is about cooling down and dissipating arousal.

Combining Taoist and Kundalini Practices

So that is one other thing that the Taoist teachings and Kundalini yoga philosophy have in common is this idea of two opposite polarities working together to harmonize. And this of course speaks to the masculine and the feminine. Now of course Kundalini yoga, there are many practices.

There are many exercises, right? A lot of them require breath work and some form of meditation, and focus. But really what moves this energy is breath and awareness. So I talked about breath as fire, right? And Qi. Prana Pneuma all these words that mean breath actually just speak to the fire, the inner fire that we are meant to raise within ourselves. And that of course speaks to the sexual fire.

So as you can see, it is quote unquote possible to manifest through sexual energy, and I mean, there's so much more theory and the teachings go a lot more deep and a lot more complex than what it is I'm bringing to the space today. This is like the basic of the basic when it comes to the microcosmic orbit and Kundalini yoga philosophy.

But really what I wanted to showcase is, yeah, we can talk about sex magic, we can talk about manifesting, we can talk about all sorts of, you know, out there concepts, but how can we use it? How can we ground it into reality so that we can actually work with it? And it always comes down to meditation, breath work, breathing, attention, focus, awareness, consciousness, and being very much in tune and connected to the body.

And obviously this is not an overnight express type of situation. I think there's a lot of talk online on the, like how fast you're supposed to manifest and you know, if you're manifesting quickly, then you're doing it correctly.

If you're not manifesting, like you're not visualizing enough. There are a few layers to that. Uh, but one thing that I've noticed, and especially in my journey, is that if the space is not made for that new manifestation, then it won't come in. And this is where liberation comes in.

This is where we are to raise, quote unquote matter within ourselves to make it into energy, to transform it into energy and then bring new energy into existence. As far as chakras are concerned with Kundalini yoga, yes, we start with Shakti at the root chakra at the bottom of the base of the spine. But once we reach the crown, it is from here where the, like the downloads come and the higher knowledge and the higher guidance come right through the crown chakra.

And from the crown chakra, we can move energy down, which will not only manifest, but also just promote a better livelihood. That's new energy coming from a higher source, from a higher consciousness. So we can promote all kinds of healing when it comes to using our sexual energy. We can promote all kinds of vitality and energy and motivation and finding a sense of purpose, right?

Because this energy, and especially as far as Taoism is concerned, is meant to fully and completely vitalize the human body. This is why we circulate it, right? So we don't waste it. We don't deplete ourselves by spending our sexual energy on non nourishing outlets and sources, but okay, when the time comes to use that sexual energy, yes, we are to connect with someone else. We are to obviously enjoy that part of ourselves, but when we're not doing that, we can fully invest in utilizing our sexual energy into furthering our mind, body, soul, spirit connection, and that is sacred sexuality.

So I wanted to bring this to the space today because especially in the West, we didn't really grow up learning about any of this. Obviously the information is available and it's becoming a lot more known that sexual energy is in fact a source of promoting a very healthy livelihood. Uh, I won't repeat what I said. You know, in the last, in the last two episodes around all the generational shaming and generational trauma, we know. We know that that's there. But by doing this work, by having these conversations, by practicing these methods, which probably many generations of ancestors did not do. And I'm not talking about the elevated ancestors, right? I'm talking about the ancestors that still carry trauma around this knowledge. This is how you can very well heal the bloodlines.

In the East. Yes, it's still being practiced, but of course there's a lot of organized institution there now as well, so it has also become suppressed, but of course not as much as it has in the West. So I've been learning this like throughout the years, right? I didn't grow up having any of this knowledge.

Um, and there was a lot, a lot of inner resistance, a lot of like fear and confusion because it was so resonating to me. It like. It made so much sense to me the second I started to read and understand things, uh, but it was just going against everything that I had learned. So it's taken quite a bit of time and work to get here and talk about these topics and themes and these schools of thought the way I am now.

So it is possible right to get to the other side with enough will, and with enough relentlessness.

Conclusion and Next Episode Teaser

This week's episode is prepping also for next week's episode. It's gonna be quite an episode, so stay in tuned for that. Uh, I will leave it here for today. Thank you for being here. Thank you for joining me. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you're on YouTube watching, please hit that like subscribe button.

I so greatly appreciate it if you're on one of the podcast platforms. Again, thanks for tuning in. For anybody who feels like somebody can hear this information, right, please share the episode in any way you feel called. I will be back next week, of course, here on Bridger of Worlds.

And in closing, as always, please remember that you are the medicine and I am just the messenger. Thank you very much.