Is a nondual realisation equivalent to a kundalini activation?

[idiot_stimpy]

Question for discussion, is a nondual realisation equivalent to a kundalini activation?

 

Are they both a means to the same end? 

 

A nondual seeing simulating the kundalini, or energetically stimulating the kundalini leading to a nondual seeing?

[Apech]

No or maybe yes.

[idiot_stimpy]

3 hours ago, Apech said:

No or maybe yes.

 

Is this your final unpopular opinion? 

[S:C]

.

Edited March 17 by S:C
Never mind

[Apech]

8 hours ago, idiot_stimpy said:

 

Is this your final unpopular opinion? 

 

Slightly flippant version.  The longer version is this:

 

I think you can raise K without a non-dual realisation.  Awakening the energy coiled at the base of your spine has several results.  One is access to additional 'mental' energy.  Another is the flushing out of stored recorded material - emotional memories and trauma and so on - which is very difficult to deal with - so beware.  Another is the energisation of the 'snake brain' - so that things are seen as pure appetival power dynamics - which can be shocking and revealing at the same time.  So an awareness which is normally fuzzed over by societal and moral blankets is accessed.  Another is potential sexual dysfunction - and/or loss/distortion of sexual desires.  So it's a mixed bag really.

 

In Buddhism the non-dual realisation is usually defined as either the union of luminosity and emptiness or the union of energy (prana) and mind (citta).  Luminosity doesn't really mean seeing light but the awareness itself - the naturally occurring awareness which is self luminous.  While emptiness can be seen as the basic nature of everything which is formless in itself but able to assume the infinite formal expression of everything.  At rest it is the sky-like empty nature of mind itself.  Like yin and yang in the taichi diagram awareness and emptiness are two sides of the 'same' coin - they are not the same as each other yet arise in mutual dependence.

 

If you look at your mind - then you tend to see it as an object while you the subject are the observer.  The basic nature of the object is emptiness because it has no fixed form.  If it did have it would have a colour, shape, location and name like all the 10,000 things.  But it doesn't, it is 'beyond' and behind them all but not fixed by any one of them.  We then tend to identify with the luminous because we see ourselves as the observer.  But as we become aware that we are not the egoically defined separate self we thought we were - this steps aside so to speak - we can realise 'Self' as the luminous (or just say that this is non-self i.e. not ego) - then the trick is to realise the 'not twoness' of the emptiness of the object mind and the self-luminous observer.  This, I think is the non-dual realisation.  

 

Further, it is possible to 'see' this without fully entering it.  So although you see this non-duality there still remains a sense of separate self.  This is why the alchemical process is needed to transform the being into a functioning entity which is independent of the usual identification with collections of thoughts, feeling, body and so on.  Beyond death and change in the normal sense this new being is immortal because it depends entirely on the luminous and the empty - which themselves are indestructible.  You could say it is a being of Spirit and not of matter.  The work for this is done with the subtle body.  To do this would require the marshalling of all available energy since it is a rare and difficult task.  So it would require the energy represented as K to complete the work.

 

So while the first seeing of the non-dual might be accessible to people in which K is not activated (possibly) - the alchemical work is not complete and so it remains as a kind of vision without real substance.  Some people mistake an emotional release and a feeling of unity or not really being there as the non-dual.  This is a common thing to be avoided in my opinion.

 

Strange though it may sound, I think the correct stance is to dedicate yourself to the alchemical work while knowing it is probably impossible or at least very, very difficult to achieve.  To do this with all the energy and effort you can muster - but without urgency - but with faith that this is what we are supposed to be doing - and that doing it is noble.

 

Just my rambling thoughts as ever

 

 

[dwai]

18 hours ago, idiot_stimpy said:

Question for discussion, is a nondual realisation equivalent to a kundalini activation?

 

Are they both a means to the same end? 

 

A nondual seeing simulating the kundalini, or energetically stimulating the kundalini leading to a nondual seeing?

Nondual realization is the full awakening of chit kundalini. What people usually refer to as “kundalini” is Prana kundalini. It can also lead awakening of chit kundalini, but not always. 

