David Deida (born March 18, 1958) is an American author who writes about the sexual and spiritual growth of men and women.David Deida official web site bio
Retrieved July 2011 His ten books have been published in 25 languages. He conducts spiritual growth and intimacy workshops and is one of the many founding associates at the

Integral Institute Integral theory is a synthetic metatheory developed by Ken Wilber. It attempts to place a wide diversity of theories and models into one single framework. The basis is a "spectrum of consciousness," from archaic consciousness to ultimate spiri ...

. He has conducted research and taught classes at the

University of California at Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located on Monterey Bay, on the edge of ...

Lexington Institute The Lexington Institute is a center-right think tank headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, United States. It focuses mainly on defense and security policy. History, staff, and positions The Lexington Institute was founded in 1998 by former U.S. ...

in Boston,

San Jose State University San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a public university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the oldest public university on the West Coast and the founding campus of the California State University (CSU) sys ...

and Ecole Polytechnique in Paris. He is the author of numerous essays, articles, and books on human spirituality including ''The Way of the Superior Man'', ''Finding God Through Sex'', and ''Blue Truth'' and the autobiographical novel ''Wild Nights''.

Early life and education

Deida was born David Greenberg in

Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

and later changed his surname to Deida. After receiving the 1974 National Writing Award, Deida was admitted to the Florida Scholars Program at the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

. While there, Deida founded the Plexus Interdisciplinary Center, researching medicine and consciousness in affiliation with the teaching hospital

Shands at the University of Florida UF Health Shands Hospital is a teaching hospital of the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. It is one of seven hospitals in the University of Florida Health system, and one of two campuses for UF's Health Science Center, the other be ...

. In 1982, he graduated from the University of Florida with a bachelor's degree in Theoretical Psychobiology. That same year, Deida was granted a fellowship at the Laboratory for Theoretical Neuroscience at the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

Medical School. As a graduate student at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco, ...

at Santa Cruz, he conducted research in the

ontogeny Ontogeny (also ontogenesis) is the origination and development of an organism (both physical and psychological, e.g., moral development), usually from the time of fertilization of the egg to adult. The term can also be used to refer to the stu ...

of self/non-self boundaries and the evolution of the nervous system and its relationship to space-time dimensionality and was awarded a master's degree in biology from the University of California in 1989.

Career

Deida was an instructor in Artificial Intelligence at California State University, San Jose and was elected as a Fellow of the Lexington Institute Boston. From 1976 to 1989, Deida engaged in research with the neuroscientist Francisco Varela and he conducted research with Varela at the

Pasteur Institute The Pasteur Institute (french: Institut Pasteur) is a French non-profit private foundation dedicated to the study of biology, micro-organisms, diseases, and vaccines. It is named after Louis Pasteur, who invented pasteurization and vaccines f ...

and Ecole Polytechnique. From 1983 to 2000, he collaborated with yoga teacher Sofia Diaz to develop yoga techniques for intimate relationships. In the mid-1990s, Deida began publishing non-academic books on spiritual practice, sociocultural evolution, and non-dual sexuality. From 1986 to 1988, Deida studied with the American spiritual teacher Adi Da SamrajDeida, D. “Before There Is Perception, What is There? Biological Cosmology and the Limits of Knowledge” Laughing Man Journal, 1986, 12:34-49 and 1988 Deida was awarded the Chateaubriand Fellowship by the French government, for his Ph.D. thesis. Deida began writing non-academic books for publication and departed the university before completing his doctoral thesis. Deida published several papers from 1985 to 1991 including, “The Form of Duality: Objectification as Implicate Time (1985)”, “Some Fundamental Aspects of the Indicational Calculus and the Eigenbehavior of Extended Forms (1985)”, “The Indicational Calculus and Trialectics (1985)”, “An Approach to a Mathematics of Phenomena: Canonical Aspects of Reentrant Form Eigenbehavior in the Extended Calculus of Indications (1988)”, and “Multiplicity and Indeterminacy in the Dynamics of Formal Indicational Automata (1991).” Deida published the book ''Intimate Communion'' in 1995 and ''It’s a Guy Thing'' in 1997 outlining his ideas on psycho-sexual development and universal masculine and feminine identities. In 1997 he published ''The Way of the Superior Man'' and in 2001 a series of personal essays called ''Waiting to Love: Rude Essays on Life After Spirituality''. His book ''Finding God Through Sex'' was released in 2002 and outlined practices for dissolving fear and self-boundaries during intercourse. Deida's semi-autobiographical novel ''Wild Nights: Conversations with Mykonos about Passionate Love, Extraordinary Sex, and How to Open to God'' was published in 2005 and tells the story of developing friends, sexual intimacy, and God awareness through the guidance of a spiritual teacher. Deida published his book ''The Enlightened Sex Manual: Sexual Skills for the Superior Lover'' in 2004 and he discusses the topics of love and expanded awareness in his 2007 book ''Instant Enlightenment''.

