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Ladyelaine
USA
1 Posts |
 Posted - Feb 04 2014 : 4:10:39 PM
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I’m trying to figure out if I had a kundalini experience and the energy went dormant, or if what happened to me was the result of my over-active imagination. I’ll give some brief background information and describe my experience.
I am a college-aged female in my early 20s. When I was a child I grew up in a Christian home, and was very dedicated to my family’s faith, but I became a hardline atheist for a while in my teens. Recently I became interested in spiritual practices again, and started daily vipassana meditation and yoga at the beginning of last December. The yoga that I do is not the intensive advanced yoga described on this site; it’s more akin to the basic hatha yoga that’s taught in most yoga studios. I haven’t done much pranayama or too much of anything outside the basic postures. I also started reading about various types of spirituality intensively. I began to notice subtle energy flowing up my body during meditation like waves. This lead me to start studying a lot about prana and energy practices.
After a few weeks, I had a very intense experience. But I feel I have reason to doubt its validity for a couple of reasons; I had just been reading about chakras and kundalini extensively (the power of suggestion), and nothing strange or out of the ordinary has happened since then. Still, whatever happened to me was extraordinary, and it definitely matches the descriptions of kundalini energy… As I said, I had just been reading a book about chakras, and I was curious. I found a guided chakra meditation that was supposed to “open and cleanse the chakras” and tried it out. It put me into a very deep meditative state, and afterwards, I did indeed feel very cleansed and purified. I went to bed and lay down on my back. I began feeling the waves of energy that I sometimes felt during meditation. I decided to just flow with the energy rather than focusing on my breath like I would usually do. It grew stronger and stronger, and I felt as if I would become overwhelmed by it. Suddenly my heart started pounding and I felt a burning ball of energy at the base of my spine. The energy began to rise along my spine, till I felt it “burst” in my head. It was the most blissful experience of my life! I’m not really sure how to describe it because words don’t really do it justice. Let’s just say that I gained a new understanding of what Christian friends from my childhood were talking about when they said they felt “the presence of God.”
Afterwards I opened my eyes but couldn’t move. It was almost as if my body didn’t exist for a few minutes, even though I was completely aware of my surroundings. The next day I felt a confidence and equanimity I have never known. I felt certain of myself and my place in the world. However, some rough experiences that week like the death of my grandma brought me back down to earth.
I haven’t had any symptoms or signs of kundalini since then. Was this just an amazing fluke experience/ product of my own imagination, or was it genuinely something more?
A couple other factors: I will also say that I haven’t done any more experimenting with chakras/energy work since that day. I am very curious but also a little frightened. I’ve heard enough horror stories to know that these things shouldn’t be messed around with unless one is prepared, and honestly I believe I still have a bit too much emotional baggage and etc. to deal with the consequences of a full blown kundalini awakening. However, I have continued my meditation and yoga practices as before.
I realize this is long, so thank you to anyone who took the time to read it. I just want to know if my experience has any validity, and if so, where to go from here.
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Christi
United Kingdom
4430 Posts |
Posted - Feb 04 2014 : 5:40:40 PM
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Hi Ladyelaine,
Welcome to the forum and thanks for sharing your experience. What you went through was a kundalini awakening- and a pretty classic one too. It is also what is sometimes called "a full blown awakening" rather than a partial awakening as the prana rose all the way to your head. So there is no need for you to fear that another, more extreme awakening is still to come.
What will come will tend to be less extreme and much slower, a gradual purification and rising of the energy through the body. But it will take months and years rather than the short time of the initial awakening. The kundalini has not gone back to sleep, it is still there, but it is much more subtle and things will be happening behind the scenes so to speak. As you continue with your yoga, you will begin to feel it and to feel how it is working to purify you.
Christi |
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Experientialknowing
USA
263 Posts |
Posted - Feb 05 2014 : 1:39:16 PM
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HI, Ladyelaine to confirm yes this was a Kundalini experience.
Has it gone dormant?
I think not it is likely you are adapting to what you experienced and being able to feel the difference between an unknown state of operating and a known one is becoming less obvious as the lines are becoming one instead of parallel and distinct.
In other words welcome to your current level of unfolding.
Whatever it is you will experience from here on out will be unique & personal to you no one can say otherwise.
Is there a reason to be fearful of what Kundalini has in store for you?
No absolutely not.
Like yourself I too have read the stories some write. There experiences are what they perceived and are not a guide or a measuring stick of any kind to the operation of Kundalini or what one should expect.
Since you are just getting started in your adult life I would recommend establishing a stable home life and independence for yourself.
Once you have these things in place it is much easier to stick with a scheduled sadhana practice for further development.
Above all else though listen to your inner promptings and then you will be doing what you should for you not what others think.
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Edited by - Experientialknowing on Feb 05 2014 1:49:46 PM |
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Evannon
USA
26 Posts |
Posted - Feb 20 2014 : 10:57:14 AM
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Hi Ladyelaine! (Hope you get this, though I'm posting weeks after your question.)
