Sexuality and religion are inseparable. 

That’s why I hesitated on writing about semen retention. 

It feels too personal. Like a form of sacrilege to open up and be publicly vulnerable about the biggest societal taboo: sex.

And no, I’m not here to give you prescriptive dogmas or sell you some cure-all panacea, but what I’ve experienced with semen retention as a man is too profound, too life-changing to not share my experience. 

How I Found Semen Retention

I got addicted to porn around the age of 14. 

I know, it sounds like I’m making a confession at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, but that’s the standard nowadays. 

Every teenager is just one “titty” search away from a crippling multi-decade long addiction, and I was one of those teenagers.

After every time I released my seed to some pixels on a screen, I felt a deep shame. Like I had been tricked into primitive savagery for a moment of pleasure. And this battle between the devil on the one shoulder and the angel on the other would continue through my adolescence. 

Around the age of 16, I couldn’t believe the idea that this was “normal” and “good for you”. Sure, it released “sexual tension”, but it also released my vitality and will to live. 

I felt drained of energy. I was socially anxious around girls. And I felt a heavy depression lingering around me like clouds. 

Then, I was on a school bus from a varsity away game and I was observing those around me with rage. It felt like I was surrounded by a bunch of cavemen howling laughter to moronic memes and having feudal debates about which girl had the fattest ass. 

Suddenly, I heard an inner-voice speak to me—I know it sounds cliché, but I really experienced this. It told me something along the lines of;

“So, you’re upset about their behavior? Well, how about your own behavior. You have all the same habits as they do. They spend hours scrolling on social media, masturbating to porn. You spend hours scrolling on social media, masturbating to porn. Instead of focusing on what’s wrong with them, focus on improving you.”

My 16-year old self was dumbfounded. I didn’t know where this Wisdom came from, and it certainly wasn’t the first time I came into contact with it, but it made complete sense. 

In hindsight, this boulder of Wisdom resonates with the famous Jung quote;

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” 

So, I made an agreement with myself. I’m going to limit my social media use and quit my porn addiction. 

In Christian language, I’m going to stop worrying about the speck in my brother’s eye and focus on the plank in my own. 

The Breakthrough

I quickly realized just how deep I had fallen into the abyss and how difficult it was to climb out.

Everyday felt like an olympic training of my discipline to stick to my good habits (meditation, reading, exercise, cold showers, etc.) and avoid my bad ones (social media, porn, binge eating, etc.).

But slowly, I climbed a little higher out of this abyss; I made a solid step in the right direction each day. 

Within a year, I was completely different person. 

I was bouncing off the walls with energy. I radiated confidence. And the feeling of accomplishment outshined the overcast of regret. 

But there was something about the sexual urge that felt impossible to master. As if no amount of willpower could ever help me breakthrough the one-month mark. 

I went in search of answers in self-improvement and spiritual books and I discovered that all those I admired had the willpower to retain their sexual energy for years. 

Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Paracelcus, Benjamin Franklin, Nikola Tesla, Malcolm X, Bruce Lee, Paramahansa Yogananda, Steve Jobs.

The more I read about the power of sublimating one’s sexual energy, the more I felt I discovered the holy grail of self-improvement. 

And with this inspiration and drive to become a genius like those I admired, I broke through the 1 month orbit and ended up retaining for 2 years straight. 

The 5 Lessons I Learned

You may be wondering why I ended up releasing and where I stand today, but before I share that, I want to share the main lessons I learned during this powerful experience. 

Yes, I’ve read many very advanced books which address semen retention, and no, I am not merely reciting from these books.

What I am sharing is wisdom that I earned through immense discipline and faith. 

That said, if you are hungry for what I believe to be the only two esoteric books you need on the topic of sexual sublimation and semen retention, I recommend “Sexual Force or the Winged Dragon” by Omraam Mikhaël Aïvanhov and “Sexual energy and Yoga” by Elisabeth Haich.

My personal wisdom, on the other hand, can be summarized by the five following lessons:

1) You Don’t Need Sex

If you grew up in a developed country or with the internet, your subconscious has been deeply programmed to believe that you need sex.

