Kundalini

"Kundalinî: 'She who is coiled; serpent power.' The primordial cosmic energy in every individual which eventually, through the practice of yoga, rises up the sushumnâ nâdî. As it rises, the kunalinî awakens each successive chakra. Nirvikalpa samâdhi, enlightenment, comes as it pierces through the door of Brahman at the core of the sahasrâra and enters!” Hinduism Today
"The Kundalini is your own mother. Your individual mother. And She has tape-recorded all your past and your aspirations, everything. And She rises because She wants to give you your second birth, but She is your individual mother. You don’t share Her with anybody else. Yours is a different, somebody else’s is different because the tape-recording is different. We say She is the reflection of the Adi Shakti who is called as Holy Ghost in the Bible. But She rises without any difficulty. Hardly any time it takes." — Shri Mataji
Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily I say unto thee, except a man born be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God... Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of Spirit is spirit." John 3:5-7

"It is important to understand about your own Kundalini, as Self-realisation is Self-knowledge. And the one who gives Self-knowledge is your own Kundalini because when she rises, she points out what are the problems on your Chakras. Now we say that it is pure desire. It is your chaste desire. It has no lust or greed in it. That power is your Mother and She Is settled down in the triangular bone. She knows everything about you just as a tape recorder. She is absolute knowledge. Because She is so pure that whatever chakra She touches, She knows what is wrong with that chakra before hand; so She is quite prepared and She adjusts herself fully so that you do not get a problem by the awakening. If any chakra is constricted, She waits and goes on slowly opening that chakra.

The Kundalini is the primordial power and is reflected in you. In a human being, it is like many strands of energy, like rope. This energy is all twisted together to form that Kundalini. In a human being the strands are 3 x 7 = 21 Nadis raised to the power of 108. When your kundalini rises, one or two strands out of this come up and pierce the fontanelle bone. It has to pass through the innermost nadi known as Brahma Nadi. It is a spiral movement throughout. The kundalini is spiral and nadis are also like a spiral. The outermost nadi is the right-side nadi, Pingala Nadi. The second innermost is Ida Nadi. She starts sending these threads through Brahma Nadi; by that they relax the centre. By relaxing of centre, the sympathetic nervous system also starts relaxing, your pupils start dilating and when it has pierced the Agnya, then the eyes will be completely dilated and shining. Then She enters into Sahasrara.

It is absolutely the pure light of knowledge of love, compassion and attention. All these things are in that energy. We know of many energies like electrical, light energy etc. These energies cannot think. They cannot adjust and work on their own. They have to be handled by us. But this energy itself is the living energy and knows how to handle itself. It thinks. If you see a seed being sprouted you will find at the tip of the seed there is a small little cell which knows how to go around the soft places, how to encircle the stones, and how to find its way towards the source. That cell has got a little Kundalini in it. But within you a tremendous force of Kundalini exists. When a realised soul says that he should have more compassion, as my compassion is not alright; my concern about others, my generosity is not alright, I have exploited other's love. Then this energy starts moving, giving you that greater dimension of love and compassion. If you do not want to grow in your awareness then She does not supply the energy which is stored in you.

The Kundalini is there to nourish you, look after you, and make you grow by giving you a higher, wider and deeper personality. All her power is nothing but love. She gives the power to forgive. Even when you think, the energy for thinking comes from Kundalini because you are asking her help.

The power of Kundalini is absolute purity, auspiciousness, holiness, chastity, self-respect, pure love, detachment, concern, enlightened attention to give you Joy. As a mother will try whatever is possible to give joy to her child, in the same way, this Kundalini has only one power and that is how to give Joy to her own Children. When we talk in the light of Kundalini, we have to understand that this light spreads in your life, outside your life and, expresses itself in a very beautiful manner.

When you worship Adi Kundalini, the reflection in you, which is your Kundalini, is very happy. Also the deities feel happy.

The power of Kundalini which is your own Mother has to rise and manifest itself, because of your Pure Desire. In your introspection, pujas, and in your Meditation, you should see for yourself why are you in meditation. It is for pure desire of compassion and love to be awakened within us. The growth has started and you will find that this shell which is human conditioning and ego will just break open. It is in the triangular bone, which comes up, manifests and can save the whole world. Just see the magnificence, the expansion, the greatness of this Kundalini which was within you and which came up in its full strength and has shown tremendous things.