[Apech]

59 minutes ago, dwai said:

Nondual realization is the full awakening of chit kundalini. What people usually refer to as “kundalini” is Prana kundalini. It can also lead awakening of chit kundalini, but not always. 

some kundalini is good and some is just chit .

[Bindi]

On 17/3/2024 at 7:55 AM, idiot_stimpy said:

Question for discussion, is a nondual realisation equivalent to a kundalini activation?

 

Are they both a means to the same end? 

 

A nondual seeing simulating the kundalini, or energetically stimulating the kundalini leading to a nondual seeing?

I think an authentic kundalini activation might lead to an authentic nondual awakening, I don’t think it works the other way round though. 

KUNDALINI AWAKENING BY SWAMI NIRANJANANANDA SARASWATI

Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati is from the lineage of the Bihar School of Yoga, which he also headed for many years. 

He has authored several books that have been published by the Bihar School of Yoga.

In one of his books – Prana and Pranayama – he talks about the experience of kundalini awakening which he calls the experience of cosmic prana. 

“…When the full potential of this energy (kundalini) is released, it travels up through the Sushumna Nadi, bringing about a complete metamorphosis of the individual. 

Cosmic prana and kundalini are synonymous terms. In awakening the kundalini, one unites with the cosmic prana.

At the time of the awakening, the two forces of prana and Chitta (mindset or state of mind) assume perfect balance within the individual and become one. 

The mind undergoes a state of fission and energy issues forth. 

There is an explosion of Satya, a moment of Truth, when one sees everything as luminous. 

One experiences oneself in every object of the universe, every person, leaf, and rock. 

The realization of cosmic prana is attained and the experience of separation dissolves. 

People who have experienced this union are called saints or liberated beings, as they have transcended duality by taming the infinite, universal energy within the microcosmic unit. 

The ultimate yoga is experienced at this level, where one discovers the abiding consciousness, sat-chit-ananda, truth, expansiveness, and beatitude…“

 

[old3bob]

Some schools finalize with  "sat-chit-ananda", an ocean of bliss and the 1st and purest of energy!  And some finalize with the Self  as being source of all Shakti (or "cosmic prana") and thus beyond all categories, even Satchitananda...(if you will such can be found pointed out in the Chandogya Upanishad and others.

 

Btw, and while getting way ahead of the game,  I've studied that basic yama, niyama and karma yoga must be fulfilled by us before any of that more advanced stuff will stick...

Edited March 18 by old3bob

[dwai]

22 hours ago, Apech said:

some kundalini is good and some is just chit .

All is chit. Chit is all.  

[liminal_luke]

18 minutes ago, dwai said:

All is chit. Chit is all.  

 

Aspiring beginners like me love the idea of oneness until it dawns on us what it really means: everything is chit.

[blue eyed snake]

6 hours ago, dwai said:

All is chit. Chit is all.  

 

but what is chit I wonder, have a vague recollection of there being several sheaths  around each other, together going upwards.

 

please, enlighten me

[stirling]

On 3/16/2024 at 4:55 PM, idiot_stimpy said:

Question for discussion, is a nondual realisation equivalent to a kundalini activation?

 

Are they both a means to the same end? 

 

A nondual seeing simulating the kundalini, or energetically stimulating the kundalini leading to a nondual seeing?

 

No. Nondual realization is a permanent shift in perspective and understanding about the nature of things that is an "always-available" perspective. It happens outside of time/space/self and it happens no-time/everywhere (or nowhere)/to everything (or no-thing). 

 

Kundalini is physical phenomenon that happens in a body to a person. It may CORRELATE (or not) with non-dual realization, but isn't realization itself. 

 

Speaking for myself I have had both, though the kundalini was fairly mild, by most accounts I've read. Some interesting crackling/electric feelings in the back of the head or spine corresponding to flashes of white in the vision.

 

The non-dual realization is something else... entirely.

[dwai]

3 hours ago, blue eyed snake said:

 

but what is chit I wonder, have a vague recollection of there being several sheaths  around each other, together going upwards.

 

please, enlighten me

Chit is who we really are — Consciousness, Being. All the sheaths are just appearances that rise and fall in chit. 

