Why are so many books on Kundalini in the West written by people who have never had a Kundalini experience? In the East, it's the practitioners that students seek out, the ones with experience. Not those who sit in libraries, copying information from other sources, lord knows, how many times removed from an actual Kundalini experience. And not just any Kundalini experience — permanently active Kundalini.
I've shared venues with other speakers lecturing on Kundalini, some of whom, it turned out, never had a Kundalini experience. Strikes me as somewhat inadequate, but indicative of the outsized value we in the West place on second hand research, degrees, and diplomas. Now to get a degree, you have to get a good SAT score; you have to score well. And to score well, you have to understand the game, know what's expected of you. Do you have to think or act creatively? No. All you have to do meet expectations. In fact, the people that score well by meeting expectations carry this trait over into their careers. They know how to meet expectations, to score well. The quintessential definition of a YES man. That's what the SAT test creates. Individuals who are prepared to please.
What do Orson Welles, William Blake, Stanley Kubrick, Michael Faraday, Woody Allen, Jacob Boëme, George Bernard Shaw, Socrates, and Ben Franklin have in common? All of them are autodidacts. Self taught by doing, by on the job training.
Would you take flying lessons from someone who's never flown? Then you'd be dealing with opinion and not fact. And that's just what you get from a book that's been written by someone who's never had a Kundalini experience: Opinions about how it might work as opposed to facts about how it does work.
I'm not against reading; I read a lot myself. Less that I used to, especially since I have so much Kundalini material to work with. Reading and research are fine up to a point. Sri Ramakrishna said, "Do you know my attitude? Books, scriptures, and things like that only point out the way to reach God. After finding the way, what more need is there of books and scriptures? Then comes the time for action."
So why do so many people spend so much time searching for spiritual meaning when scientists tell them that, aside from anecdotal accounts, there is scant evidence that metaphysics are real? Probably for the same sense-of-urgency reasons that drive so many physical scientists to experiment on themselves, using their bodies as laboratories. Here is a sampling of three cases from Wikipedia:
Yes, using the body as a laboratory is lonely, dangerous work. You have to learn to rely on your intuition and summon up abilities you never knew you had. Outside acceptance and validation are rare. What's more, even if you do reach your goal, don't expect a Nobel Prize. It takes a big person to acknowledge their opposition was ill-founded: "Even Walter Peterson [Chief of Gastroenterology at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Dallas], long a skeptic of Marshall's theories, has come around. He says now, 'We scientists should have looked beyond Barry's [Dr. Barry Marshall] evangelical patina and not dismissed him out of hand.' Agrees Vanderbilt's Blaser, 'Science needs solid research, but it also needs someone with great vision. Barry had vision.'"
In any case, the inside-out approach, the one material scientists call anecdotal accounts, is valid. If it doesn't fit the strict requirements of the scientific method, it's not because a given metaphysical experience never happened, it's because we don't have the proper tools for measuring metaphysical phenomena at this point. We will... someday. It's too bad there isn't an open dialogue, because scientists and meta-physicists should be working together not only on the true nature of consciousness, but on methods to heighten it.
Just because someone tells you metaphysical experience is not valid doesn't mean it really is, that your experience didn't really happen, that it's all in your mind. They said that to Dr. Barry Marshall, to Dr. Paul Erlich, to Dr. John Lilly, too. But they moved ever forward, in spite of the opposition: "When Barry Marshall finally presented his and Warren's findings before an international conference of microbiologists in Brussels in September 1983, he was greeted with some skepticism. Unschooled at such presentations and filled with boyish eagerness, he refused to respond to questions in the measured, cautious manner of most researchers. Asked whether he though the bacteria were responsible for some ulcer disease, Marshall replied, 'No, I think they're responsible for all ulcer disease.'
"Such blanket statements, backed only by small studies and anecdotal case histories alarmed many researchers. Microbiologist Martin Blaser, an infectious disease expert from Vanderbilt University who attended the conference, said, 'At that time, I thought the guy was a madman.'"