The joy we feel during music recitals is because Kundalini is dancing. She gets happy because you ask for nothing but enjoyment of collectivity.

You are yourself fully connected when you are absolutely detached and your Kundalini is dancing. You are alone and never alone. This oneness with the whole gives you all the security and joy you want. That's why the Kundalini awakening means collectivity. Unless and until you want pure collectivity in your being Kundalini won't rise.

When you worship Adi Kundalini, you are trying to cleanse your Kundalini, as well and please the deities. This is an object. It cannot be changed. But the reflector can change. The movement of Kundalini depends on temperament of person. Kundalini can give you honesty, and faith in honesty by actualising the experience. Supposing you want to go to a garden and you are suddenly there. Then you will know that your desire is pure and it has worked out. All such miracles happen. The pure desire works out because it is powerful.

When it works, the whole thing works out and you develop faith. That faith is within you. Nobody can challenge you if you have faith. It will be done. Your pure desire is now being fulfilled, you are now connected, and you are now Divine. You are realised souls. You are different from others. For you, all this subtle knowledge is being absorbed, because your Kundalini is absorbing it. Whatever is absorbed is absorbed back by me. But that becomes like a barometer. You immediately know without thinking, asking, you know about anyone because Kundalini is the reflector. The better a reflector, you become, the more the Kundalini shows. Though Kundalini is an individual Mother, in her functions and methods She is just the same. You cannot cheat the Kundalini; She knows you out and out. We must meditate to get into thoughtless awareness by which we allow the Kundalini to grow."

The Paraclete Shri Mataji
Philadelphia, USA — Oct 15, 1993


Kundalini: The dormant, divine Evolutionary Force that enlightens and bestows immortality when activated
"What is Kundalini Really? More commonly known in western cultures as Holy Spirit, Kundalini is the ancient Sanskrit name for the primal life force that animates all living entities—the evolutionary force behind all living matter.... Shaktipat is a Sanskrit word for the process of activating the higher Kundalini-Shakti energy, initiating the process of spiritual growth and enlightenment and advancing personal evolution dramatically. This has also been called the "baptism by fire" and "second birth"—a truly sacred mystical experience.” Dr. Larry Jensen PhD, DD, MBA.

According to Indian tradition, man has seven chakras (centres of energy). The Kundalini force is said to be sleeping, coiled like a serpent, in the lowest chakra, called the root chakra. When this force is awaken, it begins to rise up through the spine. The awakening occurs through yoga, meditation, breathing exercises etc., and was called "the shorter way to God".

