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kundalini abound. The more we do to open ourselves up, the hotter the flame
becomes. But if we try to stem the flame then we regress and damage ourselves.
It really is a case of how much bliss we can stand and how fast can we process
our emerging Self, which is largely determined by how fast and thoroughly we
can unload our baggage and past self. The increasing sense of being at home and
being Alive makes metamorphosis seem inevitable. As the awakening speeds our
incarnation, a feeling of objective conscience (baraka) and gratitude arises as a
powerful urge to go-with the force of evolution. For the spiritual drive of Eros
is our own deepest source and condition of being that we share with all Life.
If we do not listen and surrender to this feeling of right-will, we will resort to
sense gratification and self-destruction in an effort to avoid our Self and abdicate
our lives.
Kundalini awakening can leave us totally incapacitated at times, or permanently
damaged as far as our adaptability to this culture. Even Muktananda complained
that he feared he would not be able to look after himself after he had experienced
samadhi a couple of times. The Guru ashram system is great in this way, in that
it insures those that are completely lost to kundalini, will be looked after. Not so
in Western society however, the initiate is more likely to be misunderstood, taken
advantage of or locked up. Thus the more we know about the kundalini process,
the better adapted we can be to the evolutionary force while still surviving in the
Western way of life.
Metamorphosis must surely be the most amazing and misunderstood phenomena
on earth. My main intent while writing this book was to dispel misinformation,
myths, fear, resistance and superstition with regards to this most mysterious of all
life processes. So many things have to be right for a successful kundalini awakening;
going it alone is hard; being insulted and attacked by spiritual Nazis (formalists) for
expressing ones experience--these make it harder. The experience of persecution
is a common one, and the individual learns to not take it personally, and this too
becomes part of the courageous growth of the Self, while we live in a society that
is largely ignorant of and fearful of metamorphosis. Compassion and joy gets you
safely through any social ignorance.
The path of fire compared to the stoic path of many traditions might seem
unruly and unsure, but the heart can understand kundalini better than the mind
can. The heart just knows! My work is entirely bent on helping to alleviate ignorance
on this matter, to reduce the compounded suffering humanity has undergone in
the name of evolution. If one is already in total upheaval with kundalini it’s just
not advantageous to have one’s community responding in devalidation, fear and
rejection to one’s metamorphic altered states. Thus the initiate has to be twice as
strong—both to endure the fire, and to endure the social backlash.
In life we get remarkable opportunities but without knowledge, strength and
determination we can make a mess of the greatest gifts nature offers us such as
sex, youth, brains, talent and kundalini awakenings. With a kundalini awakening
we are given the possibility of unwinding the bodymind that has been largely
conditioned by others, in order to be remade by a will larger than our own, and