I agree with the answers above: YES, a kundalini awakening. Sounds practically identical to what happened with me at the end of a 10-day vipassana meditation retreat. However, based on my experience, I have to disagree with part of the first response: "what will come will tend to be less extreme and much slower...." That may be true - if you do no more meditation at all. In my experience, I kept meditating, and the experiences became more and more mind-blowing. I was drawn to the ecstacy (of course!) but also felt the peaceful equanimity you described after such meditations, and felt that the "energy" was purifying and healing. I still know that to be true, but the journey hasn't always been easy.
I too was born to a Christian family in Kentucky. And, I'm a gay man, now 46 years old. So growing up in Kentucky in the 80s and discovering I was gay was, to say the least, a fear filled experience. By the time I started meditating, I had a LOT of complexes to unravel. Kundalini has the power to bring up whatever needs to be released and purified in you. Your emotional memories are held in your entire nervous system, not some tidy hard-drive in your brain. So, depending on what's in there - AND DEPENDING ON HOW POWERFUL YOU ALLOW KUNDALINI TO BECOME - it can be a rough ride! I don't say this to scare you off of working with this energy. In fact, you may not have a choice. I didn't!
I had to find a way to work with the energy to allow it to do its positive, cleansing, healing work without overwhelming me. The lessons here were my life-saver. I recommend starting at the beginning, with lesson one, and working your way through, taking whatever is useful and works for you. There is a LOT that I've left behind. (I have no need to stick my tongue into my sinuses - I'm quite sensitive enough without that, thank you very much!) But the useful stuff really did help me! It may seem strange and esoteric at first, but it works! Particularly, be careful of the crown chakra! Focus on the third eye area to moderate the energy flow if it becomes too powerful. This one piece of advice has kept me safe and in charge.
One last thing: the deepest complex that came up for me, (and almost drove me crazy, I feared) had to do with fears of hell imbued in me as a child and intensified as I discovered my sexuality. In my family and their church, any sexuality was shamed, and HOMOsexuality most of all. I had very deep, subconscious fears that were causing serious problems in my life and relationships. At one point, Kundalini threw it all in my face at once, and I thought I was going to lose it.
So before you dive in, you might want to examine what issues you know exist in your life: what were the emotional causes and impacts of going from Christian faith to atheism to yoga? What else might be down there in your subconscious? Whatever it is, don't be afraid of it. Just know that whatever needs to come up and burn off WILL! And it will be a wonderful thing! My advice: do the work as you are called; go gently - "self-pacing" as they call it here; follow the lessons; trust yourself - "the guru is in you" is how each lesson ends. The results are invaluable, and perhaps inevitable. From the bottom of my heart, I wish you well!
Evannon |
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Dogboy
USA
2242 Posts |
Posted - Feb 20 2014 : 1:42:22 PM
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Very thoughtful advice, Evannon!  |
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BillinL.A.
USA
375 Posts |
Posted - Feb 20 2014 : 2:51:56 PM
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| I admire you Evannon! |
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SonOfTheGods
3 Posts |
Posted - Feb 26 2014 : 12:00:41 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Ladyelaine
I’m trying to figure out if I had a kundalini experience and the energy went dormant, or if what happened to me was the result of my over-active imagination. I’ll give some brief background information and describe my experience.
I am a college-aged female in my early 20s. When I was a child I grew up in a Christian home, and was very dedicated to my family’s faith, but I became a hardline atheist for a while in my teens. Recently I became interested in spiritual practices again, and started daily vipassana meditation and yoga at the beginning of last December. The yoga that I do is not the intensive advanced yoga described on this site; it’s more akin to the basic hatha yoga that’s taught in most yoga studios. I haven’t done much pranayama or too much of anything outside the basic postures. I also started reading about various types of spirituality intensively. I began to notice subtle energy flowing up my body during meditation like waves. This lead me to start studying a lot about prana and energy practices.
After a few weeks, I had a very intense experience. But I feel I have reason to doubt its validity for a couple of reasons; I had just been reading about chakras and kundalini extensively (the power of suggestion), and nothing strange or out of the ordinary has happened since then. Still, whatever happened to me was extraordinary, and it definitely matches the descriptions of kundalini energy… As I said, I had just been reading a book about chakras, and I was curious. I found a guided chakra meditation that was supposed to “open and cleanse the chakras” and tried it out. It put me into a very deep meditative state, and afterwards, I did indeed feel very cleansed and purified. I went to bed and lay down on my back. I began feeling the waves of energy that I sometimes felt during meditation. I decided to just flow with the energy rather than focusing on my breath like I would usually do. It grew stronger and stronger, and I felt as if I would become overwhelmed by it. Suddenly my heart started pounding and I felt a burning ball of energy at the base of my spine. The energy began to rise along my spine, till I felt it “burst” in my head. It was the most blissful experience of my life! I’m not really sure how to describe it because words don’t really do it justice. Let’s just say that I gained a new understanding of what Christian friends from my childhood were talking about when they said they felt “the presence of God.”
