Started watching BONDiNG today because of your recommendation, Daniel.
If Daniel recommends a Netflix show, that's just some low hanging fruits right there

Jano...

(I wonder if you're experimenting with the DhO to see what reaction you get?)

As it happens my attempt to inject humor didn't quite work, my post got truncated half way through. And then i thought 'WTH...'

I'd meant to say something like 'Shibiri: best done with someone you trussed' and then slightly more seriously 'be careful, you can tie yourself in knots with this stuff'.  Linda mentioned trying this out, and whether it's spritiual or not I can't say myself.

I'm completely unqualified to chatter about BDSM, but if you are looking to investigate 'deep spirituality' perhaps you should consider both sides of the equation ie S and well as M/M as well as S, so as to get a balanced view, otherwise maybe it's self serving? Just a wild guess. Why pick on this instead of ritual magick for example?

Another approach might be to view that recent interview w/ dhammarato on guru viking, where he talks quite a lot about 'questions that are worthy of consideration'.  Towards the end there's a question about "if there's an observation of contact/ feeling/ aversion-craving ... through to self(birth), then who's doing the observation before the self kicks in", and he basically throws the question out with an initial response of 'if you knew that would it make you happy?'

I just watched the BONDiNG trailer and one line jumped out at me, something about BDSM being really just liberation from shame. In my experience it's a lot less complicated and more liberating to allow yourself to feel the shame directly in meditation! 

This made me think... What would be the effects of trying to achieve jhana using sexual pleasure? (Concentrating on the pleasurable sensations in the genitals and spreading them through the whole body.)

This is indeed possible. It's more difficult than normal jhana. Most of my recent posts are on this topic. I don't intentionally do it anymore though. Often however it occurs spontaneously when I practice jhana. Sometimes its a bit of a nuissance though if it's early in a session and jhana isn't very deep yet, as it can detract from absorption once it subsides. 

Also I just want to say: the title of this post broke my brain. In a good way... I am intrigued by it.

So should BDSM be seen as a subset of the greater religious austerities/flagellants/mortifiers of the flesh kind of religious field ?

In buddhism I suppose this would be the austerities section of Gotama's biography, but many cultures around the world use pain in their rituals.



As further supporting evidence for my hypothesis, here Shinzen Young gets very austere until he learns to like it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sCj9PDyPsg

I think it was an excellent subject to raise, Jano, don't worry about that.

I'm not experienced in BDSM but I would disagree with this hypothesis. I think BDSM is primarily about playing with submission and control. Activates the reptilian brain. The presence of pain serving to accentuate sexual pleasure via contrast. In the the case of flagellation and similar practices however you do have intentionally inflicted pain. So perhaps there are parallels. A key difference though is that BDSM, as with sex in general, is usually done for its own sake. As opposed to the austerity practices you reference, which have a goal. A matter of art vs utility.

I would say the idea of asceticism as a whole is more about purification. And as for "learning to like it", I have been lifting weights for about 18 months. At first it felt like a chore but now I get pretty into it. That's more of a product of discipline and focus, and the feeling of reward you get after performing the practice, as well as seeing the fruits of ones labor manifest.

To draw further distinctions, austerity or asceticism in the abstract is an extended process of applying and integrating goal-oriented principles onto one's body-mind, i.e., "I'm going to perform a practice because I believe it is good for me (goal) even though the inertia of my habitual tendencies would have me do otherwise." Contrast this to BDSM which is strictly pleasure-orientated. Flagellation/mortification are also very much associated with the idea of "repentance," which I don't see being a motivation for BDSM. Also I think those practices are pathological, and members of the BDSM community probably would not think of themselves as being associated with that kind of thing.

Thanks for replying Andy. Ritual generally is about submission and control, but also about contact with other dimensions of the self, and so the other side of that is it can be about freedom. *
In the case of religious flagellation and austerity it's submission and control to a social order or within a social order, and like you say you could make a case for BDSM being abstracted away from utility or order.
Disciplined acceptance of a social order might be one aspect of austere religious practices, but I think probably there is usually a pleasure aspect to it too that will be framed as some sort of divine bliss, movement of the holy spirit, equanimity etc., as it is in rigorous meditation programmes. And pleasure can become insight. At the lighter end people go through the discomfort of extended sitting on a ten day retreat, at the more intense end it's something like Shinzen's extreme discomfort sitting, and then further along the spectrum is flagellation and serious mortification. I think there is a strong aspect of discipline and focus to all that which you could see as paralelled in weight training.
Hmm.. it's multi faceted
No sex in these though, so there is a difference, but there may be sex in cultural practices that are less well known.
Then as well as the pleasure of painful ritual there is the possibility of altered states and various religious experience that have a lot of cultural meaning. I have no idea if that comes through BDSM too, but I wouldn't be surprised.

( Arnie's chit chat and a Hollywood version of native American religion might not be great academic sources, but I'm just lazily playing around in. It's a big and complex field isn't it ? )

* a point I thought I should add.

Lee Harrington is a prolific member of the US kink community, and has a podcast that touches on this topic: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/the-passion-and-soul-podcast-b-113788/episodes/recent

as well as a book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7646576-sacred-kink

The podcast is pretty far ranging, and deep spiritual practice is only one of the topics Lee explored in it, so you might need to go digging for what you're looking for.

I tried erotic submission  to a women once. It can be cathartic. Yes  there is a temporary  suspension  of self  or ego. But it is superficial I believe. I wouldn't call it spiritual but more of a psychological  suspension  of ego.   I would stay away from it. There is a lot of drama in those bdsm circles. A lot of abuse  they  haven't  dealt with.