The most ancient Eastern spiritual texts, the Vedas, of India, tell us that the process of spiritual awakening by which one attains truth -awareness is called 'Self-Realization'. The Self Realized person lives in direct experience of reality—this is called "Jnana" ( a traditional sanskrit word meaning 'knowledge' or 'Gnosis'). Such a person is called a "Jnani" ('knower ' or 'gnostic' ) or "dwijaha" ('twice born'; first from a human mother to the earthly plane then secondly as a child of the Goddess, or Divine Mother, who gives the seeker their second, spiritual birth, Self-Realisation, into the plane of mystic awareness- gnosis! ).
Kundalini means ‘coiled energy’ and it refers to a power which lies in three-and-a-half coils in the sacrum bone called the Mooladhara which is distinct from, and lies above, the Mooladhara Chakra. (It is interesting to note that sacrum if Greek for sacred.) A pulsation is sometimes seen at this level during Kundalini Awakening. Like the Sushumna, the Kundalini is normally in a potential state. When it is awakened it ascends through the Sushumna, across the void to the top of the Sushumna. When the Kundalini emerges at this point, Yoga is said to have taken place. Yoga is impossible without Kundalini Awakening.
This happening of Kundalini awakening and ultimate union with a higher consciousness are described by a Sanskrit word ‘Sahaja’. This means literally ‘born with,’ spontaneous or effortless. The implication is that the entire mechanism is inborn — part of human anatomy — and is activated in a spontaneous and natural way without undue or extreme efforts. One analogy often used is the germinating of a seed. This happens automatically when the seed is placed in the Mother Earth.
When the Kundalini reaches the Agnya Chakra, one becomes silent and peaceful. The person sits with his eyes closed, so this is not a state of hypnosis, brainwashing or manipulation — just silence. The person is fully aware of himself and of his surroundings and is he wishes to, he can think. However, the person is very relaxed and his attention is not constantly being distracted by the normal flow of mundane thoughts. This state is not achieved by any effort of will or by any mental exercises on the part of the patient. It occurs spontaneously when a Sahaja Yogi, that is to say someone who has the state of Yoga and the expertise of the mechanism, awakens the Kundalini. But this is also an illusion as it the Divine Presence within that gives Self-Realization.
If one of the Chakras is damaged or defective, the Kundalini may be obstructed at that level. In such cases, it is often possible to see the pulsation of the Kundalini at that level with the naked eye, and to hear it with a stethoscope. This pulsation can also be heard at the fontanel and Adi Shankaracaraya called this 'spandakarika.'
As the Kundalini rises through the Agnya Chakra, it cools down the system, especially the cerebo-spinal fluid. This results in the balloons of the left and right Agnya becoming progressively deflated. Once this happens the Kundalini is able to reach the top of the Sushumna; the Sahasrara Chakra. At this point we can say that Yoga has taken place. The person feels the coolness, like a breeze of cool vibrations flowing in the fingers and palms of both hands. The sensations on the hands can, with very little practice, be used to ascertain the state of the Chakras. The nadis and the Chakras themselves begin to manifest in the conscious awareness, and what has so far been a hypothesis becomes part of one’s everyday sensory experience. Our fingertips, the base and center of the palm become extremely sensitive as the sympathetic nerve endings representing the different Chakras become enlightened. (According to the Prashna Upanishad, verse 3:6, there are precisely 727,210,201 nerves.) We can feel on our fingers our own selves and other people by a proper method of decoding, which can be taught to anyone who reaches this stage, in a month. Thus, the diagnosis takes place at a deeper level of our being through our sensitivity to these seven centres.
If one learns how to nourish the Chakras through the knowledge of Sahaja Yoga, one can cure the exhausted Chakras. Thus the patient is cured at the root of the disease. It is a scientific and logical method that exists naturally within ourselves, which gives us a balance, redeems us of our mental and physical troubles, comforts and counsels us.
PRAYER TO MOTHER KUNDALINI

Wake up Mother Kundalini.
Thou whose nature is Bliss Eternal—The Bliss of Brahman.
Thou dwelling like a serpent asleep at the lotus of Muladhara,
Sore, affected and distressed am I in body and mind,
Do thou bless me and leave thy place at the basic lotus.
Consort of Siva the Self-caused Lord of Universe,
Do thou take thy upward course through the central canal.
Leaving behind Svadhishthana, Manipuraka, Anahata, Vishuddha, and Ajna.
Be thou united with Siva, thy Lord the God.
At Sahasrara—the thousand-petalled-lotus in the brain.
Sport there freely, O Mother, Giver of Bliss Supreme.
Mother, who is Existence, Knowledge, Bliss Absolute.
Wake up, Mother Kundalini! Wake up.

KUNDALINI

The word Kundalini is a familiar one to all students of Yoga, as it is well known as the power, in the form of a coiled serpent, residing in Muladhara Chakra, the first of the seven Chakras, the other six being Svadhishthana, Manipuraka, Anahata, Visuddha, Ajna and Sahasrara, in order.

All Sadhanas in the form of Japa, meditation, Kirtan and prayer as well as all development of virtues, and observance of austerities like truth, non-violence and continence are at best calculated only to awaken this serpent-power and make it to pass through all the succeeding Chakras beginning from Svadhishthana to Sahasrara, the latter otherwise called as the thousand-petalled lotus, the seat of Sadasiva or the Parabrahman or the Absolute separated from whom the Kundalini or the Shakti lies at the Muladhara, and to unite with whom the Kundalini passes through all the Chakras, as explained above, conferring liberation on the aspirant who assiduously practises Yoga or the technique of uniting her with her Lord and gets success also in his effort.

In worldly-minded people, given to enjoyment of sensual and sexual pleasures, this Kundalini power is sleeping because of the absence of any stimulus in the form of spiritual practices, as the power generated through such practices alone awakens that serpent-power, and not any other power derived through the possession of worldly riches and affluence. When the aspirant seriously practises all the disciplines as enjoined in the Shastras, and as instructed by the preceptor, in whom the Kundalini would have already been awakened and reached its abode or Sadasiva, acquiring which blessed achievement alone a person becomes entitled to act as a Guru or spiritual preceptor, guiding and helping others also to achieve the same end, the veils or layers enmeshing Kundalini begin to be cleared and finally are torn asunder and the serpent-power is pushed or driven, as it were upwards.

