Features of Kundalini / Spiritual Energy Awakenings
Known in various traditions as Kundalini Awakening, Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit awakening, Holy Wind, Dumo Fire, Shakti, Chi activation, and other terms. Classical signs include;
- Energy Rushes. Sensations of energy, heat, and/or light that rise up the spine or rush up through the body towards the head. The energy may feel like a rushing, flowing, trickling, exploding, jumping, vibrating, burning, piercing, or like an electrical current. The body may physically jerk and move with the energy rushes, or in other cases become locked and rigid.
- Light. Perceptions of inner light, radiating light, and/or a luminosity in the outer world; perceiving liquid light flowing up the spine into the brain; or the sensation of being engulfed or immersed in a brilliant white light.
- Sound. Perception of an inner sound: often likened to the rushing of wind, the distant roar of a waterfall, the rushing of wings. May also be humming, ringing of bells, the buzzing of bees, the chirping of crickets, rumbling of a motor, or “music of the spheres.”
- Experiences of paranormal consciousness. The above sensations are associated, ultimately, with a mystical experience, out-of-body or other psychic experience, or inspired creativity.
- Unusual sexual sensations. Sometimes a kundalini awakening is associated with unusual sensations of upward moving energy activity in the genital area, or unusual sensations of sexual arousal with a possible penile erection that is not associated with sexual stimulation; rarely spontaneous orgasms that seem to be directed inward and upward rather than outward.
Suggested Further Reading on Spiritual Energy/Kundalini Awakening
Greenwell, Bonnie. Energies of Transformation: A Guide to the Kundalini Process. Cupertino, California: Shakti River Press, 1990.
Kason, Yvonne. Touched by the Light: Exploring Spiritually Transformative Experiences. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2019.
Krishna, Gopi. The Biological Basis of Religion and Genius. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.
Krishna, Gopi. Kundalini: The Evolutionary Energy in Man. Colorado: Shambhala, 1967, 1970.
Krishna, Gopi. Higher Consciousness: The Evolutionary Thrust of Kundalini. New York: Julian Press, 1974.
Kieffer, Gene, ed. Kundalini for the New Age: Selected Writings by Gopi Krishna. New York: Bantam, 1988.
Kieffer, Gene, ed. Kundalini, Empowering Human Evolution: Selected Writings of Gopi Krishna. New York: Paragon House, 1996.
Sannella, Lee. Kundalini: Psychosis or Transcendence? San Francisco: H.S. Dakin, 1976.
Sannella, Lee. The Kundalini Experience. Lower Lake, California: Integral Publishing, 1987.
Yogananada, Paramahansa. God Talks with Arjuna: The Bhagavad Gita – Royal Science of God-Realization. Los Angeles, California. Self-Realization Fellowship: 1996.