Afterwards I opened my eyes but couldn’t move. It was almost as if my body didn’t exist for a few minutes, even though I was completely aware of my surroundings. The next day I felt a confidence and equanimity I have never known. I felt certain of myself and my place in the world. However, some rough experiences that week like the death of my grandma brought me back down to earth.
I haven’t had any symptoms or signs of kundalini since then. Was this just an amazing fluke experience/ product of my own imagination, or was it genuinely something more?
A couple other factors: I will also say that I haven’t done any more experimenting with chakras/energy work since that day. I am very curious but also a little frightened. I’ve heard enough horror stories to know that these things shouldn’t be messed around with unless one is prepared, and honestly I believe I still have a bit too much emotional baggage and etc. to deal with the consequences of a full blown kundalini awakening. However, I have continued my meditation and yoga practices as before.
I realize this is long, so thank you to anyone who took the time to read it. I just want to know if my experience has any validity, and if so, where to go from here.
I am going to play devil's advocate and say you never had an authentic Kundalini Awakening.
Rather, you experienced this:
Pranotthana or Kundalini?
Recently a large number of books and magazines have been published concerning investigations into the reality of kundalini. Unfortunately, much of what has been written shows only a very preliminary and partial knowledge of the actual awakening process. In many texts, the pranotthana or release of pranic force within the body has been confused with the actual awakening of kundalini. Pranotthana is the first thing that happens as the individual evolves, and it is this release of energy which triggers off the actual awakening of kundalini. Without pranotthana the kundalini is not awakened.
There are two ways in which pranotthana can take place. The first is by regular practice of asanas, pranayama, concentration and meditation techniques. Through these practices, the prana is gradually released in the body, starting the preliminary process of purification of organs, glands, nervous system, brain and nadis. The complete purification comes only with the kundalini awakening and rising to the brain.
The second way in which pranotthana occurs is by shaktipat, the awakening of energy effected by a guru. Shaktipat does not directly awaken kundalini, it only releases the prana of the disciple. However, it is this prana in movement that awakens the kundalini. The time it takes to do so depends on the mental and physical impurities of the disciple as well as on his attitude towards the guru who gave him shaktipat and towards this new process working in him.
Whether pranotthana occurs by individual efforts or by the activation of one's prana by a guru, the fact is that this is not kundalini awakening as many people are saying. The confusion perhaps came about because the process which pranotthana affects on the body and mind of the individual is somewhat similar in the beginning to that of kundalini awakening. Some books state that this energy - kundalini - awoke and rose up to the brain, either straight away or after a few times, in many individuals. Nevertheless, these people carried on with their normal lives, apart from an improvement in health and mental clarity. This shows that it was not the kundalini energy that rose to the brain, but the pranic force released by pranotthana. This force follows the same pathways as does kundalini energy. It starts in mooladhara and ascends the spine, purifying the chakras, partially but not completely, until it reaches the brain. This pranic force thus makes it easier for the kundalini purificatory process which will come about at a later time.
As the pranic force purifies, it creates automatic body movements, spontaneous asanas, pranayamas, visions of lights, etc. as it encounters inner physiological and psychological blockages. Once pranotthana has finished its initial work of purification, it normally stabilises itself for a time, before it starts dealing with the kundalini energy,. After a time, kundalini awakens. With the kundalini awakening, spontaneous movements, mudras, bandhas, pranayamas, generation of a lot of heat, psychic visions, etc. start occurring. But these are of a more intense and deeper nature than those caused by pranotthana. It is now that spontaneous natural meditation occurs and not before. It is now that real purification takes place, and the state of consciousness of the individual radically changes. A higher state of awareness automatically dawns on the individual, and his behaviour, relations with his environment, understanding of things, etc. changes completely. He definitely seems to be a different personality. Powerful changes occur in every field of his physiology and psychology. Automatically, the man starts becoming more subtle and spiritual, or on the other hand, starts behaving like a neurotic. If he still has many blockages - not having purified himself by the practice of asanas, pranayamas, mudras, bandhas, concentration, karma yoga, etc. - the awakening can cause temporary insanity. Such people may spend some time in the mental hospital. These extreme cases occur when inexperienced individuals try to awaken their kundalini energy through unscientific methods, without any preparation. However, when properly initiated and guided by an experienced guru, kundalini awakening is a spiritual rebirth for the aspirant.
However, everything does not end here. Awakening of kundalini in itself is not a difficult thing, what is important is the ascending of the energy through the sushumna passage, and this is not easy, truly it isn't. The awakening can be effected by any guru or by your own efforts in yoga, but what then? The ascent through sushumna is clogged with samskaras, physical and psychic impurities. These great barriers are the obstacles which the kundalini energy itself will have to pull down and burn. This process will affect the aspirant in many ways causing great physical transformation, psychic visions, e.s.p. experiences, strange illnesses, unconsciousness, etc. all this depending on the impurities he has on the different levels of his being. But these are only transitory things, which go away as they came, leaving a purified awareness.
Truly this is the energy of evolution, without which a man will remain ordinary, his latent faculties dormant. Once you have put your foot on this path, you will never want to go back.
http://www.yogamag.net/archives/197.../prano.shtml |
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Did my kundalini go dormant?