Supersensual visions appear before the mental eye of the aspirant, new worlds with indescribable wonders and charms unfold themselves before the Yogi, planes after planes reveal their existence and grandeur to the practitioner and the Yogi gets divine knowledge, power and bliss, in increasing degrees, when Kundalini passes through Chakra after Chakra, making them to bloom in all their glory which before the touch of Kundalini, do not give out their powers, emanating their divine light and fragrance and reveal the divine secrets and phenomena, which lie concealed from the eyes of worldly- minded people who would refuse to believe of their existence even.

When the Kundalini ascends one Chakra or Yogic centre, the Yogi also ascends one step or rung upward in the Yogic ladder; one more page, the next page, he reads in the divine book; the more the Kundalini travels upwards, the Yogi also advances towards the goal or spiritual perfection in relation to it. When the Kundalini reaches the sixth centre or the Ajna Chakra, the Yogi gets the vision of Personal God or Saguna Brahman, and when the serpent-power reaches the last, the top centre, or Sahasrara Chakra, or the Thousand-petalled lotus, the Yogi loses his individuality in the ocean of Sat-Chit-Ananda or the Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute and becomes one with the Lord or Supreme Soul. He is no longer an ordinary man, not even a simple Yogi, but a fully illumined sage, having conquered the eternal and unlimited divine kingdom, a hero having won the battle against illusion, a Mukta or liberated one having crossed the ocean of ignorance or the transmigratory existence, and a superman having the authority and capacity to save the other struggling souls of the relative world. Scriptures hail him most, in the maximum possible glorifying way, and his achievement. Celestial beings envy him, not excluding the Trinity even, viz., Brahma, Vishnu and Siva.

Kundalini And Tantrik Sadhana

Kundalini Yoga actually belongs to Tantrik Sadhana, which gives a detailed description about this serpent-power and the Chakras, as mentioned above. Mother Divine, the active aspect of the Existence- Knowledge-Bliss Absolute, resides in the body of men and women in the form of Kundalini, and the entire Tantrik Sadhana aims at awakening Her, and making Her to unite with the Lord, Sadasiva, in the Sahasrara, as described in the beginning in detail. Methods adopted to achieve this end in Tantrik Sadhana are Japa of the name of the Mother, prayer and various rituals.

Kundalini And Vedanta

But when we come to Vedanta, there is no question about Kundalini or any type of mystical and mechanical methods. It is all enquiry and philosophical speculation. According to Vedanta the only thing to be destroyed is ignorance about one's real nature, and this ignorance cannot be destroyed either by study, or by Pranayama, or by work, or by any amount of physical twisting and torturing, but only by knowing one's real nature, which is Sat-Chit-Ananda or Existence-Knowledge- Bliss. Man is divine, free and one with the Supreme Spirit always, which he forgets and identifies himself with matter, which itself is an illusory appearance and a superimposition on the spirit. Liberation is freedom from ignorance and the aspirant is advised to constantly dissociate himself from all limitations and identify himself with the all-pervading, non-dual, blissful, peaceful, homogeneous spirit or Brahman. When meditation becomes intensified, in the ocean of Existence or rather the individuality is blotted or blown out completely. Just as a drop of water let on a frying pan is immediately sucked and vanishes from cognition, the individual consciousness is sucked in by the Universal Consciousness and is absorbed in it. According to Vedanta there cannot be real liberation in a state of multiplicity, and the state of complete Oneness is the goal to be aspired for, towards which alone the entire creation is slowly moving on.

The Mysterious Kundalini

Manastvam Vyoma tvam Marudasi Marutsarathirasi,
Tvamapastvam Bhumistvayi parinatayam nahi param,
Tvameva Svatmanam parinamayitum visvavapusha
Chidanandakaram haramahishi-bhavena bibhrushe.
"O Devi! Thou art the mind, the sky, the air, the fire, the water, and the earth. Nothing is outside Thee on Thy transformation. Thou hast become Siva's consecrated queen to alter Thy own blissful conscious Form in the shape of the world".

