Descriptions of the State of Samadhi and Its Relation to Kundalini Energy

April 27, 2005

This description is based on the spiritual experiments of Gopi Krishna, a Kashmiri mystic who stumbled upon Kundalini experiences in a Random, undirected Sadhana and later made it his life work. The emphasis is heavily on a “Sensual” experience of Kundalini arousal, but some of the metaphors are quite apt and stimulating to Sadhana.

Description of the Samadhi State

COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS

Adapted from Gopi Krishna’s Essays by Gene Kieffer

Mystical ecstasy, or samadhi, is not a random product of a merely subjective mental effort, as is commonly believed. It has a natural organic source behind it. The disciplines merely stimulate this source to increase activity. There can be a thousand different versions of the drama enacted in the Sahasrara when the energy pours its ambrosial stream of concentrated prana into the cerebrum. On the flow of these secretions the exquisite sensations are felt most intensely above the palate in the middle and the hindbrain, in a descending arc parallel to the curve of the palate. This is known in Yoga physiology as the Sankini, the curved duct through which the Somarasa passes. It is described in the Goraksh Vijaya as the serpent with mouths at both ends. At this point, the flow of the ambrosia into the head is likened to the union of Shiva and Shakti on

account of the transporting sensations felt. Normally the current starts from the base of the spine and ascends stage by stage until its thrilling entry into the brain. There Shiva, the conscious principle, is a passive spectator to the entrancing, amorous play between the two polarities. (This last sentence is not really in keeping with basic Yogic concepts as Shiva is himself one of the polarities, the other being Shakti – Ed’s note)

A full ascent of this radiant energy into the brain is invariably attended by a chain of startling symptoms, both in the reproductive organs and the head. All the allegoric references contained in the esoteric literature, from the Vedas onwards, revolve around these manifestations. The initiate finds himself swimming in a boundless ocean of radiant consciousness, a tiny point of observation lost in the immensity of the living world. He or she feels himself to be one with this all-encompassing Presence, yet at the same time a mere dot of individualized awareness in an infinite sea of immortal being, a puny self, aware of its own limitations compared to the infinity now unfolded before his inner eye. The whole area of this vast ocean of existence is flooded with wave after wave of inexpressive super-earthly rapture, of which the highest transport of carnal

love can only convey an extremely faint picture to those who do not have the experience. It is the divine ecstasy, which the allegoric love-play of Radha and Krishna or the union of Shiva and Shakti is designed to convey.

Instead of an abstract plane of consciousness, the visionary experience can also assume the concrete form of an infinite divine being, a prophet or a savior, wrapped in glory and radiating peace and happiness. This concretion may assume fantastic proportions or take unexpected turns as in the case of dreams. As we know, the pressure of erotic desire in a dream often takes the form of a love affair in which the dreamer finds himself as an actor or a spectator or both. The same can happen in the case of visionary experiences encountered in samadhi. The exquisite sensations pervading the brain can find expression in a celestial drama or in the visionary image of a god or a goddess of such entrancing beauty and grace that the ecstatic is drawn with all the power of his or her being into an intense outpouring of love – thrilled to the core.

For all these experiences, both of the concrete and abstract kind, the basic lever is provided by the enhanced flow of concentrated bio-energy or prana. Some idea of the almost infinite potential present in this living substance can be gleaned from the fact that a microscopic speck of it, present in the human seed, is responsible for the whole panorama of life and all the bewildering activity of an organism from its inception to death. This is because the Aeolian memory of hereditary factors, displayed by the genes, does not reside in their atoms or molecules but in the prana that animates and prescribes their structure. Psychic abilities, genius and mystical experience – all extraordinary manifestations of consciousness –depend mainly upon this transformation of life-energy in the body. Subtle changes occur in the biological composition of the cells and the nerve

fibrils, and a new activity starts in the brain. This is due to the opening of a normally closed chamber to the influx of an extremely fine biochemical essence that rises in a luminous stream from the reproductive region through the spinal cord. The extract serves as nourishment for the highly enhanced activity in the brain.

Stimulated by a new and more potent form of the life-energy, drawn from nerves in all parts of the body, this activity results in the explosion in consciousness characteristic of the arousal of Kundalini, and its ascent to the Sahasrara, allegorically depicted as the Thousand Petalled lotus. Subjectively, this flow of the essences, culled from the reproductive organs, can be distinctly felt in the space behind the palate (called Brahmarandhra, or the cave of Brahma) (Usually “Brahmarandhra is translated as “throne room of Brahma, not as a “cave” – Ed’s note) from the middle point of the tongue to the root. It pours into the cranium in an ambrosial stream so exquisitely pleasurable (one would not usually use the word “pleasurable” to define a spiritual experience – Ed’s note) that even the rapture of love pales into insignificance which compared to it. At the

same time, erstwhile, narrow-orbited consciousness in perceived spreading on all sides in ever-widening waves of lustrous being. It soon attains the dimensions of an effulgent, unbounded ocean of awareness, in which the wonder-struck ego appears like a dim and distant piece of floating cork, bobbing up and down and lost in the immensity of the expanse surrounding it.

