Hello I'm in yoga clases twice a week from one year.
Some months ago, sometimes, on class I feel a lot of energy in my head, like a big exposion, and when is strong I don't know where I am until some seconds later.

I discovered I can make this happen at will, just need to meditate a minutes in rock position and then open arms, to the back at my max, think in the univers at the time I take a big breathe and then I come back to rock position closing the arms in pray and holding the breathe... 

Some times is only the energy in my head, a discharging sound,a flash of light, others I have a metallic taste in my mouth, sometimes I have a lot of images and thinkings and emotions at the same time in just a millisecond, others I wake in the floor feeling all the energy over my body... Is so difficult to explain in words, I even not sure what happen because it's like my mind is not there, for exemple if there's music when I come back it takes me some time to understand that the nonsense strange noises are music... 
I do have allways like a buzz sound in my head, not only in meditation, is there all day, I like it, but I'm sure it wasn't there some months ago.

I live in small town, I explained a bit to my yoga teacher and she was amazed, she said im very lucky because she never had nothing like that, but better if I don't do it  at will... How can't? All my life I dreamed to have the opportunity to see if there's something more... and there's a door...

I'm very new to all this, I never had fear when this happen, but would love to have some guide, help or opinion.

Thank so much and sorry for my bad english.

Any advice?

I feel in nobody's land, would be very nice to know a bit more of what's happening.

Thanks!

Meditate so long till you go extinct. Don't produce anything otherwise you need to wait till they go extinct too.

Educating yourself a bit doesn't harm. Read Suttas, Sutras, Vedas few years.

Open your wallet and you have plenty of helpers who tell you exactly what you want to hear.. Are you dumb?

Wow I hoped for a different kind of response... I'll no open my wallet ;-)... and yes maybe I'm a bit dumb.

I'm trying to accommodate the new need of meditate to my life.

Thank-you Sfg Sgd for your advice.

Your welcome!

Go to real teacher who are inside the mountain, and if you just accept his advice then he gets mad.

Hello Daniel,

I had read your message when you first posted it. I did not answer because I hoped someone more knowlegeable than me might chime in, but since you did not get the help you were looking for so far, I will try to chime in. I have a couple questions below, which could help diagnose what is going on.

My first thougt is: There are some things that make it look like kundalini; however, if you lose consciousness, it might be something else or different going on in addition to kundalini.



This sounds like Kundalini. We mostly call it piti (and other names) in this forum. It is a term from Buddhist meditation jargon. See this wikipedia page for example (I also suggest two books below).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C4%ABti



Could you clarify what you mean by "I don't know where I am"? Do you lose consciousness, or are you feeling very disoriented? Is there a sense of the passage of time during the event? Do you hear sounds, thoughts? Does sight go black? Do you still feel your body?



How long do you hold your breath for? Could you just be choking yourself out? Just double checking

Would you be able to repeat the event without holding your breath? I am interested in understanding the relationship between the cognitive part of what you are doing (thinking of the universe) and what you are doing with your breath.



All of these are different forms of piti. You could map this roughly into an event Theravada Buddhism calls Knowledge of the Arising and Passing Away.

Except for the part "it's like my mind is not there". There are different phenomena that come to my mind as potentially matching what you talk about (unkowing events, strong state shifts, cessations / fruitions), but it is hard to diagnose without more information.



So do I. If it isn't tinnitus, it is, again, a form of piti.

For the definition of piti, you might want to buy Culadasa's book The Mind Illuminated 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/Mind-Illuminated-Complete-Meditation-Integrating/0990847705

and/or download Daniel Ingram's book Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha from here:

http://integrateddaniel.info/book/

More questions. How have you been doing during the last few months since the event first happened? Have you had any psychological "side effects" like depression, anxiety, irritability, and so on? Anything in that spectrum of negative moods, even if you have not connected it to the kundalini(-like) event.

Hello Neko!!
First off all, THANK-YOU SOO MUCH!! for your kind and clarifying answer

I took a look to the wikipedia link and definitely the first steeps of this called Pītin is happening to me.

When I say i don’t know where I’m is like a kind of disoriented, I think I don’t lose conscience… is more like the memories of that moments get lost as I come back to my normal state, an example to illustrate: the other day I did the think I do to get to that state, 3 times I think, every time was stronger, near of where I was meditating was a chest… The last time I came back to my normal state I was knowing I was hitting the chest with my head, when I took a look to the mirror I had more than 3 different marks on the back of my neck (I think I was doing circles with my head), today, 5 days later it still hurt; yesterday I hit the floor with my head and now I have a swelling in my front... I must put some cushions in the floor . I’m never sure how many time it takes, I’m sure that some times I talk or shout when this happens… I’m planning to record with my mobile to know whats going on.