What makes scientists so skeptical? For one, it's their training, and that's a good thing. But when it comes to new horizons, such as metaphysics, they seem as closed-mined as the 15th Century knuckleheads who persecuted Leonardo da Vinci. Material scientists tend to lump accounts of metaphysical experience, including such widely occurring phenomenon as Near Death Experience (NDE), in with religion, forgetting, it seems, that Kundalini and near death experiences occur across cultures, geography, and language to people of all religions, including those who profess no religion at all. Saying Kundalini isn't biology, it's religion is the same sort of short-sighted comment directed at Dr. Barry Marshall when they told him bacteria didn't cause ulcers; stress and worry did... Until he proved the conventional wisdom wrong, that is.
I'd love to tell you there's a quick fix, that raising Kundalini is easy to do and easy to live with. From reading the letters people write to me, I know it isn't. It wasn't for me and it hasn't been for them. Activating Kundalini takes time. Is it wrong to experiment? Not at all. The world today is a laboratory of experimentation. Millions of people, young and old, working to achieve self-knowledge and higher consciousness. Some flounder; some go straight to their goal. All I can add is: Keep on trying. Take action. Try all, and everything. But be prepared to discard whatever it is if it doesn't ring true. Don't be a YES man to enhancing consciousness. But don't be afraid it won't work either. Kundalini is coded into your bio-system. All you have to do is find the switch that triggers it. I used meditation, a seemingly benign pastime that ended up triggering bio-mechanisms (the sexual sublimation process) in my body that transformed my biological structure, and eventually my consciousness.
How do you recognize when the right system or technique comes along? You have to keep testing, listening to your body. The body knows (it's a biology laboratory), and if you're practicing — whatever that practice may be — your body will send you signals that you have to interpret. It won't steer you wrong. It's akin to auto-diagnosis.
Practice makes things happen. If nothing happens, try something else. Prefer primary sources over secondary. Talk to those who have already succeeded in a given practice, but do so with skepticism. Talk, read, think, travel, and remain skeptical. YOU are the proper study of YOU! All else is opinion and rationalization, not much good to you when the time does come. And it WILL!
I've shared venues with other speakers lecturing on Kundalini, some of whom, it turned out, never had a Kundalini experience. Strikes me as somewhat inadequate, but indicative of the outsized value we in the West place on second hand research, degrees, and diplomas. Now to get a degree, you have to get a good SAT score; you have to score well. And to score well, you have to understand the game, know what's expected of you. Do you have to think or act creatively? No. All you have to do meet expectations. In fact, the people that score well by meeting expectations carry this trait over into their careers. They know how to meet expectations, to score well. The quintessential definition of a YES man. That's what the SAT test creates. Individuals who are prepared to please.
What do Orson Welles, William Blake, Stanley Kubrick, Michael Faraday, Woody Allen, Jacob Boëme, George Bernard Shaw, Socrates, and Ben Franklin have in common? All of them are autodidacts. Self taught by doing, by on the job training.
Would you take flying lessons from someone who's never flown? Then you'd be dealing with opinion and not fact. And that's just what you get from a book that's been written by someone who's never had a Kundalini experience: Opinions about how it might work as opposed to facts about how it does work.
I'm not against reading; I read a lot myself. Less that I used to, especially since I have so much Kundalini material to work with. Reading and research are fine up to a point. Sri Ramakrishna said, "Do you know my attitude? Books, scriptures, and things like that only point out the way to reach God. After finding the way, what more need is there of books and scriptures? Then comes the time for action."
So why do so many people spend so much time searching for spiritual meaning when scientists tell them that, aside from anecdotal accounts, there is scant evidence that metaphysics are real? Probably for the same sense-of-urgency reasons that drive so many physical scientists to experiment on themselves, using their bodies as laboratories. Here is a sampling of three cases from Wikipedia:
"One evening in June 1984 Dr. Barry Marshall walked into the hospital lab, opened a test tube and added several eyedroppers of a light gray liquid to a glass beaker filled with broth. With a quick toss of the head, he swallowed the foul tasting concoction. Within 72 hours, he was doubled over in pain with a roaring case of clinical gastritis, a precursor to ulcers. Severe vomiting and stomach pain kept him awake for nights. He shuddered to think of what it was like for patients who had such symptoms on and off for years. But by the time he started the antibiotic/bismuth treatment, his system had managed to eradicate the germ."