[dwai]

9 hours ago, liminal_luke said:

 

Aspiring beginners like me love the idea of oneness until it dawns on us what it really means: everything is chit.

It’s like being the sweetness vs tasting the sweetness. 

[idiot_stimpy]

On 18/03/2024 at 6:01 AM, Apech said:

some kundalini is good and some is just chit .

 

 

 

[idiot_stimpy]

This thread has become the biggest Chit storm I've ever seen.

[Taoist Texts]

5 hours ago, stirling said:

The non-dual realization is something else... entirely.

what exactly is it?

 

 

[old3bob]

1 hour ago, Taoist Texts said:

what exactly is it?

 

 

 

it is not of mind, or definable by mind.  (that is in Hinduism's definition of mind which does not match up with the one's often heard in Buddhism)  So what is a mind supposed to do if that is the case, most schools say prepare as best you can.  Btw, to use an analogy: a baby bird pecking on its shell from the inside to get free attracts something that also pecks on that shell from the outside.

[idiot_stimpy]

Quote

By Jackson Peterson Dzogchen Discussion Facebook Group

 

Kundalini and Non-Duality

I shared an experience in my book “The Natural Bliss of Being”, regarding a time that the kundalini energy suddenly rose up my spine and entered my consciousness at the top of my head just beneath the fontanelle.  It occurred in 2006 while I was laying in bed attempting to bring the inner energies from the bottom of my spine to the top of my head according to the instructions given in Kundalini Yoga. 

While engaged in this practice, suddenly an “alive” plasma-like energy suddenly and spontaneously shot upward from the bottom of my spine like a lightening flash only lasting a second or two, but completely transforming my existing consciousness. 

It was as though my consciousness was a compressed block of ice within my skull, suddenly melting completely exposing its true nature as being the emptiness of its localized form while simultaneously being the formative nature of its own non-local cognitive emptiness. 

Immediately the understanding of the Buddhist phrase “Emptiness is form and form is exactly emptiness” was directly known as my immediate experience. 

It’s like after one’s consciousness being like a block of opaque ice, one’s consciousness itself melts into being crystal clear, boundary-less water but now in direct knowledge of itself as though for the first time.  
As the contracted form of localized consciousness, its knowledge becomes expressed as  “thoughts” in the forms of names, labels and  concepts;  all fictional in nature, like maps claiming to be the territory described. 

Consciousness when its self-contracted state releases, knowledge becomes wisdom, the non-dual and simultaneous wisdom of “emptiness and form”.  

Everything is seen to be transparent and empty while simultaneously appearing like vivid holograms of light, at least that’s how the universe appeared here for several hours afterwards.  It reminded me of how things appeared when trying LSD-25 in 1968 in Hawaii.  I suspect that certain psychedelics also can trigger releases of kundalini as does kundalini yoga. 

In that moment the “subject and object” dichotomy vanished as non-local Awareness and localized mind appeared like water and ice or ocean and wave;  known as “not two”. 

A hallmark of the non-dual, non-localized state of consciousness is a total absence of any sense of being a subjective and personal individualized self as an experiencer or perceiver who is aware OF perceptions, thoughts and phenomena.  Rather ALL experiences are merely modes that consciousness is appearing AS;  again “not two”, devoid of a subject experiencing various objects OF experience.  

Consciousness can only ever experience itself;  like there being no separation and no distance between the dreaming mind and its dreamed contents. 

Lama Yeshe explains what happens as kundalini (gTumo) enters the crown chakra:
"This simultaneously born bliss totally unifies with nonduality and actually becomes the wisdom of emptiness, the experience of clear light."

Lama Yeshe also wrote:

"The point I am trying to make is that you have the experience, but you yourself totally disappear."
"The relative you disappears, as well as any impression of the relative sensory object you are experiencing."

"At the ordinary moment we are too involved with "my" body, "my" things, "my" heart chakra. All of these have to be dissolved into emptiness."

For those finding “studying” and contemplating the various metaphysics of enlightenment as an intellectual pursuit, in an effort to acquire a final understanding, to be fruitless, then such practices as kundalini yoga will be found to be much more direct and satisfying. 