About if I was choking myself… well I don’t know! Is a very good question! thanks!! will investigate.


I’ll investigate, sorry all that is too new and I just starting to understand that something is happening... but I'm sure holding the breath is necesary.



wow wonderful!, yes that’s what happens!



Is like what I explain of music: “if there's music when I come back it takes me some time to understand that the nonsense strange noises are music…” I was there, but different and can't remmember.

---

I knew that this sound was good!, is not tinnitus for sure. Thank so much I needed to feel understood… I feel much better, less lost, there’s a path.



Some days ago I bought a book called “Kundalini Rising” that is helping me to understand that this is a normal human thing with different names but all the same. Reading in this message board I discovered the Daniel Ingram's book and already downloaded ;-)


Definitely will check the other one you recommend when I finish the other readings.



Well, I must say I been always a solitary person, is not that I don’t have friends and don’t enjoy with them, I do (and probably from outside they think I'm the king of the party), but at the same time I need a lot of time alone… I allway been like this.

I starting to realise I been always in the path, I remember that when I was a child some times I meditate, when I was like 18 I had a very hard depression (I think it was not noticed from outside) I could not bear with the hurt in the world and couldn’t understand the selfish and absurd society where I was living… for that times I remember one wonderful day when I start to feel connected with the universe, during some minutes all was ok (is one of my most loved memories)… After one or two years going down I realized it could not be, I start to focus in small thinks I like and gone out of all this sadness.

Is true that some months ago, like 8 more or less, I started to feel a lot of sadness, I didn’t know why, thanks to god all that finish and I’m again like always, with my particular need of solitude.


Thank so much Neko!!, is been very helpfull all what you told me... and your kindness!!

Just now I remembered the other day when I came back it takes me some seconds to remember who I'm, I was asking to my self "who I'm, so I'm"... Funny 

Thank-you 

Hi Bigbird!
Thank-you very much for your advise, I'll follow it and halt before is to late, will look in the AYP website, will tell you the result.

Thank-you soo much

Hi, Daniel,

My basic answer is the same as the one I gave on the other thread. In the Theravada Buddhist tradition, which is the focus of this board, these experiences would be viewed as unwelcome intrusions called vipassanā upakkilesa.

However, you probably know that other traditions, including other Buddhist traditions, actively cultivate kundalini.

For that, you could try Tara Springett's book Enlightenment Through the Path of Kundalini, and if you like it, book a personal session with Tara Springett. In-person guidance is definitely recommended for working with kundalini. The forum on aypsite.org has many examples of people who've run into trouble from unsupervised kundalini practice.

Hey Daniel,

I think that what you are describing would be called the arising and passing away in Theravada Buddhist terms. Basically, it is when you have moment of insight into the nature of sensate reality, and a sort of energetic opening occurs. It is usally accompanied by bizarre "kundilini phenomenon." It tends to be different for everyone, but things like exlosions of energy and buzzing in the ear are dead give aways.

It is a very exciting and esctatic moment in a person's life. Often a real lifechanger. But in truth, there isn't much to get out of the energetic fireworks of it all. It is actually kind of a stumbling block on the path because when it subsides and it usually does, you tend to miss it or think it was "enlightenment." But it isn't. I have definitely been there.

I think you have two options, really. One is find a meditation teacher who actually knows their shit (a lot don't) and keep going down the path in a responsible way. The other is let it go and go on with your life (some would argue that this isn't really an option). Some teachers you might check out are Shinzen Young, Vince Horn, Kenneth Folk, Ron Crouch and George Haas. 

You also might wanna read the book written by the founder of this site called - Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha.

Of course, other traditions might think about it differently, but this is my two cents. Best of luck to you!

If the life or daily living is dirty then you can get effects faster. So think of druginduced meditative insights, do they have much value compared to pure living induced effects?
Also the thing you use, the body and how it all has to taken into account when guessing what are the effects and how impactful they are.

In short take into account relativity.
Meditation speeds up something what would happen anyway and you can eradicate the seeds what hasn't started to grow or weed out weeds. List is long.

A simple decision can be much more impactful, you might not feel it. It is said that current age things get longer time to give results. So i would be sceptical on all sorts of effects gotten in a questionable dirty circumstances, look at the daily life, how much offerings or sacrifices there are and what kind.. etc etc.

Hello Daniel,

I am late on  this thread. However your post picked my attention as it does sound like kundalini awakening.