Plus, your biological instincts confirm this need. 

Pair that with school indoctrination (like the insidious addition of “sex” to the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs) and you have a populace with an unwavering worship of sex. 

In almost every movie, TV show, and advertisement is the promise of salvation through sex, yet, at the same time, there is an unspeakable taboo against it. 

Naturally, this makes one secretly believe that having sex must be the solution to all their problems. If they’re constantly receiving the conflicting message that it’s a cure-all panacea while at the same time prohibited to speak about, their rebellious instinct kicks in. 

But to spare you a lifetime of misery, I’ll tell you in advance that you don’t need sex. 

“But Jamal, we need sex to procreate! Without sex, none of us would exist!” 

True, but is everyone really thinking about “procreating” when they’re masturbating or making poor life decisions in pursuit of sex? 

When I say, “You don’t need sex”, I am not saying “sex is evil”, or any value judgement for that matter. I am simply saying that our belief that we absolutely need sex or else we will be miserable is utterly false. 

Does this mean that I am advocating for everyone to become celibate? 

No. But I am advocating for people to stop wasting their sexual energy (qi, prana, etc.) in pursuit of only one manifestation of it. 

Send the sexual energy higher. Use your creative imagination to create something valuable in the world. Appreciate the subtle exchanges you receive everyday from other women in the form of glances or a gentle handshake. Contemplate the beauty of nature. 

There is a delightful world awaiting those who embrace this lesson. 

2) You Will Always Be Attracted to Women

Message for the men: you know that surge of energy you feel when you see a beautiful woman. The desire to let go of everything and melt into ecstasy with her. 

Good news: you will continue to feel that for the rest of your life.

Bad news: you will continue to feel that for the rest of your life. 

There is no amount of celibacy that will completely rid you of your attraction to women. 

Pursuing that is akin the Westerners desperately meditating to enter “the void” of thoughtlessness. 

In the same way you will always have thoughts, you will always feel a sexual attraction to women. 

If you’re doing semen retention with the goal of no longer being attracted to women, you will be disappointed. 

It’s part of our design that is unchanging. 

It’s like trying to lecture a cat to not be attracted to mice. Even if it says, “meow” and nods its head, it can never resist the impulse to pounce on the first mouse it sees. 

That said, what we can control is how we manage our attraction and our sexual impulses. 

Will you take this tension and use it to build masterpieces? Will you take this force of love and give your gifts fully to the world?

Or will you channel it to satisfy the whims of your ego? 

The choice is yours.

3) The Secret to Sexual Sublimation is to Focus on a High Ideal

Okay, so we don’t need sex, and we’re always going to be attracted to women, but what should we do with all of our sexual energy? 

The answer is that we must sublimate it, which, in scientific terms, means to “…pass directly from the solid to the vapor state”.

In psychological terms, this means to redirect it towards an expression that is socially beneficial. Put simply, it means to make yourself useful to others. 

Instead of huddling over your penis, get up, go outside, and do something useful. 

Read, write, walk, talk to someone new, go to the gym, get a job, start a business, make art, travel.

Sounds easy in theory, but in practice, it’s the hardest thing to do. 

My advice to make it easier: focus all of your actions, feelings, and thoughts towards a High Ideal. 

In the Christian tradition, this was symbolized by the notion of bringing Heaven on earth or building the New Jerusalem. 

In non-religious language, this simply means to make the world a better place. 

If your life becomes a living meditation on how you can use this instrument that you call “me” to best serve this High Ideal, you will rise above the sexual urges. 

You will become so preoccupied with the amazing projects that you’re manifesting and the amazing people that you’re meeting that this notion of needing to have sex will escape your purview. 

4) Long-term semen retention is not for everyone

The profound personal growth from semen retention is often accompanied with a rage against the matrix. 

Once you experience it first-hand, you feel like you’ve been lied to your whole life. 

“How on earth am I able to grow so much from this practice, but virtually no other men seem to know about it?”

So, you may enter into a phase of being a semen retention pastor. 

This is very natural. I was there for a while, and it’s quite a fun place to be. 