Kundalini, the serpent power or mystic fire, is the primordial energy or Sakti that lies dormant or sleeping in the Muladhara Chakra, the centre of the body. It is called the serpentine or annular power on account of serpentine form. It is an electric fiery occult power, the great pristine force which underlies all organic and inorganic matter.

Kundalini is the cosmic power in individual bodies. It is not a material force like electricity, magnetism, centripetal or centrifugal force. It is a spiritual potential Sakti or cosmic power. In reality it has no form. The Sthula Buddhi and mind have to follow a particular form in the beginning stage. From this gross form, one can easily, understand the subtle formless Kundalini. Prana, Ahamkara, Buddhi, Indriyas, mind, five gross elements, nerves are all the products of Kundalini.

It is the coiled-up, sleeping Divine Sakti that lies dormant in all beings. You have seen in the Muladhara Chakra that there is Svayambhu Linga. The head of the Linga is the space where Sushumna Nadi is attached to the Kanda. This mysterious Kundalini lies face downwards at the mouth of Sushumna Nadi on the head of Svayambhu Linga. It has three and a half coils like a serpent. When it is awakened, it makes a hissing sound like that of a serpent beaten with a stick, and proceeds to the other Chakra through the Brahma Nadi, which is also called Chitra Nadi within Sushumna. Hence Kundalini is also called Bhujangini, serpent power. The three coils represent the three Gunas of Prakriti: Sattva, Rajas and Tamas, and the half represents the Vikritis, the modification of Prakriti.

Kundalini is the Goddess of speech and is praised by all. She Herself, when awakened by the Yogin, achieves for him the illumination. It is She who gives Mukti and Jnana for She is Herself that. She is also called Sarasvati, as She is the form of Sabda Brahman. She is the source of all Knowledge and Bliss. She is pure consciousness itself. She is Brahman. She is Prana Sakti, the Supreme Force, the Mother of Prana, Agni, Bindu, and Nada. It is by this Sakti that the world exists. Creation, preservation and dissolution are in Her. Only by her Sakti the world is kept up. It is through Her Sakti on subtle Prana, Nada is produced. While you utter a continuous sound or chant Dirgha Pranava ! (OM), you will distinctly feel that the real vibration starts from the Muladhara Chakra. Through the vibration of this Nada, all the parts of the body function. She maintains the individual soul through the subtle Prana. In every kind of Sadhana the Goddess Kundalini is the object of worship in some form or the other.[1]

Description of Kundalini

On the morning of November 18, 1996, at about 7:35 a.m. the father was asking Kash about his unique dream of Shri Mataji and putting the information into the computer. Kash's younger six-year-old son Arwinder, who was meditating nearby, suddenly opened his eyes and told his father that something yellowish had moved like a snake from his Mooladhara Chakra right up to the top of his head. He explained with hand gestures how it had snaked its way up, and was sure that it was in the form of a snake. Arwinder added that it was also very powerful as a flash of white lightning came out of his eyes when it reached the Sahasrara! He also added that he also saw different colors — red, yellow, green, blue — like "rainbow colors," one after another. (Probably he saw the different colors of the chakras.)
When Arwinder first told that he saw "something yellowish moving like a snake" he was questioned a few times to confirm the color as the father had not read or heard from any source the actual color of the kundalini. The quote below is from the book Kundalini Tantra, which was borrowed from a graduate of the Bihar School of Yoga (Yogi Alok Kumar Gupta) on January 1, 1997 i.e., after the above incident. Subsequently more information was obtained that confirmed Arwinder's description of the Kundalini.
"In the traditional descriptions of kundalini awakening, it is said the kundalini resides in Mooladhara in the form of a coiled snake and when the snake awakens it uncoils and shoots up through Sushumna (the psychic passage in the center of the spinal cord), opening the other chakras as it goes. (See Sir John Woodroffe's The Serpent Power.) Brahmachari Swami Vyasdev, in his book Science of the Soul, describes the awakening of kundalini in the following way: "Sadhakas have seen the Sushumna in the form of a luminous rod or pillar, a golden yellow snake, or sometimes as a shining black snake about ten inches long with blood red eyes like smoldering charcoal, the front part of the tongue vibrating and shining like lightning, ascending the spinal column."

Swami S. Saraswati, Kundalini Tantra, Bihar School of Yoga, 1984, p. 10