Have you tried mantras? Like like bija mantra "LAM" vibrated from mooladhara chakra. You may try with 108 "LAM" mantras with a mala.
If kundalini is awakened, you are likely to feel a flow of warm energy rising up along the spine to the top of the head, where it explodes as a flow of bliss. It actually feels like having an orgasm felt on the top of one's head (sorry but that's how it feels). In deep meditation, it can be  pretty intense.

And yes (for our Buddhist friends), this bliss is the "piti / sukha" experienced in the first Jhanas.

Best,

Alex

The effect you have itself is not jhana. It is meditative object. If you think of jhana then piti is the quality there. So if i taste the saliva in my mouth then i i need to discern the jhanic elements there. Mind itself will cling to good exprience out of all variants available there, so it could not feel like awesome but it is still the good and best.

What I said is that the bliss of kundalini / tummo is essentually the bliss of jhana. Shifting the focus of concentration from a mantra (or the visualized yantra of chakra) to these sensations of bliss is likely to lead to jhana (skt. dhyana).

You win. I just realized something. i think jhana is when hormones are released or gland is activated.

..atleast it is pretty liberating effect or result.

and it could be that glands, hormones and such are key to controlling all sorts of things, real powers.

Yes, it seems to be related to hormonal release. This is also the reason why kundalini is somehow related to sex, btw.

Hi to every one,
To resume I decided to don't more the exercise I do to arise kundalini, not because I'm afraid, I'm a very stable person with strong fundamentals and open minded, I'm sure It would be save in my case... the case is that (oh yeahh that was incredible!, and I only saw a very very small part of it, and thanks to all you I know is a normal experience) and I want to get there the best way possible, that is keeping my classes of yoga and starting to meditate seriously.

Bigbird, I registered there two days ago and today I received the confirmation of my account in the public forums, I don’t know if will post, I read a lot of experiences there and is been clarifying… many thanks to point me that way!

Derek, I’m form a small island in Spain, not easy to get to know Tara Springett, I downloaded a preview of the book Neko recommend me: “The Mind Illuminated” in the fragment it seem very interesting and a good tool to get a solid practice in meditation, so I bought it, I hope it will helpme in my path.

Hi Causes & Conditions, as you say you can’t go on with your life, as I explained a bit I started to young (I had a lot of experiences in my childhood) but I become strong inside because its been a busy life until now, I’m 40, sorry 41, today is my birthday!, and from some years I started to recover who I was… I believe that if I need a teacher it will come to me… As I mentioned I’m far from that teachers you talk … Thanks for your answer and wishes!

Sfg Sfg, my english is not very good and I don’t understand very well you, but I don’t think I’m doing dirty things… anyway as I said I decided to slowdown a bit and I think that your message go in that way.

Alex W, yesterday I heard like 20 minutes of "LAM" before sleep, been busy but wanted to try, my kundalini is not awake, is just starting to say - “hello Daniel, I’m here”, while I was meditating with it I felt like energy and feeling like I was balancing a bit front and rear… but after, when I gone to sleep.. I couldn’t!, was like excited, and to my beep (louder) joined a Hum Hum in my head… after one or two hours I finally slept… Will try another day with more time, thanks!

Thanks, Thanks, Thanks!!

Kundalini, the subtle coiled energy close to the pelvic floor, cannot be controlled by will. It cannot be manipulated. It can only be surrendered to.

Prana, on the other hand, can be controlled and manipulated by breathing practices and will power. So when people online talk about "kundalini problems" or "kundalini exploding up", they are always talking about prana which is much grosser kind of energy than kundalini. Kundalini can move quickly but it never "explodes" or causes harm. Kundalini is the energy of the divine mother, an aspect of prajna paramita, so it is subtle, tender and gentle, and brings only wonderful things, like clarification of one's mind.

Young men are usually the ones that get carried away with "powerful" practices and experiences. Been there. Before this stuff gets out of hand, I'd recommend getting info of this topic from other than hindu yoga-style sources because they usually confuse prana and kundalini. That's a huge misunderstanding out there. See what buddhists say about kundalini, among other things such as meditation, because in general they know better.

I've have not encountered this distinction between Kundalini and Prana before.  Could you provide some sources so I could investigate further?

I'm afraid I don't have any scriptural sources at hand... but I could explain a simple technique for distinguishing the two.

Interesting. Thank you Daniel.

In my case, the first big kundalini event took place in a hotel room in New York, years ago, on my way back from Kenneth Folk's place. I felt such intense bliss and the bliss seemed to get fused with non-dual awareness. The whole thing lasted for hours. For the first time, I understood what Vajrayana means by "the union of bliss and emptiness".

