Awakening the Kundalini Energy From Below or From Above

Traditional paths of yoga describe the various chakras, or subtle energy centers, that act as collecting and disseminating points for various specific vibrational patterns related to the action of that specific chakra. Certain paths, such as various Tantric disciplines as well as the well-known Kundalini Yoga, take up this knowledge and apply it to the growth of consciousness and the realization of the Divine and liberation of the individual from the external personality and the ego. The normal course is for the energy, which lies ‘sleeping’ at the base of the spine, in the Muladhara Chakra, when it is ‘awakened’, to rise up through the channels that carry the energy up through the various chakras until it meets the chakra at the top of the head, which is described as a 1000-petaled lotus. At that point, realization occurs. In the meantime, the intervening chakras are activated and energized and vibrate according to their own vibrational patterns. Kundalini Yoga and the various Tantras that rely on the awakening of this energy in this way, all point out the dangers inherent with the opening when not done under the guidance and control of a qualified Guru, as the opening of the various lower chakras in particular can bring up energies that are contrary to the aim of the seeker, or can drive the seeker into delusions, madness or even injuries to his physical health.

Sri Aurobindo experienced a different method and describes it as the energy beginning above the head, descending and opening the chakras from above to below. This method is safer and less disruptive to the being, as it uses the powers of the mind and the heart to manage and control the energy released by the lower chakras when they open. Many people have implemented this method and they report a sensation like a drill piercing the top of the skull and energy pouring in, or else, a sensation like raindrops coming down on the head. They also experience the effects of the opening of the chakras, starting with a wider insight, greater strength of will, enhanced skills at communication, a more embracing and compassionate view to life, and the opening and conscious connection to the psychic being, as examples of the type of impacts that can occur.

Sri Aurobindo writes: “There is a force which accompanies the growth of the new consciousness and at once grows with it and helps it to come about and to perfect itself. This force is the Yoga-Shakti. It is here coiled up and asleep in all the centres of our inner being (Chakras) and is at the base what is called in the Tantras the Kundalini Shakti. But it is also above us, above our head as the Divine Force — not there coiled up, involved, asleep, but awake, scient, potent, extended and wide; it is there waiting for manifestation and to this Force we have to open ourselves — to the power of the Mother. In the mind it manifests itself as a divine mind-force or a universal mind-force and it can do everything that the personal mind cannot do; it is then the yogic mind-force. When it manifests and acts in the vital or the physical in the same way, it is there apparent as a yogic life-force or a yogic body-force. It can awake in all these forms, bursting outwards and upwards, extending itself into wideness from below; or it can descend and become there a definite power for things; it can pour downwards into the body, working, establishing its reign, extending into wideness from above, link the lowest in us with the highest above us, release the individual into the cosmic universality or into absoluteness and transcendence.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Powers Within, Chapter VIII Yoga-Shakti pg. 80