Reception

Deida's

ecumenical Ecumenism (), also spelled oecumenism, is the concept and principle that Christians who belong to different Christian denominations should work together to develop closer relationships among their churches and promote Christian unity. The adjec ...

approach has caused some to question his discrimination for audiences, EnlightenNext, March–May 2009, pp. 52-62. but Deida characterizes his recent work as "spiritual theater" rather than "religious teaching". This orientation has led one critic to suspect Deida's spiritual depth and integrity, specifically questioning whether his approach has conflated

post-modern Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by skepticism toward the " grand narratives" of moderni ...

nihilism Nihilism (; ) is a philosophy, or family of views within philosophy, that rejects generally accepted or fundamental aspects of human existence, such as objective truth, knowledge, morality, values, or meaning. The term was popularized by Ivan ...

with

mystical Mysticism is popularly known as becoming one with God or the Absolute, but may refer to any kind of ecstasy or altered state of consciousness which is given a religious or spiritual meaning. It may also refer to the attainment of insight in u ...

nondualism Nondualism, also called nonduality and nondual awareness, is a fuzzy concept originating in Indian philosophy and religion for which many definitions can be found, including: nondual awareness, the nonduality of seer and seen or nondiffer ...

. Other criticism questions Deida's political stance, alleging an element of misogyny in one of his books.Gelfer, Joseph; Numen, Old Men: Contemporary Masculine Spiritualities and the Problem of Patriarchy, 2009, p. 121.

Media

Books

* Intimate Communion (1995) * It's A Guy Thing: An Owner's Manual for Women (1997) * The Way Of The Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Woman, Work, and Sexual Desire (1997, Plexus, ; 2004,

Sounds True In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid. In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' by the ...

, ) * Waiting to Love: Rude Essays on Life after Spirituality (2001) * Finding God Through Sex: Awakening The One Of Spirit Through The Two Of Flesh (2002, 2005) * Dear Lover: A Woman's Guide To Men, Sex, And Love's Deepest Bliss (2002, 2005) * Blue Truth: A Spiritual Guide to Life & Death and Love & Sex (2002, 2005) (formally published as; Naked Buddhism: 39 ways to free your heart and awaken to now) * The Enlightened Sex Manual: Sexual Skills for the Superior Lover (2004) * Wild Nights (2005) * Instant Enlightenment: Fast, Deep and Sexy (2007)

Audio CDs and MP3s

* The Way of the Superior Man: The Teaching Sessions (Audio CD),

, * Enlightened Sex: Finding Freedom & Fullness Through Sexual Union (Audio CD) * David Deida: The Complete Recordings, Volumes 1-3 (Audio CD) (1998–2002), Volume 4 (2009) * Rhythms of Revelation: Jazz, Jesus and James Bond, MP3 (2009) * Enlightenment, Marriage and the Dark Side, MP3 (2009) * Finding Love and Sex Among Vikings, Boys Toys and Superior Women, MP3 (2009) * Bondage, Boundaries and the Rolling Stones: Spiritual Happiness vs. Sexual Healing, MP3 (2009) * Emotional Chaos and Authentic Love: How to Help Your Man Navigate Your Heart, MP3 (2009) * The Third Stage: Making Love Beyond Sharing Needs, MP3 (2009) * Buddhism, Blowjobs and Chocolate: Spiritual Access to Passion's Portals, MP3 (2009) * Aligning with Love: Sex, Wealth and Worship, MP3 (2009) * Craving Nothingness, Wanting Fullness, Celebrating Nowness, MP3 (2009)

DVDs

*Function, Flow, & Glow (DVD) ASIN B000CEX3JE *Spirit, Sex, Love: David Deida in Australia (DVD) (out of print)

Published manuscripts

*1985 Greenberg, D.R., and White, C.A. “The Form of Duality: Objectification as Implicate Time.” Proc. 1985 Intl. Conf. of Soc. for General Systems Research, I, 156-162, Seaside, California: Intersystems *1985 Greenberg, D.R., White, C.A., and Berkowitz, G.C. “Some Fundamental Aspects of the Indication Calculus and the Eigenbehavior of Extended Forms” Proc. First Annual Conference/ Workshop on Sign and Space, edited by G.C. Berkowitz, 54-96. *1985 Greenberg, D.R., and Horn, R.E. “The Indicational Calculus and Trialectics” Lexington Institute Monograph Series *1986 Deida, D. “Before There Is Perception, What is There? Biological Cosmology and the Limits of Knowledge” Laughing Man Journal, 12:34-49 *1988 Berkowitz, G.C., Greenberg, D.R., and White, C.A. “An approach to a Mathematics of Phenomena: Canonical Aspects of Reentrant Form Eigenbehavior in the Extended Calculus of Indications. Cybernetics and Systems 19:123-167 *1991 Berkowitz, G.C., Greenberg, D.R., and White, C.A. “Multiplicity and Indeterminacy in the Dynamics of Formal Indicational Automata” Cybernetics and Systems 22:237-263

References

External links

The Official Website of David DeidaAn interview with David Deida by Vijay Rana of The Watkins Review in London
{{DEFAULTSORT:Deida, David 1958 births Living people American relationships and sexuality writers American male non-fiction writers American spiritual teachers American spiritual writers