Then the whole thing kind of stopped, but I started feeling vibrations, jerk and spontanious movements of the body, especially around the stomac area. Basically, ths is what is called "kriyas" in some yogic schools.

It is only a year and a half ago that, one day, something clicked and central channel opened up all the way to sahastrara chakra. It is a long process that takes years if not decades to unfold. I am of course only starting to understand it and know that there is much more to it than what I have experienced so far. What is interesting, in this early stage, is that the whole hatha yoga thing suddenly starts to make full sense. But the most interesting thing is mantras. Even reciting the catholic rosary is now sufficient to generate ecstatic intoxicating mystical states. This also seems to explain what christian mystics call the "incendium amoris".

Well, in general, for buddhists kundalini (coiled energy) is not as big thing as it is to most hindus. In buddhist tantra they do speak of kundalini but it doesn't get out of perspective as in hindu yoga. In hindu schools they consider kundalini, and it's rising as a final thing but it's not, it's just a milestone.

Do this experiment to differentiate prana and kundalini:

1. Do deep and fast breathing like bellows breath/bhastrika pranayama for ½ minute. Then stop and feel the energy. If you don't feel the energy, do another round. The energy that you feel is prana. If you were to overdo this, you'd first feel strong intoxicating bliss but then you'd start to feel negative effects. When one's system has too much prana, it starts to break, goes against the bodymind/nervous system.
2. Then pray lovingly for the Divine Mother, Praja Paramita. Put some love into that prayer so that you may feel Her. Continue until you feel something happen. The energy that you feel is shakti, much finer energy than prana. It feels like home, loving, peaceful, brightening. You can also ask dm to show you what is kundalini and how it feels like. If you overdo this, the shakti will just overflow the cup (the bodymind), it will not break it.

Do the buddhists not pray to dm as prajna paramita? Do they not worship her through devotional practices? And do they not practice pranayama? Is buddhist practice out of the range of these universal principles?

I am not a book worm and do not have a ready-steady-go quote bank where I can draw some source information from. The information I've read of kundalini from buddhist sources has been years ago and I don't remember from where. I have also discussed about kundalini with a few tantric buddhist and dzogchen teachers who were well aware of kundalini in relation to their own practice. They just don't think of kundalini so highly, as the hindus in general do. I can only suggest going through buddhist tantra books for references or asking your favourite lama.

Whether in hindu or buddhist view, as a rule, prana practices do get out of hand when they are practiced without the shakti element. When prana and shakti (energy of guru or deity) are combined the possibility of prana problems is greatly attenuated or fully removed. That is one of the reasons they cultivate both in tantric traditions, plus that combining the two gives coverage in reg. to energy body to effect more comprehensive purification of the mind

Try on your own and find out.

a)if the doer hasn't fallen away. If doer falls away then you see that you doing the practice.
then:
b)you can stop doing it(that is an energetic breath layer), you cultivate breath everytime you return to that state of emptiness.

once or couple times you get that b) point and thereon:

you can cultivate the energy directly and then locations/points/functions in body.

.......
but you can't do that way, there are practices or preliminaries before that. Awareness is covered by a layer or dust or somekind of pattern and it has location and once you see the location you can remove it. Then you can cultivate ordinary breath within ordinary breath is clarity or You channel.
......
you can't do that either, there are preliminaries to that.

whats the point is that the practice is huge. It is only said at the beginning just sit or something, because the mind is dirty whatever it does is wrong and it is better not to do anything.

the effects like flashes of lights, explosions, energy moving etc are all important and are for something or show you something. But for dirt it is said skip them or ignore them or find cure from third parties.

in short its all feelings. Think of dramas and the wisdom why something is done.

mahayana cultivates feelings. Its about feelings, prana wisdom is 'from' feelings. Vedana second skandha.

Bodhisatva skandha is third skandha, layer. Perception, you need to have cultivated feelings before you can have perception from both sides, you can emphatize.

Mahaparinirvana Sutra:...
"O good man! "Feeling" [“vedana”] is an aspect of awakening. This is middle-grade
wisdom. There are innumerable aspects of awakening when we dissect feelings. This is not what
can be known by sravakas and pratyekabuddhas. This is superior-grade Wisdom. O good man!
I have not spoken about all of this in the sutras.

"O good man! "Perception" [“samjna”] is an aspect of receiving. Thus do we understand
it. This is middle-grade wisdom. There are innumerable aspects of receiving in conception.
This is not what is known by sravakas and pratyekabuddhas. This is superior-grade Wisdom.
Nothing of such is stated in the sutras.
...