The descriptions contained in various esoteric books about “the dripping of ambrosia” on the union of Shakti (prana) with Shiva in actual fact denote the streaming of these reproductive secretions into the brain. They are drawn up the central canal as if a powerful suction is applied from above to the nerves lining the Kanda (triangular space below the navel) and the Muladhara Chakra (the plexus located between the reproductive organ and the anus. This marks the initiation of an evolutionary activity in the body in which the brain, the nervous system and the reproductive organs are the main participants. A highly accelerated effort is made to fashion the whole system to a new awareness beyond the normal with a super-sensory channel of cognition.

The constant perception of luminosity, both within and without – an invariable characteristic of higher consciousness – makes the observing soul appear as if attired in a sheath of light. This is why, in the secret books on spiritual lore, mention is made of the development of a divya-deha (divine body), a “shining body” or “diamond body,” as an auxiliary to enlightenment. The awakening of Kundalini takes two distinct forms: one is the upward flow of a radiant energy, and the other is the streaming of a fine biochemical essence into the brain and the nerve centers of the vital organs. The former appears like a luminous glow in and around the head, and the latter gives rise to distinct sensations, both in the central canal and the nerves affected by the movement. Although the awareness of the peculiar sensations is a purely subjective experience, the actual movements of the

organic essence can be objectively measured. The pleasurable sensations (Pleasurable is not an apt word – Ed’s note) experienced in the play of love are also a subjective experience, but they have objective aspects, which can be scientifically measured.

In Yoga-Vashistha Maharamayana, written approximately 2,500 years ago, the Indian poet-sage, Valmiki, says of Visuchi, “Having subdued the organs of her senses and their powers, she remained as one without her organic frame and identified with her living soul. “Her grand artery, called Brahmanadi or sushumna was raised above its cavity in the head, called the Brahmarandhra, in order to greet the holy light, as the filaments of the lotus rise to receive the solar light and heat.” The following statement by Richard Wilhelm, who translated The Secret of the Golden Flower, an ancient Chinese book of life, conveys the same secret of the inward and upward flow of the sexual energy, called Urdhva Retas by Yoga adepts of the distant past. In his commentary, he says, “The power of the kidneys is under the water sign. When the (sexual) instincts are

stirred, it runs downwards, is directed outward and creates children. If, in the moment of release (orgasm), it is not allowed to flow outward but is led back by the force of thought, so that it penetrates the crucible of the creative and refreshes heart and body and nourishes them, that is the backward-flowing method, also. Therefore, it is said: “The meaning of the elixir of life depends on the backward-flowing method!’” (In Yoga and Tantra this power of the Urdhva – Retas is not associated with the kidneys, but with the gonads – Ed’s note) Yet Professor Carl Jung, in his introduction to the same book, misses the point and attempts to incorporate this teaching within the framework of his own concept of the “unconscious.” He writes: “To a certain extent, our text leaves open the question as to whether by ‘a continuation of life,’ a survival after death or a prolongation of physical existence is meant. Expressions such as life-elixir and the like are insidiously obscure.” It is

obvious that the great psychologist had no inkling of what has been the most remarkable phenomenon in the history of civilization, namely the transmutation of reproductive energy (the Elixir of Life), leading to the two most productive states of the mind-creativity and mystical experience.

An enhanced activity of the brain requires the consumption of more psychic energy or a more potent form of this energy than is used by the average person. The mysterious force behind every form of nerve activity and sensation – the hidden cause behind the electrical discharges in the nervous system and the brain – is still a riddle to science. And yet it is in this amazing transformation of psychic energy that the whole mystery of Kundalini lies. This transformative process elevates consciousness to cosmic proportions and expands it in radiating waves far beyond the limits of the body, beyond the range of all that can be conceived by the mind or perceived by the senses. It is this unbounded universe of consciousness in which the enlightened man or woman, who has attained to the Sahaja state, lives perennially and has his being. The very fact that mystical

ecstasy gives rise to the impression that one is in communion with the Creator or has become one with Him is enough to convey the overwhelming proportions of the vision perceived. Kundalini is described as the psychosomatic mechanism responsible for human evolution. Its final aim is to raise the species to a level of cognition where the world of consciousness becomes perceptive to the individual as plainly as the world of matter discerned through the senses. The general impression still prevailing in the minds of the laity, and even of scholars, is that Kundalini is some sort of a nerve energy, bio-electricity, or astral force, which can be used at will to open the door leading to the occult realms of nature. They seldom show an awareness of the fact that prana-Shakti is the controlling Intelligence behind the universe and the Kundalini is the mechanism of its operation in the human body for the evolution of the mind. The mechanism is operative both in the

individual and the race, and it is always represented in the individual and racial consciousness. There is nothing in the organic structure of human beings so intricate and so fraught with momentous consequences as this. Empires rose and fell, attained to glorious proportions, shrank to insignificance, or vanished altogether, by the favorable or adverse operation of this mighty force.

Yogacharya Dr.Ananda Balayogi Bhavanani

Chairman : Yoganjali Natyalayam and ICYER

25,2nd Cross,Iyyanar Nagar, Pondicherry-605 013

Tel: 0413 - 2622902 / 0413 -2241561

Website: www.icyer.com

www.geocities.com/yognat2001/ananda