present. This creates an entirely new consciousness that has never occurred in ones
history, yet may have features similar to infantile being. This loss of the sense of the
known self (ego) is standard procedure in many of the extreme kundalini events
and in the overall metamorphic process itself. Contributing to this perturbation
of consensus-adaptive consciousness is both the extreme amplification and
expansion of consciousness during peak events and the consequent damage done
by neurotransmitters, free radicals and metabolites. The higher we climb above
the “norm,” the further we thus fall into the downside of these acute neurological
events. This is the shamanic journey into the heavens and then into the hell realms.
Both extra-normal conditions could be classed as regression by an ignorant observer;
but both high and low are equally part of the path toward the emergence of the life
of the Soul. There must indeed be a suspension or cataclysmic breakthrough of the
norm for the infinitely larger soul’s life to be born. So rather than “regression” in
the service of the ego, we could more aptly state that during a kundalini awakening
we undergo “suspension” of the ego in the service of the soul.
For those that are breaking out of consensus mind and who are leaning toward
inflation or the schizophrenic end of the scale, this vulnerable condition is NOT
the time to be intensive meditation, shadow work or primal processing. For
these people stabilizing and structure building is needed more than uncovering
therapies as the interpenetration of the levels of consciousness proceeds. Humor,
because of its trickster element is a great tool for establishing rationality, because
laughter builds up the prefrontal lobes. The practices for the periods of unstable
integration between the levels of consciousness should be of an embodiment and
boundary building nature—of self-definition through internal exploration via neo-
shamanistic practices of a self-originating nature. The work of Miguel Ruiz, Byron
Katie and Alberto Villoldo would be valuable at this stage to establish the self/
other boundary and build up the core-self.
Therapists attending to people undergoing kundalini awakenings could benefit
from reading Ken Wilber’s writings on schizophrenia such as Chapter 17 of The
Atman Project entitled Schizophrenia or Mysticism. He says that in his opinion
the perturbation or derepressive mechanism of a schizophrenic break comprises
of a dual process, whereby the conditioned self begins to regress to lower levels of
consciousness, while simultaneously being flooded by aspects of higher “subtle”
realms. That is as he drops into the lower submergent subconscious the higher
emergent superconscious invades him. Wilber stresses that there is both a disabling
of the adaptive functions and cohesiveness of the ego structure, as well as an
influx of the spiritual dimension. Perhaps the rationality and ego structure of the
schizophrenic is not developed or strong enough to fully integrate this bidirectional
expansion of consciousness.
I think that awakening from “normal” consciousness runs on a scale between
schizophrenia and mysticism and each of us has a gravity to a particular point on
that scale. But throughout the duration of an awakening we may sometimes be
closer to the schizophrenic end of the scale and sometimes closer to the Mystic
end of the scale depending on how stable and adaptable the rational faculty is at
the time.