The entire Zen/Chan sitting tradition of zazen, is designed to naturally bring this arising of kundalini (ki, chi) about as concentrating on the lower navel area (hara or tan tien) navel chakra, the prana energy will accumulate there and overflow backwards into the central channel, rising up the spine to the fontanelle and bursting upward into the space of Original Mind or Shen (rigpa).  The attending cognitive event is called Satori, kensho or Wu.

Chan (Zen) Master Hsuan Hua is a direct disciple of Master Hsu Yun. Master Hsu Yun was my Chan teacher’s  (Yen Wai Shih) teacher.  My Chan lineage is the same.  Below I have quoted from Master Hsuan Hua's most essential instructions.  As you can see,   the development of energy (Ki, Chi or Kundalini) is central to our practice in Chan or Zen.

“Silencing the mind reveals our wisdom”

By Master Hsuan Hua 

"Investigating Chan requires non-movement of the mind
and thoughts and this means silence. The Chan method works
like the thrust of a knife, cutting right through. Because Chan
investigation is apart from the mind-consciousness, it is
known as putting an end to the mind. Ending the mind means
ending all mental activities of the mind-consciousness. Only
when all the activities of the false mind are stopped will
thoughts be silenced. 

When that happens, we gain the power of knowing and
seeing that comes with suddenly enlightening to the nonarising
of all things. We then have patience with the nonarising
of people and dharmas. 

And we certify to four stages of practice, which are heat,
summit, patience, and first in the world. 

1. Heat. This warm energy comes as we sit in meditation. 

2. Summit. That energy rises to the crown of our head as
we continue to practice.

3. Patience. It becomes very difficult to be patient, but we
must still be patient. 

4. First in the World. We become a world-transcending
great hero.

Summit is the second stage. When you have experienced the warmth for some time, during which your
body’s chemical plant has done the necessary experiments, you will then reach the summit.

At the summit, you feel as if there is something at the top of your head, yet there appears to be nothing there. If you say there is something, you cannot see it or touch it. You only experience this feeling at the top of your head, and you will invariably feel it is indescribable.

Patience is the third stage. After the summit stage, you begin to experience an unbearable feeling. No matter how unbearable this feeling is, you have to endure it. This is known as the stage of patience. After the summit stage comes the stage of patience. It is very difficult to pass the stage of patience because of the discomfort associated with the top of your head. It seems as if there is something trying to drill a hole through to the outside. At this point, you have to be very patient.

As time goes by, the drill penetrates through and emerges
from the top of your head, just like a little bird that has been
set free from its cage. And like a freed bird, you will feel extremely happy.
If we want to attain these four stages, we must first learn to
silence the mind. Our mind-consciousness must remain
unmoving.

Our thoughts are like waves that cannot be calmed. Sitting
in meditation aims at stopping the mind-consciousness from
moving. Eventually, it stops naturally. Once stopped, the
mind is silent.

When it is completely silent, wisdom comes forth. When wisdom arises, we become self-illuminating.
When silence reaches an ultimate point, the light penetrates everywhere. That is the power of knowing and seeing that comes with sudden enlightenment to the non-arising of all things."

When I was at Harada Roshi’s Zen temple in Japan, he told me that this energy process of the kundalini energy rising into the crown was the heart essence of Zen taught originally by Bodhidharma.  

While sitting in Soto Zen zazen, this arising of the kundalini will spontaneously occur over time;  called “ripening”.  When the fruit is ripe, it falls off the tree naturally and effortlessly.  Unfortunately most sit in expectation of such ripening occurring, which in itself prevents the full ripening. 

The Crown Chakra, Kundalini and Buddhahood in Dzogchen and Chan:
“The central channel is open at the crown of your head and there is a chakra like a blue gentian flower there, hanging upside down.”  Dzogchen master, Lopon Namdak

Dzogchen:

The most essential aspect of the “crown chakra” in Dzogchen, is that it is not created, it’s not the result of a cause, it’s not a conceptual construction, it’s not material, it’s transparently empty like space, it has no borders, it’s not within space and time, it has no personal identity, nothing can modify, improve or damage it. It is that which is conscious and aware, it is the Perfect Buddha Mind, the Mind of Clear Light or rigpa. 

