Understanding Hindu concepts surfacing in the West. Part 1 - Kundalini

´Guided this way, this path, every day…

Step by step, beginning to end, light revealed within…

Walk this plane, share what is seen…

Every One the Divine Being…

There comes a time…

Remembering the All High…

Whom is Thee…

The Eternal One…

That does not die…

Dream after Dream, so it seems…

Program, Illusion, Maya, Matrix…

Beyond the body mind, there are no tricks…

Love is All there is…

Pneuma, Spirit, Holy Ghost…

Revelation of your true Self…

The Highest Degree, of Thee…

Kundalini…´

Mynzah

Where does the word Kundalini come from?

"Kundalini" is an ancient Sanskrit word that literally means "coiled snake" and this snake symbolises a divine energy in Hinduism originating at the base of the spine. References to Kundalini can be found in the Upanishads, ancient texts written between 800 BCE to 500 BCE that form the foundation of Hindu philosophy. In fact the serpent symbolises in this context the embodiment of both masculine and feminine energies and Lord Shiva, a deity in Hinduism, is often depicted as holding a serpent, representing Kundalini. The awakening of the Kundalini energy is therefore seen as a means of uniting these energies and achieving a state of balance and harmony.

In essence, a Kundalini awakening is the true spiritual awakening that all men and women can have. The energy needs to be awakened as it is something we are born with, but that lies largely dormant, hence the metaphor of it being like a snake - a coiled snake is typically well concealed and hard to spot. Hindus believe we must make an effort to "uncoil the snake," thereby putting us in direct contact with the divine and Kundalini yoga was created specifically to bring about a kundalini awakening through raising energy in the body. In fact, initial teachings of kundalini yoga were kept secret and selective by Hindu schools, such as Kashmir Shaivism, out of fear the energy was too powerful to be handled by the masses. The tantric initiation was classically handed down, in secret, from Guru to student, only after a long period of committed service and preparation on the part of the student. It is very powerful and is associated with the element of fire, even termed as the fire of life. Take care with fire, as an element it is linked with electricity and happiness, but all wise spiritual gurus will say it is actually sometimes better to be moderate with such energies, as they are extremely powerful.

The purpose of Kundalini

The purpose of Kundalini, once awakened, is rebuilding where needed your emotional and pain-body in order to overcome trauma held in the somatic memory of your cells, via more conscious self-realisation - the negative trauma parts can no longer exist within your consciousness once a Kundalini awakening occurs to you as your now clearer awareness of these traumas will make them too unbearable. This represents the balancing of the energies, both masculine and feminine.

As part of the self-realisation process, you must come to terms with understanding (not eliminating) your shadow and endure your Prayacta karma, which is karma you were born with, or the parts of the self which were there from the start but which are now ready to be let go of, or overcome if they provide too much resistance to your greater goals, though of course that may require great sacrifices. Karma is merely the sum of cause and effect, that is actions, stored in the somatic memory from your life and your ancestors, thanks to the passing on and adaption of DNA - in a way karma is your astral memory, which you are born with and add to throughout your life. Depending on your beliefs, it can be understood that Prayacta Karma includes karma from your past lives, as the Hindus understand.

All experts, be they Eastern Hindu or Modern Western agree Kundalini is no walk in the park. As you go through the vulnerable stage of individualisation in an awakening you may experience both increased hormones and bliss, on what is termed an -up stage, as well as increased loneliness and sorrow in what is considered a dark night stage. Sadness often follows happiness.

Both of these stages are vital in their own right as they permit the individual to break free from the parts of society which controls what’s constitutes wellness and from socially correct models of being, which is in general are false models of being, glorified but whose causes always end up hidden in the shadow.

One side of the awakening, the added bliss and inspiration should give you more confidence and reveal your artistic side to you, whilst the other, the dark night, should allow you to understand and come to terms with your traumas and lead to greater compassion. It generally comes along with further awakening to the faults in the world, as well as understanding the subtler realities of the earth, including psychic phenomena.

Kundalini is known to trigger great prescience, clairvoyance and psychic abilities. However, it is crucial not to confuse any phenomena such as information psychically received as more important than the information you receive in day-to-day interaction. It is not necessarily purer or more holy, and this phenomena doesn’t actually “mean” anything other than the meaning we give it. Many fall for ideas that angels are guiding them based on becoming a little more psychic, and from then on ignore what reality dictates when the angel and demon advise clearly is wrong. Many fear possession upon stumbling into the spirit world, but all spirit may be good or bad depending on the situation, just as being possessive is both a good and bad human trait. It is no good rejecting or following blindly any spirit, without understanding that your subconscious should know what it is doing, and any conscious control over it comes at too much risk.

Kundalini - a natural process

I believe kundalini awakenings are natural and not a religious myth, that there is an energy within us which generally is not rising but is able to be awoken and that is particularly spiritually potent. However, I think that they are rarer than believed, and therefore in our culture, true kundalini awakenings are generally felt as a complete shock and interpreted in wildly different ways. Furthermore, many gurus or experts stress to not be caught up in the name Kundalini, because it is so widely and differently understood, it’s almost become like a pop term. Well known Western Scientific experts on Kundalini include Jana Dixon and Itzhak Bentov.

