There are lists of the symptoms of kundalini awakening, and at first glance, they are bewildering in their breadth, and do little to shed light on the larger phenomenon (at least at first glance). I say this because they are just so broad a range of symptoms that it might lead some to wonder if this is A thing or many other things. But I assure you, it is THE thing. The symptoms are so broad I think because kundalini isn’t like something you catch, like a cold. With a cold, it’s a fairly focused or specific experience. You get head, throat, and ear soreness. You sneeze and cough. You get itchy eyes and you feel tired. You might have congestion. But for the most part, a cold has a series of symptoms that all make sense as a specific THING. With kundalini, this is involving all aspects of your being, so be ready for a host of symptoms.
Kundalini is like the World Tree of the Maya. It feeds everything, is everything. It is the World Hoop of the Lakota, the sacred circles and Dream Time of the Aborigines. So it spreads it limbs far and wide and does not include one energy, but a host of them, all interlocked, related, merging and unfolding.
While it is easy to point to the event of the rising of kundalini, I think that the approach that I do believe we make towards awakening may well provide clues to us for something looming on the horizon. In the Hindu tradition it is claimed that you cannot even awaken kundalini without the proper preparation, which means kundalini yoga and meditation. Well, there are people all over the planet right now who are awakening spontaneously without having had ANY practice and certainly not even knowing what kundalini yoga even was before this thing hit them.
Even before the series of events that took place that landed me smack dab in the nondual universe that day in August of 2006, something had actually been brewing. There was a sense of expectancy, as though something was happening, I just could not put my finger on it. The one big symptom pre-awakening (if I can even call it that) was what I would call “time slips.” Time was acting weird. I thought at the time that maybe we were being bombarded by cosmic rays (imagine my surprise when I read about how the entire solar system is actually heating up as a result of some radiation, perhaps coming in now from the central galaxy “sun” or from increased solar activity—note: Mars’ ice caps are melting and most planets are showing evidence of symptoms that could be attributed to warming up!). Others who were having these same symptoms thought this same way, too. I don’t know if this was an intuitive sense, or an attempt to fashion a myth around an unknown effect that was beginning to hold people in its sway. These slips were a sudden change in the perception of time. Time simply would suddenly seem to go by very quickly. I remarked once that five minutes ago it was yesterday, an hour ago it was last week, and who knows what tomorrow will bring. These slips seemed random, but were happening frequently.
After this period of time, I had the definite sense that something was up. What it was, I just didn’t know. I didn’t know what I knew. I was not fully aware of what I was aware of. Does that make any sense? Perhaps a new current was already making its way inward, but not enough to spark a deep enough level of awareness to gather my cognitive function into the famous “A-ha!” moment. I mention all of this because this MAY constitute one aspect of the awakening experience that is not talked about or even mentioned simply because we become too fixated on the more dramatic effects of the “rising” of kundalini. For my experience, I had a slew of symptoms that all presaged the rising of kundalini. For a good while I just wasn’t sure WHAT was going on, and because of how these symptoms presented themselves, it kept me off the scent of it being kundalini. Sometimes it can be helpful to know what you are dealing with when it comes to things like this. Many people thought they were going crazy, and I do wonder how many people did go off the deep end who were lacking in the support they may have needed at such a crucial time. Would having a good support structure make the difference between a hard or easy awakening? My sense is that if you are engaged, curious, and have a good sense of self, you can make it through all of this quite well without thinking you are going around the bend. When you awaken you aren’t alone. With it comes a presence, an intelligence, a kind of silent guide that is ever-present. However, years of programming that might keep someone from listening to this trusty presence could create a lot of inner turmoil about it.