"The reason for this is that the ushnisha (upper crown chakra) has no size, but pervades the ultimate expanse. When the thinking-mind (sem) dissolves into the chakra of the ushnisha (upper crown chakra), buddhahood is attained."
From end notes of "The Treasury of Precious Qualities" by Jigme Lingpa

"In the teachings of the Great Perfection, the thigle (drops of light) are described as rising up, being piled vertically above the head (third vision). And when the thinking-mind dissolves into the chakra of the ushnisha (upper crown chakra) the “exhaustion” of phenomena in Suchness (chos nyid zad sa, fourth thogal vision), buddhahood, is achieved."
From end notes of "The Treasury of Precious Qualities" by Jigme Lingpa

"Buddha’s ushnisha, the protuberance on the top of his head, is not made of flesh and blood, but represents the opening of the space chakra. It is also known as the “crown chakra of great bliss.” Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche

From Dilgo Khyentse's The Heart of Compassion: Thirty Seven Verses on the Practice of a Boddhisattva (translated by the Padmakara Translation Group)

"The ushnisha (gtsug tor), or crown prominence, one of the major marks of a fully enlightened Buddha, is usually represented in paintings and statues as a protuberance resembling a topknot in size, but is said to rise up from the top of a buddha's head to the infinity of space........... In the thogal practice of the Great Perfection, the ushnisha corresponds to the five-colored lights and buddhafields that manifest above one's head as the infinite display of sambhogakaya realization" (footnote 89, p. 248 Heart)."
This same experience is known in Sufism as “To know oneself is to know God” or “the Seeker IS the Sought”. 

I offer instructions in my book (available at Amazon) for an easy and safe method of kundalini yoga that anyone could benefit from.  🙏

 

Edited March 19 by idiot_stimpy
editing

[stirling]

6 hours ago, Taoist Texts said:

what exactly is it?

 

As Bob says, it isn't something easy to talk about, so the best you can hope for really is to "fail well", as neo-Advaita teacher Adyashanti suggests. This is my understanding and experience. Others may describe it differently, but you'll find remarkable agreement on these things once terminology is settled. I'm going to generally leave out historical references and jargon from particular traditions for clarity and simplicity.

 

There is, first, a shift in experience where your perceptual experience of being the center of "your" experience stops, and rather than all sensate phenomena seeming to come through the senses and being relative to your body experience becomes "centerless". There is no longer a single point that apperceives experience, there is no longer a subject (you) in a world of objects (things in the universe). None of them are separate anymore... what you are is the objective universe, entirely devoid of space in between those objects. Along with this the standard perception of time as being comprised of future, present, and past collapses. The past and the future are realized to be thoughts that always occur NOW, and are therefore phantom presences constructed in thought. Time is this moment of unfolding only and always has been. This non-duality is seen to be the predominate and pervasive quality of all seemingly separate things. 

 

After this, the non-dual (or enlightened) perspective is available at any time, albeit in a weaker depth than the initial insight when the mind is inclined toward it. One can relax the mind and the non-duality or "emptiness" of phenomena wells up into perception. Shortly after the initial insight it begins to deepen, in terms of both its appearance and the understanding of it. There are many "maps" for this, but I think how this happens is somewhat unique for each experiencer for the most part. There are hallmarks of the deepening, and the frequency of how often the non-duality spontaneously occurs increases with many interesting shifts along the way. Eventually over something like the course of 10 years (which is why many monks in some traditions disappear into a cave for years at a time) there is a moment when experiencing from the perspective of being a person or "self" drops away permanently, and the journey to "no-self" OR "Self", or "Unity" (being the entirety of the sensate field) becomes complete. While "self" has gone, there is no limit to how deep non-dual perception or understanding  become, it just keeps deepening. 