So to keep it simple, a kundalini awakening is generally all about spiritually awakening (experiencing different phenomena normally for the first times) and meanwhile developing yourself energetically and trusting yourself when going through a process which is extreme and mysterious, and therefore taken as nonsense or worse ridiculed by modern society and authority figures like doctors, who often confuse its symptoms for a form of psychosis or schizophrenia. It is highly recommended to handle calmly any kundalini awakening, and to join a camp or find an expert you trust but maintain your skepticism and your individuality (not fall for any cult), and to take particular care with authorities like doctors, psychiatrists and misunderstanding family members or friends.

Kundalini is often associated with fire, and you can imagine the idea of burning karma and dissolving previous parts of your emotional armoring. You can imagine it is a passionate, loving and angry process. It is said that it is irreversible, but I believe this is not true as in truth seeds rarely grow into plants on bad earth - I personally think both the awakened individual and it's environment can completely sabotage a Kundalini awakening if there's too much spiritual conflict emergent from it and especially as so many are spiritually ignorant, even those who try to help or worship higher powers.

At its best, I feel kundalini is about enjoying newfound inspiration and pleasure in self-realisation (the poems I wrote and shared in this blog were inspired by kundalini), but anyone who has watched anecdotes of people describing kundalini or done enough research will know it is anything but an easy ride and can be dangerous for the awakened or those around him or her - if misunderstood or mismanaged.

The crucial point I like to make is that Kundalini is not about self-improvement and nor is it something to chase, like a good to be consumed, or run away from. It is never about being the best.

In fact, Kundalini awakenings could even be viewed as a second puberty spell or as a type of metamorphism of ourselves, which is completely about liberation and if worked with well, on the large-part positive and pure (though everyone knows puberty ain't that fun). I feel the comparison made here is important, as surely no-one would chase puberty or describe it as way of self-improvement, purely natural as it may be.

The only difference is puberty is widely accepted and universally experience, whereas kundalini awakenings are very rare and therefore widely doubted. And the reason why Kundalini awakenings are so rare is exactly why they are arguably so important, the pressures of culture and twisted cultural beliefs (creating spiritual ignorance) will completely destroy an individual's chances of knowing Kundalini nine out of ten times, as it is not a safe and easy process. In truth, the short bitter-sweetness of my own kundalini awakening and its partial failure is what led me to write this blog directly - I hope others have a better time than me at stages.

Guilt is healthy (karma is not to be policed), but at the same time try not to feel guilt for your truth during the process and stick to your principals; because there is usually a tremendous society backlash that comes about after someone awakens and like anything, Kundalini may result in making that person more vulnerable, not necessarily stronger. The reason why this backlash is not hard to fathom is because people fear change and what they do not know, and it goes without saying that very few things can change an individual more than a both inspiring and frightening unexpected kundalini spiritual awakening - which to make matters harder also may give off the wall symptoms such as kyrias; particuarly to Atheists (no I am not saying we are gods or that there is a god, but definitively that there are spirits and souls and that we are in more places than one, following my awakening).

Kundalini symptoms

It is believed that there are two types of awakening, the first most common one being bottom up (routine awakening), which is achievable somewhat from following kundalini yoga and from having great health/mind, or from being in a highly stimulating energetic environment and recieving 'Shaktipat' (literally 'a touch of grace' passing energy on from a guru or powerful individual to a receiver). The other awakening is rarer, and is a top-down awakening, which is usually only achievable if you are unusually spiritually minded or are provoked by extraordinary circumstances (great trauma for instance) and may have more extreme symptoms, as there will be little preparation for such an awakening.

Without further-ado here are some of the symptoms of a kundalini awakening (hopefully useful for anyone who may have a kundalini awakening or at the very least, who encounters someone-else with such an awakening):

• Increased Heat (think of yogis entering icy lakes historically)

• Kyrias (Third Eye releases) and involuntary tremors

• Gravity Warping sensations

• Heart Expansions, spontaneous feelings of love and forced grounding

• High levels of endorphines, dopamine and natural secretion of opiods, such as enkephalins

• High levels of bliss

• Excessive Pins And Needles, tingling sensation and electrical reactions

• Telapathy

• Spontaneous mystical revelation (seeing spirits, souls)

• Clairvoyance

• Insomnia

• Increased Sorrow

• Greater need to surrender (like estatic dancing to music, or releasing kyrias) and greater need to maintain control, especially from possessive forces, during this process (like Dr Strangelove's right arm) In short, amplified body reactions to the world and external forces.

• Higher chances of anxiety attacks (and stronger attacks)

Jana Dixon's Pitfall's on the path

Jana Dixon, author of Biology of Kundalini, had a great section on how to prevent common mistakes made by those experiencing a Kundalini awakening, summarised below:

• Pathological Regression

Retreat into childlike attitude, letting life collapse to be rescued.

