My battle with my passionate thoughts has led me through a journey of discovery into my own weakness. Passion and the desire for sensual pleasures have been flaws in my personality since a very early age.

When I first married, my relationship with my wife was very spontaneous and natural; we were like children enjoying the natural and innocent love that suffused the sensual and passionate relationship between us and made it pure and happy.

Several years later, I was given some x-rated videos. These made my mind go crazy with desire. Over the course of time after watching these movies, my relationship with my wife deteriorated and became empty of loving kindness. The sexual act degraded to mere exercise done for intellectual satisfaction and relief of frustration.

Controlled and trapped by sensuality, I would regularly watch the movies at least once a day. One day when the desire arose in my mind, I rebelled, thinking, "No, I won't!" Then an irresistible impulse forced me to watch the movie. It was as if something outside of me was using my body to watch the film. At the time, I thought that this was strange.

Some time later, I was initiated by Master Ching Hai, and on that day, I burned the x-rated tapes as soon as I returned from the initiation. They hissed and spat as they melted into a black pool, giving off acrid poisonous smoke and I thought that at last I was seeing their true nature.

I practiced for about year without this problem, and then occasionally the passion began to arise in my mind again. I would then recall with some effort a sequence from the films and deliberately let down my guard to "enjoy" this sensual pleasure. Or sometimes when I saw some playing cards or magazines with x-rated images, I would pick them up just to see if I had become immune yet, but my mind would go crazy with lust. However, all the time I felt forced and I knew really that this was not a pleasure but a poison.

Something I noticed regarding my meditation practice was that each time I reached a stable point in it when everything was smooth and almost uneventful, I'd allow myself to be tricked. I realize now that this sublime state is a sign of progress and occurs before a breakthrough into a deeper realization. If you are sublime then just stay there!

My flaw raised its ugly head again through the Internet. Each time I looked at the images, the loving kindness that had built up over months of careful practice just spilled away and was replaced by a nasty cruel, selfish, negative energy. I'd become angry easily and get remorseful and my mind would be filled with passion. After this sort of event, I would want to have sex with my wife, but this would leave us both tired and drained of our good energy. We'd become irritable and angry for several days. meditation would be almost always impossible with my mind focused on the x-rated images and wrapped up in the passion and fantasies. I'd always fall asleep as if something was preventing me from doing the Quan Yin. When I'd finally exerted a supreme effort to fight the tiredness and burden and meditate, it would still feel like something was hanging on my arms. It would take about a week to remove this extra burden, but still my inner being had been polluted and my fine energy body had been damaged. Only when I went to group meditation, with the help of Master's blessing power through the group, could my inner body become clear as crystal again.

After the last time I succumbed to my flaw, I went to do the Quan Yin and I sort of passed out. Suddenly I felt very tightly confined, as if something were sitting in my lap and clinging to me. Initially, I thought that it might be my son, who also meditates with me. But then I realized that he had gone to bed and that I was the only human being in the room. When I finally realized that this was some sort of negative energy being, I felt like running and screaming but not a single muscle in my body would move. Instinctively, I carefully and deliberately recited the Holy Names and the being slid away. I felt very thankful for Master's power, but I was also very concerned that I had been so naive as to endanger my soul in this way.

I know now, after many failures, that there is no cessation of desire on the path of sensuality; this path takes one exactly in the opposite direction that we wish to go. We wish to go within to discover the most sublime secret of the universe whose value is beyond conception. When one is attacked by a negative desire, there are two options:

1) We can indulge. Unfortunately, this is like digging a hole; the more one digs, the bigger the hole gets. The passion leads one to lay down all the precepts and become like an animal for several seconds of crazy desire. Moreover, it must then be repaid by months of precious spiritual energy.

2) One can do the Quan Yin, the sound meditation, for at least two hours, balanced with the right proportion of light meditation. This will clean away the negative energy.

This morning I feel very good. I can feel the harmonious atmosphere in my house; I can feel the gentle currents of love flowing from my daughter, son, and wife. My inner being is singing, dancing, and is happy. I am actually pure; every bad thought that tries to arise in my mind, I check instantly and do not allow it to develop.

My new inner phrase is this, "If I allow myself to accept this trick, then I will never overcome this weakness." I apply that to many situations that require greater self-control.