According to Osho, it is simple: repression shows up as sexual dreams and fantasies you cannot avoid; transformation ends them. A truly meditative energy remains unprovoked even amidst temptation, as in Buddha's monk who uplifted Amrapali, while the repressed are 'sitting on a volcano' and easily fall. So check your nights and your spontaneous responses, not moral effort, for the truth.
If you still dream or daydream about sex, it's just pushed down; if those stop and you stay calm even when tempted, your energy is transformed.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved master, when do I know if my sexual energy is transformed or just repressed?
It will not be difficult. It will be the simplest thing to know. When sexual energy is repressed you will have sexual dreams, you will have sexual fantasies -- you cannot avoid them. When sex energy is transformed, you will not have any sexual dreams, you will not have any sexual fantasies. This is the simple criterion. I will end with a small story.... In Gautam Buddha's time there was one beautiful woman -- she was a prostitute, Amrapali. One Buddhist monk was just going to beg when Amrapali saw him. She was simply amazed because kings have been at her door, princes, rich people, famous people from all walks of life. But she had never seen such a beautiful person -- and he was a monk, a beggar with a begging bowl. She was going on her golden chariot to her garden. She told the bhikkhu, "If you don't…
Beloved Osho, does sex energy need to be expressed through sex, or is it just that we label this energy as such through biological needs? If energy doesn't get expressed through sex, is it a repression, or can it be transformed and find other channels?
The energy can be transformed, but only after you have lived it naturally. If you have not expressed it naturally -- sex energy, sexually -- you cannot move towards transformation. When sex is expressed as pure sex -- and there is no sin in it, there is no need to feel guilty about it; this is the way your bodies are made, this is the way your biology functions -- express it. Just by expressing it naturally, there will come a moment when the compulsion to express it as sex will disappear. That is the turning moment, now transformation is possible. First, natural expression to the satisfaction of the natural instinct in you, and then transformation is possible, because now the energy will not compel you to express it as sex; it is satisfied. It has known what sexual experience is. Only after this, the transformation is possible, and the…
Osho, I have taken the vow to remain a celibate my whole life, but why do I still suffer from sexual thoughts, fantasies and dreams?
Just the last week I was reading about one yogi, Dhirendra Brahmachari, who goes on showing his yoga postures on the television. And he was telling the last week to his audience that, "Do you know how I remain so healthy? I am pulling my anus upwards right now, but you cannot see it because I am wearing clothes." And then he told that his disciple, one girl who sits by his side to show yoga postures, "She is also holding her anus upwards, but you cannot see because she is wearing the clothes." The girl must have gone red! It is good that India has not yet gone for color TV -- in black and white you cannot see whether the girl is blushing or not. But then you have to do all kinds of nonsense things. Now pulling your anus upwards will simply force your sexual energy to…
Osho, I always dream of sex and sex and sex -- why?
ARE YOU A FOLLOWER of Morarji Desai? Something is basically wrong with you. Your dreams simply show that you are living a repressed life. Your dreams reflect how you are living your life. Your dreams are not just dreams -- they are reflections. In the waking time you must be repressing sex; then, naturally, it is bound to assert itself in your dreams. Dreams only indicate that you are doing something wrong with your life. When your life is really harmonious, lived consciously, dreams disappear -- all kinds of dreams disappear. Your whole sleep becomes dreamless. That is the indication that the transformation is happening -- that happens to every meditator. As meditation goes deeper, dreams start disappearing. But dreams show something about you. And you have to rethink, you have to rearrange your life. If you are dreaming only of sex, that simply shows you are sex-obsessed. And who…
No, Osho, what happens is that our mind is in one of two states. Either I feel I will be able to solve it, or I’m afraid that I won’t be able to solve it...
Because of that ignorance, we create many problems we don’t even suspect. For instance, in India almost everyone assumes that the sexual act is devastating. Physiologically that is absolutely wrong—completely wrong. In fact, sexual inactivity is devastating. Activity is not devastating. And it is also interesting that anyone who thinks he can go to extremes in sexual activity is mistaken. The body has checks. You cannot go to extremes; there are bodily checks. Nature has arranged it so you cannot expend surplus force beyond what the body allows. But one can misuse it, right? Even misuse is not possible—if you use full understanding. As far as sex has been understood, misuse is not possible. Misuse is impossible. Then not just sex—by that argument you can’t misuse anything! If we extend that very argument, you can’t misuse anything! No, no—you can misuse many things. Why not sex? Because the entire arrangement…