The month of August brings vacations and memories of vacations. These days, my idea of a good time leans toward quiet mornings and unstructured time — but I remember when that wasn’t the case. In my youth, vacations were practically built around sex and intoxicants. That was part of the American dream, or at least the version I inherited.
Since then, I’ve gotten sober, and I’m married. Those two life choices naturally shifted the frequency and context of both sex and intoxicants — but not my interest in them. I still reflect on how they show up in our lives: how they can bring joy and connection, and how they can distort or harm.
In Buddhism, practitioners are invited to take precepts — training steps (sikkhāpada in Pali) that support ethical conduct and the practice of the Dharma. For lay and monastic Buddhists alike, sex and intoxicants both appear in the top five:
- Avoid sexual misconduct / Cultivate contentment and satisfaction
- Avoid intoxication / Cultivate clarity, lucidity, and understanding
For monastics, the precepts expand into hundreds more. But even these two precepts open vast conversations: about trauma, misuse, joy, intimacy, secrecy, and connection.
The Buddha emphasized restraint, and for monastics, abstinence. For lay practitioners, our responsibility has been to translate these teachings into ethical awareness that fits our lives. That means cultivating discernment: asking ourselves things like, When does pleasure tip into harm? When does desire harden into compulsion? When does clarity erode? Discernment, a faculty of awakening, won’t give us a fixed answer. It changes with age, health, culture, upbringing, and emotional needs. There is no single formula.
And yet, I still hear the question: Should I practice these precepts as the Buddha did? As a monastic would? The fact that “should” arises at all reveals how deeply the ideal of purity is embedded in Buddhism — abstinence as a higher middle way.
Sex and intoxicants are highly charged. They invite us into complex territory where pleasure and pain, intimacy and confusion, desire and delusion intertwine. They matter because they touch the core of what it means to be human, to relate ethically with ourselves and others.
I’ve often wondered why they are singled out in the precepts, when other altered states — samadhi states, runner’s highs, dancing, immersion in art, flow states of yoga/tai chi — are not? The closest reason I can infer is because sex and intoxicants amplify desire, attachment, and relational entanglement. They ripple outward, drawing others in, with greater possibility of harm.
Secrecy and addiction complicate these precepts further. Addictions are complex, multifaceted dynamics that at times can only be quelled with abstinence, and other times harm reduction methods prove adequate. While privacy is healthy, secrecy can hide avoidance and shame which perpetuates harm. We’ve seen this collectively in movements like #MeToo, where bringing secrecy into the light was met with backlash — a sign of how powerful and threatening exposure can be.
In Reflective Meditation, we see precepts as relational. What may feel like a private act — drinking or using, sexual fantasizing, getting high — still affects others, shaping our relationships and the way we show up in the world. When we are connected, it is harder to disregard others. When we lose connection, our precepts often slip away too.
At the same time, precepts can easily become rigid absolutes, hardening into punishable offenses. But the precepts are inherently contextual. Sometimes needed; some work for us, others don’t. They are situational, shifting with conditions.
In Reflective Meditation, precepts, then, are not about living up to an external standard of purity. In our practice ethics arise from inner listening. By staying close to our experience, we learn what is wise, what is kind, what is clear. Creative precepts emerge so we can live our values in real life —messy, nuanced, and not once-and-for-all. Creative precepts are an ongoing process of discernment: being flexible, going with the flow when we can, accepting conditions as they are, and doing the best we can within them.
Because the truth is we will cross precept lines — and cross back again. We can learn from those crossings. Awareness is the doorway in. Connection carries us through.
Linda Modaro is the founder and lead teacher at Sati Sangha, a vibrant online meditation community that offers daily virtual Reflective Meditation and online retreats throughout the year. She is co-author with Nelly Kaufer of Pine Street Sangha, Reflective Meditation: Cultivating Kindness and Curiosity in the Buddha’s Company. You can reach her at linda@satisangha.org if you’d like to talk about meditation and reflection.