You feel like you’ve caught the Holy Ghost and you’e trying to “spread the good news” to every man and boy in your vicinity. 

But, unfortunately, you will soon discover that semen retention is not for everyone. 

In an ideal world, every man should experience at least 3 months of semen retention. Frankly, it should be a prerequisite to manhood. 

If you are not able to govern this impulse, you will not be able to govern your family. If you can not govern your family, the very atomic unit that builds our society will crumble. 

Hence, why I specifically said “long-term semen retention is not for everyone.”

I believe every man can seriously benefit from practicing it. Even if it’s just for a few weeks. 

But, at the end of the day, it’s sexual fasting. 

The ideal of being celibate one’s entire life is like the ideal to become a breatharian. 

Breatharians truly exist, and so do those who are completely celibate their whole lives (e.g. Isaac Newton). But only a very select few are meant to become breatharians. 

It’s okay to accept that you may not be Jesus himself; that you still have some more spiritual development to do. 

There are countless examples of geniuses with healthy sex lives. You can enjoy conscious physical union with a partner and not necessarily fall into the hands of Satan. 

So, before you start your evangelical parade about semen retention, don’t assume that it’s what everyone needs. Respect their personal journey and your own. 

Don’t try too hard to be perfect, it’s better to be present. 

5) You Can Never Possess the Feminine, But You Can Receive Her Support

This last one is the most difficult one to swallow. 

From the concoction of our societal conditioning and animalistic impulses is the irresistible urge to possess a beautiful woman.

It’s as if we’re designed to capture the princess and secure her in our lives. 

Marriage, symbolically, represents this security in our psyches. 

Instinctively, we want to hunt for the woman of our choosing, fend off any other hunters, and mark our territory with a ring. 

With this ring is the unspoken agreement for a lifetime of passionate sex with this woman. There is a promise of ownership, that she is yours.

But it is impossible to possess the Feminine. 

No woman will ever be “yours” more than any material possession will ever be “yours”. 

When you pass, you don’t bring any of your possessions with you. 

Yet we all share this all-powerful impulse to possess the Feminine. To own matter, or ma-terra—Mother Earth. 

And every time we entertain this impulse in our consciousness, we become disconnected from the present. 

We anticipate some future experience of the Feminine that will make us feel complete while being completely unaware of what She’s giving us right now, in this very moment. 

But the Feminine can never be possessed. 

So, when we eventually have that sexual experience or find that woman who you think will complete you or buy that land, you’ll be disappointed. It will never meet your expectations because, unconsciously, you wanted to own the Feminine, and the Feminine can’t be owned. She can only be experienced in the eternal present. 

When I began to realize this, I went through an intense experience of mourning. 

I read “The Eden Project: In Search of the Magical Other” by James Hollis and I discovered I had bought into the conditioned fantasy of being rescued by the “magical Other”. When, in reality, this Other can only be a supportive soul in your own Individuation. 

Relationships with women, then, are a form of Yoga to bring you closer to Source. 

So, instead of searching for some future perfect fantasy to satisfy your longings, learn to appreciate the subtle Love you receive from Her constantly.

Give thanks for the beautiful flowers and butterflies, the waning moons, the light-hearted conversations. 

If you’re lucky enough to have a woman in your life, do your best to appreciate her now. Don’t limit your love to future plans or purchases, communicate your love for her right now.

Stare deep into her eyes. Dance with her. Make her laugh. Go on an adventure. 

And when you let go of this need to possess Her and simply have fun being with her, the Feminine will reward you. 

Closing Thoughts

To commit to the path of semen retention is to experience an initiatic rite. 

You will never be the same. 

To the men: I hope these lessons will support you in your journey.

To the women: I hope these lessons will give you a window into the experience of male sexuality. 

For those curious, I decided to release my seed for a woman I love dearly and I don’t regret it.

In fact, I found my obsession with retention to be a blockage that I’m still healing to this day.

I still stand by my belief that it is a very supportive practice, but I am still searching for a healthy balance. 

Ideally, I would love to enjoy physical union without ejaculating, and I accept that it will take lots of tantric training to reach that goal. 

So, there you go. 2+ years of semen retention in a nutshell.