Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume 3. 1936-37

Fragment ID: 18246

1936-37

I told Dr. R that I get discharge of semen at night, mostly in connection with sexual dreams. He then asked if this happened during the waking state also. I replied, “Never.” But there can be no connection between my sex imaginations during the waking state and the discharges, because the women in the dreams at night are not the same as the ones who enter into my imaginations.

It does not follow that there is no connection. These imaginations stimulate the sex-urge and that assumes in sleep the form of dreams with any feminine form known or unknown as the centre. Sometimes even the forms are vague, it is the dream of touch etc. that causes the emission. It is true the emission can take place even if there is no waking sex urge, especially if there is pressure of urine or constipation, but that is usually less frequent or can more easily be eliminated.

What I said was that, if there is the sexual mixing in imagination that is enough to depress the consciousness and outward mixing or not then becomes an immaterial question, for it can’t bring down the consciousness worse than this kind of thing.

Can medical treatment cure an excessive sexuality? What it can cure perhaps is certain untoward results of sex on the body.

Some say it [sex] gets greater force by suppression than by leaving the ground free. But neither statement is true. All depends on the subjection of the consciousness to the sex or its power and will to control it.