"JBS Haldane, a notable British biologist, is yet another example of a scientist who conducted experiments upon himself. Haldane was a keen experimenter, and was more than willing to expose himself to danger in order to obtain the desired data. One such experiment involving elevated levels of oxygen saturation triggered a fit which resulted in him suffering crushed vertebrae. In his decompression chamber experiments, Haldane and his volunteers suffered perforated eardrums, but, as Haldane stated in What is Life, 'The drum generally heals up; and if a hole remains in it, although one is somewhat deaf, one can blow tobacco smoke out of the ear in question, which is a social accomplishment.'"
"Roger Altounyan developed the use of sodium cromoglycate as a remedy for asthma, based on khella, a traditional Middle Eastern remedy, with experiments on himself."How do these relate to Kundalini and consciousness? These researchers realized that the only way to test their discoveries was from the inside-out, in contrast to the scientific method that prescribes experiments based on observation (the outside-in approach). If the remedy worked on them, they thought, it must work on others. And because they faced steadfast opposition from scientists taking the outside-in approach, this proved to be the only way of moving their work forward. They recognized the moment and they acted!
Yes, using the body as a laboratory is lonely, dangerous work. You have to learn to rely on your intuition and summon up abilities you never knew you had. Outside acceptance and validation are rare. What's more, even if you do reach your goal, don't expect a Nobel Prize. It takes a big person to acknowledge their opposition was ill-founded: "Even Walter Peterson [Chief of Gastroenterology at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Dallas], long a skeptic of Marshall's theories, has come around. He says now, 'We scientists should have looked beyond Barry's [Dr. Barry Marshall] evangelical patina and not dismissed him out of hand.' Agrees Vanderbilt's Blaser, 'Science needs solid research, but it also needs someone with great vision. Barry had vision.'"
In any case, the inside-out approach, the one material scientists call anecdotal accounts, is valid. If it doesn't fit the strict requirements of the scientific method, it's not because a given metaphysical experience never happened, it's because we don't have the proper tools for measuring metaphysical phenomena at this point. We will... someday. It's too bad there isn't an open dialogue, because scientists and meta-physicists should be working together not only on the true nature of consciousness, but on methods to heighten it.
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"Such blanket statements, backed only by small studies and anecdotal case histories alarmed many researchers. Microbiologist Martin Blaser, an infectious disease expert from Vanderbilt University who attended the conference, said, 'At that time, I thought the guy was a madman.'"
What makes scientists so skeptical? For one, it's their training, and that's a good thing. But when it comes to new horizons, such as metaphysics, they seem as closed-mined as the 15th Century knuckleheads who persecuted Leonardo da Vinci. Material scientists tend to lump accounts of metaphysical experience, including such widely occurring phenomenon as Near Death Experience (NDE), in with religion, forgetting, it seems, that Kundalini and near death experiences occur across cultures, geography, and language to people of all religions, including those who profess no religion at all. Saying Kundalini isn't biology, it's religion is the same sort of short-sighted comment directed at Dr. Barry Marshall when they told him bacteria didn't cause ulcers; stress and worry did... Until he proved the conventional wisdom wrong, that is.
I'd love to tell you there's a quick fix, that raising Kundalini is easy to do and easy to live with. From reading the letters people write to me, I know it isn't. It wasn't for me and it hasn't been for them. Activating Kundalini takes time. Is it wrong to experiment? Not at all. The world today is a laboratory of experimentation. Millions of people, young and old, working to achieve self-knowledge and higher consciousness. Some flounder; some go straight to their goal. All I can add is: Keep on trying. Take action. Try all, and everything. But be prepared to discard whatever it is if it doesn't ring true. Don't be a YES man to enhancing consciousness. But don't be afraid it won't work either. Kundalini is coded into your bio-system. All you have to do is find the switch that triggers it. I used meditation, a seemingly benign pastime that ended up triggering bio-mechanisms (the sexual sublimation process) in my body that transformed my biological structure, and eventually my consciousness.
How do you recognize when the right system or technique comes along? You have to keep testing, listening to your body. The body knows (it's a biology laboratory), and if you're practicing — whatever that practice may be — your body will send you signals that you have to interpret. It won't steer you wrong. It's akin to auto-diagnosis.
Practice makes things happen. If nothing happens, try something else. Prefer primary sources over secondary. Talk to those who have already succeeded in a given practice, but do so with skepticism. Talk, read, think, travel, and remain skeptical. YOU are the proper study of YOU! All else is opinion and rationalization, not much good to you when the time does come. And it WILL!
Da Vinci said, " Why drink from the vessel when you can quaff from the source?"
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