Kundalini and the Art of Being ... My dad was furious. He marched up to him from the sidewalk,
shaking a fist. “What the hell is your problem, you asshole, scaring
little kids like that?” He seemed on the verge of punching the guy in
the face, having been almost as surprised and scared by the event as
myself.
“I’m sorry,” said the man, cowering a little, clearly regretting his
actions now. “It was just a Halloween prank.”
“Yeah, real funny, scaring little kids half to death...” He reached
down to grab my bag of candy from the front steps and walked away
muttering, “Stupid goddamn jerk...some people...” as he took my
hand. We walked back home through the night as I cried, still baffled
by what had just occurred.
As I lay on the apartment floor deep in meditation, I relived this
scenario as if I were actually there. I felt the intense fear that had
engulfed me and remembered that it had stayed with me for a long
time. For weeks afterward I had talked about the boogeyman at
night, afraid of going to sleep with the lights out.
I became so involved with reliving this childhood memory, that
I completely forgot about my present situation I was brought back
to my body by a sudden, subtle movement at the base of my spine.
My mind went instinctively to this movement to see what it was.
As I brought my attention there, I felt the ball of energy move again.
Then I felt it rise slightly, as if it were trying to move up my spine.
I had a sense that this energy moving at the base of my spine—
whatever it was—was somehow connected to the intense feelings of
fear I was reliving in my childhood memory. I thought that perhaps
if I allowed this ball of energy to flow completely through me, the
process would dissolve all the unpleasantness associated with the
memory and I would be left with a feeling of contentedness in its
place.
I concentrated on this energy at the base of my spine until I felt it
move again. It felt something like a bubble moving up a straw. It rose
slowly but steadily, as if it were being sucked up by something. It