• Running away

Fear of awakening and spiritual insight leading to denial and self-sabotage, e.g. eating unhealthily.

• Oblivion

Over-indulgence in bliss, fantasy and creativity, leading to avoidance of real world obligations, rational discernment and at the expense of survival. One famous Hindu yogi called Totapuri baba slashed open his ajna/ third eye physically with broken glass (avoid this).

• Diffusion

Loss of left-brain focusing and hierarchical prioritization leading to co-dependency, dependency or false security in catering to the egos of others, whereby ones highest

contribution is lost in obscurantism, confusion, ambiguity, paradox, double-binds

due to the collapse of the hierarchical prioritizing faculty.

• Directionlessness

Uncertainty leading to complete loss of plans for the future.

• Problem mind

Focusing entirely on a problem, issue - making a mountain out of a molehill.

• Fixation on Internal Processes

Overly fascinated, morbidly curious, distracted by and absorbed in kundalini

symptoms, psychic phenomena and newfound spiritual powers, leading to social rejection and isolation.

• Inability to Face the shadow

Being fearful and aiming to destroy the shadow, living a PG rating life.

• Chasing the Dragon

Aiming to achieve kundalini or make kundalini more extreme. Over-ambition and lack of patience.

• Spiritual Lust

Like sexual lust can make sexuality depraved, spiritual lust depraves spirituality. Keep on top of your primal desires.

• Spiritual Ego

Pursuing spirituality as an end in itself to bolster ego and counter bad self-esteem.

• Inability to “stop”

Rushing through the awakening creates a schism between the inner Self and the outer conditioned personality which can limit the outer-self to only “react” and learn to fit in through monkey see, monkey do. Know when to slow down or stop.

• Inflation~self Aggrandizement

Expanded psychic ability and high energy inflate the ego to feel overly special, superior and unique, triggering left-brain dominance and potentially martyrdom or creating cults.

• Deflation~self Diminishment

Often a side-effect of inflation, when the ego pops it turns nasty. Self criticism, self doubt, excessive guilt.

• Idle Speculation

Falling for poisonous conspiracy theories such as that there is a reptilian Illuminati, that the world is (or should be) transparent spiritually or that the universe isn't real, just a stimulation. To point out their flaws, such as that every animal besides the octopus originally descended from reptiles and that therefore we are all reptilian in an abstract way, is the best action to take against idle speculation.

• Internal Exploitation

Exploitation of kundalini/muse energy for “worldly goals” of power, status or monetary

gain. Abusing your goodness.

• External Exploitation

Using powerful psychic powers to exploit others in order to fulfill ones own drive for power, status or monetary gain. Power mongering and turning the sacred into the profane.

• Projecting Spirit

Transference onto Gurus, lovers, alien or channeled entities, angels, saints etc…in disownership of ones own alchemical process, soul and muse.

• Formalism

Entrenched preoccupation with appearances, rules, forms, formulas, dogmas, details,

rituals and traditions of religious sects. Fanaticism, orthodoxy, fundamentalism, elitism.

• Perpetual Seeker

Need for parental figures in guru or high-status individual as there is an unconscious commitment to remain immature,obsequious and surrender ones personal power.

• Addiction to Cognition

Inability to relax into the spaciousness of the transrational due to tenacious drive of

the mind to “know.” Unwilling to let go of focal, associative, analytic mind in order

to transcend and include it in “whole-seeing” and full spectrum consciousness

• Absolute Knowledge

Loss of growth potential by closing off to new information due to the hubris of a

premature claim to enlightenment, or grandiose mystical omniscience, or dogmatic scientific orthodoxy.

• Fear of stepping outside the Box

Giving oneself license to be one-self in a conformist world that is probably not

going to appreciate what we have to offer anyways.

• Abiding in the Absolute

Feeling like the task is holding on to the pinnacle of the awakening and trivializing the sense of its relative impermanence. Artificial perfection equating to a false permanent awakening.

• Spiritual Bypass

Premature transcendence—high level denial. Avoiding painful psychological issues by immersing oneself in a rigorous spiritual practice, or focusing on experiences of transcendence within the Kundalini phenomena to the exclusion of processing past trauma.

• Missing the Mark

Kundalini and our conceptual beliefs about God and spirituality are not what is important. What is of ultimate value to us is Life, love and relationship. If the preoccupation with our kundalini and our beliefs are interfering with our Life, love and relationship then we must do everything within our power of awareness to rectify this situation and set priorities straight.

• Guilt over Awakening

If awakening conflicts with beliefs of others (e.g. materialistic atheists, haters, fundamentalist Christians/ Muslims etc...), there is a need to be safe from their judgement. Excessive guilt for appearing all of a sudden too-good (Ned Flandersly) or for not being perfect (making more mistakes during awakening). Don't provoke by being too in the face of others.

• Threshold Unreadiness

Need to be receptive to new states of Samadhi and confident. Might require bravery if social reaction is harsh; people do spy on others spiritually, and some aggressively control.

Reference

Biology of Kundalini: Exploring the Fire of Life