Some of the most mentioned symptoms of awakening are these:
An awareness of the unity of all things – an different sense of time – increased creativity – powerfully inspired states of mind – increase or decrease in libido – changes in appetite – sleep patterns can change – quality and intensity of dreams can change – a sense of presence near or within ones self – awareness of nonphysical presences – increased empathy – increased psychic abilities – chills or goosebumps on the skin – crawling sensations on the skin – feelings of energy in the form of hot or cold, buzzing, and vibrations – hearing sounds, music and voices – sensations of pressure in the body – sudden and subtle sensations of something (energetic) moving up the body in a serpentine manner – sudden giddiness/laughter – sudden sadness or even depression and despair – light effects; seeing lights when eyes are closed, seeing energy around the body -strong effects of energy in the chakra centers a sense of pressure even to the point of discomfort can take place as chakras open in powerful ways – anxiety brought on by all of these changes – fear of losing ones mind – sense of physical pain often centered in certain regions near the chakras (abdomen, heart/shoulder as well as throat, third eye and head pressure) – the presence of synchronicities in ever-increasing numbers – a larger sense of awareness, intelligence, which you are now a part of – jerking or sudden movements that may help to relieve the “pressure” of some energy (the Hindu call these “kriyas”)
Okay, so by now you may wonder just what this is all about. All of these symptoms and others similar to these or analogous to these are all a part of the awakening process. The thing to understand is that an awakening can be beautiful or it can be horrifying. It can also be somewhere in-between. There can be bouts of incredible bliss and rushes of energy followed by a sense of intense pressure on the psyche or emotions. This process, its nature, is in truth all up to you. If you get anxious, then this will color the experience. If you surrender and go with it, it is much easier. I can remember being on carnival rides where I really didn’t or couldn’t give myself over to enjoying them. I felt like I was gritting my teeth all through it. On other rides, however, I felt open and free and had a ball. So you see, it is very much like this. So much in this is up to you, and this is all a choice. So for this reason you will notice a broad range of symptoms that are quite frankly all over the place and could make for a sense of confusion over just what this is all about. Since this is not the common cold with a fairly limited range of symptoms, this is about life. It is about you. None of this awakening will leave any part of you untouched. It will move down into the very cellular structure of your being. This can be disquieting to some who are used to being in control. It is just a ride, and we can enjoy it or not enjoy it.
What I can tell you is that the most central effects are less dramatic in nature and more feeling in nature. Yes, there is energy, and yes it creates bliss and brings on enlightened and “altered” states (I don’t like this word—perhaps “alternate” is better). it feels a bit like riding a very big wave, though, one which might be invisible to everyone around you but is absolutely there. Learning to ride this way, neither too forward nor too far back (holding on) is key to a positive experience. The chemical cocktail that gets triggered in the body is pretty significant and I will be writing more about the changes that take place with the body, and learning how to regulate feeling so that the body is an accurate mirror of what you intend or want is key. What is termed a spiritual experience is in fact a whole-being effect and what touches on the nonphysical parts of you also touches on the physical body as well. This is alchemy; a refining of both spirit and body in a crucible of energy whereby the person is brought to a new place or way of being.
But let me be clear; awakening is JUST the beginning. With rapid change taking place, it is easy to think that you are further along than you are. The junk that is now being dealt with, the “house cleaning” taking place now is up to you. You can block progress or you can get out of the way and let the “crew” within to do its work, which it will most certainly do. Perhaps enlightenment comes in degrees. When we awaken, it is as though we see the sun rise for the first time. As we progress, we move ever closer to this sun until we are this sun. Not a perfect analogy, but it gets you close. You are able to see and feel all that this sun is on first glimpse, the very moment it peeks out over the edge of the horizon, but there is a difference when you embody this solar body. Perhaps also awakening can come all at once, but we tend to pull back and try to manage it, telling ourselves that we need to be in control of this thing happening to us. This energy seeks to remove so much dross it can feel a bit like you are having someone come into your house and begin tossing out all your cherished belongings. It can take a while to begin to trust that whatever gets tossed was simply keeping you from being aligned with your own authentic divinity. I hesitate using that word because of the associations that it has, and yet it is the best one I have to use just now, so divinity will have to do.
There are other symptoms certainly, but the ones I have mentioned are the main-line ones. If you understand how you are positioned spiritually and emotionally prior to awakening then the symptoms tend to fall into three categories; energy effects (which I would include seeing lights as well as psi ability and tend to happen to everyone), and then negative and positive effect (which are determined by “where” you are before awakening).
Waking The Infinite 