 

 

[stirling]

1 hour ago, idiot_stimpy said:

The entire Zen/Chan sitting tradition of zazen, is designed to naturally bring this arising of kundalini (ki, chi) about as concentrating on the lower navel area (hara or tan tien) navel chakra, the prana energy will accumulate there and overflow backwards into the central channel, rising up the spine to the fontanelle and bursting upward into the space of Original Mind or Shen (rigpa).  The attending cognitive event is called Satori, kensho or Wu.

 

Just a note to say that "hara" practice is definitely not a feature of all Zen practice, and absolutely not any kind of important feature of Soto Zen. My brown robe Zen teachers were never taught it. My two friends who are senior Rinzai teachers do not do "hara" practice, though one of them (Harada's student) was told in very lose terms about how one could breathe down into the "hara", but it was informal and lacked much detail. 

Edited March 19 by stirling

[blue eyed snake]

2 hours ago, stirling said:

 

As Bob says, it isn't something easy to talk about, so the best you can hope for really is to "fail well", as neo-Advaita teacher Adyashanti suggests. This is my understanding and experience. Others may describe it differently, but you'll find remarkable agreement on these things once terminology is settled. I'm going to generally leave out historical references and jargon from particular traditions for clarity and simplicity.

 

There is, first, a shift in experience where your perceptual experience of being the center of "your" experience stops, and rather than all sensate phenomena seeming to come through the senses and being relative to your body experience becomes "centerless". There is no longer a single point that apperceives experience, there is no longer a subject (you) in a world of objects (things in the universe). None of them are separate anymore... what you are is the objective universe, entirely devoid of space in between those objects. Along with this the standard perception of time as being comprised of future, present, and past collapses. The past and the future are realized to be thoughts that always occur NOW, and are therefore phantom presences constructed in thought. Time is this moment of unfolding only and always has been. This non-duality is seen to be the predominate and pervasive quality of all seemingly separate things. 

 

After this, the non-dual (or enlightened) perspective is available at any time, albeit in a weaker depth than the initial insight when the mind is inclined toward it. One can relax the mind and the non-duality or "emptiness" of phenomena wells up into perception. Shortly after the initial insight it begins to deepen, in terms of both its appearance and the understanding of it. There are many "maps" for this, but I think how this happens is somewhat unique for each experiencer for the most part. There are hallmarks of the deepening, and the frequency of how often the non-duality spontaneously occurs increases with many interesting shifts along the way. Eventually over something like the course of 10 years (which is why many monks in some traditions disappear into a cave for years at a time) there is a moment when experiencing from the perspective of being a person or "self" drops away permanently, and the journey to "no-self" OR "Self", or "Unity" (being the entirety of the sensate field) becomes complete. While "self" has gone, there is no limit to how deep non-dual perception or understanding  become, it just keeps deepening. 

 

 

 

thank you for sharing _/|\_

[Bindi]

Another perspective on nonduality:

 

“In the Upanishads the [spiritual] heart is described as a secret place (guha), the cave of the heart. It is a small space, dahara akasha, in which the entire universe is held in seed form. Once we draw our awareness there we become one with all. We move from the individual to the universal.” https://www.vedanet.com/releasing-the-knots-of-the-heart-hridaya-granthi/

 

 But… if kundalini has previously become stable at the heart level, then mundane self-consciousness identification can shift to kundalini consciousness identification there. Identification as a higher consciousness. To me nondual awareness is missing the “I” passenger, an empty unguided rocket fired off into space. 

 

[doc benway]

21 hours ago, stirling said:

While "self" has gone, there is no limit to how deep non-dual perception or understanding  become, it just keeps deepening. 

 

I really appreciate your sharing.

I’d like to offer my perspective on the subtle point of “deepening” of “non-dual perception or understanding” fwiw. I propose that deepening, understanding, and perception are unrelated to non-duality but are related to the self, as the nature of mind is beyond all such concepts and is unimputable. What this sense of deepening of understanding and perception represents is the continual release of subtle remnants of self, which are never completely gone in this lifetime with, perhaps, very rare exception. Even when we feel free of the constraints of self, it is there in increasingly subtle forms. It is that very release of these myriad aspects of self which give rise to the equally varied experiences of awakening.

Just my $.02, ymmv.