The Right Use of Sperm

There is a saying in Taoism: the same energy that creates life also sustains it. This energy, called Jing, is the essence from which our vitality, creativity, and longevity arise. When we speak about the “right use of sperm,” we are really speaking about the right relationship to our generative force — our creative essence.

From a Taoist point of view, sex is both the reason you are born and the reason you die. You are born because generative energy (Jing) was concentrated and activated through sex. And you die because, over time, that same energy is spent through the many ways we disperse it — through stress, overwork, excess stimulation, and especially through unmindful sexual release. Life is a slow movement downward and outward; the Taoist path is learning to bring that energy back up and in.

In Western understanding, we tend to think of sex only in terms of momentary pleasure or reproduction. But as described in the Four Kinds of Sex — Procreational, Recreational, Transformational, and Restorational — sex can also be a path of deep healing and spiritual awakening. Taoist sexual practices specifically focus on this last type, Restorational Sex, where sexual energy is recycled and nourishes the body, mind, and spirit rather than being lost.

Sperm is concentrated Jing — the densest physical form of creative energy. When this energy is consciously conserved and circulated through breathing, movement, and awareness, it rises through the body, harmonizing Po (the soul of the body), Shen (the soul of the spirit), and Yi (the soul of the mind). When these are in harmony, the cheeks are flush with Chi, the eyes shine with vitality, and the heart opens in love, peace, and joy. This upward movement transforms instinctual desire into spiritual illumination.

To “use sperm rightly” is not to repress or deny sexual energy, but to respect its sacred value. To let it flow inward and upward rather than outward and away. Taoists understood this as reversing the flow of mortality. When generative energy nourishes the organs rather than drains them, life becomes fuller, longer, and more radiant. It is an alchemy that turns life energy into light.

This is the true art of sexual transformation — where desire becomes devotion, and sex becomes a bridge to Heaven rather than a path toward depletion.