Within the tantric path of Vajrayāna, sexual yoga (karmamudrā) is regarded as an advanced method for transforming powerful desire into a direct support for awakening. It is framed by the understanding that sexual energy can either reinforce samsaric patterns or, when skillfully guided, open into a very subtle, blissful awareness united with insight into emptiness. The pervasive imagery of male–female union, often depicted as yab-yum, functions first and foremost as a symbol of the inseparability of wisdom (prajñā) and method (upāya), or emptiness and compassion. For most practitioners, this union is cultivated internally through visualization rather than physical enactment. In this way, sexual yoga is not approached as ordinary intimacy, but as a contemplative discipline grounded in a clear philosophical view.

Traditional presentations distinguish between levels of practice. On the generation stage, practitioners visualize themselves as a tantric deity in union with a consort, sustaining the image and its meaning while reciting mantras and maintaining meditative awareness. On the completion stage, where subtle-body yogas such as working with channels (nāḍī), winds (prāṇa), and drops (bindu) are emphasized, some lineages allow for literal sexual yoga with a consort. Here, controlled arousal, retention and transformation of sexual fluids, and the dissolution of inner winds into the central channel are used to generate intense yet stable bliss. That blissful, clear awareness is then deliberately joined with the realization of emptiness, so that strong sensation becomes a vehicle for non-dual wisdom rather than attachment.

Such practices are embedded in a rigorous ethical and initiatory framework. They are said to require formal empowerment, tantric and bodhisattva vows, extensive preliminary training, and direct guidance from a qualified guru. Both partners are expected to be properly initiated practitioners, bound by the same vows and responsibilities, and to share a mature motivation rooted in bodhicitta rather than personal gratification. The traditional literature repeatedly warns that without stable renunciation, a correct view of emptiness, and prior mastery of deity yoga and subtle-energy techniques, sexual yoga easily degenerates into mere hedonism and deepens confusion instead of cutting through it. For this reason, many masters hold that for the vast majority of practitioners, the complete path of sexual yoga is to be fulfilled through symbolic, visualized union integrated with meditative discipline, rather than through physical consort practice.