Spontaneous Kundalini

Sheryl and I get an unusual number of contacts lately regarding Kundalini. We put up a video on the subject awhile ago, first on our website and then on youtube. The whole idea originally was just to have a little video so that people could see our faces and hear our voices in a kind of a “see how sane and not scary or weird we are?” way. But we had to have something to talk about, and in one of the vids I talk about how I had a Kundalini rising experience when I was 13 or so. Some very nice people posted comments about their own experiences too (on youtube) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smg5ZHAl8X4

In short, a Kundalini rising is ideally an enlightening experience. However there are a lot of descriptions on the web about people having spontaneous occurrences and being none too happy about it because they suffer ill effects. My own experiences with Kundalini have been wonderful, but I was already seriously into meditation and study when I first experienced a k-rising. The physical sensation for me felt like a spiraling/ tornado sensation of whirling energy starting at the base of the spine and moving upwards until it reached the top of my head. The feeling was of the energy passing upward and outward beyond my physical body. The physical sensations were not confined to the spinal area. Emotionally the experience was one of overwhelming love and joy, of boundlessness/ oneness or of the “numinous.” Intellectually I felt that all my questions were answered in an instant. Some people have described the experience as orgasmic or like a spiritual orgasm, but that’s an analogy and not a direct correlation to the sexual. I would call it an intense and profound spiritual experience.

So we’ve had some contacts asking how to come by this experience, and a few asking for help or seeming worried about the experience. In the last instance Sheryl gave an excellent and well considered response; having been through her own “spiritual emergency”.

So. . . here’s my answers, and they’re just opinions. You can’t take out your credit card and buy a Kundalini. No short cuts to enlightenment, and no long way round either (You might have been born enlightened). There’s a yoga practice called Kundalini yoga, and it might get you there, it might not. So might any devotional path, and in my opinion no devotional path is superior to any other. Or maybe you're just a good person with no use for any of this enlightenment talk anyway, and that's fine by me too. I'm not trying to convert or convince anybody of anything.

Conversely you might get hit with an overwhelming spiritual event that you didn’t expect and weren’t prepared for. Mostly the descriptions on the internet are about those instances, and I’m dismayed by that: where a wonderful gift of being hit by something beneficial that you weren’t quite ready for is equated with catching a painful and debilitating illness. Here is Sheryl’s edited response to a person who was having a particularly difficult time:

“Paul and I both have had experiences with Kundalini. Some of mine were quite difficult as well (Paul's were not) but we both have insights we think will help.

. . . have you ever been in a group, followed a guru or guidebook that said these (difficult) experiences are "normal", "to be expected" or suffered through because it's a "healing" of sorts? This is not strictly the case. To shift this, know that self-realization leads to knowing your infinite true nature. You ARE all and YOU have the power to work with this. Belief makes the biggest difference. For example, Paul's first Kundalini experience was very stimulating but essentially one of oneness, peace and bliss. Mine, not so much. Paul was ready. I was scared and clamped down -- I wasn't adequately prepared for what was happening, didn't understand it. I learned the hard way to:

1) Open and surrender. I learned in my Reiki Master training to use nothing more than belief and intention to open the chakras. Paul got the same idea that he could do this as a teenager before he got his Reiki training. He just does what he does naturally. I use a technique: My Reiki teacher taught me to visualize the top of a person's head opening like a flower. When I feel Kundalini rushes happen I open that crown chakra to allow the energy out the top of my head and there is no intense build-up of heat to cause problems anymore.

2) When Kundalini rushes for me spontaneously I have come to realize that it is always there to force me into awakening. I ask: why now? What exactly was I thinking, dreaming, (worrying) when the sensations took over? What do I need to learn? If I can address the beliefs I was working with and choose to accept a different one, the Kundalini automatically resolves.

3) Paul has been able to use his intention to get the flow to cease. Literally saying something like: I can choose to change this now and I ask that this happen -- and choosing to believe this power to choose IS within our own power is the key.

Practice helps. Learning through my Reiki teacher that intention is the key to healing made a big difference for me. But she didn't do more than I just said to you. She said: Do it, planted the belief that we COULD, and then let us practice on each other. The practice gave us the visceral experience of this choice working and that cemented the belief for me. Made it real so I can use it whenever I remember to. . . “

Couldn’t have said it better myself. Some people describe Kundalini as if it were an alien entity in control of your body and mind. It’s not. You are. Or rather your limited perception of self. Who ever said that the individual acting in isolated consciousness, believing itself to be separate from all that is was the norm?